Version 2011 for Windows ® © Copyright PG Music Inc.1989-2011. All rights reserved.
PG Music Inc. License Agreement CAREFULLY READ THE FOLLOWING TERMS AND CONDITIONS BEFORE COMPLETING THE INSTALLATION OF THIS SOFTWARE. USAGE OF THE SOFTWARE INDICATES YOUR ACCEPTANCE OF THE FOLLOWING TERMS AND CONDITIONS. LICENSE A. The program may only be used on a single machine. B. You may transfer the program and license to another party if the other party agrees to accept the terms of this Agreement.
Table of Contents PG MUSIC INC. LICENSE AGREEMENT.............................................................................................................2 TABLE OF CONTENTS ............................................................................................................................................3 CHAPTER 1: WELCOME TO BAND-IN-A-BOX!...............................................................................................12 WHAT IS BAND-IN-A-BOX? ...................................
Open File Dialog .................................................................................................................................................57 Custom File Selection Dialog ..............................................................................................................................57 Favorite Songs (and Styles) .................................................................................................................................58 GLOBAL SONG OVERRIDES .......
StylePicker Filters .............................................................................................................................................103 Categories..........................................................................................................................................................105 StylePicker Column Headings ...........................................................................................................................
Audio Reverb .....................................................................................................................................................167 More Audio Effects ............................................................................................................................................168 THE MEDLEY MAKER .............................................................................................................................................168 SAVING SONGS ........
Big Lyrics (Karaoke) Window ...........................................................................................................................229 PRINTING ................................................................................................................................................................231 Print Options .....................................................................................................................................................231 Print Preview....
EDIT THE AUDIO FILE .............................................................................................................................................285 Audio Edit Window Toolbar ..............................................................................................................................286 Non-Destructive Audio Track Editing ...............................................................................................................286 AUDIO HARMONIES ........................
Plug-In Options .................................................................................................................................................345 FIND FILE ...............................................................................................................................................................346 ROLAND VSC3 VIRTUAL SOUND CANVAS .............................................................................................................347 COYOTEWT ...................
Alternate Styles & Expanded/Reduced Styles ....................................................................................................418 Testing Your RealDrums Style...........................................................................................................................419 Using your RealDrums style in Band-in-a-Box .................................................................................................421 THE HARMONY MAKER................................................
SHORTCUTS: KEYSTROKE COMMANDS - HOT KEYS ...............................................................................................522 Quick Song Settings ...........................................................................................................................................522 Quick-Load Songs and Styles ............................................................................................................................522 Keystroke Commands ..................................
Chapter 1: Welcome to Band-in-a-Box! Congratulations on your purchase of Band-in-a-Box, the favorite of musicians, students, and songwriters everywhere. Get ready to have fun! What is Band-in-a-Box? Band-in-a-Box is an intelligent automatic accompaniment program for your multimedia computer. You can hear and play along to many song ideas and go from “nothing” to “something” in a very short period of time with Band-in-a-Box as your “on demand” backup band.
Installing Band-in-a-Box for Windows ® Minimum System Requirements - ® Windows 9x/ME/NT/2000/XP/Vista/7. 256 MB of available RAM. Digital audio features require a Pentium-class system. Minimum 400 MB available hard drive space. More space is required for RealDrums, about 1 GB per set. RealTracks (included with Band-in-a-Box) requires 2.5 GB of free hard disk space. Band-in-a-Box is fully functional with or without RealTracks and RealDrums. A MIDI sound source is required.
MIDI Setup Band-in-a-Box uses the multimedia drivers for your MIDI interface and/or sound card that are supported by the Windows operating system. To get sound playback you need to have a MIDI (and audio - for songs with digital audio, RealDrums, and RealTracks) driver installed. To start using the program you will need to make sure that your MIDI interface, audio driver, and Windows sound source is installed and configured. Run the program by double-clicking the program icon.
The MIDI Output Driver Wizard dialog will take you step-by-step through the process of auditioning and selecting an appropriate driver. This assumes that the appropriate Windows sound drivers are installed and correctly configured. Output to Software Synthesizers (DXi and VSTi) Software synthesizers allow Band-in-a-Box to play high quality sounds directly through your computer sound card, without requiring any external MIDI hardware.
The Synth Track tab edits Synthesizer settings, and the Audio Track tab edits Band-in-aBox audio track DirectX plug-ins. Select your desired DXi synth in the top plug-in Insert Slot 1. To apply DirectX audio plug-ins to the synth, insert DX audio plug-ins to Insert Slots 2, 3, or 4. This can be useful to add EQ, Reverb, Compression, or Peak Limiting plug-ins, if the “raw sound” of the synthesizer needs sweetening.
Select Preset Menu Select a preset. You can also use the small Right/Left arrow buttons to step forward/backwards through the presets one at a time, to audition each preset. Note: Some very nice plug-ins, including some advanced synthesizer plug-ins, may only have one preset, but that single preset can be a doozy containing many settings. Even with single-preset plug-ins, you can Save/Load Presets or Banks. Rename Pst: Rename the currently selected Preset (in the plug-in's memory).
Driver Latency Software synthesizers have some inherent latency, which is the delay between the time a note is played and it is processed by the computer. Older softsynths had noticeable latency, whereas a DXi synth using ASIO drivers has very little. This setting is used to synchronize the visual display (notation, chords, virtual piano etc.) with the sound you hear. Band-in-a-Box automatically sets the latency for DXi and some other softsynths.
The choices are: - General MIDI 2 support: If you're using the Roland VSC3, or a newer Sound Canvas (i.e. newer than 1999, or newer than the Roland SC88), then choose this GM2 support. - Roland GS (older Modules): “Older” Sound Canvases (SC55/SC88) support GS, but not GM2. The good news is that they have the same patches available, just at different locations. So if you choose this option, Band-in-a-Box will find the patches at the “GS” locations instead of the “GM2” locations.
On the Preferences [Audio] tab, you’ll see the following options for “Audio Driver Type,” MME or ASIO. MME is the default Windows audio driver type. MME is good, but there is latency (delay) associated with MME drivers. For this reason, Steinberg developed a faster type of audio driver system, called ASIO. It allows for much lower latency than ordinary MME drivers do. Note: Many OEM or value sound cards do not include an ASIO driver, so you may not have an ASIO driver yet.
output within Band-in-a-Box. If you do not hear input or output, then you may need to try different ports than the defaults. You may need to read your sound card’s instructions to determine the correct ports to use. Tip: The ASIO4All driver sometimes cannot connect if the Microsoft GS Wavetable synth is being used as a driver. So if this happens, you will get a message that ASIO will be silent, and the solution is to de-select the ASIO4All driver.
Depending on the speed of your computer, you may find that the playback has dropouts, clicks/pops, or other artifacts if you set the buffer sizes too small. This is because smaller buffers use more CPU power and if your computer can’t handle the low latency you will hear artifacts. If this happens, you would need to use larger buffer sizes. You may need to experiment to find what works well.
Chapter 2: QuickStart Creating music with Band-in-a-Box is as easy as 1-2-3! In this chapter, you’ll see how easy it is to get started with Band-in-a-Box. Step 1 – Typing in the Chords There are numerous ways of entering chords into Band-in-a-Box, we’ll discuss six of them: 1. Using the computer keyboard. 2. Playing directly on a MIDI controller keyboard. 3. Using the Chord Builder feature. 4. Importing chords from a MIDI file. 5.
cell position. Another method allows you to choose alternate chords. From the Window | MIDI Chord Detection menu item, you’ll see this window: When you play chords, Band-in-a-Box shows you the chord name and suggests alternates that you can choose from. Typing Ctrl+Enter enters the first selection, and advances the highlight cell by ½ bar. To place an alternate chord in the chordsheet click on the [Enter] button beside the chord you want. Enter Chords Using the Chord Builder Press the Chord Builder button.
Import Chords from the Audio Chord Wizard The Audio Chord Wizard is the amazing feature that automatically figures out the chords from MP3 files (or other audio files like WAV, WMA, and audio CD etc.).
You can make adjustments for the start of bar 1 and individual bar lines and also mark sections of the song using part markers, and the sections will begin on a new line with a line space between so they are clearly seen. Chords can be edited with a right-mouse click on the chord symbol. Edited chords are colored blue. Send the chords to Band-in-a-Box to make your own arrangement, transpose to your key, and print your own lead sheet for the song with chords, melody, and lyrics.
tempo, number of instruments, RealTracks artist, style set number, etc. Method 2: To make a quick selection, go to the Styles menu and choose from among the 24 “built-in” generic styles. This list provides a convenient way to choose from among the most popular music genres. Method 3: Styles that you’ve used previously show up in the Recently Played Styles list.
Step 3 – Play your song! You’ve entered chords on the chordsheet and chosen a style. Now it’s time to play the song! You’ll need to tell Band-in-a-Box how long your song is, how many times to play it through, in what key, and how fast. Framing the Song To tell Band-in-a-Box where to start and end the song, take a look at the middle of the main screen. Locate the framing buttons. There are three of them, one each for Beginning of Chorus, End of Chorus, and Number of Choruses.
Chapter 3: Band-in-a-Box 2011 50 New Features! The new features in Band-in-a-Box 2011 for Windows are… We’ve made big improvements to the sounds of the RealTracks, so that they sound more natural over a much wider range of tempos with the élastique Pro V2 time stretching engine by zplane.development. These improvements are built-in, so there’s nothing you need to do to get them working. Your existing songs will just “sound better” over a much wider range of tempos.
… and existing Jazz RealTracks have been enhanced with more natural phrasing (more pushes), better playing over non-Jazz chords (triads), RealCharts notation for some Acoustic Bass parts, and options for “simpler” playing in some RealTracks. See below for details. 35 New Pop/Rock/Folk RealTracks! These include: • Celtic (Irish) Jigs and Reels: Guitar, Piano, Bass, Bodhran (percussion). • Reggae: Guitar, Organ, Bass, Drums. • Calypso: Guitars (2), Accordion, Bass, Drums.
RealTracks sound more “musical” when stretched to extreme tempos. In addition to the major audio improvements when tempo is stretched by élastique Pro V2, the RealTracks soloists sound more musical when stretched to extreme tempos. This is because musicians tend to play more ahead/behind the beat at slower/faster tempos. This is a done automatically. New “Practicing” Feature: Change tempo of all loaded songs by X.
Easier Entry of Guitar Notation on Notation Window. If you hold down the number keys 1-6 as you click on a note, then the note will get inserted on MIDI channels 11 to 16, which are the guitar strings from high E to low E. If you also hold down the Q key, the note gets inserted as a bend. You can also click on notes on the guitar to insert guitar notation when in Editable Notation mode. RealCharts Notation and the Guitar fretboard are improved for some guitar styles (e.g. Brent Mason).
Bass, Electric, PopCalypso Ev 100 Guitar, Acoustic, Rhythm PopCalypso Ev 100 Guitar, Electric, Rhythm PopCalypso Ev 100 Guitar, High-Strung Acoustic, Rhythm PopCalypso Ev 100 Drums, PopCalypso^ RealTracks Set 107: Medium Pop Waltz Bass, Electric, PopWaltz Ev 120 Fiddle, Background PopWaltz Ev 120 Fiddle, Background PopWaltz Ev 120%%(Outside) Guitar, Acoustic, Fingerpicking PopWaltz Ev 120 Guitar, Acoustic, Strumming PopWaltz Ev 120 Guitar, Electric, Rhythm PopWaltzGrittyArp Ev 120 Guitar, Electric, Rhythm P
Vibes, Rhythm JazzBallad Sw 060 RealTracks Set 112: Jazz Vibes - Soloing Vibes, Soloist Bossa Ev 140 Vibes, Soloist Jazz Sw 110 Vibes, Soloist Jazz Sw 140 Vibes, Soloist JazzBallad Sw 060 RealTracks Set 113: Smooth Jazz - Cool Guitar and Electric Piano Guitar, Electric, Rhythm SmoothJazzCool Sw16 075 Guitar, Electric, Soloist SmoothJazzCool Sw16 100 Piano, Electric, Soloist SmoothJazzCool chorus Sw16 075 Piano, Electric, Soloist SmoothJazzCool delay Sw16 075 Piano, Electric, Soloist SmoothJazzCool dry Sw16
Piano, Acoustic, Rhythm PopUpliftHeld Ev16 120 Piano, Acoustic, Rhythm PopUpliftPulsing Ev16 120 Piano, Acoustic, Rhythm PopUpliftA-B Ev16 120 Synth Pad, PopUplift Ev 120 Drums, PraiseWorshipUptempo16ths^ RealTracks Set 118:Brent Mason Country Soloing Guitar, Electric, Soloist CountryBoogie Sw 140 Guitar, Electric, Soloist CountryFastPickin Ev 140 Guitar, Electric, Soloist CountryShuffle Sw 120 Guitar, Electric, Soloist CountryWaltz Sw 085 RealTracks Set 119: TexMex 2-Beat Accordion, Rhythm TexMex2Beat Ev 1
Then, you can run the BB iPhone app, on the iPhone BB, choose File-Server to connect with the desktop Server program, and then you’re in business! You can then transfer songs from BB desktop (in c:\bb\bb2Go folder), and generate songs on the iPhone. More details and videos at www.pgmusic.com/help100 Now let’s check out some of the new RealTracks. To do this, open files from the RealTracks – Demos folder. There are now 121 sets of RealTracks, with the newest 101 RealTracks found in sets 102 to 121.
There is a style memo for each style, that lists the instruments used, and whether the needed RealTracks are present. New Columns in the StylePicker show you how the # of instruments in each style, as well as whether all needed RealTracks for a style are present. The Filter button (as you’ve already seen), as well as the “Show All” button that clears the Filter. Now let’s shift gears, and load in a MIDI song from the c:\bb\styles00 folder. Load in the song.
You will hear the Medley play now, with the instruments changing. But what if you want different instruments, or changing instruments at different intervals? Let’s change them to every 4 bars, and add a Guitar solo instead of the Clarinet solo. Revisit the RealTracks Picker dialog. Highlight the strings track, and press the Medley button at the top right of the screen.
Chapter 4: The Main Screen Main Screen Overview Band-in-a-Box supports Windows themes. It will use the current theme that you have selected in the Windows Control Panel to use for windows and dialogs. The main screen gives direct access to the major features and program settings of Band-in-a-Box for ease and convenience during a session. There are five different areas on the main screen. 1→ 2→ 3→ 4→ 5→ The main screen of Band-in-a-Box with a new, blank song. 1.
Alert messages You’ll see that many Band-in-a-Box messages appear as “yellow alerts” at the top right of screen. That way you don’t have to respond to the message, interrupting work flow. Personalizing the Main Screen Band-in-a-Box gives you many options to personalize the main screen. Screen Layout The Chordsheet area (or Notation Screen) can be placed at the top of the screen if desired by selecting the “Put Notation/Chords on Top” from the Window menu or by pressing Ctrl+T.
Color Schemes You can choose from several color sets using the 256-color palette in Windows. Choose from pre-made color schemes or make your own. To change the color scheme, select Opt. | Preferences from the main screen, and then click on the [Colors] button in the Preferences dialog to launch the Color Selection dialog. To select a pre-made color scheme, press the [Import..] button and choose from the list of schemes. Select [OK] to make the changes permanent. Use the [Export..
Options and Utilities These settings are found in the Opt. menu and the Opt. | Utilities submenu. Language Selection This item in the Opt. menu allows you to change language from English to another language for display. If there are other languages supported by your version of Band-in-a-Box, then they will display in this dialog box. The new language will be displayed the next time Band-in-a-Box is launched. Edit Chord Shortcuts file (shortcut.txt) Add your own chord shortcuts.
Part Settings: The Bass/Drum/Piano/Guitar/Strings/Melody/Soloist and Thru buttons refer to instrument parts. The MIDI parts in use for the current song and style are shown in yellow, RealTracks and RealDrums are colored green. When a RealTracks part is underlined it has RealCharts notation or tablature that displays in the Notation window and also on the piano keyboard or guitar fretboard. Parts that are not used are in white. The names of muted parts display in red.
When the combo button is selected you can choose one of your ten favorite preset instrument combos. The patches are set from the [Fav. Patches] button in the Preferences. For example, you could setup Combo #1 to be an Acoustic Jazz combo which would send out patches like Acoustic Bass, Acoustic Piano, Acoustic Guitar, Flute, etc. When a Combo is selected changes to volume, reverb, etc. will apply to all parts. Right-click on the Combo radio button to open a menu of commands that apply to the entire combo.
Harmony The Harmony area displays the current Melody and Thru Harmony. At the top right, you'll see the harmony boxes for the Melody and the Thru/Soloist. The [M] button is for Melody harmony--pressing the [M] button produces a list of harmonies you can choose from. In this case it's set to SuperSax for a Big Band Sax-section harmony. This button permanently writes the generated harmony to the Melody track. Once converted, set the harmony to none to prevent a “harmony-on-harmony” effect.
Loop Section Settings The loop button launches the Loop Section Settings dialog, allowing you to set a range of bars to loop in Band-in-a-Box. The “LoopSec/LoopScn” checkbox turns the Loop Section on/off. When it shows “LoopSec” a selected range of bars repeats in an endless loop. “LoopScn” indicates a screen of notation is looping.
This is the “Render to WAV file” button, which will convert (render) your MIDI arrangement to an audio wave file. It includes a batch render feature to convert an entire folder of songs in a single operation. Transport Controls These buttons are like the transport controls on a CD player or a media player. [Play] button generates a new arrangement and plays the song. [Loop] plays the selected (highlighted) section of the chordsheet in a loop.
Floating Toolbars Use the Favorite Folders button to select a folder from previously used folders. Shift-click on this button to choose any folder. Open an audio file (WAV, WMA, MP3) and the Audio Chord Wizard will automatically figure out the chords. The Practice Window is where many of the features and add-on programs useful for learning can be launched. This opens a menu with selections for the RealDrums Picker and RealDrums Preferences (settings).
The Folder button allows you to change song and style folders or directories from within the program. Launches the Pitch Invasion game that helps to develop perfect pitch as you shoot down “alien” notes invading from above. Launches the Music Replay game that develops pitch, rhythm, and melody recognition by replaying what the program plays. This button opens the Notation window, where you can enter chords and lyrics, edit notation, and view MIDI notation.
The tuner button opens the Guitar Tuner so you can tune a guitar or other instrument that is plugged into the sound card. This button toggles the chord display among standard (CMaj7), Roman Numeral (Imaj7), Nashville (1Maj7), Solfeggio (DoMaj7) and Fixed Do. The SB button opens the Sound Blaster control panel, but only if you use a Sound Blaster card. Sound fonts are loaded in the control panel. This runs the stand-alone Title Generator program, which will generate and print 50 new song titles at a time.
Key Signature The key signature of the song is displayed on the main screen under the title. To change the key, click on the key signature to choose a new key from the dropdown list box. Band-in-aBox then asks you if you would like to transpose the song or not. Press [Yes] to confirm, or [No] to leave the melody and chords untransposed (only the key signature will change).
The Auto-generated song memo says if RealDrums come from the song or style. Chordsheet Area Chords, rests, shots, holds, and part markers are entered in the Chordsheet. The chordsheet can be viewed in the full linear view showing all bars, or optionally in fake sheet view that shows 1st and 2nd endings and repeat signs. Another option shows bars past the end of the song in gray.
Chord Entry The basic way of entering a song into Band-in-a-Box is to type in the chords to the song on the chordsheet (worksheet). The arrow keys move the active (highlighted) cell around in the chordsheet. The Enter key advances to the next ½ bar. Chords can be entered from the QWERTY keyboard or an external MIDI keyboard (see Window | MIDI Chord Detection…). Chords are typed in using any of the supported chord symbol displays: 1. Standard chord symbols (e.g., C or Fm7 or Bb7 or Bb13#9/E). 2.
When the chordsheet is transposed, you can type in chords in the transposed key, and they will show up as you have entered them, instead of requiring you to enter the chords in the concert key. To try this out, go to [Prefs] and click on [Display] to open the Display Options dialog. For the “Transpose” setting, choose “Alto Sax +9.” Then type in a chord, like Am7, and it will show up as Am7 without requiring you to enter it in the concert key.
Section Paragraphs When you’re reading a book, a new section begins on a new line, with space between. Band-in-a-Box does that for chords too. Whenever a new section occurs (a part marker), we start the new section on a new line and draw a grey line above to clearly mark the new section. A section can be as short as 2 bars. You’ll see each section on a new line so that the form of the song is easier to see. The feature is configurable and optional.
Chapter 5: Playing Songs in Band-in-a-Box Opening Files The SongPicker is the commonly used feature for finding and opening Band-in-a-Box song files, but Band-in-a-Box also has helpful features for locating and opening all types of music files. Find File So many files, so little time? The Find File feature is a “Swiss Army Knife” that allows you to find a Band-in-a-Box song (or any file that Band-in-a-Box can open), including filtering by words found in the file name or any text in the file.
