Live MCP

Let an AI assistant work in your Ableton Live set. Ask Claude, GitHub Copilot or Cursor to look at your tracks, turn knobs, write a bass line into a clip or find the parameter you are looking for, and it does it in Live while you watch.

Install

Live MCP is a Live extension, so it only runs in a Live that has extensions: Live 12 Suite, version 12.4.15 or later. For now that means Ableton's public beta; extensions are not in Live Standard, Intro or older versions, and without them Live MCP does not work at all.

1. Download the .ablx file from the latest release.

2. In Live, open Settings → Extensions and drag the file there.

3. Connect your assistant.

   Claude Code:

   claude mcp add -s user --transport http live http://127.0.0.1:9871/mcp

   VS Code with GitHub Copilot:

   code --add-mcp '{"name":"live","type":"http","url":"http://127.0.0.1:9871/mcp"}'

   Claude Desktop: open Settings → Developer → Edit Config, add live under mcpServers as below, and restart Claude Desktop. It needs Node.js to reach Live MCP.

   {
     "mcpServers": {
       "live": { "command": "npx", "args": ["-y", "mcp-remote", "http://127.0.0.1:9871/mcp"] }
     }
   }

   Cursor: open Settings → MCP → Add new MCP server, or edit ~/.cursor/mcp.json, and add live:

   {
     "mcpServers": {
       "live": { "url": "http://127.0.0.1:9871/mcp" }
     }
   }

That's it. Ask your assistant "What's in my Live set?" to try it.

Optional: the LiveRemote bridge

Live does not let extensions do everything. A small helper script, LiveRemote, lets the assistant also start and stop playback, undo, change routing, load presets and plug-ins, and read the full parameter names of Max for Live devices.

1. Download LiveRemote.zip from the same release.

2. Unzip it into the Remote Scripts folder of your User Library, so that you get a folder called LiveRemote there. Create Remote Scripts if it is missing.

   • Mac: ~/Music/Ableton/User Library/Remote Scripts/

   • Windows: Documents\Ableton\User Library\Remote Scripts\

3. Restart Live.

4. In Settings → Link, Tempo & MIDI, pick LiveRemote as a Control Surface, with Input and Output set to None.

Ask your assistant "Can you reach the LiveRemote bridge?" to check.

Related MCP server: Ableton Live MCP Ultra v2

What you can ask

• "Which devices are on the bass track, and what are their settings?"

• "Turn the filter cutoff on the synth down to about a third, and the resonance up a little."

• "Make a four-bar clip in the first empty slot with a simple bass line in E minor."

• "Double the velocity of every note in that clip, and mute it."

• "Add a Reverb to the vocals and a Utility after it."

• "What did I change since you last looked?"

• "Put the bass line from bassline.mid in my User Library on the bass track, at bar 9."

• "Is the vocal track clipping anywhere in the chorus, and how loud is it?"

• "Load my preset called Warm Pad on a new MIDI track." (needs LiveRemote)

• "In that clip, let the filter open slowly over four bars and close again." (needs LiveRemote)

How it works

The assistant sends its requests to Live MCP, which runs inside Live and changes your set. LiveRemote, if you turned it on, handles what Live does not let extensions do.

flowchart LR
  a["your assistant"] -- "requests" --> ext["Live MCP"]
  ext --> set["your Live set"]
  ext -. "playback, routing,<br/>presets, undo" .-> br["LiveRemote<br/>(optional)"]
  br -.-> set
  classDef live stroke-width:3px
  class ext,set,br live

The boxes with a thick border are inside Live.

Guardrails

An assistant works fast and sometimes gets things wrong. Live MCP makes mistakes less likely and easy to take back:

• All or nothing. Before it changes anything, Live MCP checks the whole request: every track, device and clip it names, and every value against what the control allows. If one thing is wrong, nothing is changed, and the assistant is told what was wrong.

• Undo works. Everything the assistant changes goes into Live's undo history, like your own edits. When it deletes or changes several things at once, one undo (Cmd+Z or Ctrl+Z) brings them all back.

• Controls that wait for you. A Max for Live device can mark a control, for example a button that overwrites a synth's memory, by ending its help text with [ask first]. Live MCP then changes that control only when you have asked for it.

• Look, don't touch. In the status dialog (right-click a track, Live MCP status…) you can make Live MCP read-only: the assistant can look at your set and measure it, but not play or change anything.

Good to know

• See what is going on. Right-click a track or a scene and choose Live MCP status…: whether the assistant is connected, whether LiveRemote answers, the commands to connect, and a switch for a password.

• Only your computer can reach it. Other computers and web pages cannot. If you want a password on top, see docs/development.md.

• Some things are out of reach for any add-on in Live today: automation in the arrangement (automation in session clips works), recording, freezing, and the MIDI To and Audio From of an External Instrument. For the last one, set them once yourself, save the device as a preset, and ask the assistant to load that preset.

• Ask it what it can do. The assistant can ask Live MCP itself, and gets an honest answer for your setup.

• Max for Live devices can explain themselves. Live MCP reads the help text Live shows in its Info View for each control, and the device's description, and gives them to the assistant. See For Max for Live authors.

Not affiliated with or endorsed by Ableton. Use at your own risk.

More

• docs/architecture.md: how Live MCP works, from the big picture down.

• docs/development.md: building it yourself, configuration, the full list of tools.

License

Copyright (c) 2026 norrby. MIT License; see LICENSE.