Real time audio and MIDI manipulation techniques

vascopereira

New member
Greetings,

I been using Ableton Live for a while, but I never used it in a live performance before. I've played in bands before, but I never played any solo laptop based set before.

I would like to ask for any techniques to edit, transform or manipulate audio or MIDI material in real time. I wish to combine real time sonic manipulation of looped audio or MIDI samples with live synth playing. I don't consider merely launching clips and scenes to be a true performance, I regard that as little better than miming. I'm also not interested in just playing live synths to a prerecorded backing accompaniment as that is too structurally rigid. I want to have the freedom to improvise.

My equipment is the following:
MacBook Pro Late 2012
RME Fireface UCX
Behringer FCB1010
AKAI APC40 MKI
AKAI APC40 MKII
Roland System 1
Nektar Impact LX49

This is an area of which I have little experience, so I would appreciate any suggestions.

Regards
 
A couple of things to start off. The clips grid is for that purpose, but then when you set the focus, you ca control all sort of things in that channel. So, if you want it to be spontaneous, you are going to have to use session view.

For the MIDI, Ableton has lots of MIDI controls that you can control from your APCs. Not sure which Ableton you have, but if it is the full version, you can see the MIDI effects. If you have Max for Live, then you have even more possibilities up to building your own effects.

There is also the effects control, when you have the effects in a channel, you can control everything for that effect in real time.

Don't forget, you can also build your own effects rack and/or instrument racks. Put your effects, instruments, etc. into a rack you build and then map what you want to control. You can even map controls to controls so that one movement can affect other movements. The possibilities are endless. Also learn how to control the BPM on the fly.

Some may see it as glorified DJ'ing, but I think the DAW becomes a new performance instrument. Plus, you can use live sounds coming in and manipulate those on the fly. Practice as with any instrument will be needed.

If you do this, just need to make sure your computer is up to it. I would think the Mac might be able to handle it. Couldn't say for 100% as I don't know the performance the OS has with an i5 chip. But we are talking about a lot of CPU processing here.

Hope this gets you started, lots of videos out there on the subject.
 
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