Home > General, Resources > Using a Trigger Finger with Ableton Live

Using a Trigger Finger with Ableton Live

I’ve been hit up a couple times and it seems I notice on the back end of this blog people who land her are looking for how to set up M-Audio’s Trigger Finger in Ableton Live.

Here are a couple quick tips…

1. The trigger finger ships with its preset of Ableton Live as P10. Access this by pressing Memory/Recall and then p10.

2. Use the Midi map function to map specific pads and faders to ableton clips, effects, etc.

3. The Ctrl/Note Mute Button changes the message sent… if you need it to be note on/off or just controller message… this applies to the rotary and faders mostly.

Once you get it hooked up and your sure that your computer (hopefully a mac, haha) is receiving messages then load up preset P10 and map away.

Happy Triggering.

Categories: General, Resources
  1. stephanie
    July 11, 2007 at 5:14 pm | #1

    hey,

    so while i got p10 loaded and the drums were sounding beautifully in sync with the pads in ableton, how do i utilize all 16 pads to launch samples? i went into the preferences, turned off the function of trigger finger for “track” and left it on for “remote” to eliminate unwanted hits (i’m using another midi controller-pcr m80-to generate synth sounds), but when i try to map each of the master-launch functions (to the far right) to each of the pads, it keeps telling me that it’s reading the top 8 pads as one key, and the bottom 8 pads as another key. is there any way i can map all 16 pads to launch different loops/tracks?

    sk

  2. digitalworship
    July 11, 2007 at 11:03 pm | #2

    Here are the instructions for programming the pads on the Trigger Finger.

    1. Enter Edit Mode by pressing Memory Recall and Prog/Bank Change simultaneously. Their LEDs will begin to flash indicating that Edit Mode is active.

    2. Tapping a pad will select it for editing. For our example, let’s tap pad 16.

    3. Once selected, you can re-program the pad with the knobs. For example, you can use the Note Knob to choose MIDI note F#3 for the pad (twist the knob until
    “F. 3” is displayed on the LED screen). For convenience, the Trigger Finger will continue to output MIDI notes when you tap the pad so you can preview your
    changes. You can twist other knobs to change their associated parameters, too. For instance, you can use the knobs to quickly set the pad to MIDI channel
    10 and its fixed velocity to 90. The CC Knob is for selecting the MIDI controller to use when transmitting pressure information. Setting this to “10,” for example,
    can be used to cause pressure to modulate the pan position of your sound.

    4. Once you have made your desired edits to the pad, you can tap another pad to select and edit it.

    5. Once all of your edits are complete, you can save your changes by pressing the Save & Exit Button followed by the pad corresponding to your desired
    memory location. If, for example, you want to save your changes in memory location 7, you’d press the Save & Exit Button followed by pad 7. If you want to
    exit Edit Mode without saving your changes, press the Exit Button. The Trigger Finger will return to Performance Mode (the two LEDs will stop flashing) and
    your edits will remain active, though not saved to a memory location. You can then try out your new preset before you save it. If you like it, re-enter Edit Mode
    and immediately Save & Exit.

  3. March 14, 2008 at 12:08 am | #3

    Launching samples in Ableon is easy, here are two very simple ways that do not involve all this complicated programming.

    Set up 4 audio tracks in the mix window.
    Think of each audio track as a column down the trigger finger. Load your loops or samples onto each pad. The top pad on the left would be the top track on track 1, etc. Then press ctrl m (on your computer) which puts you in midi edit mode. Press the play button on the clip of your choosing, then tap the pad you want to assign it too. Now it will launch the sample/clip.

    You probably want to open up the clip’s launch mode and change the quanitization of the trigger to something like 1/16.

    Another way to do it is with a program called “Battery” by Native Instruments.

    Good Luck

  4. July 21, 2008 at 2:15 am | #4

    Is it possible to assign 2 different impulse on the 16 pads ( 8 + 8 )?

  5. Yenks
    July 30, 2008 at 7:37 pm | #5

    Hey Guys. Been using my tringer finger for a while. loving it.

    One thing that Ive been trying to work out how to do is find a way to store multiple banks of midi clips on the 16 drum pads.

    Currently i use the midi map function in ableton and assign a different clip to all of the 16 pads. But this isnt enough. Id like to have it so that I have 5 or more different banks of 16 clips within ableton. So i simply hit the memory recall button or something and its on a different bank of clips within ableton and all 16 drum pads have different clips assigned to them.

    Is it possible to achieve this with the Trigger Finger?

  6. anthony
    August 20, 2008 at 2:28 am | #6

    thank you, this was quite helpful

  7. November 20, 2008 at 2:23 pm | #7

    Has anyone ever had the issue if abelton not recognizing the trigger finger. I just bought it a few weeks ago and I am running OS 10.4.11. I need help.

  8. eric
    December 2, 2008 at 11:37 pm | #8

    having the same problem as sk… top 8 pads only read as one key and same with the bottom
    any help?

  9. January 6, 2009 at 8:43 pm | #9

    thank you for this

    quick question my trigger finger’s touch pads all are assigned to CC 117, so every button is just one key? is there a way to fix that?

  10. Rob
    March 8, 2009 at 1:10 am | #10

    I recently bought Ableton Live and the Trigger Finger with the intent of running tracks for a live show. How do I set up the trigger finger to use as a trigger to take me to a locate point in a song. I am an avid protools user, so making the switch to Ableton for this has been a little tricky. Any suggestions?

  11. Clark
    May 18, 2009 at 10:31 pm | #11

    Yo.Iv had the trigger finger for almost a year.Im so fucking confused i cant see str8.Can someone please tell me how to fully get it hooked up in ableton.I get it to show up in the MIDI input and output{with track sync and remote on}but i still cant figure out if its fully synced or not.can someone please tell me how to fully sync it up.PLEASEPLEASEPLEASE:-<

  12. Clark
    May 18, 2009 at 10:35 pm | #12

    And it would be nice to know the same but with Battery 3.Thnx all

  13. September 26, 2009 at 11:20 pm | #13

    Just thought I would add this as I rolled over it in my reading of a similar site:

    ** If you want to save more than the 16 presets that trigger finger can hold, you must follow the steps outlined in the using the enigma software section. By using Enigma you can save hundreds of custom banks (each holding 16 presets) and load them into the Trigger Finger hardware whenever you want.

    http://etechdocs.com/tutorials/triggerfinger/setting_up_enigma.html

    hope this helps someone. :- )

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