Dialoque
Documentation

Max for Live devices for Ableton Live 12. Last updated 22 October 2026.

Max for Live · Live 12 · three devices

Call and response

Dialoque writes a musical conversation: a call from a step grid, an answer derived from it, and a bassline that listens to both, all over a chord progression. It plays your own instruments and effects, on as many tracks as you like.

It comes in three devices: Thoow Dialoque (call, answer and chords), Thoow Dialoque Receive (plays the answer on another track) and Thoow Dialoque Bass (a bassline on its own track). They talk over four buses, A to D, so you can run several conversations in one set.

Set up

You need Ableton Live 12 with Max for Live (Live 12 Suite, or Live 12 Standard with the Max for Live add-on), on Mac or Windows.

Call: drag Thoow Dialoque.amxd onto a MIDI track, in front of a chord instrument. A short stab works well.
Answer: set Answer to to Bus A. Drag Thoow Dialoque Receive.amxd onto a second MIDI track with another instrument, and set its Bus to A.
Bass: drag Thoow Dialoque Bass.amxd onto a third MIDI track with a bass instrument, Bus A.
Press play. Everything follows the tempo of your set.

With Answer to: This track call and answer both play on the Dialoque track. Handy for one instrument, but a Receive on another track then stays silent.

Call

The call is a grid of 16 or 32 sixteenths in the display. Click a step: off → on → accent. The left column shapes it:

Control	Range	What it does
Rhythm	8 patterns	Starting points: Pure, Dots, Skank, Push, Sparse, Ghost, Hold and Stab. Choosing one replaces the grid; your own clicks are saved with the set.
Length	16 / 32	One or two bars.
Density	−100 … +100 %	Below zero, hits drop out (accents last). Above zero, new hits are added on offbeats first. 0 % plays the grid as it is.
Shift	0 … 15	Turns the pattern by sixteenths.
Swing	50 … 75 %	Delays every second sixteenth. Also sent to the bass.
Dub	0 … 100 %	Random life: up to half of the normal hits drop out, above 50 % a few turn into accents. The randomness has a fixed seed, so it repeats, until Evolve changes it.

The display shows the bar, whether the call or the answer is speaking, the chord and the playing step.

Chords

Below the grid are the Steps of the progression. Click a step to change its degree (i → ii … vii); click + to add one, up to eight. The chord names update as you go.

Control	Range	What it does
Progression	8 presets	i, i iv, i VII, i VII VI VII, i III, i v, i VI III VII, i i iv v. A preset fills the steps; edit them afterwards.
Bars	1 / 2 / 4	How long each step of the progression lasts.
Progression / Keys		Keys: instead of the progression, the chord follows the last note you play into the Dialoque track.

The chords move with voice leading, so the voices stay close from chord to chord.

Answer

Control	Range	What it does
Form	4 forms	Call \| Answer: one turn calls, the next answers. Call Call \| Answer: two turns call, one answers. Overlap: the answer runs as a canon, delayed by Offset. Gaps: call and answer share every turn.
Turn	½ / 1 / 2 / 4 bars	How long one turn lasts.
Type	6 types	Echo: the call again, delayed by Offset. Shadow: only the accents, longer. Complement: plays in the free eighths of the call. Resolve: like the call, but the last hit lands on the tonic chord. Reverse: the call backwards. New: as many hits as the call, in new places.
Offset	1/16 … 1 bar	Delay for Echo and Overlap.
Pitch	Same, Oct down, Oct up, 5th down	Transposes the answer.
Vel	10 … 150 %	Velocity of the answer relative to the call.
Gate	×½ … ×4	Note length of the answer.
Give way	on / off	The answer stays silent where the call plays.
Evolve	on / off	Every cycle gets new random hits (Dub) and a new New answer.
Throw	on / off	At the start of every answer: CC 20 = 127 for a quarter note. Map it to the send of an echo, or let Dub Chords open its echo on it.

Key and output

Control	Range	What it does
Key	root, scale	Minor, Dorian, Phrygian, Mixolydian, Major, Lydian, Locrian.
♭♯	on / off	Follow the root and scale of your Live set (Scale mode). Needs a seven-note scale.
Out	Root / Chord	Play only the root of each chord, or the whole chord.
Chord	8 shapes	Fifth, Triad, Seventh, Ninth, Eleventh, Thirteenth, sus2, sus4, built from the scale.
Voicing	Close, Drop-2, Open	How the chord is spread.
Oct	−3 … +2	Octave of call and answer.
Answer to	This track, Bus A–D	Where the answer goes, see Receive.

Thoow Dialoque Receive

Plays the answer of the Dialoque on the same bus on its own track, through any instrument. Several Receives on the same bus play the same answer.

Control	Range	What it does
Bus	A–D	Must match Answer to of the Dialoque.
Pitch	±24 semitones	Transposes the answer on this track.
Throw CC	1 … 119	The controller number for Throw, 20 by default.

Thoow Dialoque Bass

A bassline on the roots of the chords. It reads the plan of the Dialoque on its bus: chords, call, answer and swing. The display shows what it plays.

Control	Range	What it does
Pattern	Offbeat, Push, Dub, Root, Drone	Offbeat eighths, sixteenths right after the kick, a sparse dub figure, one note per bar on the offbeat, or a held root per chord. Only Drone starts on the one.
Play	Free, Lock, Fill, Answer turns, Call turns	How the bass talks with the others: its own pattern, only together with call and answer, only in their gaps, or only during the answer or the call.
Vary	None, Fifth, Octave, Seventh	A second note for variation.
Approach	on / off	The last note before a chord change steps into the new root from a neighbouring scale note.
Anticipate	on / off	Notes on the last two sixteenths before a chord change already play the new chord.
Oct	−1 … +2	Octave of the bass.
Gate	10 … 100 %	Note length.
Vel	1 … 127	Velocity.

Record the MIDI

Dialoque sends plain MIDI, so you can record every part as a clip: create a new MIDI track, set MIDI From to the Dialoque track (or a Receive or Bass track) and choose the Thoow device in the second menu, arm the track and record. You get a regular MIDI clip to edit, loop or take to another project.

Tips

Classic dub: Rhythm Skank, Form Call | Answer, Type Echo with Offset 1/8., a soft pad with a long delay on the Receive track.
Let it breathe: Dub around 40 % and Evolve on, so the call never repeats exactly.
Tight groove: Type Complement and Give way on: call and answer interlock without colliding. Bass on Fill.
Slow changes: let Thoow Motion move Density or Dub over minutes.

Changelog

1.0.0 · 22 October 2026

First release for Ableton Live 12: Dialoque, Receive and Bass.

Credits

Thoow Dialoque, from the STEPS and CHORDS modules of our dub techno suite for VCV Rack. Design, code and display by thoow, Hamburg. Ableton and Live are trademarks of Ableton AG. Max is a trademark of Cycling '74.

Questions or feedback: service@thoow.com