Sampling is a technique often used in various audio endeavours, which can come in many different forms. This post is designed to give you a fundamental understanding of Ableton's Sampler instrument. With this tool, samples can be imported and controlled by MIDI, changing each sample's pitch and velocity with each corresponding note-stroke of a keyboard. It can also be utilised to layer various samples at once, to essentially synthesize new and unique sounds. This process of multi-sampling is quite versatile and can be used creatively in multifarious ways.
GETTING STARTED
Initially, the Sampler instrument (available only in Suite) can be dragged into a new channel in Ableton's session view. From here, any sound that you want sampled can then be dragged into the sampler; these can be visualised by clicking on the Zone tab of the sampler. Ultimately a sampled sound for each note of each octave is recommended for an optimum quality sampler instrument, however this can take up a lot of space on a hard drive, as well as adding to the strain on your CPU load. Therefore, Steve Howell (2005) recommends that most good samplers will include every third note. This way, the note only has to be transposed up or down one step, preventing unwanted warping and maintaining a sound that is more faithful to the true sample.
With just one sample imported into the sampler, any key can be played on a MIDI controllable device, and each note will play the sample back transposed to the appropriate pitch of the correlated note. Though as previously mentioned, can sound quite poor due to the transposition necessary. Therefore, once a variety of pitched samples have been imported into the sampler, it will appear as a 'wall of green' (seen below); whereby each stroke of the keyboard will trigger each sample at once. To alleviate this issue, each sample needs to be adequately organised and then distributed.
ORGANISING SAMPLES
The first step is to ensure each of the samples imported have their Root Key set appropriately; such that a string sample in the key of C#4, has that set in its Root Key section of the sampler (seen beside). This is visually represented by the little 'R' in the green bar (seen above).
It may then be useful, if the samples are not already in order, to rearrange them so that each step up in pitch is organised in ascending order. This can be done by dragging them to the appropriate location of the sampler.
DISTRIBUTING SAMPLES
The next step is to right-click in the Zone section of the sampler, and select Distribute Ranges Around Root Key. This will distribute the ranges of each sample such that each note played will trigger the respective sample (since we have already set the root key). If a sample for every note is imported, each note will trigger its own sample. If (in the situation shown below), not every note has a sample, the samples will have now been distributed to cover a range of notes, and will be automatically transposed to fit with the relevant key pressed.
Another option could be to select Distribute Ranges Equally, which will spread each of the samples out equally across the octaves, irrelevant of their root key. This could be useful if you wish to have a variety of different sounds in one sampler, or perhaps if the sample is the type of sound where pitch is irrelevant.
INSTRUMENT DESIGN
Once the sampler is operational, further steps can be taken to optimise the use of the sampler as an instrument. By right-clicking the sampler and selecting group, it will create an instrument rack which includes all of the samples. From here there are innumerable options, respective of your chosen application. Perhaps you may want to control the envelope of each sample played, low-pass filter them, or modulate them with some LFO's. For more advanced techniques, macros could be used to map the decay and sustain to some outboard gear, or automate it within the DAW. Furthermore, within the instrument rack, more plug-ins and effects can be added in to create really unique sound textures.
STACKING SAMPLES
Another possibility to design a more unique sound, is to stack samples, so that there can be multiple samples triggered when a particular key is pressed. In the below example I have found a 10 second long sample, dragged it into the sampler, and then tightened the sample up using the triangular arrows to find a particular element I would like coupled with the string pluck. By doing so, each time a key is pressed on the keyboard, both the string pluck and the extraneous noise is sampled. Furthermore, each element can have its Vol or Pan manipulated to essentially 'mix' the output sound. This process could be repeated for each note, with multiple stacks, to create an infinite number of possible outcomes.
VELOCITY SENSITIVE SAMPLES
Another possibility with the sampler is to enable different samples from triggering with respect to the note's velocity. MIDI keyboards are generally velocity sensitive already, but with respect to an ITB session, the velocity levels on each note can altered to achieve the same result. This technique is similar to the organisation of each note according to its key, just for velocity. Observing again the Zone expansion, next to the Key tab which we have thus far been working under, there is a Vel tab.
Once again, each of the samples can be chosen to trigger over a range of velocities, and once again if you right-click and select Distribute Ranges Equally it will repeat the process explained earlier, but this time for velocity sensitive ranges. Generally this could be a great idea for percussive samplers; by recording samples at soft, medium, and hard hits (as well as any in between; with up to 127 possible velocity options), a more realistic sound will be created if the velocity-sensitive MIDI controller is pressed in differing proportions; adding another element of "human-ness" to the sampler. A more creative use could be to incorporate certain one-shots, vocal stabs, or even ambient noises when the key is pressed at a certain velocity. Again, the creative possibilities are endless.
As you can see samplers can be an incredibly versatile tool for a variety of audio purposes, and this tutorial only just skims the fundamental concepts.
Stay Tuned
- TA
REFERENCES
Howell, S. (2005). The Lost Art of Sampling. Retrieved from https://www.soundonsound.com/techniques/lost-art-sampling-part-1
Comments