Ableton Live 9 announced

[whyterabbyt]

the direction of the development of the Live 9 is wrong, from my point of view (musician & producer since 1994), see my previous comments in this thread. H.

Obviously it is wrong, from your point of view. Unfortunately for you, the direction its taking is entirely consistent with the historical focus of Live, its original mooted purpose as a live performance/composition instrument, not a traditional DAW. That focus established Live in a niche of its own, and Live's development history has reinforced it. To expect that to change now is unrealistic, and to be honest, if that's what you need, it sound like your problem is that you picked the wrong tool.

[Shabdahbriah]

the direction of the development of the Live 9 is wrong, from my point of view (musician & producer since 1994), see my previous comments in this thread. H.

Obviously it is wrong, from your point of view. Unfortunately for you, the direction its taking is entirely consistent with the historical focus of Live, its original mooted purpose as a live performance/composition instrument, not a traditional DAW.

I think that nails it.

Live is an "instrument" to me.

IIRC, Live (arguably) displaced "Acid" with its initial release, which IMO never caught-up as the go-to loop/clip/sample 'compositional' "sketch-book" if you will, and has been remarkably innovative in implementing features that emphasize its roots, while expanding them to embrace numerous methodologies.

Even though the price jumped (by over $100.00) for my upgrade to Suite 8, I'm still psyched.

[loachm]

Hi

All I ever wanted from Live was to be able to open a FULL SCREEN piano roll - I don't mean full screen with the editing tools/menus taking up 25% of the laft hand side - I just wanted a full screen unadulteated by clutter piano roll!

I have not kept up with Live for a couple of upgrades so, can anyone tell me if this is possible (either currently or in the latest version)?

I might just upgrade!

you can drag the midi editor right up to the top so that it's full screen. you can then use the arrow button on the bottom right to hide/show the editor. and three of the four tabs to the left can be closed (Launch/Notes/Envelopes) via the buttons in the Clip tab. Could this be what you're asking for? This is already possible with previous versions of Live.

[Harry_HH]

But according to published
information, the direction of the Live 9 is even more towards sample based music producing and live performance than the present version. I.e., the direction of the development of the Live 9 is wrong, from my point of view (musician & producer since 1994), see my previous comments in this thread. H.

I was actually responding to your comment that it is aimed at the "DJ" users - I can't personally see anything at all in this upgrade that is aimed at those users. Nor Push, which doesn't even include a cross-fader!

As for aimed at "sample based music production" (which is pretty much all the music production in the professional world these days anyway!) and "live performance" (in other words, musicians) ... I'm not really sure why that would be wrong, or a complaint. Performance and Production (including composing by implication) covers most of what we all do, surely? And whether we do those things on stage, in a studio, or both is irrelevant - the features are great either way

Your vision of the world is pritty grim if you see "all the music production in the professional world" only as a rotating samples. I'm not living in that world, anyway.
Samples (if we include sampled instruments) are of course essential part of certain genres. But Live's characteristic feature is the session view where the samples are in different role than e.g. in the sampled instruments.
This role is focused on rotating ready-made samples and also launching samples in the live performance.
And the main "beef" (according to the Ableton itself) in the new Live upgrade is just in the new session view features and sample libraries.

Instead of developing (and advertising in their Live 9 update) the interface, work flow management and different features in the arrange, Ableton itself has pointed the development of the session as the main focus area.
(and as said before, there are tons of deficiencies/things which should be done better in the arrange of the Live). H.

[Harry_HH]

the direction of the development of the Live 9 is wrong, from my point of view (musician & producer since 1994), see my previous comments in this thread. H.

Obviously it is wrong, from your point of view. Unfortunately for you, the direction its taking is entirely consistent with the historical focus of Live, its original mooted purpose as a live performance/composition instrument, not a traditional DAW. That focus established Live in a niche of its own, and Live's development history has reinforced it. To expect that to change now is unrealistic, and to be honest, if that's what you need, it sound like your problem is that you picked the wrong tool.

If you bother reading my previous comment in this thread, you see that Live is not the only sequencer I use - I guess many of the Live users use it beside some other DAW. I "didn't pick the wrong tool", I knew what I got - this doesn't prevent me to influence the product becoming better. It's nothing short of duty as a paying customer. H.

[whyterabbyt]

I "didn't pick the wrong tool", I knew what I got - this doesn't prevent me to influence the product becoming better. It's nothing short of duty as a paying customer. H.

I dont see how it falls under the term 'duty' at all. You're talking about changing the focus of a defined tool into a different kind of tool, solely because you, as an individual, want that different kind of tool. There's nothing in that that's some sort of responsibility you have for making it intrinsically 'better' as the tool it is, its an entirely selfish want that it be changed to suit you.

[UncleAge]

I don't understand a lot of the focus of this thread really. IMO, Live has always had higher COO than most daws. As a user each of us decides if its worth it or not. Sale or no sale, I know I will be upgrading because I see enough things that I like. And I have decided that Live is my tool of choice to do most things related to music in my computer. However, I have not forgotten the last two major upgrade releases and the bugs associated with them. As a result I'll take a long look at that discount offer before I reward them with an early purchase of what has historically been beta software upon release (for me).

