The XT Live Performance Thread

[Exit Zero]

Well, a sticky thread is at least a start.

You're points are well taken, Bones. I'm very glad you are contributing to this discussion! I have similar viewpoints and what you spoke of is basically the reason I don't care for Ableton Live. But I can certianly see why those who are more into DJing or loop-arranging consider Live to be a formidable tool.

I myself do use sequenced material (I've written from scratch) as a backing track element. I have always been moving toward a more improvised performance.

But this has been a natural progession for me. I started out triggering longer sequences, basically songs, and playing keyboard leads over the top. Later I progressed into chopping up the relevant parts of those longer sequences and started triggering them improvisationaly and mixing elements from the entire pool. Now each performance was never exactly the same. And so naturally I am moving more toward the smaller and smaller elements to further expand the pallette of possible outcomes. I also am having a lot of fun with arpeggiation as a new tool to spark off of.

Anyway...

I would only like to politely suggest that we don't get into too much philisophical discussions about performance *ethics*, but rather the **technical** aspects of using Energy XT in a live setting.

For what it is worth, I know of many very respectable artists using long presequenced movements and still rock the house.

I would imagine the relevant audience of this thread to be:

- IDM or "LivePA" artists
- Keyboardists who need a virtual rack
- Keyboardists who need background sequencing
- DJs

Oh and btw, if interest warrants it, we may create a dedicated forum for this discussion as I can already see some fragments breaking off.

[parky]

For my live performance I have absolutely no need of live arrangement tools and could never imagine being entertained by someone who was focussed on doing that. What I need are tools that allow me to focus on performing. Ideally, I would only touch the computer once, at the beginning of the show to start playback. From that point everything should be done from some kind of instrument that allows you to perform like a trained monkey with ants in his pants. Unfortunately I am yet to devise a system that will work like that in a useful way. i.e. I know exactly how I could do it right now but it would be such a convoluted process that it would become as inflexible as a backing CD-R.

Given what you just said, have you checked out Brainspawn's Forte for live performance?

http://www.kvraudio.com/get/522.html

Just curious because Forte is a tool that is touted for live performance, but you see few people mentioning it.

[Exit Zero]

Just out of curiosity - do you XTLive guys create XT Sampler patches of your synths before taking it to the stage?

I have done this. Normally I run soft synths live though.

A nifty trick is to take Xlutop Chainer and create Soundfonts from multiple instances of really hoggish soft synths and effects. You can make MASSIVE sounding patches this way for later use inside XT's sampler which supports SF2. (Hot tip! Folks, you can even do this with the demo version of Chainer. You cannot save your setups in Chainer's demo but you can still create and save soundfonts, or multiple wav - even 24 bit!)

Thanks for reminding me of this Caleb, I'm gonna go make some patches tonight!

Btw, discoDSP HighLife can freeze softsynths as well.

[Caleb]

And there's also a tool that's been worked on in KvR to render to sf2 as well.

I think it's probably very relevant especially for those who might be a little concerned about CPU problems at a time-critical moment in their performance.

That's also why I think WusikStation or ManyStation is also probably an idea because the CPU use is so low and the synthesis possibilities still very high.

It might help make your favourite synth patches less CPU-consuming but still maintain some of the "liveliness" of the patch itself.

I'm sure XT's sampler is also very capable of doing this.

Caleb

[BONES]

Given what you just said, have you checked out Brainspawn's Forte for live performance?

No, I use ORION for everything else and there is no way I could find the time to port all of our songs across purely for the stage. Then there is the indispensible nature of ORION's internal generators. eXT has some great tools that I can use inside ORION which will allow us to do a lot more live than we have in the past, even if it is just triggering a bassline or arpeggio from a controller rather than leaving it to the sequencer.
None of it, however, is even close to the set-and-forget performance I have been able to get for 15 years from hardware workstations which is very dissappointing, although the advantages of working within the computer far outweigh that one drawback.
eXT gives me the ability to trigger patterns and to more efficiently stack instruments to make it possible to play more and more on stage, much better than I could with ORION alone. As we work up a new set for some gigs in September, I'm getting quite excited at the possibilities that this comination will open up as I dig deeper.

