In this tutorial, we’ll see how to record in Live. And we’ll get our first look at Arrangement view.
Below is an audio recording of this tutorial.
Setting up the Metronome
Live has a metronome. You can turn it on or off by pressing the letter o. To hear it, you’ll need to play your set by pressing the space bar.
If you want to record in time with the metronome, you’ll need to set it up to count you in as the default is to record as soon as you press the record key. To do this, you need to do the following.
Press option 0.
Repeatedly press the tab key until you get to the Metronome settings button
Press enter
You’ll be in the metronome settings dialog and you’ll be on the count-in setting.
Press right arrow to select 1 bar and then press Enter.
There doesn’t appear to be a way of keeping this dialog open and selecting a radio button, so you’ll have to navigate to the item you want and then press the Enter key to both select it and dismiss the dialog box.
You can reopen the dialog box and make other changes such as changing the sound. To do this
Press Enter on the Metronome settings button as before
Press down arrow to get to the setting you want
Use right arrow to select the option for that setting you require
Press Enter to select it and close the dialog box.
Try changing the metronome sound from Classic to Wood. Then make sure the metronome is on by pressing o and then press the space bar to hear the different sound.
Setting the Tempo
There are several ways to set the tempo in Live. The easiest way is to do the following
Press the letter o to turn the metronome on
Press option 0 to get to the Control Bar.
Press tab to get to the Tap button
Repeatedly press Enter at the tempo you want
Live will start playing your set at the tempo you want.
We’ve already seen the other ways to set the tempo in a previous tutorial, and that is to
Press option 0 to get to the Control Bar
Tab to the tempo slider
Type the tempo you want or set it using the up or down arrows
Introduction to Arrangement View
We’ve already seen, in a previous tutorial, that Arrangement view allows you to record your song by arranging bars of music along a time line from start to finish. We’re starting with Arrangement View because, if you’ve used any other daw previously, then you’ll be very comfortable working in this way.
However, regardless of whether you choose to work in Arrangement or Session View, much of what you’ll learn here will apply to both as arrangement and Session View share tracks and the mixer. So, whenever you add or delete tracks or change their volume or effects chain, you’re actually doing that in both views.
Getting around Arrangement View
There are essentially 3 main parts of Arrangement View. When you open a brand new Ableton Live Set and then press option 2, You are taken to Arrangement View and placed on the Time Line.
However, the other 2 parts are the track headers table and the track mixer panel.
The Time Line
The Timeline lets you move through the duration of your set with the arrow keys.
Press right arrow to move forward
Press left arrow to move backward
for example, you can start recording at bar 9 by repeatedly pressing the right arrow until you get to bar 9. Then you can start playback or recording from that point.
When you’re on the Time Line, you can pick the track you want to work with by pressing the up or down arrows as we’ve seen in a previous tutorial. But think of the Time Line as the place to go when you want to move to a different place in the set or when you want to edit the clips in your set, about which more later.
The Track Headers Table
Pressing the Escape key from the Time Line takes you to the track headers table. This is where you can rename or delete tracks among other things and again, you can navigate this table with the up and down arrow keys.
Pressing Escape from the track headers table will take you back to the Time Line. So, Escape will swap between the Time Line and the track headers table.
The Track Mixer Panel
When you’re in the track headers table, you can press the tab key to get to the mixer panel for the track you’re on enabling you to change volume, pan, inputs and outputs etc.
When you’re done with your mixer panel, press Escape to get back to the track in the headers table.
So, to recap:
Option 2, will take you to Arrangement View
Escape, will swap between the Time Line and track headers table
Pressing tab from the track headers table will take you to the mixer panel for the track you’re on.
Pressing tab or shift tab from the track mixer panel will enable you to move to the various options in this panel.
Escape will also exit from the track mixer panel back to the track headers table
Recording Audio
If you’ve got a brand new Live Set open in front of you, then you’ll already have a couple of ready-made audio tracks to use.
