Explore how to switch themes and customize colors in Ableton Live 12, including default, classic dark, and light modes, and adjust brightness, contrast, and hue for accessibility.

Discover Ableton Live's two main views—session view for live performance with clips and arrangement view for composing along a timeline—and how switching with the tab key supports flexible workflows.

Explore arrangement view in Ableton Live 12, contrast it with session view, and learn the canvas, tracks, browser, clip and device views, and the transport bar.

Learn how session view and arrangement view act as two canvases sharing a mixer, with separate clips; launch clips, switch views with the orange button, and manage audio.

Discover how to choose a single workflow in Ableton Live 12, either session view or arrangement view, for producing a track, and avoid mixing both to prevent confusion.

Explore the key upgrades in Live 12, including one new instrument and one new effect, plus midi generative tools and key-aware devices that follow a chosen key.

Explore how to navigate Ableton Live 12, using the transport, browser, and combined device and clip views, plus info and help views, to maintain a one-window workflow.

Open the view menu and enable info view to see a box that explains each element when you hover, such as monitoring of input and output.

Explore Ableton Live's help view for built-in lessons and tours of session and arrangement views with example sets. Use the home button to navigate and hide the view.

Learn to zoom in and out and scrub through a track with mouse or trackpad gestures, practicing click-and-hold above the magnifying glass to navigate from start to end.

Explore the arrangement view sequencer to manage MIDI and audio clips, resize tracks, split clips with command E, and route ins, outs, and monitor settings to main.

Explore session view in Ableton Live 12, including the clip slot grid, io inputs and outputs, and mixer controls, plus how the push controller launches clips.

Explore clip view in Ableton Live, zoom in on a clip, adjust volume and pitch, reverse playback, and switch between clip and device views.

Create and explore midi clips in arrangement view, add instruments, input notes in the piano roll, and experiment with copying, pasting, and importing clips to build sound.

Learn to use the Ableton Live browser as your complete musical librarian, quickly finding samples, presets, synths, loops, and plugins, and auditioning kicks with fast, organized navigation.

Explore the Ableton library, edit what’s visible, and audition sounds to compare the differences between sounds, drums, clips, samples, and grooves, then load presets into instrument racks or tracks.

Explore how Ableton drums are organized: use ADG device groups for drum kits on MIDI tracks, WAV/AIF drum loops on audio tracks, and ALC drum clips.

Discover Ableton Live instruments, from analogue to drift, and learn to drag presets onto midi tracks, audition sounds, and use drum kit sounds with synth patches.

Explore audio effects in Ableton Live 12, drag presets onto audio or MIDI tracks, and navigate presets from an alphabetical list with or without folders across Live 11 and 12.

Explore MIDI effects in Ableton Live 12, noting their limited usefulness and the arpeggiator's popularity. These effects work only on MIDI tracks and include presets, before we move to modulators.

Discover modulators in live 12, a group of effects that modify other signals, including envelope follower and lfo, usable on audio or midi tracks with presets.

Explore Max for Live, a programming language inside Ableton Live that lets you build custom instruments and effects, access shared devices, and enhance productions without requiring programming.

Explore how plugins—third-party instruments and effects—run inside Ableton Live, how to load, enable audio units and VST/VST3, rescan, and build your library.

Explore Midi clips and samples in Ableton Live, rename the Midi clips view, drag clips to tracks, and understand how instrument assignment affects playback and track management.

Explore how samples store audio clips in Ableton Live, from messy lists of WAV, AIF, and MP3 files to how the search function helps you locate usable audio quickly.

Grooves are patterns that add swing to a beat when applied to audio or MIDI clips. Use the groove pool and library to apply patterns like swing or funk.

Explore global tunings in Ableton Live 12, retuning the entire session across octave schemes—from 12 notes per octave to 43 notes to the octave—creating new sonic possibilities.

Create reusable templates in Ableton Live to predefine podcast sessions with tracks for background music, voiceover, and sound effects. Access tracks from templates to adapt setups while preserving settings.

Master how to use places in the Ableton Live browser to quickly access folders, the sample library, and your current project, turning folders into a personal bookmarks bar.

Discover how Ableton packs organize sets, samples, instrument presets, and max for live tools, and learn to install free or purchased packs from the website or Live.

Sync Ableton projects across machines with Ableton Cloud for collaboration and in-sync sets. Explore Push three and its two modes: computer control and standalone with live and a hard drive.

Identify and safeguard your Ableton Live user library, a single folder containing templates, samples, and presets, by keeping it unmoved and reconnecting it via the live settings library if needed.

Explore collections as a tagging system to quickly find and organize drums, presets, plugins, and samples. Tag items, rename collections, and customize colors to save time during creative work.

Learn to search snare sounds in the library using filters and tags, narrowing to samples or one shots, with rim, acoustic, analog, or digital options, and save live searches.

