Multiple loopers - matching BPM's ?

Discuss music production with Ableton Live.
Post Reply
seedofeve
Posts: 9
Joined: Tue Mar 29, 2011 3:39 pm

Multiple loopers - matching BPM's ?

Post by seedofeve » Tue Mar 29, 2011 4:22 pm

My goal is to perform live with freshly created layered sounds. The various layers I add are different lengths. Some parts only come in once every 8 bars, some every 4 and so on. I need the multiple additions of music that I add to be able to have the same BPM's. - HOWEVER IT CAN BE DONE. My attempt has been to explore looper so far. I am not bent on just using looper - I am totally open to however some of you have accomplished this.

Using multiple loopers, each assigned to it's own track. If the pattern is simple enough I can usually get the BPM's to match between loopers. If the second, third loopers are funky enough, it's almost impossible to match up the BPM's of the different loopers.

I have tried almost every kind of setting combination with the Global, Recording and Launch Quantization. Interestingly, Launch quantization set to Global - set to anywhere from 1bar to 1/8 does not seem to work. Also I have done some experiments with tempo control settings like "set and follow the song tempo" on my first looper, then "follow the song tempo" with the second looper... and combinations of these with the various quantization settings. NO LUCK yet.

Thanks guys and gals.

3dot...
Posts: 9996
Joined: Tue Feb 20, 2007 11:10 pm

Re: Multiple loopers - matching BPM's ?

Post by 3dot... » Tue Mar 29, 2011 6:05 pm

seedofeve wrote: I have tried almost every kind of setting combination with the Global, Recording and Launch Quantization. Interestingly, Launch quantization set to Global - set to anywhere from 1bar to 1/8 does not seem to work.
it all depends how swift you are..
I generally set the launchQ to 1/8...
then it's up to you to press it 1/8th before you want to punch-in/out of recording
so if you're slower you can set it a larger scale...
don't forget that the first loop (per looper) sets the length.. after that you can either double or half it
this shouldn't really matter if you're using multiple loopers..

also ...I've found that setting song tempo with the looper.. doesn't always work out well..
so I'd rather 'tap tempo' .. then record on time...

be sure to read about it in the 'device reference' in the manual

and btw...."recording q" is to do with recording to midi clips... so you can leave that alone for now.. it has no effect on the looper
Image

seedofeve
Posts: 9
Joined: Tue Mar 29, 2011 3:39 pm

Re: Multiple loopers - matching BPM's ?

Post by seedofeve » Wed Mar 30, 2011 12:04 am

Thanks, 3dot: That's some good info I couldn't get in the manual. 1/8 sounds good.I read up on it - missed something before: Launch Quantization does not apply unless transport is playing ("With the transport running, Looper behaves like a clip, and is subject to launch quantization as determined by the Quantization chooser" p315). I did not have the transport running.

That was it. Yep - works like a charm!

Thanks again, 3dot!

Post Reply