Ableton/Live/UG/35 Push 1
- Playing, sequencing, mixing and controlling Live with the Push 1 controller.
- Push 1 needs no drivers or setup in the Settings. With Live running, it is detected as soon as it is plugged into USB and works right away.
- Browse Mode loads sounds and effects from Push 1 without Live's browser. The display shows devices, presets and the browser's Places in columns, one column per folder level; In and Out shift the columns to reach deeper folders or show more presets.
- The Selection Control buttons (first row under the display) move up a level and the State Control buttons (second row) move down one. Core Library and Pack items preview when selected.
- The green button on the right loads the selected preset; the one on the left loads the device's default preset. A loaded entry's button turns amber, and pressing it again loads the next entry, which makes auditioning quick. Encoders scroll quickly;
Shift with up or down moves a page. - What Browse shows depends on the last selected device: replacement instruments for an instrument, effects for an effect, and everything loadable for an empty MIDI track. Folders appear only when they hold something loadable at that moment; samples show only when browsing a single Drum Rack pad.
- Turn on Note Mode and load a Drum Rack preset from Browse. On a Drum Rack track, pressing Note cycles the 8x8 grid through three layouts.
- The grid splits into three parts so you can play, step-sequence and set the clip length at once.
- The 16 drum pads use Drum Rack's 4x4 layout. Pad colors: bright yellow has a sound, dull yellow is empty, green is playing, light blue is selected, dark blue is soloed, orange is muted.
- The touch strip or Octave Up and Down move through larger racks 16 pads at a time; add
Shift to move by single rows. - Holding Note briefly shows the 16 Velocities layout;
Shift + Note locks it, and Note again unlocks it.
- Here the bottom-right 16 pads are 16 velocities for the selected drum pad; tap one to enter steps at that velocity.
- Holding Note briefly shows the loop length controls;
Shift + Note locks them.
- Uses the whole 8x8 grid for playing drums, which suits large kits such as sliced samples. Press Note again to toggle to it, and again to return to Loop Selector. Pad colors match the three-part layout.
- The 16 pads shown for step sequencing don't follow layout changes, so you may need the touch strip or Octave keys to bring the right ones into view.
- Browse can load or replace a single pad. Press Device to show the track's devices, tap the pad, then press the selection button under its name. Browse now targets that pad, and tapping other pads while browsing retargets.
35.3.4.1 Additional Pad Options for Push 1
- Hold Duplicate, press a pad, then press the destination pad to copy it. The destination's devices and sound are replaced, but its recorded notes stay.
- Tapping a pad also picks it for step sequencing; hold Select while tapping to pick it silently. Tap step pads to place notes; the clip starts as soon as you tap a step. Each step is a 16th note by default, changed with the Scene/Grid buttons.
- A moving green pad marks the playing step, red while recording. Tapping a filled step deletes the note; hold Mute to deactivate a step instead, or Solo to solo a sound. Hold Delete and tap a pad to clear its notes within the loop.
- Step colors: unlit is empty, blue has a note (darker means higher velocity), dull yellow is a muted note. With triplet steps the two right columns turn red and are unused.
- Velocity and micro-timing per note are covered in Ableton/Live/UG/35 Push 1/12 Step Sequencing Automation; loop length pads in Ableton/Live/UG/35 Push 1/06 Step Sequencing Melodies and Harmonies/01 Adjusting the Loop Length.
- Turn on Metronome for a click if wanted, then press Record and play the pads. Record again stops recording but keeps playing; a third press starts overdub, and further presses toggle playback and overdub.
- New stops the selected clip and readies a new one on the track, so you can practice first. By default it also copies the clips playing on other tracks to a new scene and keeps them playing; the Workflow preference changes this.
- Fixed Length makes new clips a set length; hold it to choose the length.
- With it off, clips record until you press Record, New or Play/Stop. Turning it on mid-recording stops recording and loops the last few bars, per the Fixed Length setting.
- Repeat and quantize options for recording on Push 1.
- With Repeat on, holding a pad plays an even stream of notes, handy for steady hi-hats; finger pressure sets their volume. The Scene/Grid buttons set the rate, and Push remembers Repeat per track.
- A quick press latches Repeat on; holding it makes it momentary. The Swing knob adds swing, shown on the display while touched.
