Ableton MCP

Connect Ableton Live to Claude AI

Prompt-assisted music production, end-to-end track creation, and Live session and arrangement manipulation — driven by AI.

Setup Video · Discord · Issues

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Quickstart

Three steps: install uv, point your MCP client at the server, install the Ableton Remote Script.

1. Install uv

# macOS
brew install uv

Otherwise, install from uv's official website.

Warning: Do not proceed before installing uv.

2. Add the MCP server to your client

Claude Desktop — Settings → Developer → Edit Config

{
    "mcpServers": {
        "AbletonMCP": {
            "command": "uvx",
            "args": [
                "ableton-mcp"
            ]
        }
    }
}

Cursor — Settings → MCP

Paste this as a command:

uvx ableton-mcp

Warning: Only run one instance of the MCP server (either on Cursor or Claude Desktop), not both.

3. Install the Ableton Remote Script

uvx --from ableton-mcp ableton-mcp-install-script
uvx --from ableton-mcp ableton-mcp-install-script --list-targets   # preview target folders first

4. Connect

1. Launch Ableton Live
2. Go to Settings/Preferences → Link, Tempo & MIDI
3. In the Control Surface dropdown, select AbletonMCP
4. Set Input and Output to None

That's it — ask Claude to build something.

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Table of Contents

• Quickstart
• Features
• Components
• Installation
  • Prerequisites
  • Claude for Desktop Integration
  • Cursor Integration
  • Installing the Ableton Remote Script
• Usage
  • Starting the Connection
  • Using with Claude
  • Capabilities
  • Example Commands
• Troubleshooting
• Technical Details
• Limitations & Security Considerations
• Telemetry
• Join the Community
• Contributing
• Disclaimer

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Features

Two-way communication	Connect Claude AI to Ableton Live through a socket-based server
Track manipulation	Create, modify, and manipulate MIDI and audio tracks
Instrument and effect selection	Claude can access and load the right instruments, effects and sounds from Ableton's library
Clip creation	Create and edit MIDI clips with notes
Arrangement view composition	Build full songs autonomously in Arrangement View, including sections like intro, buildup, drop, breakdown, and outro
Session control	Start and stop playback, fire clips, and control transport across Session View and Arrangement View
Anonymous telemetry	Usage tracking to help improve the tool (can be disabled)

Components

The system consists of two main components:

1. Ableton Remote Script (Ableton_Remote_Script/__init__.py) — a MIDI Remote Script for Ableton Live that creates a socket server to receive and execute commands
2. MCP Server (server.py) — a Python server that implements the Model Context Protocol and connects to the Ableton Remote Script

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Installation

Prerequisites

• Ableton Live 10 or newer
• Python 3.8 or newer
• uv package manager

If you're on Mac, please install uv as:

brew install uv

Otherwise, install from uv's official website

Warning: Do not proceed before installing uv.

Claude for Desktop Integration

Follow along with the setup instructions video

Go to Claude → Settings → Developer → Edit Config → claude_desktop_config.json to include the following:

{
    "mcpServers": {
        "AbletonMCP": {
            "command": "uvx",
            "args": [
                "ableton-mcp"
            ]
        }
    }
}

Cursor Integration

Run ableton-mcp without installing it permanently through uvx. Go to Cursor Settings → MCP and paste this as a command:

uvx ableton-mcp

Warning: Only run one instance of the MCP server (either on Cursor or Claude Desktop), not both.

Claude Code Integration

In the terminal, run:

claude mcp add AbletonMCP uvx ableton-mcp

Installing the Ableton Remote Script

Follow along with the setup instructions video

Install the Remote Script with:

uvx --from ableton-mcp ableton-mcp-install-script
uvx --from ableton-mcp ableton-mcp-install-script --list-targets   # preview target folders first

If you installed the package with pip or pipx, the command is on your PATH directly — just run ableton-mcp-install-script.

This copies the matching Remote Script into your Ableton User Library's Remote Scripts folder — the location Live (10.1.13+) scans for third-party control surface scripts. The installer reads the User Library location from Live's Library.cfg, falling back to the default (~/Music/Ableton/User Library on macOS, Documents\Ableton\User Library on Windows). If a different version of the script is already there, the existing file is backed up to __init__.py.bak before being replaced.

If your User Library lives somewhere non-standard and isn't detected, point the installer at it directly:

uvx --from ableton-mcp ableton-mcp-install-script --target "/path/to/User Library/Remote Scripts"

The legacy Preferences/User Remote Scripts folder (used for instant-mapping configs, not Python control surfaces) i