File Associations Go to the menu item File | File Utilities to associate the file types for Band-in-a-Box songs and styles in Windows. Once set, this means that you can double click on a song or style and Band-in-a-Box will open up with that song or style. Choose the menu items File | File Utilities | Associate File types (songs, styles) with Windows… to associate the Band-in-a-Box file types, and Remove File Associations (songs, styles) with Windows… to remove the associations.
The Font Selection button lets you pick a font, size, and style for the dialog from any of the fonts installed in Windows. The Search button allows you to search for a file by its name or part of a name. The Favorite Folders button remembers the last few directories that you've used, allowing you to easily change between directories. Favorite Folders The menu command File | Favorite Folders launches the Favorite Folders dialog with a list of recently used folders.
The “Favorites” and “Recently Played” Radio buttons toggle between a list of your recently played songs (or styles), and your favorite songs (or styles). Favorite Song/Style lists can be edited, sorted, saved/loaded, and used with the jukebox. You can add an unlimited # of favorites. The favorites list will start off as an empty one. But you can add songs as your favorites, by clicking the Add Favorite button (this button is also found in the StylePicker).
If this is not selected, notation symbols (slurs, staccato, crescendos) will not be loaded from the song. The “Defaults for new songs” are settings from the Song Settings dialog. When “Vary Style in Middle Choruses” is selected (default) the song will play in substyle B throughout the middle choruses, playing substyle A for the first and last choruses only. If this setting is not selected the substyle changes will follow the part markers entered on the chordsheet.
In this section we will explain how to load and play existing Band-in-a-Box song files. Open any song file with the familiar Windows-style dialog box, just like any other file on your disk. Or use the Find File feature (File | Find File) to filter files by words found in the file name or any text in the file. Start song playback. The [Loop] button plays the highlighted section of the chordsheet or notation in an endless loop. Click and drag the mouse to highlight a section of bars to loop.
Folder Settings The folder settings are at the bottom of the SongPicker. The Current Folder name is displayed. The folder can be changed, either by: 1. Selecting the new folder. 2. Choosing a folder from recently used favorites folder. 3. Changing the current folder to the BB home folder. 4. Going “up” a folder (e.g. from c:\bb\styles to c:\bb). When the new folder is chosen, the song list for that folder will be displayed. The song list may need to be rebuilt; the program will do that automatically.
The SongPicker lists if any RealDrums or RealTracks were not found, in a separate column (“d” indicates missing RealDrums and “t” indicates missing RealTracks). If you want to disable this feature, you can make a file named c:\bb\AlsoReadStylesWithSongListBuildUp_False.txt (contents irrelevant). Check “Play when chosen” to automatically play the selected song. Once you’ve loaded a song you’ll see the chords on-screen in the chordsheet so you can follow the chord changes and play along with the band.
Change the Style Try different styles by clicking on the [Style] button to choose from a list of the styles available in the StylePicker window. Styles that have the same feel (triplets, eighths, sixteenths) and a similar tempo range to the current prototype will be indicated with an (*) asterisk. Styles with a (^) caret have a similar feel but a different tempo range. Band-in-a-Box StylePicker window. RealStyles and Styles with RealTracks RealStyles are Band-in-a-Box styles that use RealTracks only.
You can select RealDrums styles within the StylePicker. Highlight a MIDI style that you like, and press the RealDrums [Best] button, to see a list of the most compatible RealDrums styles for that style, or the [RealDrums] button to select from all available RealDrums. You can also change the style at any bar in the song, so you could use a few similar styles to add variety while keeping the same feel.
The Band-in-a-Box Synth window controls instrument settings. Patch Changes Patch changes are embedded in the Band-in-a-Box styles and these patches are loaded with songs by default. They can be disabled in the MIDI Options dialog found in the Preferences. Alternate patches can be saved with a song (Alt+F2). Change the instrument patch by scrolling through the 128 General MIDI instrument names in the Instrument box, even while the song is playing.
When you select the instrument from this menu, it will make the bank settings (Bank0 and LSB) for you. You can also change the bank #s directly, and the patch in the box will change. GM2 patches can also be selected elsewhere in the program, such as the Edit Settings for Current Bar dialog and the StyleMaker. Additional Patches A “patch” is a MIDI instrument name. Examples of patches are Acoustic Bass, Electric Piano and Violin. Patches are used to emulate real instruments through MIDI playback.
Click on this button to go to the PG Music web page where you can download more patch files from http://www.pgmusic.com/support_miscellaneous.htm. Converting Synthesizer Patch Lists in Band-in-a-Box Band-in-a-Box can read a patch file list generated by PowerTracks Pro Audio or Cakewalk, and convert it to a .PAT file for use in Band-in-a-Box. Converting PowerTracks patch list to Band-in-a-Box .Pat files. PowerTracks stores its patch lists in a single file, called PATCHES.INI.
This is done using the same process described above for PowerTracks, except that you open the individual .INS file instead of a PATCHES.INI file. For example, if you have a Cakewalk file called “My Synth.INS” you would select this file name. You would then save that converted list to c:\bb\My Synth.PAT.
You can double click on any bar to start playback at that location. There is also an option in the Preferences dialog to start and stop playback with the spacebar. The spacebar or double click can be used on an ending bar (or a bar in the tag), and it will play from the ending (or tag). Lead-In Counts and Metronome These settings are made in the Preferences dialog. Click on the [Count-in/Met.] button to open the Count-in and Metronome Options.
Allow Any Slides If you want the slides to occur, then set this to YES. Humanize Slides If set to YES, the slides will be humanized to slide the track a different amount for each note. The amount varies from 0 ticks (none) to the slide setting for the instrument. - Press the [Default] button to fill the tracks with default slide values. - Press the [Zeros] button to 'zero-out' the slide values for all tracks. - Press the [Update] button to affect your changes and hear the result instantly.
To enter settings manually in this dialog, you start by choosing either “Loop a Single Screen of Notation” or “Loop Range of Bars.” “Loop a Single Screen of Notation” (Ctrl+NUMPAD 7) loops a single screen of notation at the current song location. The length of the loop is determined by the number of “Bars/Screen” specified in the Notation Window Options.
“Conductor”- Live Looping/Playback control. As the song is playing, many “single key” hot keys are now available to control the playback and looping of the song. Play along with your MIDI Controller Keyboard If you have an external MIDI keyboard controller connected to your computer system, you can use the MIDI THRU features to play along with the program.
Thru channel MIDI keyboard will be played through the Wizard. C, E, G, and Bb will be mapped to chord tones while D, F, A, and B will be passing tones. Changing Instruments / Settings for the Wizard As a play along instrument, the Wizard uses the Thru instrument part. To change the instrument patch, volume, reverb, etc. for the Wizard select the Thru instrument in the synth window. MIDI Normalize If performing a live set, or at a jam session, it helps to have the volume of all of the songs be similar.
Styles (.STY) can have RealDrums (e.g. “–ZZJAZZ.STY”). This setting is found in the StyleMaker’s Misc. Style Settings dialog. You can set the RealDrum style inside the StyleMaker, by pressing the [Misc] button, and then typing the name of the RealDrum style. RealDrums can be substituted for MIDI drums on existing styles in the RealDrums Settings dialog, which opens with Ctrl+click on the RealDrums toolbar button or with the [RealDrums] button in the Preferences dialog.
RealDrums are normally saved with songs, unless you have unchecked “Save all Settings with Songs” in the Assign Instruments and Harmonies to Song dialog. In that case, you can select and save a RealDrums style with your song by going to File | Save Song with Patches & Harmony (Alt+F2) to assign a RealDrums style.
The dialog allows you to assign a specific RealTracks instruments to a track in a song. It also displays any RealTracks that are currently assigned to each track. Tip: RealTracks in styles are assigned in the StyleMaker. Press the [Misc.] button or use the StyleMaker menu command Style | Misc. Settings to go to the Misc. Style Settings dialog, then click on the [More] button for the More Settings dialog. To use the dialog, first select the track that you want to assign.
Freeze Tracks Freezing (locking) MIDI or RealTracks/RealDrums Any track can be frozen (MIDI or RealTracks). When frozen, it won’t get changed or re-generated. This saves time when replaying previous songs, and allows you to freeze an arrangement that you like. If you freeze the whole song, you don’t have to wait at all for the song to regenerate. Next time you play, it is ready to go.
Forcing Generation of a Song that is Frozen Band-in-a-Box won’t touch tracks that are frozen. But if you want to change that, without having to Un-Freeze the tracks, you can do this easily. Hold down the Shift key as you press the [Play] button (the fly-by hint will remind you of that), or choose the menu command Play | Generate (even if tracks are frozen). When you do this, the song will regenerate, the tracks will get rewritten, and the song will stay frozen.
Notice the various areas of the Guitar window. - The top title bar states the key of the song is Cm, the Melody track is the track displayed, and the guitar is at the 8th position. - The fretboard is displayed with the highest notes of the guitar at the top, and the open position of the guitar on the left. - There are names for the open strings displayed on the left (E B G D A E). - There are fret positions marked at the bottom of the fretboard.
Guitar Fretboard To see the guitar neck displayed in DADGAD, choose Melody | Track Type | Guitar – DADGAD Tuning. When you open up the Guitar window and choose the Melody track, you’ll see the DADGAD tuning.
Any melody will now display in the chosen tuning. Similarly, you can set the Soloist track to an alternate guitar tuning with the Soloist | Track Type menu. The Guitar track (or Piano, Strings) is controlled by the style, and will only reflect the type of tuning stored in the style. Load in some alternate tuning styles included in Styles Set #44 – Requested 4 to see the chording on the guitar track in alternate tunings.
The examples above are for DADGAD tuning, but apply similarly to all 11 alternate tunings included. Some of the tunings are “Nashville High Strung.” These tuning have the lowest 3 strings tuned up an octave, to achieve a close sound. So a DADGAD High Strung tuning would have the lowest 3 strings “DAD” tuned up an octave. Listen to some style examples that use this tuning. One of the tutors uses 3 note Jazz voicings to simulate the famous BigBand chord guitar comping styles.
- - The default settings for this feature can be customized by pressing the [Settings…] button. The Big Piano window displays a single track on the piano. The piano can be resized by dragging the bottom of the window to enlarge it vertically. The key of the song is displayed at the top. The range of the piano is set automatically (based on the actual notes in the track) to show the largest possible piano). The notes of the scale are circled on the piano, with the note names included.
You must enable the QWERTY keys to be active for the Conductor during playback. This is done by selecting the “Enable Control by QWERTY keys” checkbox on the Conductor window. If you want to control the Conductor using the MIDI keyboard, you need to enable this by selecting the checkbox “Enable control by MIDI keyboard.” When this setting is enabled, any MIDI input will be interpreted as a hot key for the Conductor, and you won’t hear MIDI thru.
C# D3 Eb3 E3 F3 F#3 G3 G#3 A3 Bb3 B3 C4(48) Db4 D4 Eb4 E4 F4 F#4 G4 G#4 A4 Bb4 B4 C5(60) Db5 D5 Eb5 E5 F5 F#5 G5 G#5 A5 Bb5 B5 C6 Db6 D6 F6 to D7 Eb7 E7 F7 F#7 86 Half Speed Tempo Ctrl Quarter Speed Tempo Eighth Speed Tempo Loop Section Enabled NUMPAD 1 Play with last chorus looped Ctrl-NUMPAD 1 Play with middle choruses looped Ctrl-NUMPAD 2 Play with middle and last choruses looped Ctrl-NUMPAD 3 Jump to last chorus (no loop) Ctrl-NUMPAD 4 Jump to ending (no loop) Ctrl-NUMPAD 5 Loop notation screen Decrea
G7 Loop current Part c Ab7 Looping ON, previous setting v A7 Looping OFF b Bb7 Go Back 1 Chorus Ctrl a B7 Go Back 1 Section Ctrl s C8 Go Back 1 Screen Ctrl d Db8 Go Back 1 Bar Ctrl z D8 Go Back 4 Bars Ctrl x Eb8 Go Back 1 Part marker Ctrl c E8 Go Ahead 1 Chorus Shift A F8 Go Ahead 1 Section Shift S F#8 Go Ahead 1 Screen Shift D G8 Go Ahead 1 Bar Shift Z Ab8 Go Ahead 4 Bars Shift X A8 Go Ahead 1 Part marker Shift C Customizing the Sections Sections: This allows you to define up to 10 points in the song that
By pressing a QWERTY hot key prior to an action, you can control when the action will take place. If no mode hot key is pressed prior to an action, the default mode will occur. The default is set in the “Default Mode for section change” or “Default Mode for going back or ahead” combo box.
Jukebox Options Only Play song with melodies: If set to YES, the program plays only songs with melodies, that is, songs with an .MG? file extension. If NO, the Jukebox will include ALL songs in the subdirectory. Change Melody instrument: If you set this option to “Yes,” then the program will randomly change the melody instrument among your favorite 10 Melody instruments. Random order Playback: If set to “Yes,” the songs will be played in random order (though not repeating a song).
Preview: The Jukebox Preview mode will optionally play just one chorus of each song, or play a set number of bars of each song (e.g. 8 bars). To access this, press the [Juke] button, and select the Preview checkbox. Set the # of bars to use for the preview, a setting of 99 plays one chorus of each song. Delay between songs: The user can set a selectable time delay (in seconds) between songs.
Medley Maker Would you like to make a medley of various Band-in-a-Box songs (MGU) using Band-in-a-Box? This is easily done with the Medley Maker. Inside the Medley Maker, simply select the songs that you want, and Band-in-a-Box will make the medley for you. A medley is not simply joining songs together. A good medley uses a “transition” area between songs to introduce the new style, key, and tempo.
Chapter 6: Making Songs in Band-in-a-Box Make Your Own Songs Now that you’ve seen how much fun it is to play music with Band-in-a-Box, we’ll show you how easy it is to make songs of your own. This section gives you step-by-step instructions from start to finish. Getting Started Clear the Chordsheet Click on the [New] button to blank the Chordsheet. Name the Song Enter the title of the song by clicking in the title area and typing in the name.
- sets the beginning of the chorus to the current bar begin + Enter sets the end of the chorus to the current bar chorusend + Enter - sets the end of the song to the current bar end + Enter Another option is to right-click a bar in the chordsheet to set it as the beginning or end of the chorus or the end of the song from the settings in the context menu. For example, these settings are available with a right-click on bar 16.
An option (in Prefs-Display) for “11th chords” allows display of “9sus” chords as “11” (e.g., Bb11 instead of Bb9sus). This only affects how the chord is displayed, not how it is stored, and you can type either C11 or C9sus to enter the same chord. Press Ctrl+F2 or right click on a chord, and an Edit control allows you to see and edit the current chords. Enter Chords From MIDI Keyboard You can also enter chords from an external MIDI keyboard using the Window | MIDI chord detection… feature.
For example, if you have an 8-bar section at bar 9: To copy it to bar 23, and insert the 8 bars at that location drag the bar # and drop it at bar 23. To copy it to bar 23, and OVERWRITE the 8 bars at that location hold down the Ctrl key, and drag the bar # and drop it at bar 23. In the dialog that appears, just press OK. Another way to copy chords is to launch the Copy Chords and/or melody dialog by pressing Alt+C.
Assuming you have already copied some chords to the clipboard you then paste them into the chordsheet by: 1. Move the highlight cell to the bar to begin the paste of chords. 2. Click on the Paste button or choose Paste from the Edit menu. Tip: Remember that the copied section remains in the clipboard and can be repeatedly used. Example: If you're inputting a song with verse, verse, bridge, verse you can just copy the first verse to the clipboard, and then repeatedly paste in the other verses.
For example, the chord Gm7 in the key of F would be displayed as IIm7 in Roman Numeral Notation, 2m7 in Nashville Notation, and Rem7 in Solfeggio. “Fixed Do” Notation In Italy and other parts of Europe, chords like C7 are always referred to by the Solfeggio name (“Do 7” for C7) regardless of the key signature. These systems are very useful for learning or analyzing tunes, since they are independent of the key signature.
A Search/Replace Chords feature will search and replace chords, including support for asterisks (*) as wildcards. Search and Replace can be used with Roman numerals or numbers for chord names. So you can replace the V chord with V7, or the 5m chord to 5m7. Since these are remembered between songs, this feature is useful if you are changing multiple songs. A “Simpler Jazz” option will simplify chords like C13#11#5 to simply C9.
Chord Options Chord options include rests, pushes, and pedal bass. The Chord Options dialog opens with the C7 toolbar button, or from the right-click contextual menu in the Chordsheet. Normally, when a “shot” or a “held” chord is assigned, the instruments that are excluded from the shot/held chord play normally. There is an additional option for those excluded instruments to stay silent.
Double lines are drawn on the chordsheet at the bar before a part marker. Section Paragraphs When you’re reading a book, a new section begins on a new line, with space between. Band-in-a-Box does that for chords too. Whenever a new section occurs (a part marker), we start the new section on a new line and draw a grey line above to clearly mark the new section. Sections can be as short as 2 bars. You’ll see each section on a new line so that the form of the song is easier to see.
There is always a part marker at bar 1 so that Band-in-a-Box knows which substyle to begin with. The song continues to play in one substyle until it encounters a new part marker. The substyle will change automatically on second choruses when the “Vary Style in Middle Choruses” song setting is selected. Placing Part Markers - Move the highlight cell to the bar where you want to place the part market. Then press the P key on the computer keyboard.
With the Section Paragraphs feature you’ll see each section on a new line so that the form of the lead sheet is easier to see. Sections can be as short as 2 bars. The feature is configurable and optional with the “New line for every section (part marker)” setting in the Display Options dialog (Opt. | Preferences [Display] button). Applying Styles There are many styles available for use with the Band-in-a-Box program. Styles refer to styles of music like Jazz Swing, Latin, Blues, Pop, Rock, or Country.
The StylePicker Window The StylePicker window is opened by pressing the [Style] button or the Shift+F9 keys. It lists all of the styles that are present in the \bb folder. The StylePicker window allows easy selection of styles by category or from a complete list of all styles. For example, you can select Jazz styles and see a list of all of your Jazz styles. Then you can select any style to see its full title, description, and examples of songs appropriate to the style.
To use the Filter, press the [Filter] button on the StylePicker to launch the StylePicker Filter dialog. Here you can set the various filters, to narrow down your search for styles. Filters - "8ths /16ths" filters the list of styles to display 8th note based, or 16th note based styles. - "Swing/ Even" filters the list of styles to display Even 8th note based, or Swing (triplet feel) styles. - "Tempo" filters the list to only show styles that would work well at the indicated tempo.
- "Defaults" resets to default settings, which is no style filter, and all styles will be displayed. Settings: This sets the StylePicker to show ALL styles in the selected category. Loads in a song demo for the currently selected style. Reduces the duration of chords in the song by half, i.e., 4 beats becomes 2 beats. This is useful when the new style has a different feel than the original style for the song. Doubles the duration of chords in the song so that 2 beats becomes 4 beats.
The various categories in the StylePicker include lists of just the RealStyles in that category to make your selection easier. The StylePicker lists also show styles with RealTracks, a blend of MIDI tracks and RealTracks. Style names for Styles with RealTracks are prefaced by an equals sign, =. Styles with RealDrums The StylePicker has a special category called “Styles with RealDrums.” This lists many RealDrums styles (.STY) that we’ve made.
Adding RealDrums Styles You can also add or change RealDrums styles within the StylePicker. Highlight a MIDI style that you like and press the RealDrums [Best] button, to see a list of the most compatible RealDrums styles for that style, or press the [RD] button to select from all available RealDrums. The RealDrums for this style shows you the current style that would be substituted (assuming you have RealDrums enabled, and MIDI substitutions enabled in RealDrums Prefs).
When you find a style that you'd like to test, double click on its name in the list to hear a preview. When selected, the StylePicker opens showing the style in use in the current song as the prototype. When a new style is previewed, patches appropriate to the new style get loaded in if you have selected “Auto Change Melody/Soloist Patch.” So when you load in a “Chopin Piano Style” the Melody patch of your song will change to Piano to blend in with the new style.
Press the [Add New Style] button. A style has been added, called NONAME.STY. You now need to fill in all of the information in the colored fields to supply the information for the style you have added. Note: For this example, we’ll add a Jazz style called NEWONE.STY. This style is included in the C:\bb folder. This information includes: 1. Name of the Style (8 characters maximum + .STY). 2. You can type in the style name, or press the Choose button to pick a style name from the \bb folder.
Style disk #. 8. When a style is chosen in the StylePicker, it will send out patch changes on the Melody and Soloist tracks, to make the song sound more authentic in that style. The settings for Melody and Soloist patches allow you to select which patch types will get sent out. Here we choose “Jazz Patches” for our NEWONE.STY We’re finished adding the NEWONE.STY. We could now continue adding new styles, and categories, for all of our new styles that are not in the list.
Technical Information about the BBW.LST file The Help topics “Select Style with information” and “LS3 files” have information about adding styles to the Styles List. If you are technically minded and want to modify the styles list file then read on. The Styles List is built from a text file called BBW.LST. You should only edit this file if you want to change the list of styles, or add styles that you have created. Technical Information about the BBW.
