Sunday, February 9, 2014

Ableton Q&A Videos related to DJ'ing

Here's a collection of some additional Ableton Live tutorial videos that I've put together for people doing DJ'ing and studio work, based on YouTube viewer questions and feedback.  You can find a complete collection of my Ableton tutorials here:








Intermediate Warping Techniques in Ableton Live

Most of the tracks that I warped in my initial "Warping Tracks in Ableton Live" video were pretty simple to warp. In this video, I picked five EDM tracks of intermediate difficulty to warp, and gave some extra tips and tricks.





Using the Loop, Start, and End Indicators

Looping sections of existing tracks during a real-time DJ performance can add a lot of strength to your performance, and gives you the ability to be more versatile than simply playing other peoples' tracks back from start to finish. This video covers the Loop Indicators and when they can be useful, and also touches on the Start and End Indicators. The practice of looping through the use of the loop indicators should not be confused with a separate but similar-sounding practice in Ableton, namely that of importing and using "looped" audio clips.





DJ'ing with Songs in Non-Electronic Genres

I've had lots of questions about how to include tracks of significantly diverse tempos in your sets, such as hip hop, indie pop, and classic rock. This video explains my own approach to tracks in these genres.





Inserting a New Track in the Middle of Arrangement View

This one is pretty simple, to be honest. How do you insert a new track into the middle of an already-complete production in the arrangement view? This video is pretty short.





Automating Global Tempo in a Studio Production

Here's another short one, based on numerous viewer questions. Once you have a studio-produced DJ Mix set up in the arrangement view, you may want to vary the tempo as the mix plays back. This video shows you how.





Cutting Breakdowns out of Dance Music Tracks

Another very short video. If you've got a track with a quiet breakdown and you don't want your dance floor to lose energy and interest, it might be smart to use Ableton to just remove that breakdown from the song. It's very easy. However, having said that, you should also watch the next video in this post which shows you an alternative to cutting out a breakdown, namely, to keep it and enhance it.





Enhancing EDM Breakdowns with Simple Editing Techniques

As you probably expect, this video teaches you how to spice up an existing track by adding things like extra drums, extra bass notes, etc. This is a medium-length video, but I hope it opens your eyes to all sorts of production capabilities that you might want to start digging into.





Clarifying Warping and Global Tempo:

Many people didn't entirely understand how warped tracks would synchronize together, so this is a short video that aims simply to clarify how warped tracks are treated by Ableton, and how they are tied to the global tempo.






I'm Jonathan Clark, known online as DJ Bolivia.  Do you want to learn more about DJ'ing and music production?  If so, visit:



If you happen to enjoy techno tracks, most of my tracks are available as free downloads from this link:



Thanks so much for visit, and for your support!  I really appreciate the fan base that I've been able to build up over the years.

Also, if you want to visit any of my other sites, here are a few links:
    YouTube:  youtube.com/djbolivia
    SoundCloud:  soundcloud.com/djbolivia
    Blogger:  djbolivia.blogspot.com
    Main Site:  www.djbolivia.ca