
Get Started Making Music - capableweb
https://learningmusic.ableton.com/
======
PascLeRasc
This is incredible, I love it. I've recently switched to using Ableton
exclusively for making music, it feels like more of an instrument than a
computer program to me. It's so expressive and lets me make the sounds I want
to hear as well as things I can't even conceive of. I can't really articulate
what it is about Ableton, but I really love it and I'm so thankful that it's
around.

If anyone wants more, Ableton also has a synthesizer playground site at
[https://learningsynths.ableton.com/](https://learningsynths.ableton.com/).

~~~
codesternews
Are you a programmer? Could you please share your creations? Why you use these
tools?

I wanted to learn but I do not know where to start. Just asking out of
curiosity. Thanks

~~~
dirkk0
I recommend starting with p5.js. If you need synchronized tracks, add Tone.js
to the mix. The Ableton website also uses Tone.js.
[https://tonejs.github.io/](https://tonejs.github.io/)

------
flavor8
I got into programming as a kid through a desire to make music (my first
program was a "song" written in pascal, playing a series beep tones at
different frequencies and durations.) I got into trackers (fast, impulse,
buzz) in my teens, and then synths.

These days I have a strong preference towards "hardware"* only music making --
I spend most of my waking life staring at a screen, so I find it satisfying to
step away and be hands on when creating music. The brains of my studio is a
Synthstrom Deluge, which is an amazingly intuitive little gizmo - it has a
built in synth and drum machine, a looper, a sampler, and a MIDI sequencer
allowing you to drive all other synths in the studio. I also have an Arturia
Keystep, which has a great live MIDI sequencer. Another fun gadget is the
Roland RC 505, which gives you 5 independent and dubbable loops - I drive one
of the two fx sends from my mixer through it, letting me build loops live from
any of the other synths. Aside from those I've collected a handful of synths,
both FM and analog.

(* quotes because pretty much all available synths, analog included, run on
software. Most come with USB ports allowing you to connect and change
settings, update firmware, etc.)

~~~
munificent
I'm getting back into making electronic music now and I've agonized over where
to go the software/computer/DAW route or hardware/groovebox/sequencer. Right
now, I'm doing it all on a computer using Reason and a very nice MIDI
controller (Arturia KeyLab 61 mkii <3 <3 <3). But I follow the r/synthesizers
subreddit and all of the pretty blinky lights and buttons look so fun and the
sounds can be amazing.

The main things I like about doing it all on a computer are:

* Great screen and interface. It's easy to drag and drop and see the composition visually. Boxes like the Digitakt look like a lot of fun, but then I watch a youTube video of it and it's like 80% knob-scrolling through menus on a tiny LCD screen and that doesn't look like fun.

* Easy file and data management. It's all just files on a hard drive. It's trivial to switch between projects, back up, restore state, etc. Managing that when the data lives on flash cards across a handful of sequencers seems really stressful to me. I'd be so worried about accidentally losing a patch or something.

* It's cheaper. If I want two separate delays with different settings, I can just add a second delay. I don't have to go on Sweetwater and drop another $200. Sure, Eurorack stuff is "modular", but each module requires shelling out cash. In Reason, I can wire up huge racks of crazy stuff without spending a dime.

 _But..._ , man, the hardware stuff looks like a _lot_ of fun. I also feel
like it can be a real struggle to get something that sounds rich and full out
of Reason. I can get there, but it takes effort. It's default sound tends to
be kind of brittle and dry, which is to be expected from software but can be
uninspiring. (I should maybe check out a different DAW, but I know Reason well
and exploring different software is a whole other can of worms.) With a lot of
hardware gear — at least judging by videos online — you power it up and it
sounds fat immediately.

I think what really matters the most to me is finding a path that gets me
finishing music I like quickly. I don't want to just noodle, but I also want
something fun and immediate enough to stay in the moment. I'm still not sure
if software or hardware (or a mixture of both?) is the right path for that.

Any thoughts on how to dip my toes in the water with hardware to see if that's
a better fit?