Favorite Styles Button Another way to load a style is with the favorite styles [F] button, located to the right of the StylePicker button. This opens a dialog with separate lists of Recently Played and Favorite styles. You’ll see “Favorites” and “Recently Played” Radio buttons that toggle between lists of recently played styles and your favorite styles. The favorites list will start off as an empty one. You can add styles as your favorites by clicking the [Add Fav] button.
And when you have found a new favorite style, just change the alias. You can also load or save sets of “Alias” files and share them with others. To type in a style name that you don't have, use the [Custom] button. 1. To create a new alias, click on an empty spot (i.e. no alias defined) in the alias list, or click on the alias you wish to edit if you wish to change an existing alias. 2. Press the [Choose] button below the Original style box and select the style you wish to be replaced. 3.
Using MultiStyles Band-in-a-Box MultiStyles are styles that can have up to 24 substyles; original Band-in-a-Box styles had two substyles, “a” and “b.” Band-in-a-Box MultiStyles typically have four substyles, but may have up to twenty-four, selected by using part markers “a” through “x.” You can easily make your own MultiStyles, either from scratch, or combining parts from existing styles to make a MultiStyle.
If you’d like more substyles, add more styles separated by semicolons (e.g. “zzjazz;z5bossa;c_george”). Then you’d have 8 substyles from “a” to “h.” Note that each of these styles can have a specific RealDrums style, either stored in the style itself (Misc. Style Settings “RealDrums Settings”), or substituted via MIDI substitutions in RealDrums settings. MultiStyles in Songs If you have a song, you can also use more than 2 substyles for that song.
1. 2. - or 3. Clicking on the RealTracks toolbar button and selecting RealTracks Picker Dialog. Right-clicking or double clicking on an instrument name at the top of the Band-in-a-Box main screen and choosing Assign RealTracks in the menu. Press the [Assign to Track] button in the RealTracks Settings dialog. The dialog allows you to assign a specific RealTracks instruments to a track in a song. It also displays any RealTracks that are currently assigned to each track.
Tip: RealTracks in styles are assigned in the StyleMaker. Press the [Misc.] button or use the StyleMaker menu command Style | Misc. Settings to go to the Misc. Style Settings dialog, then click on the [More] button for the More Settings dialog. To use the dialog, first select the track that you want to assign. Then, select the RealTracks that you want in the list below it. Using RealDrums in Songs There are several ways to hear RealDrums with new or existing Band-in-a-Box songs.
The RealDrums Picker can also be opened directly by clicking on the toolbar button. This action selects a RealDrums for the current song. It does not change the RealDrums set used in the style. RealDrums Styles There is a separate category in the StylePicker for styles with RealDrums. These styles can be identified by the style name beginning with a minus sign. For example “-ZZJAZZ.STY” is a version of the ZZJAZZ.STY that uses RealDrums. Styles (.STY) can have RealDrums (e.g. “–ZZJAZZ.STY”).
With “Enable RealDrums” checked RealDrums may be used rather than MIDI. There is also a hot key combination to turn RealDrums on/off (Ctrl+Shift+F6). The hot keys also work while the song is playing. This will substitute RealDrums for MIDI styles. You can change the setting from 1 to 5. If set to 1, almost all MIDI drums will get substituted by RealDrums. If set to 5, only RealDrum styles that match the style perfectly will get substituted. Technical note: The text file a_pgmusic.
The Edit Settings for bar… dialog (F5 key) lets you use multiple RealDrums styles within a song - either using the RealDrums from a Band-in-a-Box style or specifying a RealDrums style to use at a particular bar. Note that changes at any bar must be enabled in the RealDrums Settings. Arranging Your Song Note: The chapter titled The Main Screen has additional information on the settings described here. Setting the tempo The tempo is displayed under the title.
This button opens a dialog box where the song’s title and its main settings can be typed in. These settings are usually made in the main screen title window. This buttons opens the Edit Settings for Current Bar dialog. This button opens the Chord Options dialog where you can edit chords and add rests and pushes.
These are additional song settings that are saved with the song. Vary Style in Middle Choruses If set to “Yes,” the song will play in substyle “b” throughout the Middle Choruses. The Middle Choruses are considered all choruses except the first and last ones. For example, in the Jazz Swing Style, since the “b” substyle is Swing, all of the middle choruses will have swing bass. (Whereas the “a” substyle is playing half notes on the bass.
To turn song endings off for all songs, choose Opt. | Preferences and then press the [Arrange] button to open the Arrangement Options dialog. Set the “Allow any Endings” checkbox = “Off” (cleared). Fade Out Song You can now quickly choose a fadeout ending, just press the [Fade] button in Song Settings, and Bandin-a-Box will fadeout the last “x” bars of the song (you can specify how many bars). Or customize the fadeout with precise values for each bar.
On slower computers, songs with lots of RealTracks might have playback problems (stuttering). If so, you can use this setting to disable Fast Generation for this song. You can turn Fast Generation off for all songs in the RealTracks preferences by unchecking the setting “Speed up generation of RealTracks (disable on slow machines).” Repeats and Endings You can add repeats and endings so that the Lead Sheet window will display and printout using 1st /2nd endings.
Sequencer Mode There are 2 tracks in Band-in-a-Box to add your own recordings. These are the Melody and Soloist tracks. Normally you would want a single part on each of them. But, since MIDI information can have separate channels, it is possible to store 16 separate parts on each of the Melody and Soloist parts. When the track has been set to “Multi (16) -Channel” we refer to this as “Sequencer Mode.
Record a Live Audio Track You can record an audio track of your live vocal or instrumental performance and save it to an audio wave file along with the Band-in-a- Box accompaniment. Make sure that you have a microphone plugged in to your sound card, or a connection from a mixer, keyboard, or other audio device connected to the Line In jack on your sound card. Click on the [R.Aud] button to prepare to record and audio track. The VU Meters will also open automatically when the Record Audio dialog is opened.
Set the start point for the recording. You can record from the Start of the song, somewhere in the middle, or punch in by choosing a bar and chorus # to start recording. Also Record MIDI? If you also want to record MIDI at the same time, press [Cancel] to exit the Record Audio dialog, and choose the Audio menu command Record Audio and MIDI (or Shift+click on the Record Audio toolbar button).
Press [Stop] or press the [Esc] key. You will then see the “Keep Take?” dialog. If you are happy with your recording, you should choose [OK -Keep Take] and the audio will be added to the Audio track. You can listen to the results by pressing [Play]. If you are not happy with the results, you can choose Edit | Undo Keep Audio Take and you will be back to where you were prior to the recording. You can also choose the option to [Take Again], which reopens the Recording dialog.
Harmonize the MIDI Melody Press the [M] button in the Synth window to add a MIDI harmony to the Melody track. Pressing the [F] favorites button brings up a list of the last 50 harmonies used. The Select Melody Harmony dialog box allows you to choose from any of the pre-defined harmonies and even allows you to define your own. This button opens the Harmony Maker, where you can customize Harmonists. You can search for a harmony by a keyword (i.e.
When adding a harmony to the Melody (or Soloist) you can use the option to loosen up start times of for the harmony notes to achieve a more natural, richer harmony sound. Choose menu item Melody | Edit | Utilities | Loosen Start Times. You can select the range of adjustments. For example, if you want the notes to be played earlier, use a negative number. A setting of minus 5 to positive 6 would cause the start times to be varied up to 5 ticks early and 6 ticks late.
Note: Once the track is converted you should set the harmony to “None” or you will hear harmonies being applied to the harmony notes, i.e., “harmony-on-a-harmony.” Live Harmonies While Band-In-A-Box Is Stopped Normally, the Live Harmony feature is not active when Band-in-a-Box is stopped. But you can in fact use the Live Harmony even while a song is not playing. You need only to open the Harmony | Real Time MIDI Harmonies menu item.
If you set the Only Harmonize if Left hand chord held down you'll be able to control what notes get harmonized by holding down the chord when you want a note to be harmonized. Play Along with the Wizard The Wizard is an intelligent play along feature that is controlled with the bottom two rows of your computer’s QWERTY keyboard. The bottom row of keys plays chord tones; the second row plays passing tones.
MIDI Keyboard Wizard By turning on this Wizard setting in the Opt. | Preferences Transpose dialog, notes played on a Thru channel MIDI keyboard will be played through the Wizard. C, E, G, and Bb will be mapped to chord tones while D, F, A, and B will be passing tones. Changing Instruments and Settings for the Wizard As a play along instrument, the Wizard uses the Thru instrument part. To change the instrument patch, volume, reverb, etc. for the Wizard select the Thru instrument in the synth window.
Add a Solo - “The Soloist” That’s right! Band-in-a-Box can “solo like a pro” in hundreds of styles. Use the [Soloist] button on the main screen to open the Select Soloist dialog box and choose from over up to 2000 Soloist profiles. You can select a Soloist type (e.g. Modern Jazz) and see only soloists matching the type. And you can also filter to show/not show soloists from Soloist sets that you don’t have. Use the preset Soloist settings, or choose a Mode and which Choruses to solo.
There is a dedicated function to vary the start times of notes on the Melody or Soloist tracks, with options for what notes to affect (harmony, chords, and amount of variance). Choose menu item Soloist | Edit Soloist Track | Utilities | Loosen Start Times.
Automatic Songs - “The Melodist” Feel like composing a brand new song? With Band-in-a-Box you can compose a new song, in the style of your choice complete with intro, chords, melody, arrangement, and improvisations, all created by the program! All you have to do is pick from one of the “Melodists” and press [OK] - the program then automatically generates the intro, chords, melody, and arrangement in the chosen style.
Edit Functions The on-screen display of the song file name includes “*” when the file has been changed. - Edit | Undo and Edit | Redo allow you to Undo (or redo) most operations. Multiple Undo supports up to 999 levels of undo (configurable). The default number of undos is 99. If you need to change this, it can be done in Opt. | Preferences “Number of Levels of Undo.” The range can be 5 to 999. You can also choose Edit | Redo to redo an undo.
”K” Quick Copy Method By simply typing “K” at a bar followed by the Enter key you can instantly copy the last 8 bars to the current position. By adding additional keys in the K command, you can customize this shortcut (e.g. typing K 12, 3 would copy from bar 3 for 12 bars to current position.) The current position is advanced to the bar beyond the copy. This speeds up song entry! For example, if you're entering a song that has a repeating section of chords for 8 bars.
With this dialog, you have complete control over erasing a number of bars of chords and/or the Melody, Soloist, and Lyrics. If you're erasing the Melody, Soloist, or Lyrics you need to specify which chorus you wish to erase. Intro Bars – Auto Generate (or Remove) To generate an intro, press the [Intro] button (or choose the Edit | Intro Bars… menu item). The Generate Chords for Intro dialog opens. With a single press of a button you can auto-generate a 2, 4, or 8 bar intro for any song.
Repeats/codas/1st-2nd endings Most lead sheet-style printouts contain 1st/2nd endings, repeats, coda, tag, and sign markings. Band-in-a-Box now supports entry, display, and printout of song forms using these symbols. This command launches the Edit Repeats and Endings dialog where you can enter repeats, 1st and 2nd endings, DC, DS al coda and more.
For example, to have one bar (bar 13) of 5/4, select Edit | Set Time Signature… and toggle the 5/4 button. Then, type in the bar beginning and ending range in the space provided. (In this case, 13 and 1.) Transpose This submenu lets you transpose the entire song by a number of semitones, or specify a range to transpose with the Transpose From.. To.. command. To transpose part of a song, simply highlight the area you wish to transpose and select Transpose From.. To.. in the submenu.
If the “Summary” checkbox is selected, you’ll see an additional window that automatically displays a full summary of the song (title/tempo/patches used in the song), as well as other special features, such as substyle patch changes or harmonies. Auto-Generate Song Title allows you to generate a title for a song. There is also a button on the main screen for this. ‘Jazz Up’ The chords This will “Jazz Up” the chords by changing chords like C and Cmaj to 7th and 6th chords.
You can enter pedal bass with any chord. For example, if you are in the Key of F, and would like a pedal on a C note for 2 bars (on an Fm7 chord), then type in the settings as shown. This will play the rhythm specified – in this case the pattern will play on beat 2 and 4. The [Clear All] button erases all Rests/Shots/Pushes/Pedal Bass from a song.
Tempo Change If you want to change the tempo at a certain bar of the song, then use this dialog box to type in the new tempo in beats per minute. The tempo change takes effect at the beginning of the bar and remains until a new tempo change at another bar is inserted. Alternatively, you can specify a percentage change in tempo. Key Signature Change You can have multiple keys in the same song with the new key signature shown on notation.
Style Changes To choose a new style for this bar you can select the style from the StylePicker by pressing [.STY] or from the \bb folder by pressing [Open]. The [Play] button in the StylePicker allows you to listen to the style before loading it. This allows you to hear what the selected style will sound like in your song. When chosen, the name of the style change for the current bar will be displayed. Click on [Clear STY] if you want no style change to occur.
Style, tempo, key signature, volume, patch, and harmony changes will be recorded on your song worksheet indicated by a small red square around the bar that will be affected. Changes remain in effect from that bar forward until new changes are recorded or until the next chorus if you have set the changes to apply only to the current chorus. Piano Roll Window You can edit your tracks using the “Piano Roll” window, similar to the type found in many sequencer programs.
Keyboard Pitch Panel 1. Click on a single note of the keyboard to select all notes of the clicked pitch. 2. Click-drag on the keyboard to select all notes in a pitch range. 3. Shift-click-drag to add another set of notes to the selection. 4. Ctrl-click-drag to invert a pitch selection. For instance, you could drag C5 thru C6 to select an octave of notes. Then Shift-click A3 to add all A3 notes to the selection. Then Ctrl-click F5 to remove all F5 notes from the selection.
Zero-value events are drawn as small hollow squares, to make them easy to identify. When graphically inserting controller and pitch bend events the event density is adjustable from one event per 1 tick up to one event per 30 ticks. With events such as pitch bend or controllers like modulation and sustain, it is important to take care to end a “gesture” with a zero-value event.
useful when viewing multi-channel tracks. View/Edit Graphic Data Determine what graphic data to view or edit in the bottom Graphic Data panel. Choose Velocity, Controller, Program Change, Channel Aftertouch, and Pitch Bend. If Chan is not set to “All,” only the selected channel events will be displayed. Controller Type If “View/Edit” is set to “Control,” the Controller Type control becomes visible. The Graphic Data panel will display the chosen controller type.
Note Editing Edit Note Time Stamp (start time): Move the cursor over the left of a note. An east-west cursor appears. Then click-drag the note to a new time (horizontal dragging). If multiple events are selected, and you want to move all selected events, use Shift-click-drag. Otherwise a click on a note will deselect the previous selection, and it will only select/edit the clicked note. Edit Note Pitch: Move the cursor over the middle of a note. A north-south cursor appears.
Edit Events Edit Event Value: Move the cursor over the top half of an event. A north-south cursor appears. Click-drag vertically to scale event values. To scale a selected group of events, Shift-click-drag vertically on one of the events in the selection. Edit Event Time: Move the cursor over the bottom half of an event. An east-west cursor appears. Click-drag horizontally to slide the event in time. To slide a selected group of events, Click-drag horizontally on one of the events in the selection.
Select All Note Events (Of Current Channel): (right-click the Note Panel or Note Ruler) If the Chan combo box is set to All, this item will select ALL NOTES on ALL CHANNELS, but it will not select any non-note events. Otherwise, ALL NOTES are selected which match the CURRENT MIDI CHANNEL.
When editing a multi-channel guitar part or editing an imported multi-channel MIDI file, this command may be useful. Beware that it might initially appear confusing. For instance, one might set the view channel to ALL, and make a selection (intending to set these events to Ch 12). Then set the view channel to 12, and of course the selected events disappear (if the events had some other MIDI Channel).
Standard Notation Window The Standard Notation window can be used for notation display and the entry of chords and lyrics. Just type a chord name and it will be inserted at the current time line location (the black vertical stripe just under the tool bar.) Click on the instrument buttons to see the notation for the different parts: Bass, Drums, Piano, Guitar, Strings, and the Melody [M], or the Soloist [S]. Press the [Opt.
This is the screen for step-entry of a melody or for editing existing parts. There are checkboxes for different note entry modes. The Note or Rest checkboxes determine whether a note or a rest will be inserted when the mouse is clicked. When the Mono checkbox is selected, the notation is entered as monophonic (one note only). This is useful for melodies that only have one note playing at a time.
Staff Roll Notation Mode Click on the Staff Roll Notation button to go to Staff Roll Notation mode. Band-in-a-Box Staff Roll Notation window. In addition to the editing features of the Editable Notation mode, in Staff Roll mode the velocity (vertical line) and duration (horizontal line) of notes can be edited with the mouse. Adding Note-Based Lyrics to Your Song Open the Notation window by pressing the notation button. Press the [L] button on the Notation toolbar.
The [Section Text] button enters the text in the lyric box as section text at the current bar. The [Edit] button opens the Edit Lyrics dialog where lyrics and section text can be edited. Viewing the Lyrics The big [L] button in the user configurable toolbar opens the Big Lyrics/Karaoke window. The font and colors are selectable, you can show or hide the chords, and words highlight as the music plays. Band-in-a-Box Big Lyrics window.
During playback, red rectangles highlight the current bar. If the bar is empty (or in Fake Sheet mode), the Lead Sheet will draw the staff lines and bar lines in red. Multiple Tracks of Notation Multiple tracks of notation can be viewed together in the Lead Sheet window. To select tracks, hold down the Ctrl key and click on the part buttons at the top of the screen in the order that the tracks should appear from top to bottom.
This song has a 1st/2nd ending entered, with separate lyrics for each ending. Multiple lines of lyrics will also appear if there are lyrics in multiple verses (choruses). In the Notation Window Options, “Lyric Position” allows you to vertically position the height of the lyrics. Lead Sheet “Lyric Text Block” A large text block can now be appended to the Lead Sheet window and printout.
Lead Sheet Printing Click on the [Print] button to print your song as sheet music. There are print options for “# of copies to print” and “print specific page #.” In the Print Preview screen the notation can be saved as a graphics file to be imported to a document or uploaded to an Internet page. Choose the file type that you'd like to save to. If you want an exact rendition of the screen, choose MONO BMP, since bitmap files are saved without any loss of quality.
Band-in-a-Box MultiTrack notation. Multi-Channel Notation (Sequencer Mode) Normally you would want a single part on the Melody and Soloist tracks. But, since MIDI information can have separate channels, it is possible to store 16 separate parts on each of the Melody and Soloist parts. When one of these tracks has been set to “Multi (16)-Channel” we refer to this as sequencer mode.
Note: These settings are only visible when the track type for the Melody or Soloist is set to Multi (16) – Channel. Select “CUSTOM channels play/display” and press the [Set…] button to launch the Sequencer Window (Multichannel track on Melody/Soloist) dialog. Then you can customize which channels will play and display. This dialog can also be opened by clicking on the [SEQ] button on the toolbar.
Digital Audio Features There is a File | Open Audio command, to open WAV, WMA, MP3, WMV, or CD Audio files. Once opened, you can play the audio track along with a Band-in-a-Box song. Open an MP3/WAV/WMA or audio CD track, and play back at 1/2, 1/4, or 1/8 speed without affecting pitch. This is great for transcribing or analyzing audio. To play it at a slower speed, choose the desired speed on the Play | Tempo menu.
If we want to renumber the bars, right click on the waveform timeline at the place that you would like to be bar 1, and choose “Set Bar One.” To change the # of bars per row, or rows per screen, right click on the chordsheet. The +/- buttons at the bottom right of the window also change the row height. Chords may be edited in the Audio Chord Wizard with a right mouse click on the chord. When Edit Chord is selected, a highlight cell opens at the chord location.
Record a Vocal or Any Live Instrument To start recording audio, plug your instrument or microphone into the computer’s sound card. The Line Out from electronic instruments or amplifiers can be plugged directly into the Line In jack. To record your voice, or an acoustic instrument such as a flute, plug a microphone into the Mic jack. If you have a Sound Blaster card, this button is used to select the Microphone input and/or Line In input to record digital audio.
To select a punch-in range, open the Audio Edit window and highlight the punch-in section. The highlighted range will set the From: and Thru: values for Punch-In Record. Press the Esc key or click on [Stop] to stop recording. Band-in-a-Box will prompt you to keep the take or take again. When you get a take you like, press the [OK – Keep Take] button to save your recording.
Once you have recorded a vocal part into Band-in-a-Box, you can use this feature in many ways, including: - Record yourself singing into a Band-in-a-Box file. Create a vocal harmony for part or all of the song by selecting a Band-in-a-Box harmony and choosing the Generate Audio Harmonies option (Harmony | Audio Harmonies & Pitch Tracking or Audio | Audio Harmonies & Pitch Tracking).
