> Step by step
4. Cloning a sampled loop in Ableton Live
1 How many times have you heard a loop and thought ‘I wish I could recreate that!' Now you can! We want to reproduce Proof Loop 1. wav included in the Tutorial folder. We've loaded in the loop at 142bpm. If your audio originates from a different source, you may need to isolate and loop the required section to determine the correct tempo.
2 Right-click (or Ctrl-click) on the clip and select Convert Drums to New MIDI Track. Live analyses the audio and detects any kick, snare and hat transients it can find, then creates a new MIDI track containing note events that correspond to them. The MIDI track contains a preset drum rack of Roland TR-606 samples to play them.
3 Open the new part in the MIDI note editor to see what the software has made of the loop. It will have interpreted each transient as either a kick, snare or closed hi-hat event, placing the beats on the default notes for these sounds. Use the track Solo buttons to flick between the original loop and the rendered MIDI part to spot any major differences.
4 Live got pretty close, but it interpreted some of the hi-hat beats from the original as extra kick drums. This is an easy fix – just delete the unwanted kicks on 1.2.4, 1.4.3 and 2.2.4. To bring out the two open hi-hat beats on 1.4.3 and 2.4.3, transpose the closed hi-hat F# A# on these beats up from 1 to 1 using the up arrow key on your computer keyboard.
5 Now we can go about replacing the sounds. Switch to Device View by clicking the tab in the bottom-right corner of the screen, then open the Sample Browser's content pane. We'll change some of the current sounds for some others. In the Tutorial Files, locate the file KD 1.wav and drag and drop it onto the Kick 606 pad in the drum rack.
6 Do the same for the snare and hi-hats, bringing in SN 5.wav, HH 6. wav and OH 4.wav. It's easy to spot the right pads as their play buttons flash when triggered. The new sounds' volume levels are a tad uneven, so reduce each sample's Vel control (in the Device View) to 0% and turn up the Volume parameter above it to a good level – we've gone for 0dB.