- Quantize snaps notes in the selected clip to the grid. Hold it for options:
- Swing Amount — also on Encoder 1 or the Swing knob.
- Quantize To — the nearest note value to snap to.
- Quantize Amount — how far notes may move.
- Record Quantize — quantize while recording, value on Encoder 8; mirrors the Record Quantization chooser in Live's Edit menu.
- Hold Quantize and press a drum pad to quantize only that drum's notes.
- Add Track adds a MIDI track and opens Browse to load an instrument; hold it to choose Audio, MIDI or Return. Inside a Group Track, new tracks go into the group.
- On an instrument track the grid plays notes, in C major by default. The bottom-left pad is C1; each row up is a fourth higher and each pad to the right is the next scale note. A scale is three pads in a row, then three in the next row, and so on.
- Pad colors: blue is the key's root, white is in the scale, green is playing, red is playing while recording.
- Holding Note briefly shows loop length controls in the top row;
Shift + Note locks them. - Scales changes key and scale with the display and the Selection and State Control buttons. The first encoder or the two far-left buttons pick the scale type.
- Fixed Y/N — with Fixed on, the grid stays put when the key changes and the bottom-left pad stays C, or the nearest key note. With it off, the bottom-left pad is always the root.
- In Key/Chromatic — In Key folds the grid to scale notes only; Chromatic shows every note with in-key notes lit.
Shift in Scales offers more layouts: "4th" and "3rd" set the interval between rows, ^ and > set whether it runs up or right, and "Sequent" lays notes out in order with no duplicates for a wide range.- Key, scale, In Key/Chromatic and Fixed are saved with the Set.
- Drum recording options (fixed length, Repeat, quantize) work here too. Hold Delete and tap a pad to remove every note of that pitch in the loop.
- Press Note again for the Melodic Sequencer, where all eight rows place notes. With In Key each row is a scale pitch; with Chromatic, in-key rows are lit. The light blue row, bottom by default, is the root. Each column is a step at the Scene/Grid resolution.
- Hold Note for the loop length pads in the top row;
Shift + Note locks them per track. - Octave Up and Down or the touch strip shift the pitch range;
Shift fine-tunes it. Bright touch strip lights show the visible range and dim lights show where the clip has notes. - Note again switches to Melodic Sequencer + 32 Notes. Velocity and micro-timing are in Ableton/Live/UG/35 Push 1/12 Step Sequencing Automation.
- Each loop length pad is a page of steps; a page's length depends on the step size. Drums at 16ths show two pages, or two bars; the Melodic Sequencer shows one page of eight steps, or two beats.
- Hold one pad and tap another to set the loop; double-tap a pad for a one-page loop.
- Pages follow the play position by default. Single-tap a page to lock the view to it while the loop keeps its length; reselect the loop to follow again. Tapping a page outside the loop sets the loop to it.
- Colors: unlit is outside the loop, white is in the loop but not shown, dull yellow is shown but not playing, green is playing.
Shift + Note locks the pads per track. Hold Duplicate and press two page pads to copy a page on top of the destination; hold Delete and tap a page pad to clear it first.
- Combines step sequencing with real-time playing across several octaves on one page, useful for working out chords and longer phrases.
- The bottom half plays scale notes and selects them for sequencing; selected notes show in a lighter track color. Hold Select to select without playing.
- Colors: blue is the root, blue-green is selected, green is playing, white is in scale.
- Octave Up and Down shift the range;
Shift with the touch strip moves by octaves and Shift with Octave moves by one scale note. The Scale menu applies here too.
- Tapping a step in the top half adds all selected notes to it. Holding a step shows its notes in blue-green below; tap one to remove it. Holding several steps adds the notes to all of them.
- Hold Duplicate, press a step, then another to copy notes on top of the destination.
- Colors: blue has notes, green is playing, white is selected, dull yellow is muted, gray is empty; with triplets the two right columns go unlit and unused.
- Two pages, or two bars, show at 16ths. Hold Note for loop length pads in the fifth row;
Shift + Note locks them. Page copy and clear work as in Ableton/Live/UG/35 Push 1/06 Step Sequencing Melodies and Harmonies/01 Adjusting the Loop Length.
- Left and right arrows move between tracks. Selecting a MIDI track arms it, shown in Live by a pink Arm button.
