Hmm... ummm, not sure about the way you want to use midi when playing live, but midi tracks work great in Live. Like everyone in my crew uses Live to produce music, and it is half VST's or AU's (they use MAC) with midi tracks if not all midi tracks.
 
Lance

Okay, thanks. I had read that it didn't have a decent MIDI capabilities but if you are using midi with no issues. Tell me, does Live have similar tools to Instrument Definition files (with upper bank functions) in Sonar? Or does it only recognise the basic 128 patches of GM?

You got me on that one... I don't go that deep with midi tracks, etc.
 
Lance

No probs Lance - understand. FWIW I do have Live 9, but have never bothered to install it and learn it, only to find it cannot really do MIDI all that well (in previous versions midi was pretty much non-existent for any serious work). Which is the reason I have never installed it, after trying a bundled Live 3 or 4 (?) although I did buy the full version and have kept acquiring updated versions
 
Cheers

x2 and x3 are both almost gapless for me. but ableton was designed that way from scratch so it's tough to beat. it's worth mentioning that the size and complexity of the project have a substantial effect on how gapless a daw runs INCLUDING ableton.

Amen to that last comment.

Ableton can send bank select messages, 128 banks, 128 sub banks and 128 programs per bank are supported. I don't think there are instrument definition files. I use midi a lot in Live but to be honest not intensively for external hardware. I think there are some issues sending sysex too, where you have to get a Max4Live device do it or something I never tried.

Live is a great product to use, well, "live", and it offers some unique and interesting workflows for composition. I would never let it replace Sonar in a studio situation, though I do use it as an addition sometimes. My live needs are mostly based around freely selectable looping song sections, let's say 80 percent pre produced audio, with 20 percent VSTis. And then a lot of fx tweaking. I could never do this with Sonar. But if your songs are linear and you need to control a whole bunch of hardware synths and switch patches, send SysEx etc., it may not be for you.

thx sanderX
 
I would be using it primarily to run VST synths (via virtual midi cabling) from midi backing tracks. Perhaps with some audio as well. I guess the main reason is to be able to dynamically change the sequence of a song in situations, for example, where you are playing a tune, and folks decide to get up and dance in the last 16 bars.  Happens a LOT! 
 
I know I can do this using part markers in Sonar and assigning keys to jump to the markers, but with Sonar having such a bad rep for "live" work, I am looking at alternatives.
 
At present I am using MP3 backing trax (my own recordings from prepared midi files) but this is pretty inflexible and not conducive to quick and easy editing...hence the queries re Live...although I don't think Live has any sort of "setlist" or playlist if you like, function so it is still probs not a goer anyway
 
 

I think i do basically the same thing in that case. And you have to ask yourself if you really need all of them to actually be midi all the time or if you could bounce a few to audio.
My songs follow a more or less standard track order and I can drag and drop in entire new songs while the previous one is playing. It's really a great working concept if you can accommodate it in your workflow.

Cool, I might have another look then - I guess I could run the audio tracks in the same sort of layout as is Sonar (and not use MIDI at all as you suggest), as in each instrument has it's own track, instead of mixing them all down to a single audio file (vis MP3)
 
Cheers

Oh yes definitely. My typical songs consist of;
1. A bass track (audio)
2. A drums track (audio)
3. An extra drums track ( audio)
4. A harmony part track (audio)
5. Another harmony part track (audio)
6. Miscallaneous ( audio)
7. A live input for vocals ( fx type sounds)
8. Maschine (played and edited live, so midi)

Everything is pre split into sections/loops of course, so I can jump to the chorus or verse of a given song at any time, mix the bass in or out, etcetera. Keeping the track order between songs means I can select an entire song from the browser, plunk it in, and have roughly the same mix. While everything keeps playing. It's super flexible this way and I usually don't really need to edit midi synth parts while performing live ( I also play keys live), I tend to focus more on fx and mix, dj-ish.