Ableton Note is great

Before I bought the Ableton Move I was looking at reviews that mentioned that it might share some code with the iOS app, Ableton Note.

I was intrigued so I bought the app for $8.99.

After playing around with it a while I think it’s amazing. Initially I thought it was cool but limited. It’s only an 8×8 grid in the arrangement window.

It’s the clip editor that is genius. It’s based on a sort of buffer that you play into and it updates visually. If you wait and do nothing it clears out. It infers the pattern length based on what you are playing. It works with automation too, showing the curve as a dotted line until you commit.

Hitting a button converts the buffer into a clip. You can continue to overdub and add automation.

The clip creation workflow is just amazing. I’m surprised that it hasn’t been extensively covered by the music tech media. I’m going to dig into this smart buffer pattern a little more.

The Ableton Move has a feature to capture what was just played into a clip without entering record mode. I think this is the closest thing to what Note does, but since Note shows you visually what is getting recorded I think it’s way more powerful.