User Guide

Chapter 4: The Main Screen
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- One by one drag the notes up to the correct melody note, holding down the Shift, Control, and Command key
for sharps, flats, and naturals respectively. You'll then have entered a melody that sounds like it was recorded
from a keyboard, without the stiff sound of a melody entered in step time!
Note: If you have the wizard on, the SPACEBAR won't stop playback. You need to press ESCAPE to stop playback if the Wizard is
on. This is because people mistakenly hit the spacebar while playing the wizard, which would stop the song inadvertently.
The Embellisher
Click on the Embellisher checkbox to enable live embellishment of the Melody or Soloist part
during playback.
When musicians see a lead sheet that has a melody written out, they would almost never play it exactly as written.
They would change the timing to add syncopation, change durations to achieve staccato or legato playing, add grace
notes, slurs, extra notes, vibrato, and other effects.
If you enable the Embellisher, any Melody will get embellished as it is played so that you hear a livelier, more
realistic Melody - and it's different every time.
Click on the Embellisher
toolbar button to open the
Melody Embellisher dialog.
The Memo shows the current
embellishments that have been
applied. You can change
settings and redo the
embellishment, or you can
make the current
embellishment permanent.
The Embellisher is only active while the music is playing, it doesn't permanently affect the Melody track. There is
an option to make the Embellishment permanent, so that if you like a certain embellishment you can add it to the
Melody track. This is especially useful to spice up songs that have been entered in step time with “robotic”
velocities and durations of notes. Using the Embellisher makes it sound like a person was playing instead of a
computer!
Toolbars
The main toolbar extends the full width of the screen. (It is divided in two here.)
The [New] button clears the Chordsheet to start a new song. Band-in-a-Box reminds you to save your
work before it erases the chords.