[Caleb]

I knew you'd find eXT useful for something Bones.
I never thought it would replace Orion for you but to add to it.

It's really great to see that start happening for you.

Caleb

[mystahr]

just to add my two cents here; although besides performing live online (meaning I got to perform from my home studio) I haven't been mobile yet. And since I don't feel like bringing a full puter on stage, experimenting more with XT as a live tool will proceed once there's a laptop here.

But....

in the live performance I have used XT for sequence-playing and as an infinite looping device. I have a few odd recordings here of considerable length (noises, voices & feedback) that I let freerun in XT while performing live and use the UC33 knobbox to mangle the heck out of it. Ehm, I use dburgans liveWAV for this purpose. As said though I have yet to experiment way more with XT to fully get the most out of it, but will use it more for backgrounds or additional sound sources to the hardware.

Then again I feel I need to prep myself more (building cases, etc) and then still hope that one day I can do a true live ambient show.

PS: good to have this as a sticky btw

[Klemperer]

A nifty trick is to take Xlutop Chainer and create Soundfonts from multiple instances of really hoggish soft synths and effects. You can make MASSIVE sounding patches this way for later use inside XT's sampler which supports SF2. (Hot tip! Folks, you can even do this with the demo version of Chainer. You cannot save your setups in Chainer's demo but you can still create and save soundfonts, or multiple wav - even 24 bit!)

Btw, discoDSP HighLife can freeze softsynths as well.

Yes, Chainer is fine for that! I like it much, even if I only have the demo (should have saved other things it seems). Is Xlutop still "active"= do you get your license soon? As I didn't hear anything of them since ages, no updates and so on.
Highlife was too heavy for my laptop as I tested it, but if you got the CPU-power, it must be great?

I once donated for a little tool called "VSTi-dumper", there's a thread about it here at KVR, but the guy has other works to do, so it still is a bit buggy it seems. Can export to sf2 and wavs too.

Cheers Mystahr. The FAQ kept me from listening to more of your stuff, but I'll surely do...

[Aj@uma]

Hi all,

A couple of weeks until my first XT/lappie gig. Everything seems rock solid but having a few probs with levels on certain vst instruments. Some are really low and barely register on the XT mixer comp, others are too high. I've tweaked the levels on the main mixer and in the vst themselves which has helped a bit but it's still a problem - because I have to lower the louder instruments to work with the quiet ones the output from the soundcard ends up too low.

I thought about using a compressor or a simple gain. Can anybody recommend one that's cheap/free with low cpu overhead (yes, I know I'm asking for the world)?

AJ@uma

[inkinen]

AJ@uma> here's a list of free dynamic processors :

http://www.kvraudio.com/get.php?mode=re ... =3&rpp=100

personally i use the blockfish a lot, but there are other good plugins there as well! try the kjaerhus ones too. tug of war compressor comes to mind too, but im not sure if its available anymore.

sounds exciting doing a live gig with xt! thats something i want to try too. good luck, and dont forget to tell me how the gig went!

[Aj@uma]

Thanks inkinen. I already have some of those on the list and will try the others out. Anybody used any of these live?

AJ@uma

[inkinen]

i have used the tls limiter, mda limiter and also the classic master limiter for live use! works just fine..i also like the new tls pocket limiter too.

the w1 limiter looks promising too.. havent tried it yet though!

[Klemperer]

Just short, the FAQ and TIPs are now kind of a wiki. This is to say if you want you can add any LIVE-topic there too, and do it yourself! See the other sticky, if you'd like...

[Caleb]

So - what about effects during a live performance?

I might be taking a wrong direction here, but I would imagine the primary importance for effects during a live performance is efficiency (even over sound).

I'm guessing that the pristine nature of the effect isn't as important in a live setting as in the recording studio.

I'm also guessing that you can probably drop reverbs in general and replace them with delays - especially on vocal performances?

Anyone think much about this sort of thing in their own performances?

Caleb

[soma]

Some good ideas for live mode in this thread!

http://www.kvraudio.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=96721