In this tutorial I share a technique for turning any texture, pad, or soundscape into a tight rhythmic stuttering pattern. It’s accomplished using sidechain options of the gate effect in Ableton Live. This type of effect is something you hear in a lot of psy dub, psy trance, and psybient music. You hear it used in many songs by artists like Shpongle, Ott, Bluetech, Phutureprimitive, and many more.

In this Ableton Live lesson, I will demo how to split 2 or more instruments across your midi controller.  That way you can play one instrument with each hand or switch between sounds quickly.  I use this technique sometimes when playing live with my band to control bass with one hand and pads/synth with the other.  It comes in extremely handy… 

Here’s my latest Ableton Live tutorial where I explain some interesting ways to create morphing arpeggio effects using instrument racks, effect racks, velocity sensitivity, and a little creativity. As an example I made an arp that fades from a piano to a plucked string instrument sound.