Ableton Forum

I'm using drag & drop to import midi files into Ableton Live 8 arrangement view to create a timeline with several MIDI files, separated by about 10 seconds between songs, and locators to start any song quickly. However, several tracks that contain nothing more than patch changes (for effects and harmonizers, etc.) are not importing the patch changes. The units will make the first patch change at the beginning of the song, but skip the rest. Either they aren't importing, or they are just not playing. There are no channel conflicts, and I know the changes are there, because they play flawlessly in Win Media Player. Can anyone help???

each clip only sends 1 program change at the start

separate the clips when the changes need to happen and change it in the notes section of clip view

Forgive my noobishness, but the only view I know how to open of a MIDI track is the scrolling note view, which shows a single set of bank/bank/patch info to the left of it. Is there some way to insert a patch change at a designated point in the MIDI track?

no, thats what im saying

are you doing everything in arrangement or session?

in arrangement you will have to set up new clips each time you want a change and put the change in the bank/bank/program menus for each clip

in session you will do the same but with follow actions which might be nice, you could start each song with a scene and then put the last clips of the song ending with a stop action, then map the starting scenes to a midi controller so it would act kind of like a song choice controller

The way im running it i need to do it in arrangement. I drag over midi files and audio tracks if the song uses it, and add a locator for each song. I have about 400 songs back to back in alphabetical order so i can play any one I want in a live setting by clicking on the locator. Ableton live is the only method i can use to not have to open a new file for each song. I used to use Cubase 5, but it was tedious ( and took too much time between songs - I hate dead space on stage).

this is just a condensed example in the real set you would have the clips where you need the program changes to be sent

the point is there is only one program change sent per clip and its at the very beginning of the clip, so to have multiple program changes in one song your song will need to be made up of multiple clips

yes - I can see it much better visually. i will have to time the pgm chg data perfectly though, because they are timed to bring in (for example) DDL patches for vocals that have to cut in and out at just the right instant. Thanks again

Is there a way to merge or consolidate several patch changes into one clip so they can be used easier in session view? Some of my midi tracks have upwards of 20 patch changes per song - a real bother to move around...