~~~
romaniv
_> Any thoughts on how to dip my toes in the water with hardware to see if
that's a better fit?_

How much money is "dip my toes"? If you're talking less than a hundred bucks
for some cool toys, you can buy Korg Volca and one of PO-x0 series from
Teenage Engineering.

If you're thinking $500+ you can get something like Alesis Micron (designed by
Bret Victor, BTW) or Korg Electribe, or Elektron Model:Sample. If you're fine
with real-time recording, you can instead get something like Behringer Neutron
or Kors Minilogue. You can make entire tracks on those even if all you have is
a linear recorder.

If you're in ~$1000+ range you can buy Analog Four or OP-1. The former is a
very practical machine, the latter is a marvel of design, very fun and great
for experiments.

Or you could go for a workstation. FA-06 has pretty good UX, although it's
closer to DAW-on-a-keyboard than other things I mentioned here.

Find a device you like and learn it inside out. It's a very rewarding
experience. Also, try to buy a used device. You can save tons of money this
way.

~~~
winternett
Using hardware now is like using a land line with a rotary phone to make phone
calls... It's pretty outdated to use hardware unless it's a unique or live
instrument. Also if you use Hardware, you end up with a lot of complications
in terms of recording your music into digital format, and you'll likely lose
the things you create because hardware can easily get lost, stolen, reset,
etc... Hardware interfaces are nothing like modern software interfaces now, so
you'll also be learning a lot of stuff, but not stuff that allows you to jump
into the modern world of music production.

If you are just starting out, in my opinion, the best way to get into working
things out is to just dive deep into a software based music DAW, you can try
Garage Band or Fruity Loops, which have a slightly lower learning curve than
other tools, there are also tons of tutorials on youtube. Ableton is a bit
overdone and technical as a starting point, but then again, most valuable
skills don't have very easy entry/starting points in life.

~~~
nineteen999
Jeepers, I know your comment is coming from an electronic music mindset, but
to those who learned audio engineering by setting up drum kits, amplifiers,
pianos and mic'ing them by hand are probably having a bit of a chuckle at your
"hardware" comment.

No malintention meant here, and as far as electronic instruments go I agree
with what you're saying, I just know several drummers and guitar players who
would by quite incensed by the comparison with their instruments to rotary
phones.

------
fractalf
Ableton is great and paved the way for a more creative and intuitive workflow!
I switched from Cubase very early on and never looked back. That is, until I
found Bitwig ([https://www.bitwig.com](https://www.bitwig.com)) which supports
Linux! They also deserve a shout out taking it even further!

~~~
kristiandupont
Bitwig looks really promising. But how is the VST landscape? Is it even
supported?

EDIT: sorry, my question was about whether _Linux_ supports VST. I would
assume that Bitwig did at v0.1 :-)

~~~
atoav
Longtime Bitwig user here that switched there after Ableton 9 which I used
since the very start.

Bitwig is quite similar to Ableton in terms of capabilities, I never tried
this myself, but there seems to be a way (assuming you want Windows VSTs on
Linux) [https://answers.bitwig.com/questions/624/vst-windows-on-
linu...](https://answers.bitwig.com/questions/624/vst-windows-on-linux-with-
bitwig)

I am perfectly happy with the built-in stuff however. Because of bitwigs
extremely strong modulation engine the standard effects are probably the most
powerful and expressive ones out there.

------
Heliosmaster
Talking about synths, I can definitely recommend VCV Rack [0], an open-source
virtual modular synth!

What I mostly love is that through plugins you can find virtual versions of
existing hardware modules!

[0]: [https://vcvrack.com/](https://vcvrack.com/)

~~~
Tepix
Looks like many of the modules need a purchase.

~~~
jlarcombe
A lot of amazing ones don't, though. It's really worth digging in.

------
TheOtherHobbes
As a dev, I find Ableton incredibly frustrating. The Live Object Model (LOM)
allows custom automation and software control. But it's half-closed, and half-
open.

Access is through Max for Live, which is a dataflow language "programmed" by
joining little object blocks to other object blocks - like Scratch. There's
unofficial Python support, but it's poorly documented.

Many things are possible, but many other things aren't possible - even though
they're available on Push, so obviously the hooks are there.

