Looking to improve mpc + ableton combo for live use

[philphil]

Hi everyone,
Here's my set-up:

My mpc1000 (master) sequences samples ableton's drumracks (slave) created from slice to midi samples. Each drumrack has 1 midi channel = same midi channel in the mpc since it's the master sequencer. I just love the workflow.

I would like now to improve it in a live configuration. My problem is that I have to load a new ableton project for each new song. Indeed, each one of my songs uses around 10-12 midi channels (10-12 drumracks) and there are 16 max available in midi apparently.

To load a new midi-only project in the mpc1000 takes less than one second (it's midi-only, no samples). However on my laptop, it takes around 10 seconds to load a new ableton project and it's not super practical to have such a gap in a live set between songs.

Here's my question: Is there a über-classy way, on one single project on which my whole set's drumracks are loaded (yup, that's a whole lotta drumracks), to switch from one "drumrack ensemble" to an other? Something that would say to Live "now midi-channels 1-to-10" will play this very batch of drumracks (which corresponds to a song in my set).

Like a switch?

Thanks a lot for your help.

PS: I looked for it on various forums but since I don't really know what to look for it's a bit tough.

[ct43]

Have you tried putting your drum racks inside a instrument rack? You could then switch them for each song.... That + somehow finding a way to switch multiple instrument selectors at once...

Either that or you could mix down (with eq + fx etc) all your parts and create a drum rack that can span many songs.. Though I'm guessing you don't want to do this or you would have already?

Just some thoughts, I'm sure someone while chime in with a more elegant solution

[philphil]

haaa... the instrument rack! I'm going to give this a try.

I might have found another way:
I see that a track receives midi signal only when it's armed. If I do a "track-arm group" midi implementation on my uc33 buttons for example. A track group would be a bunch of drumracks corresponding to a song. so when I'm going to the next song I unarm the current song's drumracks and arm the next song's drumrack with the previously assigned buttons. Pretty seemless. Cpu sticks to 30% with around 40 drumracks (3 songs..) on the same project, so I think it's alright.

I could even use looper as a transition tool on a separate track while I load my new midi project on the mpc.

I might end up with a live set that has 400 drumracks.. ouch..

[ct43]

400 drum racks would get pretty messy

[philphil]

Yeah.. it would. I tried with 40 drumracks and it takes around 30 secs for the project to load. The CPU is below 30% at all times which is cool.
I guess my next move will be to get a looper running in between live set loading time.
Or am I doing this wrong?
Suggestions?

[ct43]

I don't think its 'wrong' what your doing... Its whatever suites you I suppose...that's the great thing about Ableton, everyone uses it in a slightly different way

It took me weeks to get a workflow that suited me, but that doesn't mean its 'the one'

[philphil]

Damn right!

I just changed it again for more flexibility.
My main worry was to load a Live set every 2 songs because I would run out of midi canals.

However I can assign 1 mpc pad to 1 unwarped/unlooped clip sitting in a track. 1 ableton track = 1 mpc track = 1 canal. Also on the mpc you have 4x16 =64 pads per track. Which means that per canal I can trigger 64 samples/clips. Per song I usually have a max of 8 samples per track. Which means that on a single set I can have minimum 8 songs. That's Great.

So I can go on producing the songs individually and when it's time to add the song to the master set, I just drag/drop the samples I need from the (not the whooooole slice, since I chop small). It is similar to the drumrack thingy with midi pitch but much easier.

Party on.

[ct43]

I have a similar thing going on with my set... i trigger clips quantised to 16th's when I want to improvise with certain elements...

around the 6:15 mark you can see what I mean:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ozoxunLCvU8

The drag and drop 'als' feature from the browser is brilliant. I do the same as you, create a song in isolation and then load up the clip in the master session

[philphil]

Nice stuff! Nice setup too!

It's great, I'm going from gazillion drumracks to 10 tracks. WOOO!
I guess you crop the sample in "sampler" and drag-drop the audio silce in the clip and then assign the clip to a pad, right?

[ct43]

I just copy a clip as many times as I need then move the start \ markers to where I want then..... Then yeah just midi assign them to mpc pads... Simple but effective