Especially when using Ableton Live for live music performance you want to stay in time. When you play live beats or instruments and when you trigger scenes and clips this is crucial. Using a click track or an audio click metronome monitor in Ableton Live is not for everyone. The sound of the click can get annoying and take away the feeling and vibe. You should find the best ‘feeling’ set-up to perform music – always – and one way could be to set up a visual metronome monitor.
How to set up a visual metronome monitor
I designed a Max for Live device which gives you a fully customisable floating pop up window. You can customise colours, size and all different common bpm monitor visual tools.
You would need Max for Live, which is included in the Ableton Live Suite Version to be able to use this.
Different visual options with the Metronome Monitor
Beat counts
You are able to select if the monitor should show the beat counts and in which color they should be shown.
Sliders
You can as well use two different visual slider options. The circle slider and the “left-to-right” slider. Customise the colours and opacity for the sliders.
Beat flashing
If you like to get a flashing on every beat count you can easily set this up. You can set the length of the flashing relative to the master BPM in Ableton Live but as well to independent time values. Set the count “1” a different color if you like.
Tutorial on using a visual metronome in Ableton Live
In the video below you can find a whole walk-through tutorial on all the different option you get in Ableton Live when using this Metronome Monitor device.
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