It would make me unbelievably happy if Ableton opened up the LOM and included
a properly documented hook for absolutely every important feature - preferably
one that could be used from any language, maybe via OSC, rather than M4L.

To be fair Live at least has a LOM, while other sequencers/DAWs don't. So
that's a plus. But it's still a shame it isn't more complete - because that
would make all kinds of cool things possible.

~~~
jcelerier
If you use OSC you could be interested in the DAW I develop:
[https://ossia.io](https://ossia.io) ; a part of its object model is
accessible through it, hadn't had the time to expose everything yet.

------
pacomerh
This is great!, I thought they were only gonna do a simple piano roll and
start/stop, they touch on pretty good topics including song structure, chords,
modes, scales, diatonic triads, voicing, etc. This is a pretty good intro to
getting into Ableton Live really. I come from using Cubase and honestly the
new Live is very capable for building fluid songs, it has so many features now
and the interface makes it really easy to draw automation curves, set
different timings, route midi, build drum kits, etc.

------
S_A_P
I really tried to get into Ableton. I found a Push 2 at a pawn shop and while
I can say that the push 2 controller is pretty damn amazing and turns Ableton
into a pretty cool device, I can't get the arrangement to feel natural to me.
I am a long term linear sequencer user, and Logic is pretty much muscle memory
to me now. However, Ive used FL studio since version 1.x and that also feels
much easier to use than Ableton. I can create patterns super easily on Ableton
but then turning that into a song is just clunky to me.

~~~
rock_hard
I came from CUBASE and it took me a couple attempts to get used to ableton

Frankly thinking of it as a sequencer is a limiting mental model.

Think of it as a instrument to jam with.

When I used cubase I spend about 20% of the time with jamming together a basic
idea and then 80% with arranging.

Ableton flipped that for me...now I spend 80% of the time jamming (and loving
it) and only all the way at the end I quickly create the arrangement once I am
already super familiar with all the parts I created during jamming.

It’s had a really super positive on my creative quality!

~~~
S_A_P
Ive heard this from quite a few folks. I dont do a lot of ITB recording
though, so that may be my problem. I mainly use my 2 SPs (SP-1200/Sp-16) for
the jamming part along with keys/guitar/bass. By the time I fire up software
the idea is already there, and I want to arrange it.

~~~
te_chris
If you already have a solid OTB workflow, Ableton won’t really give you much
tbh

------
bartproost
I love seeing how the big brands are picking up web audio. I refuse to work on
anything else these days, and it's easier than I thought when I started. Built
5 web games using tone.js for Red Bull Mind Gamers last year and just launched
a site that auto generates unlimited royalty free mp3s using web audio for a
dollar[1]. [1] [https://strikefreemusic.com](https://strikefreemusic.com)

~~~
jwyatt1995
Do you have any open source work? I've been playing around with web audio
applications myself and would love to poke around.

~~~
bartproost
I don't unfortunately. If I find some time I'll have a think about what I
could open source.

------
dang
A thread from 2017:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14299628](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14299628)

~~~
thrwn_frthr_awy
And one from 2019:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20272346](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20272346)

~~~
dang
Good catch! We should have marked this one a dupe in that case, but missed it
and will leave it now.

------
vectorEQ
prefer renoise, it's cheap and super easy to work with :D. Never actually
liked the workflow of ableton (personal flavour i suppose), its audio engine
is fairly decent, but imho for 500ish euros it costs to get the suite it's a
bit expensive for what u get.

Cubase has a much superior audio and processing engine like Logic Pro for mac
users, and is in a similar pricing range. It has less quality built-in dps
etc. ,but most DAWs lack on that.

Renoise for like 50 euros is super cheap in comparison, and most dps it has
have awesome performance and quality.

