In this post, we’ll be taking a slightly deeper dive into Arrangement View with the use of locators. Locators, or markers as we’ll be referring to them, can be really useful by marking out the different song sections, labelling them and even looping/skipping a section on the fly. We’ll be covering the basics of how to add them in and how to use them to create a custom arrangement.

Adding in Song Section Markers

We have a ‘Cues’ track in our song, so we’ll be using that as a reference for our markers. If you don’t have a cue track, you’ll have to scrub through the song to determine where the markers should be. All you need to do to create a marker is click on the bar at the start of the section and click ‘Set’ located toward the top right of the screen in Ableton. (TIP: We recommend assigning a shortcut key to create new markers, this will speed up workflow.)

Renaming Song Sections

The next step is to label all of the song sections so we know what they are. If you haven’t got a cue track to tell you, just listen through to find out which section is which. By default, all locators are numbered when created, click on a locator and press Cmd-R to rename it.

Creating A Custom Arrangement in Arrangement View

Once our song is labelled, we can easily see where all of our sections are and adjust them at will. In this example, we’ll get rid of the turnaround before the bridge and repeat the final chorus. Some handy shortcuts to remember are Cmd-Shift-Delete = Delete Time, Cmd-Shift-D = Duplicate Time. It’s important to use the time functions as opposed to just regular delete and duplicate. If you just deleted the time, you’d have a blank section in your song or if you just duplicated a section it would paste over the next section that was originally there. Also, don’t forget to add in a locator if you add in a section.

Closing Thoughts

We hope you found this short post informative, check back for more info and tips.

Thanks for reading!