the beginner’s guide to live <
Instruments
Live’s selection of integrated instruments covers everything from sampling and virtual analogue
synthesis to more esoteric fare such as physically modelled mallets, strings and electric pianos
MULTIBAND DYNAMICS
Designed to emulate the big sound and
hands-on programming style of classic
hardware synths, Analog might appear
intimidating to the newcomer but it’s
actually quite straightforward once you get
your head round the basics. The interface
crams a lot of elements into a small space,
but if you take the time to explore it fully,
you’ll find that there’s actually nothing too
complex going on.
Analog’s raw sound is generated by two
oscillators – each of which can be set to
sine, saw, rectangle (pulse) or white noise
shapes – and a dedicated noise generator.
All three of these have Balance parameters,
which control how their outputs are
balanced between the synth’s two resonant
multimode filters. There are also dedicated
envelopes for modulating pitch, filter cutoff
frequency and amplitude, plus two LFOs for
rhythmic modulation.
All pretty standard stuff, then, but
Analog has a few tricks up its virtual sleeve,
including sub-oscillators, oscillator hard
sync, a choice of filter saturation models,
and two- or four-voice unison detune with
a Delay parameter that controls the lag
between each unison voice. These bells and
whistles give Analog the ability to produce
some interesting and useful sounds, making
it worthy of investigation even if you’ve
already got a favourite subtractive synth.
Analog is included with Live Suite, and costs
£59 for Standard and Intro users.
COLLISION
A physical modelling instrument primarily
dedicated to the synthesis of mallet
percussion, Collision is capable of creating a
wide palette of tones, from plucked strings
to pan pipes. The synth’s sound is produced
by a pair of oscillators called Mallet and
Noise, which model the behaviour of a
mallet striking a surface and generate the
instrument’s initial impulse. This impulse is
only a small component of the overall sound,
though – it’s the resonators that the impulse
feeds that give the synth its characteristic
timbre. There are two of them, each of which
can be set to one of seven object types:
Beam, Marimba, String, Membrane, Plate,
Pipe and Tube. The characteristics of the
object are customised via a selection of
specialised parameters, such as Material
(controlling the damping properties of the
material used) and Inharmonics (governing
the harmonic relationship of the partials
generated by the resonator).
Collision makes full-bodied sounds that
really cut through the mix, and by combining
different resonator types, all sorts of weird,
wonderful and atmospheric noises can be
conjured up.
The instrument is included with Live Suite,
is £59 for Standard and Intro users, and
includes the Corpus effect (see p29).
DRUM RACK
Live’s Drum Rack is a container device
used for building drum kits. A Drum Rack is
automatically created when you use Live’s
slicing functionality – see Audio slicing and
creating custom Library content on p19 – but
their main purpose is to enable you to design
your own kits.
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Each of a Drum Rack’s slots/pads is
triggered by a specific MIDI note, from C2 to
G8, and hosts its own full device chain, so you
can drop whatever instruments or effects
you like on each one – Simpler is often the
first port of call for sampled hits, thanks to its
ease of use and low CPU overhead.
The potential is there to creating
massive, complex kits, but the container is
surprisingly light and quick to use, making
it ideal for building more basic things such
as Choke Grouped hi-hats, too. To do exactly
that, activate the Show/Hide Chain List and
Show/Hide Input/Output Section buttons,
and set both pads to the same Choke Group.
Now, whenever you play one sound on the
Choke Group, the other will immediately
stop sounding.
ELECTRIC
Electric emulates the sound of classic
70s electric pianos. Like Collision, the
sound starts with synthesised Mallet and
Noise elements, which ‘strike’ a physically
modelled fork. The fork is divided into two
subsections: Tine (the part of the fork struck
directly by the mallet) and Tone (controlling
the secondary resonance of the fork), and
by adjusting their parameters, a variety
of timbres can be generated. Electric also
simulates the dampers found in real electric
pianos with its Damper section, which gives
the release stage its character, and magnetic
coil pickups with its Pickup section, which
affects how bright and distorted the sound is.
Electric does a great job of creating
convincing electric piano tones, which can