That being said, ableton does offer a better 'live' environment for
live/performance based things.

on workflows, bitwig is really the innovator, as it combines workflows from
different daws like cubase and ableton and lets the user itself choose its
work-flow instead of forcing it upon the user.

~~~
enqk
funnily enough, the founder/creator of renoise was working for Ableton in the
early years of renoise

~~~
PavlovsCat
Is there a source for this? I never heard that before, though I know Renoise
started out as a fork of NoiseTrekker so to speak:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renoise](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renoise)

> I started coding 2 years ago with this project, so I'm more musician than
> coder I started making music with protracker

[https://web.archive.org/web/20020803155023/http://noerror.sc...](https://web.archive.org/web/20020803155023/http://noerror.scene.org/people.php?id_p=3)

~~~
enqk
I was running the website you've linked to (noerror.org) with a friend, and I
have met Taktik.

He is listed under his real name (Eduard Mueller) here in 2004 on the ableton
website:

[https://web.archive.org/web/20040816022620fw_/http://www.abl...](https://web.archive.org/web/20040816022620fw_/http://www.ableton.com/index.php?main=people)

[https://web.archive.org/web/20040914164146/http://www.ableto...](https://web.archive.org/web/20040914164146/http://www.ableton.com/pages/company/people/people/eduard/eduard.html)

------
marapuru
Very cool and interesting website.

I recently bought a Maschine MK2 to get into the music making thing. It
surprised me how easy to use it is.

My wife is a professional acoustic musician, and although she firstly was a
bit hesitant with this 'instrument' she quickly turned around. And we started
making music together.

It's perfect for me since it is very well arranged, the buttons make sense in
my head.

I play a bit of guitar and always have trouble making sense of the notes in my
head.

~~~
marpstar
I'm a Maschine user as well, but I've got a background in guitar, having
played in rock bands from my early teens through mid-20s.

I've always been intrigued by MIDI, but always felt "limited" by piano-style
keyboard MIDI controllers. Maschine really helped me break open my writers
block and made playing music _fun_ again.

I can put Maschine in front of my 5 year old and he can figure it out. It
makes more sense to him than my 61-key MIDI controller does.

------
bauerd
On a side note, this was written (partly) in Elm:
[https://twitter.com/abletondev/status/861580662620508160](https://twitter.com/abletondev/status/861580662620508160)

~~~
jamil7
I'm fairly sure Elm was ripped out and replaced with TS later on.

~~~
gullibleAndVain
Yeah, not sure if this is the same but here's a tweet about some recent tech
usage
[https://twitter.com/AbletonDev/status/1143880805317525506](https://twitter.com/AbletonDev/status/1143880805317525506)

"Running on Web Audio, WebAssembly and WebGL. Made with three.js, Tone.js,
anime.js and React using TypeScript and much "

~~~
klemola
That tweet is about the newer learningmusic.ableton.com. Apparently a
different project, different stack.

------
milesward
Ableton works how my brain works for music. It's lovely :)

~~~
milesward
If you wanna hear some outputs:
[https://soundcloud.com/funkitekture](https://soundcloud.com/funkitekture)

------
adamnemecek
I've been working on an IDE for music composition. I'll launch soon
[http://ngrid.io](http://ngrid.io).

~~~
WhitneyLand
Is there a way to try it or learn more before signup/email list sub?

I started composing about a year ago using general tools like CuBase and
Garage Band and wow, it's tedious, even when the initial sketch is worked out
before hand on a keyboard.

There are just a ton of ideas that come to mind on how it could be an order of
magnitude more efficient. Maybe there are apps that don't focus so much on
production, that do a better job solely for the writing music part?

~~~
bq313
I am not sure how familiar you are with notation, but you might wanna consider
Dorico, it is focused more on writing than on production bus still has a lot
of features to make it sound pleasant (as opposed to other notation programs
like Finale or Sibelius.) It is a sort of notation program / DAW hybrid that I
think is a really interesting crossover / niche. Another suggestion might be
to check out Synfire. (I have no experience with Synfire though, yet)

------
JacKTrocinskI
Ableton is top notch but for me nothing beats coming up with melodies in FL
Studio's "Piano Roll", a lot of fun times spent in that program.

~~~
taffronaut
FLStudio has a great community and Image-Line deserve kudos for their
"lifetime" license model. I used it extensively for a few years and found it
solid and productive. It's maybe closer to Ableton than Cubase.

------
cyberpip
Bit of a side note, but I've been playing with [http://sonic-
pi.net/](http://sonic-pi.net/) and it's teaching me so much about synthesizers
AND music (even though I have a bit of a background in both).

------
redmaverick
I want to make music that sounds like the band "Chinese Man".

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kqjeNSNuNPM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kqjeNSNuNPM)
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A9QU5-9DFC4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A9QU5-9DFC4)

Can we do it using Ableton? How does one even approach trying to do something
like this?

