In contrast to many other software sequencers, Live is designed to be an instrument for live performances as well as a tool for composing, recording, arranging, mixing, and mastering audio. It is also used by DJs, as it offers a suite of controls for beatmatching, crossfading, and other different effects used by turntablists, and was one of the first music applications to automatically beatmatch songs.[3]
Live is available directly from Ableton in three editions: Intro (with fewer features), Standard, and Suite (with the most features). The Suite edition includes "Max for Live" functionality, developed in partnership with Cycling '74.[4]
Ableton has also made a fourth version of Live, Lite, with similar limitations to Intro, which is only available bundled with a range of music production hardware, including MIDI controllers and audio interfaces.[5]
Live was created by Gerhard Behles, Robert Henke and Bernd Roggendorf in the mid-1990s.[6] Behles and Henke met while studying programming at Technische Universitt Berlin, and wrote software in the music programming language Max to perform techno as their band Monolake. Henke and Behles identified a need in Berlin's electronic music scene for user-friendly software for live performances, and worked with local acts to develop it.[6] Though Live was not developed in Max, Max was used to prototype most of its features.[7]
Henke said later of Live's creation, "I think the feeling we had was [that] there was enough like-minded people in our closer community who could appreciate a product like this, and that it could work commercially. That gave us confidence to believe that a small company could actually survive on the market."[6] He said one of the first industry figures to recognize Live's potential was the Hollywood composer Hans Zimmer, who was impressed by Live's ability to change the tempo of a loop without altering its pitch.[6] Roggendorf, another programmer, joined Behles and Henke in the late 90s and helped them turn their Max patches into a general set of software for retail.[6] They released the first commercial version of Live on October 30, 2001.[8]
Unlike Pro Tools, which focuses on multitrack recording, the first version of Live was designed for performing live with loops.[7] It offered sophisticated tools for triggering loops, playing samples and time stretching audio, and was immediately popular with electronic music producers.[7] Live's time stretching algorithm, known as "Warping", was particularly notable and gave DJs greater control over mixing and beatmatching, smoothly blending tracks of different tempos.[7]
In 2010, Ableton introduced Max for Live, enabling connectivity between Max and Live.[7] Live made it easier for musicians to use computers as instruments in live performance without programming their own software, influencing the rise of global festival culture in the 2000s.[6]
Live utilizes audio samples or MIDI sequences, referred to as Clips, which are arranged to be played live (i.e. "launched" or played back in a pre-arranged order. MIDI information received by Live can trigger notes on Live's built in instruments, as well as third party VST instruments or external hardware.[20]
Live Intro includes four instruments (Impulse, Simpler, Instrument Rack, and Drum Rack). Live Standard additionally includes External Instrument, with users having the option to purchase additional instruments. By contrast, Live Suite includes all available instruments.
Akai Professional makes the APC40 mk II, a MIDI controller designed to work solely with Live and closely maps the layout of Live's Session View onto a physical control surface. A smaller version, the APC20, was released in 2010.[24] Novation offers the Launchpad, a pad device that has been designed for use with Live.
Ableton has also released their own MIDI controller, the Push, which is the first pad-based controller that embraces scales and melody.[25] In November 2015, Ableton released an updated MIDI contr