More Audio Effects You can add professional audio effects like reverb, echo, and compression by choosing a plug-in from the Audio menu (Audio | Plug-in). Band-in-a-Box comes with a large selection of high quality audio effects built-in, and DirectX plug-ins are supported. The plug-ins apply audio effects or utilities such as compression to the already recorded audio part. A typical plugin dialog is shown.
A medley is not simply joining songs together. A good medley uses a “transition” area between songs to introduce the new style, key, and tempo. The Medley Maker automatically creates a nice transition area for you, writing in chords that would smoothly modulate to the next song, style, key, and tempo! To open the Medley Maker, click on the [A+B] button on the toolbar or choose File | Medley Maker. This launches the Medley Maker dialog.
Saving Song Settings By default all settings are saved with songs unless the “Save all Settings with Songs” box is unchecked (off) in the Assign Instruments and Harmonies to Song dialog (Alt+F2 or File | Save Song with Patches & Harmony). This includes RealTracks, RealDrums, and RealTracks solos as well as Patches, Volume, Audio and MIDI Reverb, Tone, Panning, Bank, Harmony (both Melody and Thru), and the Soloist.
Select the “For this song only, force MIDI drums” checkbox if you always want MIDI drums, not RealDrums, used with the song. Select “For this song only, use this RealDrum style” to assign a specific RealDrums style to your song. Press the [RD] button to choose the RealDrums style. This dialog box is usually used in combination with and not instead of saving a song. To save a song with this embedded information to your hard drive, you therefore: 1. Choose File | Save with Patches and Harmony (Alt+F2). 2.
By default, Band-in-a-Box writes Type 1 multiple track Standard MIDI Files. You can also save Type 0 MIDI files, they have all of the parts on a single track and are used by many hardware modules and other devices that play MIDI files because they are simpler to play (since they only have 1 track). Karaoke files (.KAR) are a special type of sing-along MIDI file with text events for the lyrics and a specific order for the tracks.
Include 2 bar lead-in in MIDI file If you don't want to create a MIDI file containing the first 2 bars of the 1—2—1-2-3-4 count-in you can select this option. If there is a Melody pickup, then the 2 bar lead-in will remain in the file. Write Lyrics in General MIDI format The GM specification has agreed upon specific requirements for writing lyrics in MIDI files, which are supported, so that lyrics that you save in Band-in-a-Box should show up identically in other MIDI programs.
For example, you could select Chorus #2 if that is the chorus that you want. The resultant MIDI file will be made from the selected range. Alternatively, without selecting a range on the chordsheet, you can make a MIDI file for a partial range by pressing the MIDI file button, and then the “Set Range” button. Batch convert a folder of songs to MIDI files.
Save Options [File on Disk] saves a MIDI file to your hard drive or floppy disk. You can then load the MIDI file into your sequencer for further editing. [Clipboard] copies the MIDI file to the Windows Clipboard as a Standard MIDI File. This feature allows clipboard enabled programs to Edit | Paste the Band-in-a-Box MIDI file directly into the program. For example, you can clipboard-paste Band-in-a-Box MIDI data to PowerTracks Pro Audio, CakeWalk, Musicator, etc.
The Render to Audio File dialog box permits you to save your file as a wave file (*.wav), a Windows Media Audio (*.wma) file, or other compressed audio formats supported by your system. Note that the MP4 and M4A options require Apple QuickTime for Windows, version 7.6 or higher, available from www.apple.com. You can direct render “MIDI only” songs into high quality wave files with the included Roland VSC DXi or Coyote WT softsynths, or with any other DXi or VST softsynth you have.
Choose the menu item Opt. | Save Preferences As to save a configuration or Options | Open Preference to load a saved configuration. Burn Your Own Audio-CD You can burn your Band-in-a-Box composition directly to an audio CD that will play in any standard CD player. To burn your CD: Press the [.WAV] button to open the Render to Audio File window. Then press the [Burn to Audio CD] button.
Chapter 7: RealTracks and RealDrums RealTracks What are RealTracks? RealTracks create Band-in-a-Box tracks with live audio recordings of top studio musicians and recording artists. These tracks take the place of the MIDI track for that instrument, but can still be controlled just like the MIDI instrument (volume changes, muting, etc.). Best of all, they follow the chord progression that you have entered, so that you hear an authentic audio accompaniment to your song.
In the RealTracks Settings dialog you can Enable/Disable the RealTracks feature. RealCharts (notation from some RealTracks) Most RealTracks now display notation, i.e. RealCharts, showing the notes that are being played. Some Guitar RealTracks also show tablature and an accurate on-screen fretboard guitar display to show what is being played on guitar. To see which instruments have RealCharts, visit the Assign RealTracks to Tracks dialog and sort column 11, “Chart.
RealTracks Folder The RealTracks styles are stored in c:\bb\RealTracks (assuming that c:\bb is your Band-in-a-Box folder). You can choose an alternate location by pressing on the folder button and picking an alternate folder. Then, click on the [Update] button to confirm the new location. You don’t need to visit this folder when using RealTracks; it is used internally by Band-in-a-Box, so you shouldn’t add or remove files from this RealTracks folder unless you “know what you’re doing.
You can then substitute all four parts by pressing the RealTracks toolbar button and then clicking on Select better RealTracks for this tempo. The Tempo Swapping (TS) column of the RealTracks Assign dialog shows which RealTracks are eligible for Tempo Swapping. The tempo swapping only occurs if you have the RealTracks in your installation. This “speed up” feature works automatically and uses CPU resources during playback.
Many Jazz comping styles play triads (instead of 7ths) when simple triads are entered, instead of “jazzing them up” to 7ths chords. Enable this setting if you prefer to have triads automatically “jazzed up” when comping using Jazz RealTracks. If this is set, when an old song with a MIDI style loads a RealStyle may get substituted automatically, making your songs sound better. You can reverse the substitution in the RealTracks toolbar menu by selecting Restore Style prior to Style Alias.
- In the RealTracks Settings dialog (Preferences), leave “Use +/- RealTracks for generation (enable on slow machines)” unchecked. The program won't use them. - Use the program for a few days, playing all kinds of songs, including ones with lots of RealTracks, and in different keys (e.g. Gb). If you look at the CPU usage of bbw.exe during playback, you can see how hard your machine is working. If it is less than 60% CPU use, things are fine.
2. - or 3. Right-clicking or double clicking on an instrument name at the top of the Band-in-a-Box main screen and choosing Assign RealTracks in the menu. Press the [Assign to Track…] button in the RealTracks Settings dialog. The dialog allows you to assign a specific RealTracks instruments to a track in a song. It also displays any RealTracks that are currently assigned to each track. To use the dialog, first select the track that you want to assign.
Tip: RealTracks in styles are assigned in the StyleMaker. Press the [Misc.] button or use the StyleMaker menu command Style | Misc. Settings to go to the Misc. Style Settings dialog, then click on the [More] button for the More Settings dialog. The list can be sorted by clicking on any column heading. As well as Name, Instrument, Type (Rhythm or Soloist), Feel (Even or Swing), Tempo, Genre, and Number there are more columns with additional information about each RealTrack instrument.
Use the song and style demos to audition RealTracks. The [Song Demo (MGU)] button will display a list of songs in the bb\RealTracks – Demos folder that use the selected RealTrack instrument. Click on the song name and then press the [Play] button to hear it. The [Style Demo (.STY)] button shows a list of styles that use the currently highlighted RealTracks instrument. Clicking on a style name will load the style into the current Band-in-a-Box song.
Multiple search terms work with the filter. If you separate terms with a space, each term is searched for separately. So a search for “Country Guitar Ev 120” will find any Country Guitar styles with an Even feel that would work with a tempo of close to 120. Adding a search term that has a number will filter for RealTracks that match the tempo or within a compatible range. [Generate Track] will generate a RealTracks instrument on the currently selected track.
Using RealTracks in Styles. For this discussion, we will assume that we are using RealPedalSteel, in the style “=GeorgeP.sty.” Note: We use this naming convention for Real Styles. This is optional. The first letter of “=“ indicates that at least one instrument is a RealTrack. The last letter(s) indicate(s) which instrument it is. “P”= Pedal Steel, “G”=Guitar, “PG”=Pedal Steel and Guitar. So the name “=GeorgeP.sty” tells you that it is a style called George, that has RealPedalSteel.
Typing 361 and pressing [Go To #]. 1. Choosing Favorites will allow you to return to a recently chosen Soloist 2. 3. Choose the Genre “RealTracks (audio soloists)” from the list of genres to see all available Soloists that use RealTracks. As with other Soloists, press the [All Solo] button to make sure that the Soloist will be generated for all choruses, or [Melody and Solo] if you just want the Soloist for a certain chorus.
musically different, not just “sped up.” Drummers play different types of fills etc. at slower/faster tempos, and these are captured with RealDrums. Technical note: If interested, you can see which tempos have been recorded by looking in the c:\bb\drums\ folder for the particular style you are interested in. How Do RealDrums Work? There are several ways to hear RealDrums with new or existing Band-in-a-Box songs. The simplest way is to select a style that already uses RealDrums.
This feature selects variations of RealDrums instruments with each PLAY. Most RealDrums styles (starting with RealDrums set 5) contain may instrument variations (“brushes vs. Sticks”, “HiHat vs. Ride Cymbal” “Percussion only” etc.). Now, by selecting [Pref] [Real Drums] “…choose different variations with each PLAY,” you can hear a different variation each time play is pressed, so the song sounds fresh each time. One time you’ll hear it with brushes, the next time with sticks and ride cymbals, etc.
In the RealDrums Settings dialog, there are now buttons that will, for a chosen RealDrums style, enable you to (1) play the RealDrums demo song, (2) show a menu of BB styles that would work with the Real Drum style and (3) play a song demo of various BB styles that work with the Real Drum style. INSTALL button. When this is pressed, WAV files will be created from any RealDrums styles that are still WMA files.
A filter is available. Type a filter text, (e.g. bossa) and press [Update], and you will then see the list filtered to show only RealDrums that have the word bossa somewhere in the title, memo, genre etc. Pressing [Show All] will cancel the filter, and show all RealDrums again. Multiple search terms work with the RealDrums Picker. If you separate terms with a space, each term is searched for separately.
“Memo” is a memo description of the style. These are stored in bb\RDPGMemos.txt file. You can also add your own memos in the User Comments box below. The “Artist Bio” shows brief summaries of the careers of the top drummers featured in RealDrums. This shows the current RealDrums for this song. This can either come from the style, or a specific RealDrums for this song, set in this dialog. Tip: RealDrums in styles are assigned in the StyleMaker. Press the [Misc.] button or use the menu command Style | Misc.
RealDrums styles ending in a caret (^) have variations available. They are listed here. Where there are two instruments shown, such as Brushes/Sticks, the first one plays in the “a” substyle and the second in the “b” substyle. [RD Demo] loads and plays a demo of the chosen RealDrum style. [SongDemo] shows Band-in-a-Box styles that will use this RealDrums style if “Substitute RealDrums” is selected. The song demo for the style will get loaded.
Audio Controls for RealTracks and RealDrums Tone Control There is a bass/treble Tone control for individual tracks with RealTracks or RealDrums, so you can easily adjust the bass/treble EQ for any RealTrack. The Tone settings save with the song. Choose an instrument and then use the tone control to adjust the tone from -18 (maximum bass) to +18 (maximum treble). Default is 0. Audio Reverb Control The A.
Reverb Settings The default is a “room” type of reverb but you can also set the type of reverb. To do this, press the Audio Reverb toolbar button, and adjust the various parameters in the PG Music Reverb dialog. You can enable/disable the audio reverb. If you disable it, this will save some CPU cycles, so this might be advisable on an older/slower machine if you hear that the audio is clicking or not keeping up. Click on the green Select a Preset button to open the list of presets.
Mix is the proportion of original signal to the reverb signal. Output adjusts the final level of the plug-in. Typical Reverb Settings - A large hall might have long Pre-Delay, long Decay, and moderate Density. - A hard large space such as a Gymnasium, might have long Pre-Delay, high Density and high HF Roll off. - A soft large space such as a concert hall with carpet, padded seats, hangings, might have medium Density and low HF Roll off.
Chapter 8: Notation and Printing Band-in-a-Box offers a variety of notation and printing features, both for viewing parts on-screen as they play and for printing them as sheet music. To view the notation, open the Notation window by pressing the notation button on the main screen. Close the Notation window by pressing the notation button again. Band-in-a-Box Notation screen displaying the melody track in Standard Notation mode.
Note / Rest checkboxes Mono Mode Clean Notation Loop Screen Track Select Event List Editor Lyrics Button Zoom Buttons Section Text Scrub Mode These determine whether a Note or a Rest will be inserted when the mouse is clicked. When this is selected, the notation is entered as monophonic (one note only) to avoid extra notes in a single note melody line. The Clean Notation Mode cleans up the notation by eliminating display of redundant grace notes and glitches for easier reading.
- As the notation plays, the notes that are sounding are highlighted in red. This helps with sight reading or following the music. You can set the notation to scroll either 1 or 2 bars ahead of the music without interfering with your view of the current notation. Handles Jazz eighth notes and triplet figures correctly. Automatic options such as auto durations, clean notation, mono display, minimize rests, hard rests, and engraver spacing produce very musical and readable notation.
- To step 4 bars back, press the UP arrow key Editable Notation Mode Enter the Editable Notation mode from the notation screen with a single mouse click on the Editable Notation button. In the Editable Notation mode you can enter, move, and edit notes and rests using standard mouse techniques – point and click, drag and drop, and right-click to open the Note Edit dialog box. Band-in-a-Box Editable Notation window. This is the screen for step-entry of a melody or for editing existing parts.
Beat Resolution The user can manually set the resolution for any beat in the Beat Resolution dialog, which opens with a right click on the black vertical time line. Setting the Treble Clef Resolution for this beat to 5 allows a group of five notes to be placed on one beat. Tip: Although you can edit any track (e.g., Bass track), your edits to Band-in-a-Box instrument parts will be lost if you press [Play] and the song arrangement is regenerated.
on the [Rests] button and then click on the notation at the location that you'd like a 16th note rest. The Hard Rest will show up in blue in the editable notation window and can be removed by holding the [DEL] key and clicking on the rest. Moving a note in time. If you want to change the start time of a note, drag the note with the left mouse button to the new location. This is a simple way to move the note. Alternatively, you could edit the note numerically with the right mouse button.
Notation Symbols for Expression and Articulation The Notation Symbols are entered from the Notation Event dialog, which is accessed from the right-click menu in the Editable Notation window. This dialog lets you insert (or remove) notation symbols such as, Slurs Accents Crescendo - Legato Decrescendo - Marcato Staccato - Staccatissimo Select a notation symbol from those listed and the Notation Event dialog will open.
the pop-up menu that launches this dialog). For example, if you had right clicked on the treble clef, then this will be set to treble. When Snap to notes toward beginning / end of range is enabled slurs, crescendos, and decrescendos will be based on notes that exist at the beginning and end of the specified range. The Offset field, if present, lets you adjust make adjustments to the vertical position of an event, e.g. slurs or chord height.
Select a region of notation to edit To select a region of the notation you can Shift+click on the end point to easily select a large area. - Select a small region by dragging the mouse.* - Enlarge the region by Shift-clicking on the end point. *Note: Shift-click is also used to enter a sharp (#) note, so the selection via Shift-click requires that a small region be already selected.
Piano Roll Window For advanced editing of notes plus graphic controller editing, go to the Piano Roll window, either by selecting the Piano Roll button on the toolbar, or the Window | Piano Roll Window menu item. Notation Window Options Press the [Opt.] button in a notation window to bring up the Notation Window Options dialog box: Track Type Normally you'd leave the track type set to Single Channel, but you can also set it to Multi-Channel, Guitar, or Piano.
The [Update] button applies the changes made to the Notation Window Options. Pressing [OK] will have the same effect. Snap to grid lines If the Snap To Grid Lines checkbox is checked, the inserted note will be lined up with the closest grid line. This is similar to the way a graphics or typesetting program aligns elements accurately on a page. This means that you don't have to click exactly on the beat to have the note inserted precisely on the beat.
Note Names There is an option to display note names in the center of the note head. You can display absolute note names (A, Bb etc.) or you can display numbers relative to the key or the current chord. This is helpful for learning to read music. Combined with the ability to display large font sizes, this achieves the big note look common to “EZ-2-Play” music books. Channel numbers can also be displayed on the notation. When editing notes, it is often helpful to see the channel number of each note.
Jazz Chord Symbol Graphics (circles, triangles) Jazz and Pop music often use certain non-alphabetic symbols for chord types. These include a delta (triangle) for major chords, a circle for diminished, and a circle with a slash for half-diminished. Also, tensions like b9 and b13 are stacked vertically and contained in brackets. You can now select this option, and see these symbols for display/printout on the Chordsheet, Notation, and Lead Sheet windows.
Tab When set, the Guitar and Bass parts will print tablature notation. Show fret #s on chord diagrams This will display the fret numbers for each string on the guitar chord diagrams. Load notation layout w/songs When this box is checked your Notation Option settings will be saved with the song and restored the next time you load the song. Show Key Signature If turned off, you won't have the key signature box displayed on the Notation Screen. This will save some space on the screen.
Enharmonics for passing tones are based on chords if “Use Chord Scale Enharmonics” is set to true. For example, on an F#7 chord in the key of Eb, the Ab note is part of the F#7 scale (as a G#, the 2nd of the scale), but is also part of the Eb key of the song. If you want to display based on the chord scale, setting “Use chord scale enharmonics” will display the note as a G# instead of an Ab.
Bar Number Font and % Select any installed font for the bar numbers and adjust its size in a percentage range from 10% to 1000%. These settings affect the notation, lead sheet, and printout. Display Font Size % To select the notation font size for display, enter the Display Font Size as a percentage, either more or less than 100%. The same setting is available in the Lead Sheet window and the Print dialog. Chord Vertical Position This controls how high the chords will be written above the staff.
[More] button The [More..] button opens the Other Notation Options dialog. Inserted Note Defaults These settings determine the default values for notes that you enter manually. Duration % Notes are not always played for their full duration. If a whole note is inserted with a duration of 80%, the note would play for 80% of 4 beats = 3.2 beats. Velocity The loudest possible note has a velocity of 127; a velocity of 0 is silent.
Channel Assign the MIDI channel of the inserted notes. Play Inserted Notes When checked, notes that you insert will sound briefly as they are inserted. This lets you hear that the note you inserted sounds correct. Advanced Notation Settings These advanced settings give you control over the clean notation features. Chord Note Separation in MS and Chord Total Separation in MS This lets you set the width of chords. Band-in-a-Box will display a new group of notes on the notation for every chord.
4. Use the cursor left/right keys to change the note's start time, duration, channel, or velocity (depending on the setting of the “Right/ Left Cursor Edits” field in the Notation Options Dialog. Press the Esc key or [Stop] button when you're done. Section Text for Notation You can add custom Section Text and Boxed Text messages at any position in the notation track, with optional box to appear around the text.
Lead Sheet Window The Lead Sheet window displays a full screen of notation with one or more parts. Other options include a selectable number of staffs per page, clefs to show, font size, margin, scroll-ahead notation, guitar chord diagrams, and lyrics. If you like to sight-read along with Band-in-a-Box, this is the window for you. Launch the Lead Sheet window from the main screen by pressing the Lead Sheet button (or Alt+W keys), or with the Window | Lead Sheet Window menu option.
Selecting Parts in the Lead Sheet Click on the track selection toolbar to select a different track. The tracks are [B]ass, [D]rums, [P]iano, [G]uitar, [S]trings, [M]elody, and [S]oloist. To view multiple parts, click first on the button for the top part you want to view, and then hold down the Ctrl key and click on the other parts you want to view in the order you want to see them, from top to bottom. You will then see a group of tracks, displayed in the order that you requested them.
Band-in-a-Box have multiple keys in a song, the new key signature is shown on notation. Band-in-a-Box Lead Sheet Options dialog Chords and Staff Lines Both are shown by default. Uncheck this box if you don’t want them to display. Show Bar #s Choose whether the bar numbers will be shown for each bar, only at part markers, or not at all.
Margins Set margins for the Lead Sheet window, just like the margins in a word processor. For example, if you want the lead sheet window to only take up the top part of the screen, set a bottom margin (of, say, 2 inches) and then make the lead sheet window smaller by pulling the bottom up. This feature has no effect on printout; the Print dialog has its own margin settings.
Fake Sheet Mode The Lead Sheet window has its own Fake Sheet Mode checkbox. When it is NOT selected, the lead sheet will work as it always has (in linear mode). When Fake Sheet Mode IS selected, the form will show like a lead sheet, with only one chorus showing, and 1st/2nd endings and repeats displayed. The Fake Sheet can show multiple lines of lyrics for 1st and 2nd endings or several verses stacked in multiple lines. Multiple lines of Lyrics on Fake Sheet.
