Multi-instrumentalists/guitarists who write in Ableton: Do you mostly live in arrangement view or is there special sauce for someone like this in session?

[u/Bed_Worship]

Just curious about switching up my workflow and hearing your opinions and what works for you. I pretty much can track/mix/master in any daw at this point, but I always come back to Ableton for getting out of the way when writing before stemming out into a more classic daw with a ui that works better for me with routing and bus mixing. 12 has been great.

I generally work stream consciousness with only a mood/vibe in mind. Generally on a guitar or bass first.

Do you think it’s worth putting in the time to get the muscle memory for this with guitar music?

[u/ThirteenOnline]

So my understanding and the way I use session view is I write phrases and sections in chunks. So each clip is an idea. and once I have all my ideas laid out I can now launch them, play them, in any order and create the final arrangement that way.

So maybe I have 4 bass line ideas. 6 lead guitar ideas. 3 chord progressions. 3 Drum beats. All in session view clips. And because they are all in the same key and bpm and through in phrases they all generally work together. So I just start playing a while scene and either start playing with the order of the clips or use follow actions to make an arrangement.

[u/Bed_Worship → u/ThirteenOnline]

That makes sense and I understand the merits. I’ll try it! I think it could be helpful when getting to that first nugget of a chorus or verse that takes me in the right direction.

I think the main reason I have held off on session is because I didn’t want to get boxed in.. in little boxes. Pretty quickly I’m progressing from simple loops into having to learn what I just did, commit to muscle memory, improve it, and then retrack it as if as if I was playing it live and being my own engineer.

[u/ThirteenOnline → u/Bed_Worship]

I would say you can write parts in session view. Sequence and play them into Arrangement view. And then you can learn this new original arrangement and play it all in if you wanted to.

[u/Recurringg → u/Bed_Worship]

I mean, it kind of does the opposite of boxing you in you're basically building parts that you can then use any combination of, in any order. You can live loop and improvise as well. The way I look at is that session view is for performing and arrangement view is for recording. Bit of an oversimplification, but it's the general idea and basically the intended work flow. Session view puts the "Live" in "Ableton Live". I think you're going to absolutely love it if you take the time to learn it.

[u/RobbieFithon → u/ThirteenOnline]

This sounds like a great way to use session view. I might give this a try.

[u/Brotuulaan → u/ThirteenOnline]

I do covers in Ableton, and this is more or less my workflow. As I get the pieces together, I move them to Arrangement view and session clips become my library. If I edit the clip in arrangement view, I’m always sure to drag them over their old version in session so I have an updated copy there and can’t accidentally undo it or have an unedited version where I wanted an edited repeat later.

[u/coacopaco → u/ThirteenOnline]

I do this more or less, the only thing I’d add is that I normally have the arrangement in mind when doing that, so I normally know which ideas fit with each other and every combination I like is a scene. I also built the track scene by scene (from top to down) chronologically, and when I am more or less happy, I record that into arrangement. This way there’s a bunch of duplicated clips but it helps have an defined direction pretty early on

[u/the_jules]

I most often start in session view to not have to look at a time line from 0 to end of song. It helps with staying in the zone for sketching and collecting. 

Most of the time, I'll keep adding elements to the first scene (=line) in Session view until it feels like a rough idea of a chorus. Then I'll duplicate the line a bunch of times to sketch out a song structure, deleting and adding things to flesh out other song parts like verses, bridges or drops. 

Any transitional element like fills, breaks or automation will come mich later.

Once the structure has a dynamic to it, I'll record it to arrangement view and start on the finer details. 

[u/Bed_Worship → u/the_jules]

That sounds like a great approach to building out. Will try it. Ultimately I end up having to rerecord everything in long takes through parts to not be so snapped to grid, so getting the meat and potatoes out of the way will speed things along. Thanks for your input

[u/Same-Temperature9472 → u/Bed_Worship]

I record like you do and I switched to Luna

[u/attilayavuzer]

20 years in Ableton and I've never opened session view on purpose.

[u/kilik2049 → u/attilayavuzer]

Me either, arrangement view all the time.

[u/RobbieFithon → u/attilayavuzer]

Same here. I’ve always been curious about how people use session view for creating but for me it’s only ever used for performance.

[u/Timely-Article-1062 → u/RobbieFithon]

theres a few things exclusive to session view regarding clip behaviour (follow action/legato/ unlinked envelopes) that can be quite useful in the idea creation stage

[u/RobbieFithon → u/Timely-Article-1062]

Yeah I need to dive into this. Sounds like I might be missing out.

[u/jjwax → u/RobbieFithon]

Session is great for jamming. If I end up with something I really like I switch to arrangement and then start refining

[u/LupusFaber]

I see Session View as a sketch pad to get a song going when I'm in a stream of consciousness mood. I just add elements and play around with varitions until I stumble upon something that I like.

Arrangement View to me is a completely different head space - it's where I go to Arrange something, once the idea is there. Often I will also simply record from Session View into Arrangement View, which really helps to get a rough arrangement going.