There are quite a few things in those videos I like though. The midi transformation tools (and I'd like to see more), the clip automation in session view, audio to midi, new browser and the addition of the glue, which was on my list to purchase before the end of the year. But the biggie for me is Push. I put off buying one of the other controllers to see what might come along in the second and third generations. And that intro video of Push is the most compelling thing I've seen in any if the videos.

With all that said I'm still not happy with the snail-like progress the company has made with some of the smaller, but important, workflow features. I hope this extended upgrade/development cycle allowed them to make whatever changes was necessary to their code thus allowing some more customization and workflow improvements.

For instance... Things like custom keyboard shortcuts should not take 9 versions to work out. When I work in the midi editor I like to disable/enable notes quite a bit. But I can't get to ths function via a keyboard shortcut. And this is just one small thing that users have asked for that the Abe's need to address, in my humble opinion.

And the price? Well, truth be told I paid that inflated price in the past and I'm likely to pay it again. Even with no discount. Just being honest

[kx.001]

Hi

All I ever wanted from Live was to be able to open a FULL SCREEN piano roll - I don't mean full screen with the editing tools/menus taking up 25% of the laft hand side - I just wanted a full screen unadulteated by clutter piano roll!

I have not kept up with Live for a couple of upgrades so, can anyone tell me if this is possible (either currently or in the latest version)?

I might just upgrade!

AFAIK its still stuck in the bottom part of the screen, although you can stretch the piano roll a bit, it still involves turning off other parts half the time. I'm interested in M4L so wondering whether you can have that full screen (I want to make a dj type mixer in it)

Hopefully someone with more knowledge will enlighten both of us

[Harry_HH]

I "didn't pick the wrong tool", I knew what I got - this doesn't prevent me to influence the product becoming better. It's nothing short of duty as a paying customer. H.

I dont see how it falls under the term 'duty' at all. You're talking about changing the focus of a defined tool into a different kind of tool, solely because you, as an individual, want that different kind of tool. There's nothing in that that's some sort of responsibility you have for making it intrinsically 'better' as the tool it is, its an entirely selfish want that it be changed to suit you.

Your approach is quite a strange: you say "changing the focus of defined tool".
The tool is not "defined", it's not locked as you seem to think - the idea is to develope the product all the time. And how it is developed? - by the feedback of the end-users. Not "solely because of me" as you seem to missread, but as the aggregate of all the present/potential user manifested needs and the company/product strategy. This aggregate is called "markets" and this if how the market economy works. And by the "duty" I mean using my vote in the market, how else could the developer know what his clients think of the product and what needs there are. H.

[SLiC]

I think the progress may have been a lot faster if literally half the company hadn't left to form another company! That would slow most people down...

I also get the impression there has had to be a lot of core/original code that needed to be completely re-written; this may result bin better sound (they say it does) better CPU use and better stability, 3 of the most important aspects of any DAW/Instrument.

Guess we will find out Monday when the Beta tests start, assuming they are open

[headquest]

I think the progress may have been a lot faster if literally half the company hadn't left to form another company! That would slow most people down...

Three people out of around 150 is hardly "half"

It took time because they stopped development for over a year to fix Live 8 after its rushed release. And since then I believe they have mostly rewritten the core of Live in order to implement session automation, native 64 bit support, and other things.

Also during that time period they released Max 4 Live, Serato Bridge, and various minor enhancements. So they've not exactly been slacking

[paradiddle]

Looking forward to this update. Session automation is a big deal to me. The bezier automation curves is another one. Much faster browsing. better quality effects. M4l seems to be much faster on loading.

[billcarroll]

For me (and each of looking at the upgrade spec will see different things that do and don't appeal) the biggest news of all is the inclusion of the Orchestral Woodwind/Strings/Brass/Percussion Live Packs, which have until now retailed at a combined price of more than 400euros. We're talking one of the best orchestral sample libraries on the market, all carefully mapped out to seemlessly work in Live.

This slipped passed me, and I agree with you ... very exciting addition to Live 9 suite

[phazedown]

delete-me

[re8]

...As a user each of us decides if its worth it or not. Sale or no sale, I know I will be upgrading because I see enough things that I like. And I have decided that Live is my tool of choice to do most things related to music in my computer. However, I have not forgotten the last two major upgrade releases and the bugs associated with them. As a result I'll take a long look at that discount offer before I reward them with an early purchase of what has historically been beta software upon release (for me).

Same here. I didn't think Live8 nor M4L worth it (since I already own many VSTs, Reason, SynthMaker), but the Suite price + Push integration is worth it. Not super-deal worth it, but enough with the discount.

But looking Live's bugs' history, & now so many website/support issues now, I want to put off that purchase as long as possible.

When is the 25% discount to end please?