This song has a 1st/2nd ending entered, with separate lyrics for each ending. Multiple lines of lyrics will also appear if there are lyrics in multiple verses (choruses). In the Notation Window Options, “Lyric Position” allows you to vertically position the height of the lyrics. Lead Sheet Memo You can enter a memo to add to the Lead Sheet printout. Click on the [Memo] button in the Lead Sheet to open the Lead Sheet Memo window. You can copy/paste from/to this memo.
Harmony Notation Display Harmonies can be displayed on the Lead Sheet window (or printed) with separate notation tracks for each harmony voice. View each harmony on a separate track, or view/print a single harmony voice. To examine the harmony display features, load in the song “Night_T.MGU.” The melody of this song was previously converted to a harmony using the Melody | Edit | Convert Melody to Harmony option, so this song contains a harmony on the Melody part.
Four-part harmony on four separate staves. Press the [Print] button to print out “Voice 2.” If needed, press the notation “Transpose Options” to first visually transpose the instrument to Eb for an “Alto Sax” chart. Multi-Channel Notation (Sequencer Mode) Normally you would want a single part on the Melody and Soloist tracks. But, since MIDI information can have separate channels, it is possible to store 16 separate parts on each of the Melody and Soloist parts.
Note-based Lyrics Note-based lyrics offer accurate placement of lyrics by placing a word under each note. You can enter note-based lyrics by pressing Ctrl+L keys or pressing the [L] button on the Notation toolbar to open the Lyric Edit window. Lyric Edit Window The [Line] button enters a forward slash “/” line break marker in the current lyric. The [Para] button enters a backslash “ \” paragraph break marker in the current lyric.
The Lyrics Menu The complete list of Lyrics functions is found in the Lyrics menu.
Copy Line Lyrics to Note Lyrics converts line-based lyrics to note based lyrics. It is imprecise, because the linebased lyrics don't correspond to individual notes. But you can edit the positions of the note-based lyrics using the event list or the Move Lyric back/ahead to time line functions discussed above. Move Line lyrics to Note Lyrics works like the Copy Line lyrics to Note Lyrics function, except it erases the Linebased lyrics.
you can simply Copy/Paste them to/from your word processor. This allows you to quickly add lyrics to any Bandin-a-Box song, and they will display in the Big Lyrics window. You can open this window by choosing Window | Lyric Document Window, or pressing Ctrl+Alt+Shift+L. In addition, if “Auto-open lyrics window for songs with lyrics” is set to true in the Lyric Window Options dialog (Opt.
If you have the Lyrics window option “Auto-open lyrics window for songs with lyrics” selected, and a MIDI file (or .KAR) containing lyrics is opened, the lyrics window will open to show the lyrics. The popular Karaoke file format (.KAR) can be opened directly into Band-in-a-Box just like MIDI files. Chord symbols are displayed (Band-in-a-Box intelligently analyzes the chords of the song), as well as the lyrics from the Karaoke files.
You can choose to have a background to the window, either a moving one, or fixed picture. These pictures are in the c:\bb\KaraokeBMP folder, and you can add your own BMP or JPG image to that folder. The Big Lyrics window’s [Print] button opens the Options for Copy Lyrics to Clipboard dialog. This function allows you to copy a song's lyrics (and/or the chords) to the standard Windows clipboard. By pasting this data into a word processor, you can print out the lyrics in the font of your choice.
Customize your printed sheet music in the Print Options dialog box. Chords If selected, this will include the chords of the song on the lead sheet. Remember that you can set the height that the chords will appear in a different dialog box (the Options Dialog box). Notes If you want only a chord lead sheet with no Notes, then turn this off. Otherwise it should be ON. Staff Lines Set to off (uncheck) to print a “chords only” fake sheet with chord symbols and bar lines but no staff lines or notation.
Template There are print templates in the print dialog to achieve various printout styles - Normal/Lyrics Only/Chords and Lyrics/Chords Only/Blank Paper. In the print dialog, select the desired print template. To return to default settings choose the “Normal” template Bar #s Below By This sets the vertical position of the bar numbers in the printout between 1 and 7. 1 is closest to the staff and 7 is farthest from the staff (lowest).
You can also select the Always fill tempo option, which automatically writes the current tempo on the song sheet. On print out, if “Include ‘a’ / ’b’ part markers” is set bar numbers will include “a” or “b” after them (the name of the substyle). Use “Offset Bar Numbers by” to offset the display of bar numbers on the printout or lead sheet. For example, if you want bar 1 to display as bar 17, enter an offset of 16. Title/Style/Tempo/Composer/Copyright Enter this information in the fields provided.
In the Preview Options you can set the exact number of pixels to display for the print preview, the same settings are also used if you choose to save the pages to a graphics file in the popular .JPG, .TIF, or .BMP file types. Printing your song to a graphics file allows you to embed your notation in a document, or in an HTML file for use on your web site. This feature is only limited by available memory. This allows high resolution BMP’s like 2400 x 3000. A BMP of 2400x3000 is 300 dpi for an 8”x10” image.
Chords-Only Lead Sheet Display and Printout Need a simple fake book style chord chart? You can display just the chords in the Lead Sheet window or print out a lead sheet with just chord symbols. To print a chords-only lead sheet, uncheck the Staff lines checkbox in the Print Options dialog. Band-in-a-Box chords-only Lead Sheet. There are print templates in the Print Options dialog to achieve various printout styles - Normal/Lyrics Only/Chords and Lyrics/Chords Only/Blank Paper.
Print Preview of Band-in-a-Box multipart notation including guitar chord diagrams. Print Multiple Songs To print out a single song you use the [Print] button in the Notation window. If you want to print out several songs, use the Print Multiple Songs feature to print them all out at once.
This allows you to print all of the songs in a subdirectory with one command. This feature is accessed from the File | Print Multiple Songs menu item. You can set options to refine which songs will get printed. For example, you might want to only print songs in a certain style (e.g. Bossa Novas ), or only songs beginning with letters R to Z, or only songs with melodies.
Pop Ballad 9 Irish L Shuffle Rock A Pop Ballad 12/8 L Light Rock B Country old 12/8 M Medium Rock C Reggae N If your printer requires loading each sheet, you might want the program to beep after each printed song. The “Beep after each printed song” setting is useful to monitor the printout if you aren't near your printer, because if it stops beeping, then printout has stopped, and you may be out of paper.
Chapter 9: Automatic Music Features Automatic Medleys - “The Medley Maker” Would you like to make a medley of various Band-in-a-Box songs (MGU) using Band-in-a-Box? This is easily done with the new Medley Maker. Inside the Medley Maker, simply select the songs that you want, and Band-in-aBox will make the medley for you. A medley is not simply joining songs together. A good medley uses a transition between songs to introduce the new style, key, and tempo.
The current size and time of your medley is displayed in the Length label. You can have multiple choruses, so if you had 3 choruses of a 250 bar medley, it would last 750 bars. Tip: Your medley will use RealDrums if you have RealDrums enabled. If so, you should keep the various tempos of the songs within a close range. Because the quality of the RealDrums stretching would go down if a song in the medley had a much lower tempo than the previous one, it is tempos that slow down to avoid.
The left side of this screen displays the list of the Melodists available, including Pop, Swing, Bossa, Waltz, Rock, Bebop, and Jazz Ballad. Selecting the “All” checkbox displays all available Melodists, or they can be filtered by genre (e.g. Dixieland) to show only melodists in that genre. To filter the Melodists, de-select the “All” checkbox and then check on the genre that you are interested in. You can also filter to show/not show melodists from Melodist sets that you don’t have.
A2 Transpose In songs with an AABA form, it is common for the second “A” section to be transposed. For example, the first “A” section might be in the key of Eb, and the second would be transposed up to the key of Gb. Melodists store these settings, and some Melodists are set to transpose the A2 sections. If you don't want to allow Melodists to transpose the form in this way, set the A2 transpose to none.
The Favorites button in the Generate Chords and/or Melody dialog allows you to pick a Melodist that you've used recently. The Favorite Melodists dialog keeps track of the last 50 melodists that you've used, so you can easily recall them. Highlight the melodist you want to use and press the [OK] button, or double-click on the selection you would like to make.
Automatic Song Title Generation The Song Title generator names every song that the Melodist writes, if the Auto-Titles checkbox is selected. This feature can be used on its own to suggest titles for your own compositions. It will keep making titles until you get one you like. Press the [TITLE] button to generate a song title , a new title will appear immediately in the title area of the screen. Click again for another one. Select Edit | Undo Title to go back one title.
You can load in existing songs, song demos that we have provided for the styles, or songs that have RealDrums, or finally there is a button to load in any song. Please note, if using an existing song (composed by someone else), make sure that you have sufficient rights to use the song for your project. Once you have loaded in a song, you can now choose a portion of the song to use for your project. Assume that you want a 30 second clip of music. Set the desired duration to 30 seconds.
You can choose which instruments to include in the arrangement. Use the [Play] and [Stop] buttons to hear the work-in-progress. You can also loop the song playback. Now, generate your SoundTrack file. This will save a file in WAV, WMA, or MP3 format. Set Fade-in, Fade-Out options in seconds for the audio clip. You can hear your finished audio clip by pressing the [Preview] button.
The pre-made Soloists may set the style, instrument, and harmony, but you can change these settings to your own choices. The [Clear] buttons will remove the currently selected Instrument, Harmony, or Style. Use the [Choose(1)] button to select an instrument and automatically set the soloist note range for that instrument. For a harmonized solo, choose a harmony from the Harmony list. Use the [Choose(2)] button to select any style from the \bb folder.
3. Choose the Genre “RealTracks (audio soloists)” from the list of genres to see all available Soloists that use RealTracks. As with other Soloists, press the [All Solo] button to make sure that the Soloist will be generated for all choruses, or [Melody and Solo] if you just want the Soloist for a certain chorus. Your RealTracks solo will be saved with the song and the Soloist track will be frozen and marked with an asterisk (*).
Custom Solo Generation The [Custom] button located on the Soloist Selection dialog launches the Generate Solo for a Specific Range of Bars dialog. This allows you to set the range for the solo: Tip: You can have these values preset to the values you'd like by first selecting/highlighting the range of bars that you'd like from the Chordsheet screen, then clicking on the Soloist button. In real life, a Soloist tends to play a couple of extra notes after the solo section ends.
A strength (%) setting allows you to control how much the solo will be influenced by the melody. Choose the melody influence (%), and one of several presets to control the type of influence (pitches/rhythms/note density, etc.). To generate a solo that is influenced by the Melody, select the Enabled checkbox in the “Melody Influences Solo” group box. Then choose the type of influence by choosing a strength (0 to 100%) and a type.
Target Phrase Anchor Point score – phrase anchor points are points where both the pitch and timing of the Melody note and the riff match each other. Rhythm Matches – per cent of time that a melody note is found at the same time as the note in the riff at the same point (pitch is irrelevant). Density -# of Notes Matches – the number of notes in the melody compared to the number of notes in the solo. For example, 8 melody, 10 solo = 80%. Note: If set to exactly 49, 59, 69 etc.
5. Concentrate separately on different aspects of your playing with assistance from the “Wizard.” From soloing with proper phrasing and “feel” (the best notes are included automatically) to accompanying a soloist with confidence and authority Tip: Try muting out one of the accompaniment parts such as the piano or guitar part and play along to the Soloist in a supportive role - its fun! 6. 7. Use the Soloist track to record another part in addition to the Melody and other parts provided by Band-in-aBox.
Insert the title of your ‘soloist’ in the Title box, and any memo note you wish to add. (The Num field will be filled in for you.) For the Memo box, you can put in information like “extra legato, straighter 8th notes, on top of the beat, laid back, etc. The “Soloist is” box allows you to define what type of notes the Soloist will play (i.e. swing 8th notes, straight 8th notes, 16th notes, etc.) There are several databases of Solo ideas to choose from.
The Sub-Soloist checkboxes are for use ONLY with add-on hybrid soloists such as the ones found on the SOLOISTPAK for Band-in-a-Box. These checkboxes can be used to “sub” a different instrument and playing style in a Soloist which contains more than one playing style, such as BG_BAND.ST2 found on Soloist Disk Set #5. For more information on additional Soloist Disk Sets and the additional features available with them, contact PG Music.
When this is done, the left hand will be stored on channel 8, and the right hand on channel 9, on the Melody track. You can export the MIDI file to a sequencer, and these 8/9 channel assignments will be preserved. Automatic Guitar Solos – “The Guitarist” The Guitarist allows you to generate a guitar chord solo for any melody. Band-in-a-Box will intelligently arrange the melody to a guitar chord solo by inserting real guitar voicings throughout the piece.
Here are the steps to generate a Guitar Chord Solo: Select the Guitarist to use. In the main list at the left of the Window, you see the list of the Guitarists that are already defined. For example, you can see that Guitarist #2 is called “Jazz Guitar, single position.” That will create chord solos that stick to a single position on the guitar neck whenever possible. Select Melody (or Soloist) track.
position for the chord solo to be played. If you wanted the solo to be in the 12th position, you could de-select the “Auto-Set” and then set the guitar position to 12th position. If you already have a guitar track that has guitar channels (if it was played on a guitar controller as a single string guitar part), then you might want to tell Band-in-a-Box not to change the guitar positions of the notes that it finds. Otherwise set “OK to change existing guitar channels” to true. Press OK to generate the Solo.
Automatic Embellishments – “The Embellisher” Overview When musicians see a lead sheet that has a melody written out, they almost never play it exactly as written. They change the timing to add syncopation, change durations to achieve staccato or legato playing, add grace notes, slurs, extra notes, vibrato and other effects. You can have Band-in-a-Box do these automatically using the Embellisher so that you hear a livelier, more realistic Melody - and it's different every time.
Embellisher Settings The settings that affect the embellishment can be turned on and off, and given a percentage strength. Humanize The velocities, durations (legato), and timing of the notes are humanized. The original velocities etc. of the notes are ignored. The option to only humanize the timing of the music if the timing was “stiff” to begin with allows the Embellisher to leave the timing of human input melodies alone, and humanize only the ones that were entered in step-time.
Quarter note doubled. Unembellished. Extra Notes Extra notes are added between melody notes. Unembellished. With extra notes added. Note Turns With a note turn, a single note is replaced by a group of notes that include the original note and semitone or scale tones above and below the note. In this “before and after” example, the C note is replaced by a turn of 3 notes with a note a scale tone above the C. Unembellished. Embellished with turn.
Embellisher Presets The presets allow you to quickly choose common combinations of settings for the Embellisher. The Embellisher Memo describes the current embellishment, with statistics counting the number of embellished notes. If the song is playing and the Embellisher is enabled, you can update the embellishment by pressing this button. This is useful if you've changed settings, and want to hear what the new embellishment sounds like. The [Defaults] button reverts to the original Embellisher settings.
Chapter 10: Working With MIDI Band-in-a-Box has two built-in MIDI sequencer tracks. They are named the Melody and Soloist tracks, but they can be used to record any MIDI part you like – such as drum overdubs or layered accompaniments. MIDI can be recorded in Band-in-a-Box - Live with a MIDI keyboard, MIDI guitar, or MIDI wind controller. - In step time by entering notes in the Notation window with the mouse. - Using the Wizard feature to “play” notes with your QWERTY keyboard.
[OK - Keep Take] (yes/no) saves the take you just recorded. Remember that it’s easy to fix small glitches in the Editable Notation window or in the Event List editor. [Take Again] lets you quickly reject a take and start the recording again. Press the “A” key to do this with a keystroke. [Cancel] ends the recording session; nothing is saved. To start again press the [Rec.] button or the [R] key.
Enter the Editable Notation mode from the Standard Notation screen with a single mouse click on the Editable Notation button. In the Editable Notation mode you can enter, move, and edit notes and rests using standard mouse techniques – point and click, drag and drop, and right click to open the Note Edit dialog box. Confirmation dialogs prevent accidental entry of a duplicate note (same pitch near same time) and accidental entry of a very high or very low note (large # of ledger lines).
To use the Melody Wizard, make sure the Keyboard Wizard is enabled on the main screen. This will also enable the MIDI Wizard on the QWERTY keys. If you also want to use the Melody Wizard on MIDI notes, go to Preferences [Transpose] and enable “Allow Melody Wizard on THRU part” in the Settings for transposing songs when loaded or “Do it Now” dialog. *.MGU Then, choose a song that has a Melody track. Mute the Melody track by right clicking on the Melody track (Alt+9). Play the song.
This is done from the Melody menu, or can be done by pressing the Sequencer button. Now, when you are in this multi-channel mode, output from the Melody part will be on whatever MIDI channel the information is stored on, and will not be using the Melody MIDI Channel. You can examine the track to see the channels by looking at the event list, which you can access by pressing the [#] button on the Notation window.
In the example picture, we have set Channel 2 (Bass) and Channel 4 (Trumpet) to show on the notation, and have set all of the channels to play (to hear them). For a specific channel, (e.g. channel 3: piano), we see the following information. Channel 3: Acoustic Piano (this is the patch name found on the track). 843 There are 842 events in the track, usually every note is an event. We have customized the piano track so that it can be heard (play=true), but not seen in notation (Show=false).
Recording Your Own Parts To The Melody Sequencer Normally you would record your parts to the Melody, and not be concerned about what MIDI channel they are using, because Band-in-a-Box uses the Melody channel (usually channel 4) for this. But if you have set the Track type to be multi-channel, the output on the Melody part will be whatever channel is stored in the tracks.
Importing MIDI Files Importing MIDI Files to the Melody or Soloist Tracks Standard MIDI files can be read in to the Melody or Soloist tracks from MIDI files or from the Windows clipboard. You can read in all of a MIDI file, or selected channels and a specific range of bars.
1. 2. Melody | Import MIDI File – to select a MIDI file from disk using the Windows Open File dialog. Melody | Import MIDI File from Clipboard - when the MIDI data is already copied from another program to the Windows clipboard. The clipboard option will be grayed out if there is no MIDI data in the clipboard. Once chosen, the Import MIDI File - Options dialog box opens. Import Which Channel(s)? You'll need to know which channel(s) of your MIDI file the melody is on.
As you can see, we have broken down the Humanize effect into 5 main categories: tempo, lateness, 8th note spacing, legato, and feel. The best way to learn how these parameters combine is to try them (you can always press the UNDO button if you don't like the results.) For example, try changing the tempo of a song to see the changes that this will make to the 8th note spacing and lateness. Press the [Quantize NOW] button to apply your changes to your song.
or in the Notation window by pressing the event list button (#). Different colors are used for different event types in the event list, to visually distinguish notes, patch changes, etc. The Event list for the notation colors the events differently as follows: - Notes starting near the beat boundary are dark pink. - Notes starting on the off-beat are light pink. - Patch changes are cyan. - Controller changes are yellow. - Pitch Bends are grey.
The Event Type to Edit dialog opens when either the [Insert] or [Append] buttons are pressed in the Event List Editor. This dialog allows you to select which type of event to insert or append - note, controller, pitch bend, etc. – and then opens the selected edit dialog. Notation Window Editing You can often get better results by using the Notation Window to edit notes instead of the Event List window. To do this, open the Notation window in either Editable Notation or Staff Roll Notation mode.
Piano Roll Window Editing The Piano Roll window enables precise graphic editing of note timing and duration. You can also graphically edit note velocity, controllers, program changes, channel aftertouch, or pitch bend. The Piano Roll may be opened as a movable window, which floats above the Band-in-a-Box main window, or opened embedded in the same position as the Chordsheet/Notation panels in the Band-in-a-Box main window. Note Panel Horizontal bars represent notes.
1. Add Mode Add/subtract the same amount to all selected events. 2. Scale Mode Scale the selected events. Select one or more Graphic Events, and move the mouse over one of the events. Shift-drag vertically, and the events are scaled in a proportional fashion. Large-value events are scaled more than small-value events. This keeps the same shape of a gesture, but makes it bigger or smaller. Note Velocity Line Tool - With Add Mode, note velocities will exactly match the slope of your drawn line.
With events such as pitch bend or controllers like modulation and sustain, it is important to end a “gesture” with a zero-value event. Otherwise, subsequent notes will be affected, with “hanging” permanent pitch bend, permanent vibrato, or sustain pedal locked down. Event Selection Graphic Event Ruler Time Selections: Selected Events are red. The Graphic Event Ruler will only select nonnote events.
Chapter 11: Working With Audio About Band-in-a-Box Audio Files The File | Open menu command shows and opens all available file types including audio files (WAV, WMA, MP3, and CDA). And it remembers your preference, so you can restrict it to a certain file type. If MySong.MGU is loaded, and a same named audio file (MySong.WMA, MySong.MP3, MySong.WAV, etc.) is present, Band-in-a-Box will open the audio file to the audio track.
The audio reverb type is settable in the PG Music Reverb window. PG Music Reverb To make your own reverb settings, press the Audio Reverb toolbar button, and adjust the various parameters in the PG Music Reverb dialog. You can enable/disable the audio reverb. If you disable it, this will save some CPU cycles, so this might be advisable on an older/slower machine if you hear that the audio is clicking or not keeping up. Click on the green Select a Preset button to open the list of presets.