~~~
gagege
Yes, you could definitely make this in Ableton. Basically, all you need is
samples (recordings of instrument sounds, either individual notes that you put
in whatever order you like, or recordings of someone playing a whole musical
phrase, preferably something that loops well) and a sequencer of some kind,
which is the main function of Ableton. There are also effects and mixing and
mastering techniques that can drastically change the sound of music, but all
you need to get started are some samples and a sequencer.

------
afroisalreadyin
It's really awesome Ableton is going in this direction. Live is a beast, but
it's a quite intimidating beast if you don't have experience working with DAWs
and music software in general. I worked there for three years, and couldn't
bring myself to learn the basics. Tutorials like these will definitely make it
easier to pick the basics and start off with Live with more confidence.

~~~
josmall
how was working there? I did a code challenge there last year but I didn't
make it to the next round. Still kind of bummed about it.

~~~
afroisalreadyin
When I was there it was a great place to work: Nice people, a lot of perks,
beautiful office etc. Especially if you are into music, you can learn and
collaborate with pretty much everyone, as making and listening to music was
and is pervasive within the company. The problem was that I was in the web
team, and that was not their actual focus. They have grown considerably,
though, so I'm sure it has changed at least in some respects.

~~~
josmall
Sounds about right. I interviewed for a web position too. But I was really
curious about the software and how I can potentially transition into it.

------
fit2rule
You can get a lot of the functionality of Ableton under Linux, albeit using
other, modular tools.

seq24 for sequencing/block-style arranging. Reaper for recording tracks.
VCVRack for synthesis, Hydrogen for drums.

In fact, its kind of amazing what tools a budding musician has available to
them - for free - in the Linux ecosphere. I hope to see more articles
describing these tools soon .. or maybe I should do one of my own ..

------
rcarmo
I've been noodling with iOS music apps and MIDI hardware as a sort of ramp-up,
and tried Ableton 10 Lite for a bit this summer. Really cool.

Notes:
[https://taoofmac.com/space/blog/2019/09/07/1140](https://taoofmac.com/space/blog/2019/09/07/1140)

------
totoe
Fruity Loops, Cubase, Reason, Reaper, Cantabile Performer, Presonus Studio
One, Ableton, OpenMPT, Jazz and Logic before apple... I love to have a good
sequencer on my hands to handle the recording of my creative spirits. I also
love to look back in time and stumbled over some old music programs on the
amiga system. I would love to learn more about working with tracker based
sequencing but iam faster done in a modern daw. Presonus Studio One is a good
DAW. Ideas sketching via webtools is also awesome. I love me my little
beepbox.co [https://tinyurl.com/y6rr2rok](https://tinyurl.com/y6rr2rok) At the
end it only counts if you have fun, how to control or create, do things with a
digital working station.

------
ubermonkey
No discussion of Ableton should omit high profile users like Imogen Heap or
Zoe Keating.

~~~
brokenmachine
Zillions of electronic artists use Ableton.

Although I like Imogen Heap, I don't see why she's so deserving of a special
mention.

~~~
ubermonkey
You seem fun.

------
johnhess
Ironically for the name, ableton turns out not to be accessible for the blind.

