Producing Music with Ableton Live

Learn the ins and outs of the revolutionary Ableton Live software in the online course Producing Music with Ableton Live. Berkleemusic’s twelve-week course offers online lessons in audio and MIDI techniques and music applications for studio production and live performance, all using Ableton Live 6.

Ableton Live is specialized music production software that allows you to spontaneously compose, record, remix, improvise, and edit your musical ideas—in real-time. It allows musicians to bring acoustic, electronic, and virtual instruments, as well as prerecorded music, together in a single, elegant user interface.

“What makes Ableton Live unique is its application and flexibility in all stages of music production,” said Kai Turnbull, course author and instructor. “Live has all the bases covered, from the initial recording of a musical idea to mix-down and live performance of a song production on stage.” And now, with the inclusion of extensive MIDI capability, new instruments and effects, track routing, I/O and sync options, and updated remix features, Live 6 offers a viable alternative to the traditional linear-based music recording and production software programs on the market.

Interactive Practice Activities

Berkleemusic’s online course examines a wide variety of musical uses for the program, from expressive sound design using audio and MIDI clip manipulation, to innovative signal processing with Live’s unique built-in effects. It also covers real-time control for laptop performance. The course includes a series of topics focusing on specific programming techniques, and also examines creative methods to arrange and produce entire song productions. “I show musical approaches you wouldn’t necessarily find on your own.” Turnbull said. And, he said, students love that. They regularly express their amazement at the breadth of Live’s capabilities.

In many of the course lessons, students begin music development from the Session View first. This is the same window you would use when performing live with the program to trigger samples, song sections, or complete mixed tracks. “For example, if a band decides in the spur of the moment to change the song order of a set, or a laptop DJ artist wants to beat-match songs with different tempos in real time, Live 6 ’s unique session view offers them that capability,” Turnbull said. “The fact that we specifically focus on this in our course activities as a starting point for song production means that you develop the skill-set by the end of the course to take your music live on stage.”

“Almost all other major software programs work in a linear fashion—an introduction, a verse, a chorus, and so forth,” Turnbull said. For example, with other software, it is feasible to prerecord backing tracks and jam along on stage, but with that model, you’re fixed into playing music in the order in which you’ve prepared it. “But the joy of live performance is that you get on stage, and suddenly the sax player plays a great lick or the guitar player plays an inspired solo, and the band wants to extend the musical section in response,” Turnbull said. “In Live, there’s a way you can support this kind of spontaneity. In real time, you can automatically extend or play back any section of a song, and rearrange on the fly, without losing a beat. That’s the program’s beauty and greatest strength.”

Whether you use Live for producing, composing, or live performance—and whether you are a beginner or a studio professional—this course will help you discover and even invent new ways of making music using Live 6. You’ll learn the best ways to integrate Live into your home or project studio, as you share your work and your musical insights with fellow students and get production tips and techniques first-hand from Berklee faculty. Speed up the learning curve online, and master Live 6 —software that blurs the line between stage and studio music production.

Producing Music with Ableton Live online course at Berkleemusic

Producing Music with Ableton Live

Production Resources