Mix the proportion of original signal to the reverb signal. Output adjusts the final level of the plug-in. Typical Reverb Settings - A large hall might have long Pre-Delay, long Decay, and moderate Density. - A hard large space such as a Gymnasium, might have long Pre-Delay, high Density and high HF Roll off. - A soft large space such as a concert hall with carpet, padded seats, hangings, might have medium Density and low HF Roll off.
Audio files can also be opened from the File menu with the command Open Audio (WAV, WMA, MP3, WMV). Open an MP3/WAV/WMA or audio CD track, and play back at 1/2, 1/4, or 1/8 speed. This is great for transcribing or analyzing audio. If you load in an audio song (WAV file, MP3), when the song plays you can: - change the tempo of the audio to slow/speed up the song. - press Ctrl+[-] for half speed, Ctrl+[=] for full speed. - highlight an area of the Audio Edit window and press [Play Selected Area].
Then, as the song is playing, use the tap tempo feature (the minus key, pressed 4 times in tempo) to set the tempo of the piece. Your audio file will then start playing at bar 1 of the Band-in-a-Box song in sync with the audio starting at the place you have marked as bar 1, and the bars will be in sync (approximately in sync, they will drift as the tempo of your live performance varies.) You can put tempo changes on certain bars to keep it perfectly in sync if you want to.
Audio VU meters These show the Record and Playback levels for audio, allowing adjustment of microphone and speaker levels. VU Meters can be launched by pressing the VU Meters button on the toolbar. The VU Meters will also open automatically when the Record Audio dialog is opened. The VU Meters will close or stay open when the dialog is exited depending on the “Leave VU Meters open” setting in the Record Audio dialog.
Set the start point for the recording. You can record from the Start of the song, somewhere in the middle, or punch in by choosing a bar and chorus # to start recording. Also Record MIDI? If you also want to record MIDI at the same time, press [Cancel] to exit the Record Audio dialog, and choose the Audio menu command Record Audio and MIDI (or Shift+click on the Record Audio toolbar button).
Options If you've recorded only 1 chorus of the song, you can choose the option to copy that first chorus of audio to the whole song. This will fill up the whole song with the audio by repeating it as many times as necessary. Then you'd just need to record the ending of the song. At the end of recording, you receive an option to overdub with the underlying audio. This means that both recordings will be merged together to form a new file, with both recordings preserved.
Audio Edit Window Toolbar These buttons zoom in and out to the audio window. The 100% button sets the Audio Window to display about 8 bars per screen. This button zooms to the sample level so that you can see the actual sine waves present. The [100%] button restores the wave view. This setting allows you to select audio by snapping to a 16th note (or a triplet in swing styles). This button plays the selected area, and then stops. The other instruments are all muted; you just hear the audio.
In this dialog, there are 3 types of harmony that we can choose from: 1. Melody Pitch Tracking only (this would change the pitch of our singing to the correct pitches found on the MIDI Melody track). 2. Harmonize to the MIDI Melody. This applies a 1-4 part audio harmony – turning your singing track into a harmony singing quartet. 3. Harmonize to the chords of the song. If your song doesn’t have a MIDI melody, you can still create a vocal harmony, based only on the chords of the song.
Portamento controls how fast the pitch will change from one pitch to another. Settings above zero give smooth transition from one pitch to another. Pitch Styles When you generate audio harmonies to your recorded vocal tracks, you can select Pitch Styles to add vibrato and scooping effects to the vocal harmonies. There is a drop down combo list at the bottom of each voice. You can choose a type of “pitch effect” (combination of vibrato and scooping) called a Pitch Style to be applied to each harmony voice.
When you are happy with the settings, press the [GENERATE] button. This generates a harmony for the complete song (takes about 20 seconds for “Listen” depending on your CPU speed). The dialog then exits, and your song is ready to play in Band-in-a-Box. Band-in-a-Box gives you a confirmation message that the audio harmony has been created. Tip: When playing back the harmonies, mute the MIDI melody (right click on Melody part at the top of the screen or Alt+9).
This will give you 4 harmonies, and one of them will be a unison harmony doubling your voice. You can assign specific vibrato and other settings to the unison voice so that it sounds slightly different than your own, creating a “fattening” effect to your voice. Choir Effect In the TC-Helicon dialog, you can select a choir effect, from none/small/medium/large.
Pitch Styles Preset Details (one per voice) Each of the four voice banks has a Pitch Styles preset selection list. This control allows pitch scooping and vibrato effects to be added to the harmony voices. These effects can be used to increase the naturalness of vocals processed by melody pitch tracking, produce a more polished, professional sound in the harmonies, and even to create strange special effects.
34 Nervous Vibrato 35 Sheep Vibrato 36 Siren Vibrato 37 Slicer Vibrato 38 UFO Vibrato Special Effect. Special Effect. Special Effect. Special Effect. Special Effect. An agitated, uneasy sound. The likeness of sheep bleating in the field. The sound of a North American emergency vehicle. A choppy alternative to a standard vibrato. The sound of your science-fiction imagination Applying Audio Plug-Ins When you've recorded audio, you'd likely want to apply some type of effect to the audio recorded.
To use real time DirectX or VST audio plug-ins, open the Band-in-a-Box Audio Settings dialog with the Preferences [Audio] buttons. Check “Use Realtime DX Audio Plugins” to enable this feature. DX/VST audio plug-ins are not enabled by default, in case an older/slower computer might have trouble with DirectX. If your computer misbehaves with DX/VST audio plug-ins, simply make sure this option is unchecked.
The [Edit DX Exclusion List] button lets you edit the list of plug-ins to include or exclude in the DirectX editor. This is useful if you have plug-ins installed, which are not compatible with Band-in-a-Box. If you edit the exclusion list, you’ll see a dialog box with the left side displaying the included plug-ins and the right side displaying the excluded plug-ins: The [<] button lets you move a plug-in from the excluded list to the included list.
Rendering Audio Files Rendering WAV Files Audio rendering means converting a MIDI song to audio format, usually to a WAV file. Press the [.WAV] button on the main Band-in-a-Box screen to launch the Render to Audio File dialog. This shows the directory where the rendered wave file will be saved. You can use the [Choose] button to specify any folder on any drive for the rendered wave file. If you have selected a DXi or VSTi synthesizer for your MIDI output in the Opt.
Batch convert a folder of songs to audio files (MP3, WAV, or WMA). Do you need to convert an entire folder of Band-in-a-Box songs to audio files? This can be done easily by a single command with an option to name the resultant audio files based either on the original file name or the song title name. Press the [Batch] button to Batch create audio files. Select the folder that you want to use (e.g. C:\bb\my songs). Add a suffix for each file name. For example, if the suffix is _Demo, then MySong.
Windows. Option added to reset the DXi synth after each render. This insures that no audio (stuck notes etc.) from previous file is retained. Press the “Go” button to render all of the Band-in-a-Box files in the folder to the selected audio format. There is a [Cancel] button in the Batch Rendering screen. Rendering in Other Audio Formats Band-in-a-Box has enhanced audio support for saving in Windows Media Player format.
Click [Yes] to render the file. If RealTracks are present, they will be generated for the song and then all tracks will be rendered to a WAV file. Next, a dialog will open where you select the audio format for your file. From this dialog, you can choose the type of compression that is appropriate (from the available installed codecs). You can save your settings as named presets by using the [Save As] button. You will see a progress screen during rendering, followed by a completion message.
Rendering Options 9 Merge in Audio Track Rendering of songs to .WAV files always includes the MIDI tracks. If this option is checked, the audio track will be merged with the MIDI tracks in the wave file. Use “Adjust Audio Track volume by” a number of dBs to balance the audio track with the level of the rendered MIDI tracks. A setting of 6 dB is double the volume, -6 dB is half the volume. “Boost All Files Amplitude by” adds a dB amount to the whole mix, so that the mix will be louder or softer.
If launched from Band-in-a-Box, the current BIAB song has automatically been added to the Burn List. If MiniBurn is running standalone, you must add Wave files to the Burn List. Burn List Burn list files are displayed in MiniBurn’s central file list region. Column 1- Track Number Column 2- Path and name of Wave files Column 3- Play time of each Track, formatted in minutes:seconds:frames Burn Time indicates the sum of all the burn list track times.
MiniBurn automatically selects the fastest rate reported by your drive. It is typical to use the fastest rate, unless you know from previous experience that your computer doesn’t burn well at high speed. In that case, set a slower burn rate to ensure a good burn. Test Mode Checkbox (Simulate Burn) To test the CD Burner without actually writing a CD, turn on the Test Mode checkbox. After your PC has “proven itself” with a couple of good burns, routine testing is not necessary.
Burning Progress While a CD is burning, progress is indicated in the lower-left of the MiniBurn window. Progress messages are also displayed in the Status Bar at the bottom of the window. Read Buffer %- The computer’s disk read buffer usage. If Burn Proof is not available, you may have burn errors if this drops to zero in mid-burn. In this case, try a slower Burn Rate. Drive Buffer %- The CD Burner’s write buffer usage. If Burn Proof is not available, you may have burn errors if this ever drops to zero.
Chapter 12: Wizards, Tutors, and Fun Audio Chord Wizard (“Chords from MP3”) This amazing wizard automatically figures out the chords from any MP3, WAV, or WMA (Windows Media Audio) file and displays them in Band-in-a-Box. Just load an audio file and you’ll instantly see the chords. Using the Audio Chord Wizard is a great way to learn and practice popular songs as you play along and see the chords.
To change the # of bars per row, or rows per screen, right click on the chordsheet. The +/- buttons at the bottom right of the window also change the row height. Chords may be edited in the Audio Chord Wizard with a right mouse click on the chord. When Edit Chord is selected, a highlight cell opens at the chord location. Type in the name of the new chord using standard Band-in-a-Box chord entry characters and press the Enter key to make the edit. The edited chord name is blue in color.
Audio Chord Wizard Window Primary Program Controls Toggle Play/Pause (Space bar or Play/Pause key). Stop play, rewind to start with Esc key. Moves nearest bar line to current play position. F8 or Enter keys also set bar lines. Song time signature, 2/4 to 12/8 supported. Average tempo, right-click for options. Song key signature.
Use to correct pitch of song if necessary. Exit and send chords to Band-in-a-Box. Exit without sending chords to Band-in-a-Box. Chord Detection Chord Detection accuracy depends on the accuracy of the bar lines. If bar lines are not well-aligned then the Chord Detection can be expected to be rather poor. It is quick and easy to align the bar lines on most songs, once you get the hang of it. The first task is to locate the beginning of Bar One.
When satisfied with the Bar lines and Chords, click the [OK] button to return the Chords and Tempo Map to Bandin-a-Box. Chord Edits Chords may be edited in the Audio Chord Wizard with a right mouse click on the chord. When Edit Chord is selected, a highlight cell opens at the chord location. Type in the name of the new chord using standard Band-in-a-Box chord entry characters and press the Enter key to make the edit.
Jump Forward Four Bars- PAGE DOWN key, or DOWN ARROW key, or Multimedia keyboard NEXT TRACK key Jump Back Four Bars- PAGE UP key, or UP ARROW key, or Multimedia keyboard PREVIOUS TRACK key Special Cases Time Signature: If a song is not in the default 4/4 time signature, set the Time Signature very early before you do anything else. Bad Initial Tempo Estimates Double/Half Tempo: Sometimes Audio Chord Wizard will guess double or half of the tempo you might prefer.
If you are playing along with a song on your keyboard, you might decide to make an ear-estimate of how far out-oftune is the song: For instance, you could adjust the fine-tuning control on your keyboard until your keyboard matches the song's pitch (according to your ear). Then you could look at your keyboard's tuning readout, and adjust ACW's Fine Tune Control to match. Either click-drag ACW's Fine Tune control (like a slider control), or right-click the Fine Tune control then type in a number.
Odd Length Bars and Drastic Tempo Changes If a 4/4 song contains occasional bars of 3/4, 5/4, or whatever, or if there are sections where the music has an extreme ritard or accelerando, sometimes you can just Tap Bar Lines to adjust it. But it is sometimes more convenient to manually add or delete bar lines. The following example song has an overall Time Signature of 4/4, but Bar 9 should have a time signature of 2/4.
Change Bar 10 to its desired duration. Hover the mouse over the red triangle marker at Bar 11, and the mouse cursor becomes a drag cursor. Click and drag the bar line to the location marked 11:3 Now we have edited bar 9 to have its proper 2/4 Time Signature and preserved the song tempo on both sides of the 2/4 bar. Notes Display The Notes Display looks like a MIDI Piano Roll, but it is not exactly the same as a MIDI Piano Roll.
Audio Chord Wizard Utilities Dialog The Audio Chord Wizard Utilities dialog box can be launched at any time from the menu item (File- Audio Chord Wizard Utilities, or Audio – Audio Chord Wizard Utilities). It is also launched automatically after returning from the Audio Chord Wizard Automatic detection of key signature based on the chords only. This is useful for a song from the Audio Chord Wizard, where you forgot to set the key signature or for any song without the key signature set.
If you enable the MIDI style, you’ll be hearing the audio file as well as the BB MIDI style. Otherwise you can mute the BB style by disabling it here. You can revisit the Audio Chord Wizard by pressing this button (this can also be done from the Audio menu). Revisiting the AudioChordWizard is useful to refine the bar lines.
Importing Chords You can import the chords from a MIDI file. To do this, first blank the chordsheet by choosing File | New. Then select the menu item File | Import Chords from MIDI file to launch the Interpret Chords from MIDI file dialog. Press the [Open (Change)…] Button to select the MIDI file that you'd like to import. Once you've selected the file, you can press the [INTERPRET CHORDS NOW] button. When you do that, the chords will be interpreted from the MIDI file, and written onto the chordsheet.
- has 2 bars of lead-in. - has 103 bars of chords. - is in the key of F with a 4/4 time signature, and a tempo of 120. - has the Bass Part on channel 2. - has the chording (comping) parts on Channels 3, 6 and 7. - has the Melody on Channel 4. - has no other parts like the Melody to put on the Soloist track. Now, after loading in the MIDI files, you'd normally have a look at these settings above, to see if they seem reasonable for your MIDI file. If not, you can change the settings.
Bass Part Type You can set this to “Root,” “Root-3-5,” or “Walking Bass.” If you choose “Root,” the chord Wizard will assume that any bass note is the root of the chord. Choosing “Root-3-5” will cause the Chord Wizard to assume that the bass pattern is mainly on the root, 3rd and 5th of the chord. If you choose “Walking bass,” it will assume that the bass notes can be changing and can include many notes beside the root.
So that we can see how well the Chord Wizard did, we can compare it to the “correct chords” of the song, input by a musician listening to the song. As you can see, by comparing the two sets of chords, the Chord Wizard got almost all of the chords correct in this example. The Chord Wizard purposely avoids chords like “C13.” It will put a simpler “C7” instead, since this is more like a typical lead sheet. If you've read in the entire MIDI file, you have 103 bars of chords on the Chordsheet.
The setting for “Write Chord Summary Notes to Soloist Track” is only used for diagnostic or special purposes. When set, the Soloist track will contain a special track that has a chord written every 2 beats (or whatever the setting for chord resolution is) that contains every note found for the chord. This shows you the type of logic that the Chord Wizard is basing its decisions on.
Handy buttons for on-screen transposition for non-concert instruments. One button access to many of the Band-in-a-Box add-ons “101 Riffs” series and “Master Solos.” One button access to many other PG Music educational programs and lessons. Most of these items are “add-on” products, available separately, and are not included in the Band-in-a-Box program.
Ear Training Tutor Ear training is an important exercise for all musicians. Now you can practice your ear training with help from Bandin-a-Box. In addition to the common interval exercises (perfect 4th, minor 2nd, etc.), learning to “play-by-ear” for Jazz and Pop music is further enhanced by ear training exercises to recognize common chord types (e.g., Major, Minor, Dominant, etc.). For example, Band-in-a-Box will play a chord and you will have to identify the correct root and chord type.
Start the game by pressing the [Guess Interval] button. You can control the starting note and the second note in the dialog. Once the game starts, click on the interval that you think is being played. Chord Tutor Click on the [Chord Tutor] button to enter the Chord Tutor module. - Press the [Play Tonic] button to familiarize yourself with the root note of the scale as a reference point. Click on any of the other note names to hear that root. Click on any of the chord extensions to hear that sound.
Guessing the root You can test yourself on roots only or root AND extension. Press “Guess a New Root” and you'll hear a root played. Press this button to hear the root-to-guess replayed. If you need help, press [Play Tonic – C] to hear the root again. When you think you know the root, press the root name on the list of note names at the left. If you guess incorrectly, you'll see a message that says “Wrong Root.” You'll then hear the note that you guessed playing, followed by the root-to-guess note again.
Click on the root, and when you get it correct you can move on to the extension. Types of Roots to Include For the Roots, you can choose which types of roots to include. This can be any of the 12 semitones, or just the scale tones, or just the 1-4-5 of the scale. Extension to Include For the extensions, you can include all of the extensions listed in the dialog, or just the subset that are common extensions.
For Pitch Invasion, choose a level that will specify the # of note types that will be invading. The LEVEL determines the speed of the notes. To shoot the aliens, click on the on-screen keyboard, MIDI keyboard or QWERTY keys. The program settings allow you to customize the game. Press the HELP button for more information. Music Replay Music Replay develops your pitch, rhythm, and melody recognition by replaying what the program plays, in note, rhythm, or melodic modes.
Vocal Wizard The “Vocal Wizard” displays the best song keys for your vocal range! This feature helps you choose the best song key for your vocal range. Open the Vocal Wizard, enter your vocal type (baritone, tenor, etc.), or choose a custom range. Then the wizard analyzes the song and recommends the best keys for that song. Options available to “include/exclude falsetto range,” “restrict choices to these keys […],” and “transpose now.
2. Selecting the keys that would be “allowable.” Most musicians have favorite keys, so this area allows selection of keys that would be acceptable for the Vocal Wizard to choose. For example, if we choose “Jazz” keys, we’ll see that the Vocal Wizard now recommends the key of C instead of D. 3. Setting the range of the song to analyze (usually the whole song). Normally you’d want to analyze the whole song, but this allows you to select a partial range. 4. Selecting the track to analyze.
In the example Old Folks at Home, you can see that D is the best key (“green”), but any of the keys from G to Db are also good keys in the selected vocal range. The area in black at the bottom gives an analysis of the vocal range if the song was transposed to the chosen key. Now that the Vocal Wizard has told us the best key for this song, we can either close the dialog, or transpose it now to the recommended key (or any other key that we have selected with the radio buttons.
You’ll then get typical Jazz chords. Verify that the key is correct. Band-in-a-Box analyzes the melody, and gives its best guess as to the best key for the song. If it is different than the current key, Band-in-a-Box will suggest the new key, and you can press the button to set the key to the new key. Set the region of the song that you want reharmonized. Usually this will be the “Whole Song.” Press [OK-Reharmonize]. You’ll now get a brand new chord progression for the melody.
Choose a chord progression, and press [Do-Reharmonize NOW] and the program will insert that progression. The progressions are sorted in alphabetical order, or from “best to worst” depending on this setting. Chord Substitution Wizard Reharmonizing a song with the Chord Substitution Wizard is a fun and educational way to perform or practice a familiar song in a brand new way.
Chord Substitution Dialog This dialog depends on what chords were present at the bar that was currently highlighted. This bar number is shown in the dialog and may be changed. In the example shown, the chord was an F7 chord, so the substitutions shown are for an F7 chord. The substitutions shown may work for up to 4 bars, depending on the substitution. In the examples above, the substitutions work for 2 bars.
Auto Chord Substitutions You can quickly auto-generate substitutions for an entire song, or portion of a song using the auto-substitution dialog, which is accessed with the menu command Window | Auto Generate Chord Substitutions. For example, we can generate substitutions for the !Freddie.MGU song. Here is the original chord progression.
If you'd like Band-in-a-Box to only generate chords for a certain range of bars, you should highlight that range of bars in the chordsheet first, and then launch the dialog. The Range will then be set to “Part of Song” and the “Bar” and “# bars” settings will also be set. You can override these settings with manual settings, if necessary.
If you are happy with the sound of the chord, you can press the [Enter Chord] button to enter the chord at the bar and beat specified. If you would like the chord to be inserted automatically when you click on the note/extension names, select the “Enter chord when clicked” option. This will advance the Bar/Beat position. You can change the Bar/Beat settings to move to a different bar. Rhythm Guitar Chord Tutor Use the Guitar Tutor to analyze any song.
Half Note (sax) chords use the advanced Jazz Guitar “highest-4-strings-comping mode.” This usually plays on the 4 highest strings, and it plays several chords over a single chord. For example, for 2 bars of Cmaj7 it might play Cmaj7-Dm7-Ebdim-Em7 all played as half notes. There are also tutors for the alternate tunings like DADGAD, Open G, etc. They can be selected from this dropdown list.
