Where most Recording Studio software programs are intended for stationary use in a static setting, Ableton Live has been tried, tested and refined for live performance functionality, combining the recording and editing tools and features of the best Recording Software programs with real-time effects, sequencers, loop machines to give electronica artists a powerful instrument on stage and artists and engineers of all musical genres and callibers a powerful tool to edit, modify and refine music off stage. For these reasons and more, Ableton is "TopTenREVIEWS Silver Award" winner.
In addition to its visually-oriented, well-organized user interface and powerful tools and features, Ableton has built and maintained a thriving community of artists and engineers that actively participate in tutorials and user-guides, adding a degree of experience and expertise to the already-in-depth help sections, FAQ pages, built-in tutorials and other resources. As many new and experienced come to find out, making use of Recording Studio software can be difficult to learn and master. Fortunately, with Ableton Live, the learning curve is greatly reduced and acheiving technical understanding is always just a few clicks away.
Standout Features
- New Drum Rack streamlines beat production
- Use multiple time signatures within a single Live Set
- Video export
- Easier automation
- Tempo nudge to sync easily with live musicians or DJs
- REX file support
- Improvements to core functions Live, Operator and Sampler based on user requests
However, what makes these features stand out in the first place is Ableton's intuitive interface, which manages to stay extremely user-friendly even when a complicated rack has been assembled.
The enhanced audio engine in Ableton Live 7 provides clean sound with 64-bit processing, an improvement over Live 6. Increased audio clarity has even been reported in older sessions made with previous versions of Live.
Ableton Live is tailored for simple, on-the-fly audio production, but provides classic audio workstation functions found in more expensive software. The Arrangement View shows a familiar timeline-based interface found in other digital audio workstations, while the Session View is perfect for improvising and sketching out all your musical ideations.
In either view, adding sound clips, full tracks and virtual instruments from Live's extensive audio Library is a simple task with the File Browser. Drag and drop audio files from the Library, or anywhere on your computer into the timeline. Once you have your composition together, changing the speed is a simple matter of using the warp tool to alter speed without warbling, stuttering, or other artifacts.
A feature that DJs will appreciate is Tempo Nudge, which allows you to adjust the beats per minute to sync to an external audio source, and old pros will appreciate the new compressor model, which mimics the design of many vintage compressors.
The new Drum Racks bring you the combined functionality of an instrument rack with a trigger pad interface. Add chains to the rack by dragging and dropping clips or instruments to Drum Rack pads. Drag and drop audio clips to Drum Rack pads. You can literally spend entire weekends playing with this new feature!
Other standout features in Ableton Live 7 include:
- Fully integrated sidechaining capability
- New and improved EQ
- High-quality modes for reducing digital artifacts
- Spectrum analyzer to show real-time visual feedback for any audio signal
- Improved MIDI timing engine
- Simpler hardware integration
- Enhanced memory management
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