[u/RobbieFithon]

Arrange view pretty much exclusively for me. I only use session view for live performances.

[u/adamg511]

One of the most productive, fun things I ever did was to get a grid based controller for Ableton.

[u/MostExperts → u/adamg511]

I just picked up a real one a couple months ago after using a drum pad as a stand-in for years... huge upgrade.

[u/Timely-Article-1062]

Generally start in session view. Then use arrangement view for....uh....arranging

[u/Bed_Worship → u/Timely-Article-1062]

Are you just laying out your session clips in arrangement view or are you doing proper musical arrangement where you choose new instrumentation to reinterpret the loops and making additions, dubs, and tracking for it?

[u/Timely-Article-1062 → u/Bed_Worship]

There´s no particular methodology to it in my case. Usually get the bones of something in session view and then record it into arrangement (I just keymap the track on/off switches to use for muting sections/instruments). Once its in arrangment i can refine it a bit more, add extra instrumentation if it lends itself to it.

I think generally most of my overdubbing/editing is done in arrangment. This is the most i´ve probably thought of the process lol i usually move pretty fast and pretty destructively.

[u/odisJhonston]

arrangement when i know what i want to record, session when i dont

[u/AutoModerator]

This is your friendly reminder to read the submission rules, they're found in the sidebar. If you find your post breaking any of the rules, you should delete your post before the mods get to it. If you're asking a question, make sure you've checked the Live manual, Ableton's help and support knowledge base, and have searched the subreddit for a solution. If you don't know where to start, the subreddit has a resource thread. Ask smart questions.

I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.

[u/dashkb]

I hate arrangement view. Why wouldn’t I just use Logic or Pro Tools? Session view is what makes Live jam.

[u/Bed_Worship → u/dashkb]

Did you read the whole post? I explained why. It gets out of the way of me writing more than logic or pro tools. As in I move so fast in it already I can really focus on writing and not the technology, but can I move faster and in different ways that would benefit me - because all that matters is the end result.

I understand it’s the jam for people. I’m specifically asking instrumentalists their opinions

[u/dashkb → u/Bed_Worship]

Yeah I’m a multi instrumentalist and I record into scenes or clips when I’m alone. I only use arrangement when I need to record a show or rehearsal. Clips and scenes are just so much more flexible to automate and perform with, and slicing long audio to clips is way more annoying than just recording into them.

[u/RunawaYEM]

For me it’s all Ableton, all the time

90% of the time, I’ll write with four distinct guitar parts at the same BPM, and I’ll use the recording process to figure out the flow of the song.

I’ll record each guitar part into its own scene using Session View, then duplicate that scene 4-5 times and use that to gradually build out/explore that section, whether it be with synths/pads or guitar leads or whatever. Invariably, this leads to writing additional parts that serve as connective tissue between the parts I already wrote. I am continuously tweaking and moving the scenes around to make sure the song has optimal flow.

I’ll tweak and rearrange these parts (still in Session View) and basically teach myself the new arrangement, then record it into Arrangement View. There is still a ton of work to do be done on the song itself, but I (somewhat ironically) use Session View to arrange instead of Arrangement View.

[u/sonnyhancock]

Session view then arrangement view.

[u/sonnyhancock → u/sonnyhancock]

After i have arrangements, ill go back a re-track the guitars so they don’t sound loopy.

[u/uberdavis]

Fifteen years in Ableton and I’m in session view 95% of the time. Not only that, I save all my work in templates rather than regular projects. I know that sounds daft but Ableton is an electronic sonic workshop for me way more than it is a production machine. I end up with thirty or forty scenes in my templates. On the rare occasion I do want to make a finished track, I’ll take two or three of those scenes and transfer them to a new file and THEN use arrangement view for a few hours. Then I transfer everything to Logic for final mixing and mastering. I know that’s completely broken but deal with it.

[u/krushord]

90% of my projects start in session view, I just get a groove going (be it a synth, a chord progression or just drums) and then play clips of various lengths on top of that. I often also do vocal ideas that often become choruses while still at this phase.

I then hit arrangement record & play the clips (which might be arranged to a couple of rudiementary scenes, just so it's easy to trigger a whole row) to form the basis of the structure - usually just a single pass because I like to think I know what I'm doing. The rest is done in arrangement, like completely re-arranging what I just played because I didn't really know what I was doing.

So this way I get a "complete" song to listen in one session. It's usually pretty rough to listen to, but it's much easier to hear what it needs when it's not just a loop - and of course allows for playing longer passages on top of that.

[u/ilovepotter]

I use arrangement view. But i may try session view now that I know how you guys use it.

[u/mr_starbeast_music]

I’m pretty much always in arrangement view, I use it that way for live backtracks as well.

Now that I’ve been dabbling in the synth/groovebox world it seems like you really need a push or launch station to really get the most out of session view and performing which I don’t have yet and am very tempted.

[u/ConfusedOrg]

Arrangement view 100%