− Picking the channels to use for the BB Parts. − Picking the snapshot bars for the “a” and “b” substyle. − Pressing the [Generate NEW style…] button. This section will discuss the various items in the Style Wizard dialog and the Style Wizard Additional Settings. The Style Wizard is used to generate a Band-in-a-Box Style from a MIDI file. The Style Wizard does this by analyzing the file and creating patterns emulating the notes and rhythms for the style. First off, you'd need to get a MIDI file to use.
The channels used in the MIDI file are displayed in the dialog, with the patches used and # of notes played on each channel. (For Violet.MID you can see that channels 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, and 10 are used.) The Style Wizard analyzes the parts and guesses at which Bandin-a-Box part - Bass, Piano, Drums, Guitar, or Strings to use for each track. Band-in-a-Box has correctly assigned 5 instruments – not assigning a part to the Melody. The Style Wizard suggests which bars (“snapshots”) to include in the style.
In the Snapshots area of the Style Wizard: - Enter “1-20” for the bars for the “A” Substyle. - Enter “21-28, 37-68” for the “B” Substyle. - Enter “12, 20” for the “A” Drum Fills. - Enter “28, 36, 44, 52, 60, and 68” for the “B” Drum Fills. Note: Of course you don't need to enter this much detail. You could just enter a single range like 1-20 for the “a” substyle and make a quickie style. We're illustrating “advanced” style-generation here.
There are 2 sections to this dialog, Advanced Instrument Settings and Preferences. Advanced Instrument Settings The advanced instrument settings allow settings for the instruments (drums / bass / piano / guitar / strings) to be included in the style. The settings are: The “Substyles” determines whether the instrument is included in the “A,” “B,” or both “A&B” substyles. For example, if you want to make a style that only uses the strings on the “B” substyle, set the strings instrument part to “B” only.
Piano, Guitar, and Strings Voicings determine how the Piano patterns will be voiced. The choices are Auto, Include Full Voicings, Tritones only (3rd/7ths), Power Chords (Root/5th), Chord Mask Half Octave, and Chord Mask Full Octave. The auto-setting usually uses the “Include full voicings.” If the part uses 2-note chords, you should over-ride this setting to “use tritones” so that the most important notes of the chord (the tritone) will get included.
Auto-interpret MIDI file. (Default = Yes) When set, the Style Creation Wizard will set the channels, BB Parts, and snapshots for you. Normally this setting should be left on. Delete existing patterns (when adding to the style). (Default = No) If this option is set when you create style patterns to add to an existing style, the entire instrument will first be erased in the style for any instrument used in the new style.
Repeat symbols are drawn at the beginning and end of the entire form (bars 1, 32 in this song) and “end” is written on bar 33, which is the ending. Bars past the end of the song are colored gray. These form markers are present for every song, unless you disable them by Preferences | Display. These are not the type of repeats/endings we’re referring to here however.
- 1st ending lasts for 8 bars. - Type of Repeat/Ending = 1st/2nd endings. By entering this data we’ve defined the complete 1st and 2nd ending. If the 1st ending begins at bar 9 and lasts for 8 bars, the 2nd ending must begin at bar 17+8=25 (there’s an 8 bar repeated section from bar 1 to 8). Now, this was a pre-existing song, and it already has all of the bars laid out. So we make sure that we don’t select the “Generate (insert) new bars” checkbox.
The List of Repeats/Endings allows you to manage the repeats/endings that have been entered. Delete/ Append/ Insert a repeat or ending using this list, which opens with the [Edit List] button in the Edit Repeats and Endings dialog.
Chapter 13: Tools and Utilities DAW Plug-In Mode Band-in-a-Box has a “plug-in” mode for your favorite sequencer (RealBand, Sonar, Reaper, ProTools, FLStudio, Nuendo and more). With the plug-in mode, Band-in-a-Box is open as a small always-on-top window, and acts as a plug-in for your favorite DAW/sequencer, so that you can drag-and-drop MIDI and audio (WAV) tracks from Band-in-a-Box to your favorite sequencer.
can set this in Plug-in Options. 5. It is also possible to drag and drop selected regions of a track. If you would like to transfer only a portion of the performance, you can do this by selecting the region in Band-in-a-Box, and then dragging from the instrument part at the top of the screen (don’t drag the selected region). You will then get just the selected region dragged to your DAW.
You will then see the plug-in options. Allow Drag n Drop (default=true). If disabled, the Drag Drop feature will not work. There shouldn’t be a reason to disable this. “Drag Individual MIDI tracks as audio (using VST/DXi)” (default=false). When enabled, the chosen MIDI tracks get converted to audio, using your currently selected VST/DXi (e.g. Roland VSC, or Forte). Drag Combo track as audio (using VST/DXi) (default=true).
Example uses: You can: - Get a listing of all BB songs on your PC with the word “Blues” in the title. - Get a listing of all BB songs in the BB folder with the word “Reggae” in them. This produces a list of over 50 songs in the MegaPAK. So you can quickly choose from them and know that, if you’re a reggae lover, you haven’t missed out on any BB songs/styles with Reggae. A similar listing for “Blues” reports 454 files.
Another way to assign the CoyoteWT as your default DXi synth is to click on the [DXi] button to open the DirectX/VST Window and then select CoyoteWT for the top Plugin slot. This window will also display the main display panel for the Coyote WT. Coyote WT Overview The main display panel lists the sixteen available MIDI channels down the left side with the program, bank number, and name of each instrument patch assignment.
- 128 MB RAM. - 20 GB disk, 7200 rpm. - a 16-bit sound card. - Windows 2000, XP, Vista, or 7. For best performance, the following specifications are recommended: - Pentium-4 or Athlon XP CPU at 1.7 GHz. - 256 MB RAM. - 40 GB disk, 7200 rpm, 30 MB/s read rate. - a 20-bit or 24-bit sound card. - Windows 2000, XP, Vista, or 7. Coyote Settings Program settings for the CoyoteWT are made in its context menu.
not) you may be able to reduce audio clicks by choosing a number lower than 100. This is usually preferable to the artifacts produced when you run out of CPU power. EQ Clicking on this brings up a dialog box in which you can specify the amount of boost or cut to be applied to the low or high frequencies. You can use this to compensate for the frequency response of your speakers, your sample file, or just to accommodate your preference.
For example, the screen might say - “My Tune” - 120 Mel v 122 p1 Acoustic Piano - Track < and Track> buttons change the current track Bass/Drums/Piano/Guitar/Strings/Melody/Soloist/Thru Controlling Patches/Tempo/Volume - The WHEEL changes the tempo. - Shift-WHEEL changes the volume of the ALL TRACKS. - [Prev] [WHEEL] changes the volume of the current track. - [ADD] [WHEEL] changes the patch of the current track using Favorite Patches.
- [REC] has no action. [PUNCH] has no action [Footswitch] has no action Guitar/Bass Tuner The Tuner is optimized for guitar and bass, though it may be useful with other instruments. Connect an electric guitar or bass to your computer’s sound card Line-In, or tune an acoustic instrument using a microphone connected to the sound card Mic input. Play a pitch and the tuner will auto-range to determine the nearest note, and display the intonation of your instrument.
Dynamic 3D Drum Kit Window This sizeable drum window is an animated 3D display of a complete MIDI drum kit with all 61drum sounds displayed on their respective instruments. Watch the drums being played or play-along/record by using QWERTY keys or a mouse. - - To launch the Drums window, click the Drums button in the View Panel. You can do several things with the Drums Window: Watch the Drum part being played on the Drums window in real time.
The multi-note instruments send different MIDI notes to your sound source, depending on where you “click” on the instrument. For instance, the Kick Drum can send three different notes: Ac. Bass Drum (MIDI note 35), Bass Drum 1 (MIDI note 36), and Square Kick (MIDI Note 32). Tip: The hint line at the top of the window describes the current control under the mouse cursor. Use the hint line to learn the mouse-responsive areas of each drum instrument.
Whistle - Long, Short Triangle - Mute, Open Guiro - Long, Short Scratch - Push, Pull Settings Dialog Press the Settings button (to the left of Rewind button), to adjust the various Drum Kit Settings. Drum window is always on top Use this checkbox to keep the Drums window on top of other program windows. Note Velocity When playing drums with a mouse or computer keys, the shift key toggles between two levels of note velocity. The two velocity levels can be set any way desired.
MIDI Monitor MIDI Monitor displays a listing of data received from computer MIDI Input and/or Band-in-a-Box output, useful for educational or diagnostic purposes. The MIDI Monitor opens with the [MIDI] button on the main screen toolbar, or with the menu command Window | MIDI Monitor. The MIDI Monitor main window. Tip: To display the data received from the computer MIDI Input, the MIDI THRU option must be enabled in Band-in-a-Box.
Timer A millisecond timer useful for viewing timing relationships between messages. To use Band-in-a-Box to measure in milliseconds- set Band-in-a-Box PPQN to 480, and Band-in-a-Box tempo to 125 BPM. With this special resolution and tempo, tick values in the Event List window will correspond to milliseconds. Current Time - The millisecond count since the timer was last started. Click anywhere in the Timer area to clear the Current time, setting it to zero.
Tip: Virtually any combination of display events can be selected in the filter. It is therefore possible to select combinations that do not display any MIDI events at all. The MIDI Monitor will warn you about the more obvious “nil” combinations, but if you find that you are not receiving what you expected, carefully re-examine these filter settings. Sound Blaster Support There is direct support for the Sound Blaster series of sound cards.
Event List Filter There is a filter for the Event List Editor, allowing you to, for example, quickly spot all patch changes. For example, to examine all of the patch changes on the Melody track. Choose “Use Event Filter,” and then press the [Filter…] button. In the Event List Filter select the type of information you want to display. In this case, it is program changes (patches) only. The track will then display with the program changes only.
The Event Type to Edit dialog opens when either the [Insert] or [Append] buttons are pressed in the Event List Editor. This dialog allows you to select which type of event to insert or append - note, controller, pitch bend, etc. – and then opens the selected edit dialog. PG Vinyl DirectX Plug-In Remove clicks and pops from your old vinyl record collection with the new PG Vinyl plug-in. If you no longer have a phono preamp, just attach your turntable to your mixer console.
against the inevitable vinyl pops, clicks, and surface noise. Pre-emphasis also prevents low frequency signals from bouncing the stylus out of the groove. When you play a record, the preamp's RIAA de-emphasis will reverse the EQ. High frequencies are cut, and low frequencies are boosted. If you do not apply RIAA de-emphasis, either with a phono preamp or in the software, vinyl will sound too bright and shallow.
NOTE: If DeCrackle is set outrageously high, the DeCrackle Activity reading can exceed 100 percent. This is not a bug. The DeCrackle section does three processing passes in progressively lower frequency bands. It might happen that the first pass will “heal” a click, but subsequent bands will “heal” the left-over residue of that click. Sometimes a bad click might be repaired in multiple processing stages, until the defect can no longer be detected.
On many recordings, the extrapolated guesses are quite good. Frequent clicks can often be removed without audible side-effects. One might encounter a badly damaged record where the audio is so damaged that the guesses are not good enough to be completely transparent. In these problem cases, you could try setting Fill Gaps to 70, or 50, filling the gaps with lower-amplitude guesses, which may sound less obnoxious. Set Fill Gaps to 100, unless it sounds bad.
But there is a limit what can be done for severely damaged discs (without investing in very expensive tools). On very damaged records, you may be forced to decide between a “natural” sound which contains a few residual defects, versus a more heavily processed sound which has collected new annoying artifacts to replace the old annoying defects.
Zoom In to see the best amplitude resolution. For instance, in the screenshot above, the display was zoomed to 3 dB per ruler line, which emphasizes the differences between loud and quiet frequency bands. View Range Scroll Adjust the Scrollbar to center the display to taste. When zoomed-in on a quiet track (as in the screenshot above), you would scroll down to get a good view of the frequency distribution.
Adjusting Reverb Reduction Experiment to get a feel for what works. There may be some songs where the reverb can't be improved, and in those cases just disable the Reduce Reverb Checkbox. Some vocals have short pre-delay and reverb tails. Short attack and release would make sense. Some songs (especially ballads) have loud “balloon” reverb tails with long pre-delay.
Chapter 14: User Programmable Functions The StyleMaker™ The StyleMaker is the section of the program that allows you to create brand new styles or edit existing styles. This is done by recording patterns for each of the drums, bass, piano, guitar and strings parts, or by entering these parts in the StyleMaker Pattern Editor notation window. If you don't want an instrument in a style you don't need to record any patterns for it.
(F8) Record Pattern (F3) Options (F10) Quantize Pattern (Alt+Q) Slide Pattern Volume adjust (this pattern) (Ctrl+Alt+W) Volume adjust (this row) (Alt+V) Volume Adjust (all patterns) (Alt+J) Legato Adjust Transpose Pattern see the effects of smooth voice leading or macro notes in a pattern. Records a pattern. For drums it enters the STEP EDIT Drum Editor. For the other instruments, it starts a real time record (2 bar lead in then record 2 bar pattern).
.MID to Drum Kit the instruments that are found in a MIDI file. A quick way of building up a kit. For example, if you are making a Latin style called “mambo” you could load in a Mambo MIDI file that you made, and then the StyleMaker’s “Style | Import notes from .MID to Drum Grid…” menu command would extract the drum notes from the MIDI file, and put them on the drum grid.
Help These menu items are quick links to the main Help and to StyleMaker topics in particular. Index (F1) Topic Search (Ctrl+F1) StyleMaker Overview Tutorial 5 Editing an Existing Style Tutorial 6 Making a New Style Drum Patterns Bass Patterns Piano/Guitar/String Patterns How To (Shift+F1) StyleMaker Toolbar Buttons These options are also available from the StyleMaker window pull-down menus. Saves and overwrites existing style using current name. Saves the style, but allows you to rename it first.
Exploring the StyleMaker To become familiar with the StyleMaker it is easiest to begin with an existing style and examine its makeup. This example uses ZZLITROK.STY, a basic Light Rock style. Patterns are played back from the main StyleMaker screen: The StyleMaker displays current patch numbers for the parts on the main window. Band-in-a-Box StyleMaker window showing Drums patterns window. The StyleMaker always opens to the Drums window, as indicated by the highlighted button to the left of Drums.
You can easily create new patterns of your own by selecting an empty box in a row of patterns and then clicking the [Rec] button to open a blank Drum Pattern Editor grid. To hear the pattern you have made click on the [Play] button. Click on the [Help] button for more tips and details. Defining a Custom Drum Kit To set up a custom drum kit, select the menu item Style | Define Custom Drum Kit in the StyleMaker window to launch the Define Custom Drum Kit dialog.
In defining a custom drum kit in the StyleMaker, you can use the drum notes found in a MIDI file. For example, if you are making a Latin style called “mambo,” you could load in a Mambo MIDI file that you made, and then the [Import notes from .MID…] function would extract the drum notes from the MIDI file, and put them on the drum grid. Drum Screen Alternate Notes What are alternate notes? Alternate notes can be entered for any note.
Playback Bar Mask (Usual Setting =0) Playback Bar Mask determines on what bars of the song the pattern will play. The bar #s are counted relative to the last part marker. Bar 1 is the first bar after a part marker for example. A bar mask setting of 0 is the default. This lets the pattern be played at any time.
It is possible to assign RealDrums (audio drums) to a particular Band-in-a-Box style in the Misc. Style Settings dialog. RealDrums Settings (Audio Drums, instead of MIDI drums) Enable “Style uses RealDrums (audio drums)” in order to designate a RealDrums style, and then press the [RD] button to select your RealDrums style. Whenever the current style is played, it will use your RealDrums style provided that RealDrums are enabled in the RealDrums Settings dialog.
Recording a New Pattern New patterns are recorded by playing them live in real time as the StyleMaker plays an accompaniment on the drums and other instrument parts for the style. If you don’t want to hear other parts - say you just want to play along to the drums – any part can be muted with a right mouse click on the instrument name in the Band-in-a-Box main screen. Go to the correct row for the length of the pattern you want to record (8 beat, 4 beat, etc.) and click on an empty cell.
instructs the pattern to always be played instead of the other patterns on the same row. These patterns always have other options set which specify the times that this pattern would be eligible to be played. Playback Bar Mask (Usual Setting = 0) Playback Bar Mask determines on what bars of the song the pattern will play. The bar #s are counted relative to the last part marker, and range from 1-8. Bar 1 is the first bar after a part marker for example.
Note# 77 (F): Note # 78 (F#): Note # 79 (G): Root of next chord. Note a semitone ABOVE root of next chord. Best fifth (a fifth above or below the root depending on how high the root is. Stays on the root if in a slash chord (C7 /E). Remember that to get Bass Macros working you must: - Hit the right note # (you may be out by an octave). - Set “OK to use macros” to “Yes.” - Playback the Pattern with [F8] key or [CHORD] button.
Thru Patch If you set the Thru Patch to other than 0 the instrument that the user plays along to your style will be the Thru patch that you set. If you're making a “Heavy Rock” style, you might want to set the Thru patch to be Overdrive Guitar if you expected that the user would want to play along on a rock guitar patch. Melody Patch If set to other than 0 all melodies will be played on the specified instrument.
change the volume of a part is to use Pattern | Volume Adjust (Alt+W) to set the volume of each pattern individually.) ‘Riff’ voicing type uses chord tones This is an option for piano, guitar, and string patterns. If selected, voicing modifies to match the chord and scale. Deselect for a simple transpose ignoring chord type. Press the [More..] button for the additional Settings for Rests, Pushes dialog.
Similarly, each push is accompanied by a drum stab, and the style can define what instrument to use and at what volume. The Lowest Bass Note setting defaults to the low E on the bass guitar or acoustic bass. It can be changed to match the range of other bass instruments, such as a tuba, or to extend the range of the bass for keyboards or 5-string and 6string basses.
Relative Weight (Usual Setting = 5) Set this # higher/lower if you want the pattern to be played more/less often than the other patterns on the same row. This number is also displayed on the main StyleMaker screen. A setting of 9 (always) is a special setting that instructs the pattern to always be played instead of the other patterns on the same row. These patterns always have other options set which specify the times that this pattern would be eligible to be played.
List of Piano Macro Notes (same as Guitar/String macro notes) MIDI Note # 83 B Pop Chord Diatonic Below MIDI Note # 84 C Pop Chord MIDI Note # 85 C# Pop Chord Diatonic Above MIDI Note # 88 E Jazz Chord Chromatic Below MIDI Note # 89 F Jazz Chord MIDI Note # 90 F# Jazz Chord Chromatic Above Remember that to get macro notes working you must: - Hit the right note # (you may be out by an octave). - Set OK to use macros to Yes. - Playback the pattern with [F8] key or [CHORD] button.
The styles can be set to use different types of voicings for guitar. For example, there are Jazz, Pop, and Folk (open position) voicings. Also, some of the styles allow the guitar to play advanced chords and inversions. Some of the styles play chord patterns, so the chord in the song might be F7, but the guitar plays a “walking-chord” pattern of F7,Cm7/G, Abdim, F7/A on each beat. There can be fingerpicking styles that have a lowest note alternate between root and 5th.
In the dropdown “Guitar Chord Types to Use” combo box, set the type of chords to use: Jazz, Pop, Folk, Half Note (sax), Ukulele, Mandolin, 5-string Banjo or alternate guitar tunings. Set the complexity of the chords to use. These can be single chords, chords with variations, inversions, and chord “walking” patterns. If you want a simple guitar style, set the first one to 100%, and the rest to 0%. Set the strum speed and fret range that should be played on the guitar.
Guitar Macro Notes Tip: Middle C is C5 or note number 60 The main Guitar Macro notes to use are: Strummed Chords C6 note Plays a guitar chord, with a slow strum. D6 Plays a guitar chord, with a faster strum. For example, if you want a simple 4-in-the-bar pattern that plays a slow-fast-slow-fast strumming pattern, play the notes C6 D6 C6 D6 for the pattern. Additional strumming macros are: F#6 Back strum, chromatic below. G6 Back strum. G#6 Back strum, chromatic above.
Check the “Over-ride Guitar Settings for this pattern only” checkbox to set new parameters for this pattern only. Guitar Chord Types to Use Use this feature to set the type of guitar chords to use for this pattern from the list, which includes alternate tunings. Single Chords CHD1 The Single Chords feature will play the chord as intended in the pattern for the percentage value entered.
Include Highest Note in Finger Picking Check to include the highest note (for Single String Macros) when played as a macro. Only include first chord of pattern Check to play the first chord only. Lowest Fret The Lowest Fret feature will limit the notes not to be played beneath the fret specified. Highest Fret The Highest Fret feature will limit the notes not to be played above the fret specified. Embellish pattern OK (Sax db) This allows embellishment of the pattern from the Sax patterns database.
Velocity Boost of pushes Pushes can get a velocity boost, so that they are played louder than other patterns. A usual setting would be 10. # ticks to push Styles can be pushed with the StyleMaker. This will cause the patterns to be played a little ahead of the beat, a certain % of time, which gives your arrangement a more human (musical) feel. Band-in-a-Box uses a resolution of 120 PPQ, i.e., 120 ticks to a quarter note.
