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Alternative to... Ableton Live

Hi everyone.. as a musician and producer who finally completely switched to Linux (from Mac), I ask you: don't you think it's a pity not having a valid, working, massive, free alternative to Ableton Live on Linux? Even if without recording features... Even just for playing live loops in a creative way, with easy bpm stretching/adapting functions, etc...

I tried "giada" and "LuPPP" but they both have something missing... the first would be nice but it's quite unstable, the second misses some important features...
Bitwig is ok but obviously it's not free and open source.

Do you know if there's some work in progress about an alternative software?

(another Q*-thing would make a lot of musicians happy, I suppose! Do you think it would be possibile to re-use some Qtractor code to make a loop playing software, e.g. session-based like Ableton?)

Just an idea, coming from a real need. All Q*-software is a masterpiece and Qtractor is my favourite software and my best friend while making music.

Greetings from Italy. Manu

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rncbc's picture

hi Manu

Many thanks for the kind words, really appreciated.

BWS (Bit Wig Studio) might be your best bet indeed as an alternative to Ableton Live on Linux. even though it is not open-source.

You must be certain that all this kind of software is extremely sophisticated and way too complex to develop let alone by a team of full-time average skilled programmers. So please don't you expect for that to happen anytime soon. Speaking for myself, Qtractor development was kicked-off when Ardour and LIve had no MIDI capabilities at all. And I remember telling people that yours truly was posed to be a Live clone at the time. You may take your conclusions where they all are now almost 15 years after :)

However, I've been hearing that some kind of "clip launcher" is being thought for Ardour, maybe on the next decade or so, who knows :)

Cheers

manu_controvento's picture

thank you for your reply and opinion!
I think I found something similar to what I need...
"Linux Show Player". It's not so popular so it wasn't easy to find.
I will test it for a while.
As I told many times, Qtractor is amazing, it really can make possible the transition from commercial systems and I really don't miss Logic or Acid Pro.

manu_controvento's picture

I succeeded in my purpose, using: LuPPP + Carla about send/return for live effects, and Qsynth, with a midi controller AKAI APC Key 25.
LuPPP connects to the midi controller thanks to the "a2j" package. Controller pads send data via channel 1.
Then I connect the controller also to Qsynth, and the piano keys send notes via channel 2.
In this way I can control backing loops and record new ones with pads, while playing instruments with black and white keys.

LuPPP is lacking a bit of functions, but at the moment I can deal with it.

I'm doing some test using SuperBoucle too, but it seems to disconnect from MIDI device...

Have a nice day
Manu

manu_controvento's picture

Hi everyone, just to tell some news: I didn't give up on this topic and since Super Boucle could almost fit, I started trying it in last November-December.
It was lacking a bit of features and I found some little bugs too. I got in touch with its creator to report everything, he solved some issues but he had not time to improve the application.
So, finally I decided to do it on my own.. some days ago I downloaded the source code, and now I'm almost finished applying my changes... I had to learn a language which I never used too, but it's not been so hard.

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