Ableton Live
Open your Ableton Live sets in monody. Send them back with stems.
monody is a DAW with an AI assistant built in. It opens Live 12 sets (.als) with their notes, audio, tempo, levels and groups, and writes your project back out as a Live project folder with stems.
Ableton Live
Try it without leaving Live.
Bring a stuck Live 12 set in, finish it in monody, and send it back. Nothing to switch before you know it helps.
- 01
Open your set
Open a Live set (.als) as a new project, or pull chosen tracks into the one you have. Notes, audio clips, tempo, levels and groups (as buses) come across.
- 02
Finish it here
Arrange, mix and master with the assistant beside you. Everything it changes is marked, and Before / After flips a whole request.
- 03
Send it back
Export for Ableton Live writes a Live project folder: the set, your audio, and stems of monody’s instruments, effects and buses. It opens in Live 12.
Stays behind, for now
- Live’s instruments, effects and plugins — MIDI parts get a monody sound picked from what they play
- Warping — warped clips play at their own speed for now
- Return tracks, automation and the master chain
Tested with Live 12 sets. Older sets should open too, but haven’t been tested yet.
What comes across, and what stays behind
monody reads the set itself, not a bounce of it. Here is what lands in your monody project when you open a Live set:
| Comes across | Stays behind |
|---|---|
| MIDI tracks and their clips, note for note | Live's instruments, effects and plugins (monody lists them) |
| Audio tracks and their clips, with the samples | Warping: warped clips play at their own speed for now |
| Tempo | Return tracks |
| Track volume and pan (a muted track comes in with its fader all the way down) | Automation |
| Group tracks, as buses with their routing | The master chain |
| Arrangement clips, and Session clips laid out scene by scene when a set has no arrangement |
The audio files come from where the set points to: the paths saved in the set, or Live's own library folders on your Mac (Core Library, User Library, Packs). A set moved from another computer may open with some samples missing.
Open a set in three steps
- In monody, choose Project ▸ Open Ableton Live set… for a new project, or Import tracks from an Ableton set… to add tracks to the one you have open. Dropping a
.alsfile on the arrangement works too. - Pick the tracks you want. monody shows every track in the set before anything is copied.
- Work on it. The arrangement, the piano roll, the mixer, the Finish view and the assistant all work on the imported tracks like any other.
Importing tracks into a project is one step in its history, so a single undo takes them back out.
Send it back to Live
Project ▸ Export for Ableton Live… writes a Live project folder:
<Name>.als, the set itselfSamples/Imported, your audio filesSamples/Processed/Bounce, stems of monody's instruments, effects and buses
MIDI tracks keep their notes, so you can keep editing them in Live. Live has no copy of monody's synth, so each instrument's sound comes along as a stem next to its MIDI track. Audio tracks keep their clips. Export the whole project and the stems add up to your mix. The folder loads in Live 12.
Limits, said plainly
- Ableton's instruments, effects and plugin settings don't come across. A part that depends on one plays on monody's synth instead.
- Warped audio comes in unstretched.
- Return tracks, automation and the master chain don't carry over in either direction.
- monody runs on macOS. Windows comes once it has passed testing on a real PC.
If those limits rule it out for a project, that's fine. If they don't, a stuck set is a good way to try monody: open it, finish it, send it back.
Questions
- Can I open an Ableton .als file without Ableton Live?
- Yes. monody opens Live 12 sets as a new project, or pulls the tracks you pick into the project you have open. MIDI clips, audio clips, tempo, track levels, pan and groups come across, and muted tracks arrive with their fader all the way down. Ableton's own instruments, effects and plugins don't. Bitwig Studio can also import .als files.
- Which Live versions does monody open?
- It is tested with Ableton Live 12 sets. Sets from Live 8 to 11 use the same format and should open, but they haven't been tested yet.
- Is monody an Ableton plugin?
- No. monody is its own DAW, a separate desktop app. It reads and writes Live's file format so you can move a project between the two. monody is not affiliated with or endorsed by Ableton.
- What happens to my Ableton devices and plugins?
- They stay behind. monody lists them when it opens the set. Each MIDI track gets a monody synth sound picked from what the part plays, and you can change it by hand or ask the assistant for a different one.
- Do I need a paid plan to open a Live set?
- No. The Free plan opens sets of up to 8 tracks, and you choose which tracks to bring in. Pro removes the track limit.
- Does the export open in Ableton Live?
- Yes. Export for Ableton Live writes a Live project folder with the set, your audio and stems, and it loads in Live 12. MIDI tracks keep their notes; the sound monody gave them travels as a stem next to them.