Ableton Live 12: MIDI Transformations

Arpeggiate will transform chords into arpeggios.

Transform your MIDI with Live 12’s new tools.

In the August 2024 column we covered the stimulating world of Live 12’s MIDI note generators. And now that we’ve generated all these notes, what are we going to do with them? Transform them, of course! To save you, the humble electronic music genius, from having to manipulate these notes manually, why not get the computer to do it? The new (MIDI) Transformation Tools are your new (MIDI) robots in disguise!

Live 12 came with a raft of intriguing and useful MIDI Transformations, which can manipulate notes in a MIDI clip. Some reduce the time it takes to create frequently used effects, and some can create melodic and rhythmic variations on existing material, potentially re‑stimulating the creative juices.

You will find these 12 new options in a MIDI clip’s MIDI Transformations tab. What follows is a brief overview of each and their most likely applications.

Arpeggiate

The Arpeggiate Transformer (shown in the opening screenshot) builds on the Arpeggiator device and contains a subset of its options (Styles, Steps, Distance, Rate and Gate). Given that it acts on selected notes in a MIDI clip it’s no surprise you can see the notes change in real time as you change the parameters, which is, of course, extremely handy. They can then be edited further on the grid, ensuring the results meet your needs. In keeping with Live 12’s new features, the Distance setting can be set to Chromatic or Scale Aware, a nice touch.

Something to note is that if you trigger or edit a different MIDI clip from the one you are working on the arpeggiation notes on the piano roll will become permanent, and you won’t be able to toggle back to the originating chord sequence again.

If I could request one feature here, it would be great to have Euclidean‑style rhythms available in the presets, or the ability to mute notes in the pattern to give more rhythmic variety.

Strum

As you might guess, Strum emulates the natural feel of strummed chords on a guitar or similar stringed instrument. Instead of all the notes in a chord triggering simultaneously, Strum introduces a timing offset between each note.

Strum emulates the sound of strumming a guitar.

This is beautifully implemented and easy to use: simply drag the bottom of the ‘pendulum’ left or right, and the selected chords will shift according to that slope. The slope can be curved using the Tension control, and the top of the pendulum can also be shifted using the High control (which accordingly moves the top note of a chord around). It’s simple, fun and effective. To get the best results I would recommend taking the time to give each chord its own strum setting, which will...