Make notes throughout a long clip

[Jonny]

I've used Ableton for 15 something years now and I often use it as more of a songWRITING tool than anything... once I've got couple instrument parts I like, I can loop it with some randomness introduced and noodle around on the guitar over top for a long jam session. I don't think about parts or scenes or recording at all - this is how I've worked for years.

However, I'll end up with a single guitar clip that's maybe 30 minutes long full of some good ideas and some bad ones. What I do now is listen to the clip again and insert warp markers on things that I like [and that's better than nothing] but I'd LOVE to have some better ways of making notes through the clip. I'd like being able to type out short comments ['transition to interlude here?'] or adding icons or maybe the ability to click and highlight a piece of the clip as a different color.

Really, would just love to see some more features around organizing thoughts and ideas as a songwriter. I know I'm a fringe user and that's not really Ableton's core purpose, but I'd love to see it - I think it's a great way to work. Thanks.

[Mutzu]

Hi, I'm using a lot of annotations while I'm writing on paper (or in MuseScore). Sometimes I add ideas or I comment sections that I'm not satisfied with yet. I think that's a good way to improve my work, like carving a sculpture.
Unfortunately, this is quite limited in Ableton Live.

So it's +1 from me!

I'd also like to add that, for me, the navigation in long (MIDI) clips I've recorded is rather cumbersome.

[Jonny]

FWIW I've learned that you can right-click on a clip and "edit info text" which gives you a small notepad like box to save notes per clip. It's still pretty cumbersome for longer clips, but it already exists, so thought I'd share.

Ideally, though, I'd like to be able to create 'locators' in a clip, just like you can do in the arrangement view, give them a small note and then see all the locators listed in the info text, ordered by position in the clip.

[Exie]

You can use project locators and navigate a clip through arrangement rather than clip timeline. Locators can have notes too. And the ease of navigation can be a reason to split audio clip, same for midi clips, but they can also benefit from multiclip editing. You can put time-aligned dummy clips on a separate track instead of locators for the same purpose. I'd like this to be simpler too but I doubt a feature like this will ever arrive

[Mutzu]

Thanks, Jonny and Exie. I will try using the info text for locators and dummy clips.

In case the annotations feature gets implemented, there could be a section in the left side pane dedicated for it like it is for "Instruments" or within "Current project". It could be a list of all annotations in the project.

If you click on an item, you move to the corresponding location in the project's clip. They could speed up navigation by acting as bookmarks.

If I wrote tags in the annotations, like "#chorus", it would be nice to filter them like all other tagged items.

There may even be notes in this list that don't belong to any clip.

I could imagine, if there will be a song lyrics feature (like in MuseScore), the lyrics could also show up in the mentioned list within a dedicated folder.

[Exie]

In case the annotations feature gets implemented, there could be a section in the left side pane dedicated for it like it is for "Instruments" or within "Current project". It could be a list of all annotations in the project.

M4L is the right tool for this. It would be relatively easy to implement but I'm unaware of the existing devices that do something like this regarding notes. As for arrangement locators alone, it could be something like https://maxforlive.com/library/device/8 ... or-manager

[Mutzu]

Thanks! I'm using Live Standard without M4L. Perhaps I'll make an upgrade if I really need this.