Lesson 2 - How to make bass lines for electronic dance music using Ableton Live 9 - taught by Ben (producer/remixer from synthpop band COSMIC ARMCHAIR (www.cosmicarmchair.com) at the ELECTRONIC MUSIC LAB (www.eml.org.sg)

1. Benjamin Ang (www.cosmicarmchair.com)

2. Lesson 1 in this series: Beat Making

3. Menu
Zoom in and zoom out
Tempo
Start, Stop, Record
Select a section
Loop
Switch between Arrangement and Session mode
Switch on or off
Volume control
Click on Add Folder and look for your Samples folder
Zoom in and zoom out

4. 1. Choose Instruments
2. Simpler / Bass /
Analogue Bass
3. Highlight one bar. From the menu, click Create-Insert MIDI Clip
4. Double click on the MIDI clip to edit it
5. Scroll to C1 and click to insert notes

5. You have created a bass line in C
Copy and paste this a few times
After a few bars, you may need a change – we call this a chord progression

6. Duplicate the clip
Select all the notes in the duplicate clip
Move them up or down to make a variation
Copy and paste variations
Popular chord progressions are:
C – Em – F – Am
Am – C – Dm – F
C – G – Am – F
See autochords.com for more ideas

9. Change octave up or down
You can also use the
computer keyboard to play notes

10. 1. Choose Instruments
2. Simpler / Bass / Analogue Bass
3. Click this to switch on the metronome
4. Click on the circle button to ‘arm’ it for recording
5. Click the ‘record’ button to start recording

11. Try it
Use the beats you created in Lesson 1
Add a bass line using one of the suggested chord progressions
Next week
Introduction to Synths
How to record lead lines, riffs, pads and other important instrument parts