- Up and down move one scene and start playback right away, taking over the play position like Legato Mode. In Scene Workflow the whole scene launches; in Clip Workflow only the selected track's clip does.
- Device Mode puts device parameters on the encoders. Selection Control buttons choose a device on the track and State Control buttons turn it on or off; an arrow marks the selected device.
- In and Out reach more parameter banks and the chains inside Racks.
- Volume puts eight track volumes on the encoders. Pan & Send cycles through pans and each send.
Shift gives fine control. - Track Mode puts one track's volume, pan and first six sends on the encoders; Selection Control buttons pick the track, and Master picks the Main track. Hold a Group Track's Selection Control button to fold or unfold it.
- With Split Stereo Pan Mode, Pan & Send shows the pan value but disables the dial; Track Mode shows the pan control or the stereo pan sliders.
- Automation toggles Live's Session Automation Arm, so encoder moves record into the clip. Press again to stop.
- Hold Delete and touch an encoder to clear that parameter's automation, or reset it to default if it has none.
- The display marks automated parameters with a rectangle and shows overridden values in brackets.
Shift + Automation re-enables overridden automation.
- Both drum and melodic step sequencers can automate parameters for selected steps. What can be changed depends on the display mode.
- In Clip Mode, hold a step to put its note settings on the encoders:
- Nudge — offset from the previous grid line as a percentage; negative means early.
- Length — coarse and fine.
- Velocity
- Hold several steps to edit them together; the display shows each value's range. Holding an empty step and turning an encoder creates a note with those values.
- For drums, hold Select and press a pad to edit every note that pad plays. Hold Duplicate, tap a step, tap a destination, and release to copy a step with its settings.
- In Device or Volume Mode, hold steps and turn an encoder to write automation for just those steps' time, even on steps without notes.
- Session switches the grid to clip launching and the Scene/Grid buttons to scene launching; holding Session or Note switches temporarily. Pressing an empty slot on the selected track records a new clip.
- Pads show clip colors; playing clips pulse green to white and recording clips red to white. Live outlines the slots Push controls.
- Turn on Stop and press a track's State Control button to stop it;
Shift + Stop stops all clips. - Arrows move one scene or track; with
Shift they move eight. Octave Up and Down also move eight scenes. - Hold
Shift in Session Mode to zoom out: each pad becomes an 8x8 block of clips, covering 64 scenes by 64 tracks, and each scene button a block of 64 scenes. Press a pad to jump there; row three, column one is scenes 17–24 and tracks 1–8. - Colors: amber is the current block, green has playing clips, red has none playing, unlit has no tracks or scenes.
- Hold User for preferences:
- Pad Threshold — the lightest touch that triggers a note. Low settings can cause accidental or stuck notes.
- Velocity Curve — from Linear to several Log curves; higher Log values give more range when playing softly.
- Workflow — how Duplicate, New and the up and down arrows behave:
- Scene Workflow (default) — Duplicate captures the playing clips into a new scene and keeps playing, like Create → Capture and Insert Scene; New does the same but leaves an empty slot on the current track; arrows move and launch whole scenes.
- Clip Workflow — Duplicate copies the selected clip to the next slot (
Shift + Duplicate captures a scene); New readies an empty slot on the current track only; arrows launch only the selected track's clip.
- Aftertouch Threshold — the lowest aftertouch value, 0–127, that Push registers; values above it are rescaled across the full range. At 120, an input of 119 does nothing and 120–127 map onto 0–127.
- What each section and control does.
35.15.0.1 Focus/Navigation Section
- Note — on an instrument track the pads play notes, and further presses switch between real-time playing and the melodic sequencer. On a Drum Rack track the lower-left 16 pads play, the lower-right 16 set loop length, and the top four rows step-sequence; press again for 64-pad mode.
- Session — pads launch Session View clips.
- Shift — hold for second functions.
- Arrow keys — move around the Set in Session Mode, or between tracks and scenes in Note Mode.
- Select — hold and press a clip to select it without launching and show its name, or a drum pad to select its notes silently.
35.15.0.2 Add Section
- Add Effect — opens Browse to add a device right of the selected one;
Shift adds it to the left. For a MIDI effect, select the instrument and use Shift + Add Effect. - Add Track — adds a MIDI track to the right; hold to choose Audio, MIDI or Return. Inside a Group Track, the new track joins the group.