Navigate your search history with back and forward buttons to revisit recent searches, quick searches, and yesterday’s queries, saving time by retracing steps.

Discover Ableton's sound similarity search to find sonically similar snare sounds and drum loops, and use it as a compositional tool to diversify tracks while planning a basic recording workflow.

Connect your mic or MIDI controller, set preferences for recording, and learn how to add content to Ableton Live by recording or importing MIDI and audio clips.

Set up audio input and output in Ableton Live by selecting core audio on mac, choosing your microphone or USB interface, and configuring sampling rate and latency for clean recording.

Set up a MIDI keyboard in Ableton Live 12 by enabling input tracking and confirming inputs. Learn to use sync, remote, and MPE, and verify MIDI activity with the indicator.

Record audio in Ableton Live 12 by arming a track, selecting a single input, and using the correct monitor mode to prevent feedback.

Record MIDI by arming a track, placing an instrument to convert data dots into audible sound, then listen or playback to hear the results.

Explore take lanes and comping to record multiple takes, then select and assemble the keeper take as the best performance, with future tightening via warping.

Explore MIDI comping by recording multiple takes, using take lanes to assemble a composite MIDI performance, and leveraging capture and automation recording for both notes and non-note MIDI data.

Deconstruct a funk synth wave track in Live, identifying a MIDI riff, Meld and FM8 synths, vocal sample from Splice, Kontakt, and Guitar Rig, then explore editing to align layers.

Edit audio in Ableton Live 12 by cutting, copying, pasting, and duplicating clips, split with command e, and tweak the grid with adaptive options for precise edits.

Discover the six clip corners and header corners that reveal content, enable non-destructive editing, sculpt fades with a middle dot on edges, and enable fades in record warp and launch.

Decode the timeline in Ableton by reading bar, beat, and 16th-note markers from bottom to top, and apply the kick on downbeats and snare on beats two and four.

Explore how to loop clips, sections, and entire tracks in Ableton Live 12. Use loop braces and command L to set loop length in clip view, session view, and arrangement view.

Automation changes a parameter over time by placing two points and drawing a line. Enter automation mode, add dots on volume or panning, and watch the pink automation lines.

Deconstruct a podcast music and sound design session, showing how automation shapes vocal track levels, fades, and the mix of sound effects and MIDI music for sci-fi narratives.

Assign an instrument to your MIDI track to hear notes, not the data. Duplicate tracks and place different instruments to hear the same MIDI clip in piano and Wurlitzer.

Edit MIDI clips by lengthening, setting start and end with the grid, and duplicating or moving clips across tracks. Understand velocity and automation shape MIDI volume, with no fades.

Explore how Midi clips and audio clips interact on Midi tracks and audio tracks in Ableton Live, including cross-track conversions and how to trigger, convert, or undo them.

Explore the piano roll editor in Ableton Live 12, editing MIDI notes and adjusting start and end. Use velocity dots and the headphone to audition notes, and explore scale features.

Learn to use the global key, scale highlighting, and fold in Ableton Live to stay in or explore outside C minor, visualize notes in key, and hide unused notes.

Quantize midi notes in Ableton Live 12 by snapping to the grid with command U, adjust grid resolution and timing, and explore transform menu options to generate new material.

Explore midi transform tools in Ableton Live, turning a melody into new ideas with arpeggiate, spread, ornament, quantize, and recombine within d minor.

Explore MIDI generators in Live 12, crafting rhythms and melodies with generate and transform tools. Create seeds, shapes, and Stax chords, adjust density, jitter, and quantize for evolving harmony.

Explore velocity editing in Ableton Live, apply randomization with limits, and ramp velocity to shape MIDI dynamics. Add deviation to create a natural, human feel in the piano roll editor.

Learn chance editing in Ableton Live 12, using drum kits, 16th notes hi-hats, and velocity lanes to randomize play probability, adjust grouping, and create dynamic rhythms.

Explore building Time Givers with a dense Ableton Live track featuring numerous MIDI layers, string synths, string samples, and layered loops using keyboards, pads, and bells.

Lock down a track by freezing and flattening to render MIDI or audio with effects into a temporary file, freeing CPU and enabling easier sharing.

Collect all and save to share your session, ensuring others have the same live version and a single packed folder of all files. Learn to render your track after packaging.

Export your track as WAV/AIFF or MP3 (or both at once), then select the region and render the track at the project sampling rate with optional normalization and PCM encoding.

Preview the next class in the Ableton Live 12 series, recording music in Live 12, focusing on recording audio and MIDI, guitar and vocal work, plus a studio field trip.

Learn to record with Ableton Live 12, covering audio interfaces, microphone types, MIDI recording with keyboards or MIDI guitar, and using warping to align tempo across clips.

Explore recording audio and MIDI in Ableton Live 12, master warping for automatic tempo syncing, and learn hardware interfaces, recording comping, multiple takes, and capturing vocals and acoustic instruments.