PRODUCING IN ABLETON LIVE __ GEAR NEEDED

[joaocaracas]

Hello,

I work with Ableton live for over 1 year now, but only mixing tunes and performing....i want to start producing now, house and electro music.

I use the Novation Nocturn as a controller for live perfomances, since it is very simple and small...

I was wondering if it would be a good combination do buy an APC-40 and a synthesizer...say the Akai MPK25

what do you guys think about? any suggestions?

thanks a lot

[kanuck]

i agree for the price i don't think anything comes close to the apc40. currently i'm using that and an lpk25 but real pads would be nice and soon i'll be moving up to a 49 key keyboard.

[joaocaracas]

I was wondering if it would be a good combination do buy an APC-40 and a synthesizer...say the Akai MPK25

Just to make sure; the mpk25 is not a synthesizer. Its a (midi) keyboard controller which has onboard drumpads and some controlling capabilities (knobs and buttons). Figured I'd mention it to avoid any confusion; this critter does not produce any sounds on its own, it merely triggers Live by sending midi data.

Anyway, hard to comment on. IMO its a good combo, the keys on the mpk are quite nice and the drumpads should make a good addition too; this should give you a good basis to create both sound (keyboard) as well as percussion (drumpads).

Although I've recently been tempted by the dark ('NI') side (no, that's not the knights who say NI ) with their Maschine I still hold my mpd (the mpc style pads) in high esteem.

Well, and personally I think the APC is a no brainer when it comes to controlling Live. Its not a full mouse replacement but it does make working and recording in Live a whole lot better for me. Whenever I'm simply playing about or trying to find / create "that" sound in, say, Operator I do most of the work on the APC. The finetuning is eventually done using keyboard and mouse, but the rough foundation is 100% APC. I really love that workflow.

Same with creating arrangements (although I don't do that very often). Tweaking knobs and sliders gives a whole better result than boringly programming in your automations IMO.


SO yeah; I think you should get a good starting point with these two.

With the instruments in Live 7, do you think i would have a good amount of sounds? or do you think i should upgrade to Live 8 in order to get even more sounds? As i just discovered (through you) that the MPK25 doesnt contain sounds, i want to have a good variety of sounds and stuff like that...

talking about tweaking, the APC-40 gives me enough knobs for programming cool tweaks in Live??

Another question....I have Live 7, does the APC-40 automatically programs itself, or i actually need to program button by button, knob by knob?

what does IMO mean?? hahah sorry, im from Brazil so i dont know what it means...haha

thanks again!!

[kanuck]

I was wondering if it would be a good combination do buy an APC-40 and a synthesizer...say the Akai MPK25

Just to make sure; the mpk25 is not a synthesizer. Its a (midi) keyboard controller which has onboard drumpads and some controlling capabilities (knobs and buttons). Figured I'd mention it to avoid any confusion; this critter does not produce any sounds on its own, it merely triggers Live by sending midi data.

Anyway, hard to comment on. IMO its a good combo, the keys on the mpk are quite nice and the drumpads should make a good addition too; this should give you a good basis to create both sound (keyboard) as well as percussion (drumpads).

Although I've recently been tempted by the dark ('NI') side (no, that's not the knights who say NI ) with their Maschine I still hold my mpd (the mpc style pads) in high esteem.

Well, and personally I think the APC is a no brainer when it comes to controlling Live. Its not a full mouse replacement but it does make working and recording in Live a whole lot better for me. Whenever I'm simply playing about or trying to find / create "that" sound in, say, Operator I do most of the work on the APC. The finetuning is eventually done using keyboard and mouse, but the rough foundation is 100% APC. I really love that workflow.

Same with creating arrangements (although I don't do that very often). Tweaking knobs and sliders gives a whole better result than boringly programming in your automations IMO.


SO yeah; I think you should get a good starting point with these two.

With the instruments in Live 7, do you think i would have a good amount of sounds? or do you think i should upgrade to Live 8 in order to get even more sounds? As i just discovered (through you) that the MPK25 doesnt contain sounds, i want to have a good variety of sounds and stuff like that...

talking about tweaking, the APC-40 gives me enough knobs for programming cool tweaks in Live??

Another question....I have Live 7, does the APC-40 automatically programs itself, or i actually need to program button by button, knob by knob?

what does IMO mean?? hahah sorry, im from Brazil so i dont know what it means...haha

thanks again!!

I don't know about live 7 vs 8 but if you want proper instruments get suite. I currently only have Live 8 and i can only use presets at the moment. My soon to buy product will be suite 8 or suite 9 if that comes out within the next 6 months.

[kanuck]

Obviously you can midi map some controls to other functions if you want to. For example, I do use the tempo tap button occasionally (that's the square button to the above right of the device controller section), but those two small buttons below it (nudge down & nudge up) were useless to me. So now I have those re-assigned to follow on/off and 'back to arrangement'.

that's a neat idea, i have no use for the nudge buttons as well.

[joaocaracas]

Thanks for the help guys....you've answered everything i had doubts with for sure.

Live 8 is pretty expensive but it's definetly a MUST HAVE if you are trying to get serious on production....

I'll go after the MPK25 and the APC-40 for sure.

thanks again.

Joao

[The Carpet Cleaner]

you need a mouse and a keyboard

[kanuck]

you need a mouse and a keyboard

NO, I refuse to buy a mouse and keyboard with my computer

[nathannn]

every time i ever a controller to use with live i almost never use it.
for me live works best with a qwerty keyboard and a mouse... and monitors.

[geddy]

I currently use an APC40 with Live 8 and they go well together! I have just started to get into production my self and I currently use the ACP40 to navigate around Live, and it is also amazing at using it with 'Sampler' by controlling ADSR parameters as you can quickly swap between different tracks to change settings.

A must have IMO

[The Carpet Cleaner]

you need a mouse and a keyboard

NO, I refuse to buy a mouse and keyboard with my computer

Then you need an apc40.
with Live, that's the best midi controler you can get. Maybe not the best compared to other controler for other DAWs, but for Live, that's the best thing. No hassle, it just works. and it's great.
You can use it with Nativekontrol, which adds lots of other functions.