35.15.0.3 Note Section
- Scales — on an instrument track in Note Mode, picks the key and scale, with Fixed Y/N, In Key/Chromatic and scale type. No effect on Drum Rack tracks or in Session Mode.
- User — turns off Push's built-in functions so it can be remapped; hold for configuration. Relative encoders work best as "Relative (2's Comp.)"; turn the encoder slowly left while mapping to get it.
- Repeat — holding a pad retriggers it at the Scene/Grid rate.
- Accent — every note plays at full velocity; hold for temporary accent.
- Octave Up/Down — shift pads by octave on instrument tracks, by 16 pads on Drum Racks, and by eight scenes in Session Mode. Unlit when no further range exists.
35.15.0.4 State Control Section
- For tracks, the eight left buttons stop clips, mute or solo, depending on which of Stop, Mute or Solo is active. For devices they turn devices on and off. Other modes reuse them, for example for scale selection.
Shift + Stop stops all clips.
35.15.0.5 Selection Control Section
- Chooses what the encoders and display edit. In and Out reach devices in Racks or more parameter banks, and in Browse shift the columns.
35.15.0.6 Display/Encoder Section
- Six buttons beside the display set the encoder mode; hold one to switch temporarily. The ninth encoder is Main track volume, or Pre-Cue volume with
Shift. Shift with any of the first eight encoders gives fine control. - Volume — eight track volumes.
- Pan & Send — pans, then each send in turn.
- Track — one track's volume, pan and first six sends; Master selects the Main track.
- Clip — for MIDI clips: Loop Start (or Clip Start), Position, Loop Length (or Clip End), Loop on/off. Audio clips add Warp Mode, Detune, Transpose and Gain.
- Device — parameters of the selected device.
- Browse — scroll devices and presets.
35.15.0.7 Tempo Section
- Tap Tempo — the Set's tempo follows your taps. With "Start Playback with Tap Tempo" on in the Record, Warp & Launch Settings, four taps in 4/4 also start playback.
- Metronome — toggles Live's metronome.
- Left encoder sets tempo in 1 BPM steps, or 0.1 BPM with
Shift. Right encoder sets swing for Quantize, Record Quantize and Repeat.
35.15.0.8 Edit Section
- Undo — Live's own Undo, including actions not made on Push;
Shift + Undo redoes. - Delete — in Note Mode deletes the selected clip; in Session Mode hold and press a clip. Hold with a Selection Control button to delete a device or track, or touch an encoder to clear its automation or reset it.
- Quantize — press to quantize selected notes, or the whole clip; hold with a drum pad for that pad only. On audio clips it moves transients. Hold for settings.
- Double — doubles the loop and its contents.
35.15.0.9 Transport Section
- Fixed Length — new clips get a set number of bars; hold to choose.
- Automation — toggles Live's Automation Record for playing Session clips.
Shift + Automation re-enables overridden automation; Delete + Automation clears all automation in a clip. - Duplicate — captures a scene in Scene Workflow or copies the selected clip in Clip Workflow; with a drum pad, copies that pad.
- New — stops the selected clip and readies new recording. On an armed MIDI track, Record + New triggers Capture MIDI.
- Record — record, then play, then overdub.
- Play/Stop — Live's play button;
Shift + Play/Stop returns to 1.1.1 without playing.
35.15.0.10 Touch Strip
- On instrument tracks it is pitch bend (default) or mod wheel while playing live, and the note range while step sequencing; Select + tap the strip toggles bend and mod. On Drum Rack tracks it picks the pad bank.
35.15.0.11 Pad Section
- Session Mode launches clips. Note Mode plays notes on instrument tracks or splits into play, loop length and sequencer areas on Drum Rack tracks, with 64-pad mode one Note press away.
35.15.0.12 Scene/Grid Section
- In Session Mode these launch scenes; hold Select to select a scene without launching. In Note Mode they set step size and Repeat rate.
35.15.0.13 Using Footswitches with Push 1
- Two jacks take momentary footswitches. Footswitch 1 is sustain. Footswitch 2 toggles Record on a single tap and acts as New on a double tap.
- If a switch works backwards, plug it in while holding it down, or use a pedal with a polarity switch.
