Hello there,
I’m a new user to hooktheory. lots of learning so far.
I’m using some loops on ableton and as i’m crafting chords i’d like to sync hooktheory that sits in my chrome browser with Ableton.
Any simple way to do start / stop on ableton, and sync hooktheory ?
I was thinking that maybe using an IAC midi bus I could send a start / stop to hooktheory if the possibility exists .
@team hooktheory, any thoughts or alternative ways to do so ?
many thanks !
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Hello, and thank you for your question!
Unfortunately I don’t think that that’s possible right now. Even if you would be able to start both Hookpad and Ableton at exactly the same time, both systems wouldn’t be in sync as Hookpad uses an internal buffer of 100ms to play instruments with slow attack times with the right timing. And the browser might add an unknown amount of latency as well. Perhaps you could add a manually adjustable delay in Ableton and tweak it until it sounds in sync, but I can’t guarantee that this would ever be a great workflow.
One thing which could help you is our new stem export feature. So you could create your chords in Hookpad, add an instrument of your choice, export the stems and import them into Ableton.
Or you could also export the a single instrument as midi and import this into Ableton.
Please let me know if this helped.
Dennis
Hi Dennis
thanks for the feedback and Happy new year !!
well, you have to understand where I im in the the creation process . I’m not at export stage but rather at ideation stage in my electronic music track creation. I will export as you propose when it’s all constructed as I want.
on one hand, I use Ableton / Loopcloud to create a super loop. 8 to 10 tracks of samples basically that gives a rhythm and a sense of key signature and maybe some melody with some vocal samples.
on the other hand, I use hook theory to put all the harmony , harmony changes and I must say it’s very good and I 'm doing some chord quality changes, parallel modes borrowing of chords, and I’m playing with “B” and I digg into the various left / right hand piano modes, the drum styles etc… to give a jazzy vibe for example .
the only way to make it happen for me is : launch Hookpad with 8 bars of preroll and launch ableton jutin time. if you look at the reactivity it’s clearly chrome to be launched first then ableton as it is super fast start.
I can send you an example of parallel creation with both softwares, played quasi at the same time.
Also, there is no offset delay, meaning that 120 bpm in chrome is 120 bpm in ableton.
finally, maybe this piece of software could help to synch them both - it doesn’t seems crazy to code at least !
I could beta test it for you if you 'd like.
cheers !!
Thank you for the explanation and the link!
One problem is, that Hookpad doesn’t use Midi internally, we have our own system for that. So we won’t be able to just output the midi-data during playback as there is no midi data there.
But perhaps we could make an option to output MIDI notes to start/stop playback. The users would have to setup the midi connections and the DAW which would be slaved to Hookpad themselves, put the cursor on the right position, select the right tempo etc… I also don’t think there is a way for us to check if Hookpad and the DAW are in sync, all we can do is to select the same tempo for both and hope it stays in sync.
So this looks like a pretty incomplete feature for me, but at the same time it could be really helpful if the user has some skills to set everything up and make it work. I have to think about it a little bit more.
Dennis
Hi !
i’m doing a remix in electronic music and I have a 2 screeen setup.
left screen is hook theory with the piano chords / style that fit the singer melody
right screen is ableton with the remix.
I put hookpad on a loop and start it, work on the chords at same BPM;
once my chord progression is done, I start the playback on the left screen, and would push the space bar, in tempo, to sync like a DJ the two programs once a complete loop is done.
I hope it makes sense.
It would be great to have a way to sync the start / stop together.
Hi, waiting for the loop to start new is genius!
What would you need to sync Ableton? Some kind of midi trigger signal? I agree that this would be a great thing to have. I’ll investigate what’s needed.
Syncing in general can get complicated with master and slave apps and processes which make sure everything stays in sync and starts at the same position. But perhaps for now it is enough to just send a start and a stop trigger from Hookpad to your DAW and you do all the start positions etc yourself?
Regards!
Dennis