~~~
big_chungus
It's not exactly _easy_ to make an "accessible" DAW. Especially not when you
consider that there probably isn't a huge market of blind music producers
relative to the amount of work it would take to, say, make a somewhat-sane
interface for a screen reader for a program as complex as ableton. The
interface is very complex as is, and would almost certainly require some re-
jiggering before it would work well. I doubt enough people would buy t to ever
make it a worth-while investment.

~~~
jedimastert
I just did an interview with a (blind) professor from Berklee that run an
assistive music technology program and lab that has been using Pro Tools for
quite some time. He's released a pile of scripts called "Flo Tools"[0] to
assist with visually impaired use.

[0]: [http://flotools.org/](http://flotools.org/)

------
hit8run
I use Ableton for many many years now. Did this remix in one day on vacation
just using the acapella and NO external plugins.

[https://soundcloud.com/hit8run/happyathens-
finetune/s-dWSSq](https://soundcloud.com/hit8run/happyathens-finetune/s-dWSSq)

So you can achieve alot with the productive workflow of ableton. I also bought
Logic but never finished a full song with it and always felt restricted by
it's workflow.

------
yummypaint
Speaking of in browser sequencers/synths:
[https://www.audiotool.com/](https://www.audiotool.com/)

------
jldugger
Intro page vaguely reminds me of DropMix, which has unfortunately been EoL'd.

------
chevas
There's a delay when trying to hit stop on any of the boxes. It's really quite
frustrating.

I really like this idea. This is something I want to explore as a non-music
person.

~~~
yellow_postit
Checkout Pocket Operators from Teenage Engineering if you haven't seen them
already. Its a lovely (to me) line of physical synths that are quite
inexpensive < $30 USD and also as a non-music person really got me started
down a path of wanting to learn more.

~~~
backpropaganda
POs were a bit too limited for me. The sequencer isn't powerful enough to make
anything more complex than basic chiptunes.

Not to diss on PO. I was super hyped about it as well, and would have liked to
know about its limitations before buying it. Anyone of the numerous phone apps
would be a cheaper and better replacement for a PO.

What got me started in music was Garageband. It's free (for macos users) and
quite simple and intuitive. It's not as fully-featured as something like
Ableton, but quite capable for making professional-level songs.

~~~
criddell
It's pretty remarkable to see what people do with Garageband even on iPhones.

I bought an interface for my guitar ($20) and have played around with
Garageband on my iPad and just playing with the amps is a lot of fun. It's a
very low friction way to record myself playing while practicing and since I'm
using headphones, I'm not irritating everybody around me with my terrible
playing.

One complaint about Garageband (and Cubase - a copy of that came with my
Yamaha amp), is the lack of tutorials for people like me. I'd love a start-to-
finish tutorial for recording a toy song that includes recording my instrument
on top of simple drums and maybe one or two other virtual instruments.

------
1k
This is awesome. I used to think music was no big deal but after playing with
this I realize I have no musical talent whatsoever.

------
umvi
Pretty cool! It's like FLStudio-lite in the browser

------
mister_hn
Can someone here say more about Ableton as employer?

~~~
jamesb93
I have friends who work there in a number of areas and colleagues who have
freelanced for them (convolution reverb for example). It is pretty nice from
what I hear and the focus is very much enabling creativity before profit.

~~~
mister_hn
and how's their salary compared to other Berlin companies?

------
floatingsmoke
see [https://mixart.ist](https://mixart.ist) which is a great alternative.

------
quirkafleeg3
Trust me, the world is better off without the sort of music I would make.

------
harrydry
well fuck me that wsa amazing

------
PavlovsCat
Pro/Fasttracker in the browser:
[https://www.stef.be/bassoontracker/](https://www.stef.be/bassoontracker/)

And it can load modules directly from modarchive and modules.pl, too! e.g

[https://www.stef.be/bassoontracker/?file=https%3A%2F%2Fapi.m...](https://www.stef.be/bassoontracker/?file=https%3A%2F%2Fapi.modarchive.org%2Fdownloads.php%3Fmoduleid%3D75418)

FWIW, that's how I learned making music, just learning the commands and making
things I like by ear. Though being a kid with no internet probably helped.

~~~
dysoco
I might be missing something here but I click record, play some notes with the
A-Z keys, stop the recording, and when I click play nothing happens (I hear no
audio) however with the demos I hear the audio.

Any ideas what am I missing?

EDIT: I was supposed to add a sample (in the Edit Samples tab) in case anyone
was confused like me.

~~~
PavlovsCat
Loading a song and using its samples is best to start out with IMO; not just
beause it's easier, but because the instruments also tend to be "in tune"
(relative to each other)

------
cryptofits
This site is the reason bookmarked were made for

