Ableton Forum

Hello Ableton Friends,


Our next User Group will be held Tuesday, April 24th; 6-8 pm at

Tekserve
119 W 23rd Street
NY NY 10011
(between 6th and 7th Ave's)


We will be part of Tekserve’s Live Performance Week and will share the bill with IK Multimedia’s Tony Grund showcasing soft synths and effects in a live performance setting, using Ableton Live as the host.

Ableton’s Dennis De Santis will show some basics and then will focus on Effects Racks in a performance context, MIDI controlling Racks to instantly remix audio on the fly. He will also discuss some advanced sound design, compositional and mixing tools using Racks including multiband effects devices and randomization utilities.


Dennis DeSantis is Ableton’s Head of Documentation and works as a composer and sound designer. He received a Doctor of Musical Arts degree from the Eastman School of Music. His electronic music appears on labels such as Global Underground, Cocoon and Kanzleramt and he has performed throughout North America, Europe and Japan.

Dennis is also a percussionist and technical director for Alarm Will Sound, a leading contemporary music ensemble based in New York. His concert music is widely performed, and recent highlights include a 2007 Carnegie Hall commission to arrange the music of Autechre for chamber orchestra.


Come on out and join us. Get your questions answered, share your ideas and thoughts or just come by to say hello and hang with the ableton crowd.



...AND should you be in the mood for drinks with lots of music afterwards please feel free to slide right into Moldover’s b’day celebration at the Warper Party:


DJ Shakey and Moldover present
WARPER
2 Floors of Omnidigital DJs and Biomorphic Musicians
Live Music from 8pm sharp
Tuesday, April 24th
8 pm - 2am
FREE
THE DELANCEY
168 Delancey (betw. Clinton and Attorney)
212-254-9920
warperparty.com
myspace.com/warperparty


Thanks to all of you who came out the last time and very special thanks to Everett Bradley who did a great (unrehearsed!) demonstration. It was fun!

See you soon,

Antje

Damn! You guys do it up right!

Too bad Dennis didn't get past the first item on the list of to-do's: Show some basics. Sometimes this group gets in depth, sometimes it feels like a 2 hour "what is this Ableton Live you keep talking about?" session. There was no focus on Effects Racks in a performance context or MIDI controlling Racks. No discussion on advanced sound design, compositional and mixing tools using Racks. I understand that the class is free, and you in fact give out expensive freebies, but it would be nice if you guys could have a seperate "Class for people who DO NOT own Live and have NO IDEA what it does," vs. an actual USERS group. Tonight was basically a 2 hour waste of time for a person who actually owns and uses Live. I'm surprised some people stuck around as long as they did. Probably just for the free software. I suggest limiting the 'basics' section to the first 10 minutes, then get on with the planned and advertised demonstrations and teachings. Or call it what it is: Ableton Live & IK Multimedia Sales Pitch. I'd be fine with that. Then I could make an informed decision to go home and use Live instead.

Hi sparklepuff,

I'm sorry you were disappointed in the material presented, and I apologize for not being able to get to all of the things I had planned. Unfortunately, there's always a risk when running a fully open, public user group, that the plan will have to be adjusted to suit the level of the audience.

The truth is, we never know what sort of audience we'll get for these events. And with a limited amount of time to present, we have to improvise a bit if there are an overwhelming number of questions at a basic level (as there were the other night).

We've done a few marathon sessions, with clearly delimited beginner, intermediate, and advanced time blocks. But this requires a big time commitment, both for the presenters and the venue. And even then, there's never a guarantee that people will accurately gauge their knowledge and come to the right session.

In short, it's an imperfect system. Like you, I had hoped to cover a bit more than I did. But the audience turned out to be mostly very new to the program, and I would have probably alienated them if I had gone ahead as planned.

If you're interested, I'd be happy to send you the materials I had prepared for the rest of the talk, as well as answer any questions you might have about them.