Press Escape to get to the track headers table
Press down arrow a couple of times to get to track 3
You’ll hear that this track is called audio. let’s rename it to “my first recording”. to do this
From the track in the track headers table
press command r
type # my first recording
Press Enter
The # character at the start of the track name will cause the track number to be included, you can omit this if you don’t want the number included.
Choosing your audio input and turning on input monitoring
To tell live which input on your audio interface you want to record through:
Press tab to get to the track mixer panel
Press tab to get to the input channel setting
Select the input you want to use with the up or down arrows
Press tab to get to the monitoring setting
use the left or right arrow keys to set this to auto so that you can hear yourself while recording
Press Escape to get back to the track headers table
Arming Recording and Playing Back
Plug in your instrument or microphone and then press the letter c to arm or record enable your track. At this point you should be able to hear yourself through your speakers or headphones. Now’s the time to set your recording level with the gain on your audio interface.
To actually start recording in Arrangement View, press F9.
Your metronome will count you in and you’re now recording your performance.
When your done, press the space bar to stop recording.
you can play back what you recorded by pressing space again. And, if you didn’t like it, you can undo it with command z and try again.
Creating and Deleting Audio Tracks
The final thing for now that you need to know about audio tracks is how to create new ones and delete unwanted ones.
To create a new audio track, press command T
When you do this, a new audio track will be inserted just below the track you were on when you pressed command t and the new track will be selected. Of course, you can now rename it with command r if you wish.
To delete an audio or a MIDI track when you’re in arrangement View
Get to the track headers table and then
press backspace.
When you do this, be aware that the track will be instantly deleted regardless of whether you’ve recorded any clips on it or not, However, if you delete a track by mistake, command Z to undo is your get out of jail free card.
Recording MIDI
You can record MIDI either by using an external MIDI controller or by using your computer keyboard. For now I’m going to assume you have some kind of MIDI controller. If you have one of those, Ableton will automatically recognise it as long as you’ve already installed any necessary drivers for it.
So, to record some MIDI first get to a MIDI track either from the Time Line or from the track headers table.
The next thing you’ll need to do is to put a MIDI instrument on that track, they all live in the browser.
Searching in the browser
Let’s use a grand piano from the browser. To find one
Press command f
type grand piano
Press Enter
You’ll now be in a list of browser results which you can navigate using the up and down arrow keys.
press down arrow until you find grand Piano.adg Press Enter to put that piano on to your MIDI track. When you do this, the track will automatically become armed and you’ll hear the piano when you play your keyboard.
Whenever you navigate to a MIDI track, if you want to hear the instrument that’s on it when you play your keyboard, you’ll have to press the letter C to arm the track. If you press c now, the track will become disarmed and you won’t hear it’s instrument.
Actually recording MIDI is exactly the same as recording audio, simply press F9 to start the recording and space to stop it.
Again, you can rename a MIDI track with command r and you can delete them with backspace from the track headers table, just like audio tracks.
To create a new MIDI track
Press command shift t
The new track will be inserted just below the track you were on.
Record Quantize
There are several ways of quantizing MIDI in Live, but for now, try looking in the Edit menu near the bottom for the Record Quantize sub menu. The default is no quantization, but you can have your MIDI recordings automatically quantized as you record by selecting a different option from this submenu, i Often use the 16-th note quantization option, give it a try.
Summary
This has been a very long tutorial, but I hope you’ll be in a good spot after you’ve worked throught it.
here’s what we’ve covered:
Arrangement View. press Option 2 to get into it. use it to record music along a time line.
The time line, use right and left arrow keys to move around it and pressing escape will get you back there
The track headers table, use this to rename tracks with command r or delete them with backspace. Escape will get you here.
Tracks. move between them with up or down arrows. add audio tracks with command t and MIDI tracks with shift command T.
Track Mixer Panel. Use this to change your audio input channel, volume pan etc. Get here by pressing tab from the track headers table. Press escape when your done with it to get back to the track headers table.
Record Quantize. use this submenu of the Edit menu to select a quantize setting for your MIDI recordings.