Allow Volume Changes with Style (Usually = No) Usually you don't want specific volume changes in a style. But if you decide to change the volume of instruments, you can do it by setting this to YES and then entering the Volumes you want in the settings below. (A better way to change the volume of a part is to use Pattern | Volume Adjust (Alt+W) to set the volume of each pattern individually.) ‘Riff’ voicing type uses chord tones This is an option for piano, guitar, and string patterns.
Styles can have multiple RealTracks. For example, you could have a Real Guitar and Real Bass - and also RealDrums for the drum track. Styles can also use MIDI soloists. For example, make a style with a banjo part that has the same quality as the Band-in-a-Box Banjo Soloist. Here we are assigning an Earl Scruggs Bluegrass solo to the Strings part. Use the dB offset to match the level of your RealTracks audio or MIDI soloist to the rest of the style.
Note: There is a hot key combination to turn RealDrums on/off (Ctrl+Shift+F6). This also works while the song is playing. To make your overall dB setting a bit higher or lower for this particular Band-in-a-Box style you can enter a setting here. There are also fields for adjusting the ‘a’ or ‘b’ subsection volumes only.
If you set the Thru patch to other than 0 < No Patch Change >, the instrument that the user plays along to your style will be the patch that you set. If you're making a “Heavy Rock” style, you might want to set the Thru patch to be Rock Guitar if you expected that the user would want to always play along on Rock Guitar. Advanced Editing Of Patterns Patterns can be “tweaked” with the other advanced features in the StyleMaker - Trim Pattern, Late Notes, and the Event List Editor.
The global setting for late notes in Opt. | Preferences [Arrange] will reduce the volume of the late notes for a smoother transition from one chord to another. Event List Editor The [#] button in the StyleMaker Pattern Editor notation window opens an event list for editing, inserting, or deleting notes in the patterns. Style Log Options For people making styles, the Style Log text file shows exactly which pattern was used in the song generation for every instrument and bar/beat.
Then, a file called BBStyleLog##.txt will be displayed. Here is a sample: Bass: Bar 1 Beat=1, Row= 1, Col=12, Location=13, Chord= C Piano, Bar 1 Beat=1, Row= 1, Col=17, Location=140, Chord= C Guitar, Bar 1 Beat=1, Row= 5, Col=8, Location=287, Chord= C Strings, Bar 1 Beat=1, Row= 5, Col=23, Location=274, Chord= C This tells you that when the song was generated, for the bass track, at bar 1 the pattern found in row 1, column 12 of the StyleMaker was chosen.
Importing Instruments from Other Styles This is a great way to have fun with the StyleMaker, and to create great new styles in no time. The dialog is accessed from the Style | Import Instrument menu item. Choose the instrument you want to import and select the desired options. Click on [OK] and a standard Windows Open dialog will be launched so you can select any style on your computer as the source for the instrument. Mix and match instruments from different styles to create fresh new arrangements.
Convert Track to C7 chord Choose Melody | Edit Melody Track | Map Melody track to C7 chord. The purpose of this function is to allow you to quickly import any MIDI file track into the StyleMaker and make a style from it. Once you choose the option, you select whether it is a bass track to import, or a piano track (actually any part other than bass or drums). A bass track uses notes below C4 (MIDI note #48) and above the lowest note you select in the dialog.
Editing Patterns Slide Pattern X ticks This is another option available on the StyleMaker menu. This allows a pattern to be time shifted any number of ticks, based on a PPQ setting of 120. The StyleMaker screen displays the number of patterns, which combined with the map to C7 function, allows you to quickly import any MIDI file track into the StyleMaker and make a style from it.
The “part markers” for the file are displayed on the Chordsheet. For Violet.MID, the Style Wizard has found the correct part markers – by looking for drum fills and other signs of a part change – and has assigned substyle “a” to all of them. We'll change some of them to “b” later. The channels used in the MIDI file are displayed in the dialog, with the patches used and # of notes played on each channel. (For Violet.MID you can see that channels 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, and 10 are used.
In the Snapshots area of the Style Wizard: - Enter “1-20” for the bars for the “A” Substyle. - Enter “21-28, 37-68” for the “B” Substyle. - Enter “12, 20” for the “A” Drum Fills. - Enter “28, 36, 44, 52, 60, and 68” for the “B” Drum Fills. Note: Of course you don't need to enter this much detail. You could just enter a single range like 1-20 for the “a” substyle and make a quickie style. We're illustrating “advanced” style-generation here.
There are 2 sections to this dialog, Advanced Instrument Settings and Preferences. Advanced Instrument Settings The advanced instrument settings allow settings for the instruments (drums / bass / piano / guitar / strings) to be included in the style. The settings are: The “Substyles” determines whether the instrument is included in the “A,” “B,” or both “A&B” substyles. For example, if you want to make a style that only uses the strings on the “B” substyle, set the strings instrument part to “B” only.
Piano, Guitar, and Strings Voicings determine how the Piano patterns will be voiced. The choices are Auto, Include Full Voicings, Tritones only (3rd/7ths), Power Chords (Root/5th), Chord Mask Half Octave, and Chord Mask Full Octave. The auto-setting usually uses the “Include full voicings.” If the part uses 2-note chords, you should over-ride this setting to “use tritones” so that the most important notes of the chord (the tritone) will get included.
Auto-interpret MIDI file. (Default = Yes) When set, the Style Creation Wizard will set the channels, BB Parts, and snapshots for you. Normally this setting should be left on. Delete existing patterns (when adding to the style). (Default = No) If this option is set when you create style patterns to add to an existing style, the entire instrument will first be erased in the style for any instrument used in the new style.
JazzBrushes_045_Style JazzBrushes_060_Style JazzBrushes_070_Style JazzBrushes_100_Style JazzBrushes_120_Style JazzBrushes_145_Style JazzBrushes_175_Style JazzBrushes_210_Style JazzBrushes_250_Style JazzBrushes_300_Style The easiest way to make a style is to use a text-file template. Making A RealDrums Style Using An Existing Template Templates are available for download from http://nn.pgmusic.com/pgfiles/realdrums_stylemaking_templates.zip.
37 – single drum hit, which will be used for “shots” in Band-in-a-Box 38 – single drum hit, which will be used for “pushes” in Band-in-a-Box 3. 32_bars_of_drumming_with_shots_two_endings.txt bar# 1-2 – count-in for two bars (i.e.
67-68 – ending, lasting two bars (usually the second bar ends on the downbeat, with a cymbal decaying) 5. 64_bars_of_drumming_with_shots.txt This is exactly the same as 5, with these bars added: 69 – single drum hit, which will be used for “shots” in Band-in-a-Box 70 – single drum hit, which will be used for “pushes” in Band-in-a-Box 6. 64_bars_of_drumming_with_shots_two_endings.txt bar# 1-2 – count-in for two bars (i.e.
The last thing you would need to do would be that if your style were a waltz (3:4) style, you would need to change “TimeSig=4” to “TimeSig=3”. If, however, you are making a 4:4 style, your style is ready to be used! Additional Changes There are a few additional changes that could be made to fine-tune your style. The first is to enter a different value in the “Offset=“ line.
half of the drum bars, and then the groove can change and should remain basically the same through to the end. Keep in mind also when you either record or piece together your wave file, that in each “substyle”, there need to be examples of fill, normal bars, and post-fills (bars specifically designed to come after fills, often containing a crash cymbal which completes a fill). You also need at least one 2-bar ending. After the bars of drumming should be a short section of single drum hits.
between the start of the drum hits and the actual bar line. The highest example would be entered as the offset amount. In example 2, the beginning of the drum hit at bar 15 occurs at 14:04:118, or 2 ticks before the downbeat of bar 15. If all other bars were similar, you would enter an offset of –2. Example 2: The left edge of the highlighted area represents the beginning of the drum hit that occurs at bar 15, and the right edge of the highlighted area represents the actual downbeat of bar 15.
For example, if “MultibarPatternPercent=20” is entered, then every time Band-in-a-Box searches for a pattern, there is a 20% chance that it will eliminate 1-bar patterns as possibilities. If “MultibarPatternPercent=80” is entered, then every time there will be an 80% chance that 1-bar patterns will be eliminated as possibilities. If such an instance occurs, but no multi-bar patterns will fit in the Band-in-a-Box bar in question, a 1-bar pattern will be allowed.
MSSlide=x This shifts the entire drum part either forwards or backwards by x number of milliseconds in relation to the MIDI parts. A negative amount will make it play slightly before the MIDI parts, while a positive amount will make it play slightly after the MIDI parts. This can be used to make slight changes to the overall feel of the drummer.
• • • pattern,PostFill,A,8,0,8,1 pattern,PostFill,A,5,0,1,9 pattern,PostFill,B,4,0,2,17 PreFills PreFill bars occur immediately before Fills. PreFills are not essential for a style to work, but can be useful in situations where a drummer begins an elaborate fill a bar early. When Band-in-a-Box picks patterns for bars that precede fills, it picks from among the pool of normal and prefill patterns. PreFills can either be 1 or 2 bars long.
• pattern,PostFill,A,5,0,1,9 • pattern,PreFill,A,4,0,2,7 • pattern,Normal,A,2,0,1,3 • pattern,Normal,A,5,3,2,11 Here are some examples of ‘B’ patterns: • pattern,Fill,B,6,0,1,32 • pattern,Fill,B,5,0,1,58 • pattern,PostFill,B,4,0,2,17 • pattern,PreFill,B,7,0,1,57 • pattern,Normal,B,5,1,2,75 • pattern,Normal,B,2,5,2,64 Here are some examples of ‘0’ patterns: • pattern,Count-in,0,5,0,2,-1 • pattern,ending,0,1,0,1,33 Here are some examples of special-case endings: • pattern,ending,Aending,5,0,2,37 • pattern,end
The other special case is a 0 weight. This is only used for fills. When Band-in-a-Box finds possible patterns, if a particular pattern is going to end where a fill is required due to the part-marker placement, then the pattern will only be included as a possibility if that bar in the style wave file has been designated as a fill at some point in the text file. Likewise, a pattern that ends with a fill will not be considered a possibility if the fill doesn’t match up in the Bandin-a-Box song.
Example 7: Normal pattern needed for bar 13. In example 7, if Band-in-a-Box is trying to find a normal pattern for bar 13, it will look for patterns with a mask of 0, 1 (because it is an even number of bars from the part marker) or 5. If it were trying to find a normal pattern for bar 14, it would look for patterns with a mask of 0, 2, or 6. 5. Duration PostFill and Normal patterns can be any number of bars long, however there is a practical range that is commonly used.
If this is confusing to you, there are two ways you can simplify this. Some audio editors allow you to designate bar “1” at any point in a wave file. Simply go to bar 3 and designate that as bar 1. Then, any bar number you see will directly match what needs to be entered into the text file.
Example 10: Here the shot begins at bar 171 (173-2), at the third beat, or 240 ticks into the bar. 4. Duration Unlike patterns, which use numbers of bars for durations, the shots use ticks for durations. So, for example, if a shot lasts for three beats, you would enter 360 (3 beats * 120 ticks per beat).
If you type a semicolon into the text file, whether it’s at the beginning of a line, or at the end of a pattern definition, and text that is typed after the semicolon is ignored, which allows you to type comments. For example: • ;this entire line will be ignored by Band-in-a-Box • pattern,normal,A,5,0,4,15;this text will also be ignored by Band-in-a-Box Pascal-style comments are comments that are enclosed by { and } characters. Any text enclosed by these characters will also be ignored by Band-in-a-Box.
The other things you need to take into account are the count-in and endings. The count-in will be different for the two tempos, so it’s best to record two completely different count-ins. The alternate one can be pasted onto the end of the file if necessary. For endings, it’s also good to simply record two versions of them, which also can be at the end of your file.
The next information it displays is a separate line for every bar of the song. The first item for every bar is the actual bar number in the song, but the type of information that is displayed after that depends on whether the bar represents the start of a pattern, or a subsequent bar in a multi-bar pattern. If the file c:\bbNumberedDeveloperFiles.txt exists, the DrumAudioResults.txt file with information gets numbered and written to c:\bb\Results folder Note: You need to create a c:\bb\Results folder first.
text file, and the current pattern is ending with that Fill. The other message you may see is “*** BB song has no fill, but WAV has a fill ***(Could be Error2 if mask0)” This means that Band-in-a-Box has recognized that a bar that is designated as a Fill occurred within the pattern, but not at a place where a Fill is required. Fills often sound good 4 bars into phrases, even if no fill has been designated, so in these cases, this could be fine.
You'll see the voices down the left side of the dialog box. Each harmony can use up to 3 channels. Harmony Channel A, B, and C. If your harmony only has one instrument, then you will use Channel A for all the voices. If your harmony uses Flute and Bass, then you could use Flute on Channel A and Bass on Channel B. Tip: When you want to hear the harmony as you are developing it, have a song with a melody playing before you enter the Harmony Maker.
Tip: These channels are set to numbers in the Harmony Channels Dialog box, accessible by selecting the [Harmony] button under the Opt | MIDI Channels, options… menu. Octave This allows the harmony to “drop-down” or “go up” by a number of octaves. This octave change will only happen in a certain range, as chosen in the LOW, HIGH settings. Tip: There is also an Overall Harmony Octave setting that changes the octave of the entire harmony setting (accessible by pressing the [More] button). O.
Additional Harmony Options Press the [More…] button to launch the Additional Harmony Options dialog. Use Close Harmony This only applies to 2 and 3 part harmonies. If set to = 0 it will use only close harmonies, mainly 3rds for 2 part harmonies. If set to = 1 it will use mostly 3rds, with some 6ths for 2 part harmonies. If set to = 99 it will use mostly 6ths, with some 3rds for 2 part harmonies. If set to = 100 it will use only wide harmonies, mainly 6ths for 2 part harmonies.
Use Guitar Harmony Voicings Harmony Maker will use real guitar chord voicings that display correctly on the guitar fretboard. Selecting this checkbox means that guitar chord voicings will be used, instead of any other voicings specified in the Harmony Maker. Check out Harmony #32 (J Pass) for an example of this Use voicings in 4ths Modern Jazz harmonies often voice chords in 4ths. For example, a C chord with C melody might be voiced C, G, D, A, E.
Insert the title of your ‘soloist’ in the Title box, and any memo note you wish to add. (The Num field will be filled in for you.) For the Memo box, you can put in information like “extra legato, straighter 8th notes, on top of the beat, laid back, etc. The “Soloist is” box allows you to define what type of notes the Soloist will play (i.e. swing 8th notes, straight 8th notes, 16th notes, etc.) There are several databases of Solo ideas to choose from. Select the database (*.
You may also select an instrument from the “Patch Change” window, but selecting an instrument with the [Choose] button also fills in the specific note range for that instrument. If you wish to have a harmonized solo, select the harmony type by clicking on the Harmony box and choosing from the drop-down list. To Modify (if required) the “Phrase Length,” “Space Length,” and “Outside Range” parameters, simply click in the box you wish to change and type-in the new number.
For example, you can set a “Rock Guitar” Soloist to use nothing shorter than 16th notes. This would produce less “guitar hero” solos with bursts of 32nd notes etc. Or you could create a Jazz solo that uses only quarter notes or longer to help with sight-reading or student study. 10 easy steps to make a Soloist 1. Bring up the Soloist window by pressing the [Soloist] Button. 2. Select a blank spot in your list of soloists and press the [Edit] button. 3.
generation can be used with different soloists, so you can use a “tenor sax jazz” soloist for a few bars, and then insert a custom “bluegrass banjo” soloist for four bars and so on. Tip: Band-in-a-Box even solos over the “slash chords.” The Band-in-a-Box Soloist feature analyzes slash chords like C/Bb to determine the best scale type to use (e.g. Bb Lydian).
The Patch Change area allows you to select an instrument and Harmony, and to set Change Instrument setting for when you would like to change to a new Melody patch (e.g. Each Chorus). In the Change Style to .. window you can choose a style for the Melodist, and specify the feel for the style in the .STY is box. Legato Boost % changes the legato (length) of the notes generated. Instruments like Saxophone have longer legato phrasing.
Number of Variations to Choose From As the Melodist is determining what type of phrase to generate, it will narrow the possibilities to the number of variations set in this variable. Setting a higher number results in more interesting melodies, but the chord progressions are more unusual. Default = 15. Tempo Range / Auto Tempo The Tempo Range setting determines the tempo range that the tune will be created with (it will be a random tempo in the range).
Force Open Position This option forces all of the guitar voicings to the open position. The exception is when the Melody notes are so high that they can't be played using open position voicings. If the Melody is in a high range, and you want a “forced open position” you should likely transpose the Melody to a lower octave prior to generating the solo. The settings for Note Duration thresholds to get a chord refer to how long a note must be before a chord will be generated. (Quarter note = 120 ticks.
- Similar interpretations for notes occurring on “Beat 2, 3 and 4.” You can see that the threshold is higher for notes on beat 2 and 4, which is how a guitar player makes chord solos. “Passing notes” are defined as short duration notes that aren't on the beat, and are followed by a note that is on the beat. In this example, passing notes will never be voiced as chords since the tick threshold is set to zero. A further threshold is applied to the possibility that a note is voiced to a chord.
If set to Never, no chords that require and open string will be played. Include Open Strings (Never/ Sometimes/ Favor) If set to Favor, it will play open strings whenever possible. Sometimes is a “middle ground” setting. Include Chords with this # of Notes You can select the # of notes for chords to be included in the chord solo. In the example above, chords with 2-6 notes will be included. Embellish Chords Embellish how often: Allows you to specify the frequency of embellishment.
Chapter 15: Reference Band-in-a-Box Menu Descriptions This chapter gives line-by-line descriptions for all Band-in-a-Box menus. File Menu New is used to blank the chordsheet and start a new song. Open shows and opens all available file types (MGU, WAV, WMA, MP3, MID, KAR, CDG, and CDA). And it remembers your preference, so you can restrict it to a certain file type. Open MIDI file loads a MIDI file into Band-in-a-Box and the MIDI file will play with the chords intelligently interpreted on-screen.
Launch Audio Chord Wizard… (WAV, WMA, MP3, WMV, CDA) will open the Audio Chord Wizard to analyze chords in an existing Band-in-a-Box song (that has a WAV file on the audio track). Audio Chord Wizard Utilities opens a dialog with handy options to - Make/Remove tempo map in Band-in-a-Box - Remove audio file from song. - Auto-set Key signature, with button present in the Audio Chord Wizard. - Enable/disable the BB MIDI style.
Favorite Folders… opens a list of recently used folders for quick access. File utilities… opens a sub-directory of file utilities. Change Directory (Path) opens the Browse Folder window where a new directory can be selected. Run Explorer in Current Directory launches Explorer. Pressing Ctrl+Shift+F3 is the usual way to get to this item, and will quickly open Explorer. Once Explorer is open, you could double click on a song or style to load it in.
There is also an option to save Drums on separate tracks. This is a special type 1 MIDI file with each individual drum instrument - such as kick drum, snare, and hi-hat - on its own separate track. When you load this type of MIDI file into a sequencer, like PowerTracks Pro Audio, it’s easy to fine-tune the level of each percussion instrument in the drum kit. This button saves a MIDI File to Disk. You can then load the MIDI File into your sequencer for further editing.
Edit Menu Edit | Undo and Edit | Redo allow you to undo or redo most operations. Edit | Cut functions like a delete command to remove bars from a song. Edit | Copy and Edit | Paste are to copy chords. Copying a section of chords can be done in the same manner as copying text in a Windows word processor.
Pasting Chords from the Windows Clipboard Assuming you have already copied some chords to the clipboard, you are then ready to paste the copied chords into another part of your chordsheet. Move the highlight cell to the bar to begin the paste of chords. Copy the chords at the highlighted bar with the on-screen paste, the keystrokes Ctrl+V, or choose the Edit | Paste menu item. Tip: The copied section remains in the clipboard and can be used repeatedly.
Inside the dialog, you should choose the “Source Track” and the destination track to Copy/Move selected channels to. Source track can be any of the Band-in-a-Box tracks – Bass, Drums, Piano, Guitar, Strings, Melody, or Soloist. The track to “Copy/Move selected channels to ->“ can be Melody or Soloist (since these are the only tracks that are editable in Band-in-a-Box). For copying from Melody or Soloist track, you can also specify which channels to include in the copy, or delete or move certain channels.
Reduce (durations of chords by 1/2) cuts chord durations by 50% (e.g., 4beats>>2beats; 2beats>>1beat). Expand (durations of chords by 2) doubles the durations of chords (e.g., 1beat>>2beats; 2beats>>4beats). Unfold (convert to 1 BIG chorus) Choose this command to unfold a multi-chorus song into one BIG chorus. When selected, Band-in-a-Box will display all choruses and verses of a song without loops or repeats.
Set Time Signature (range of bars) In Edit | Set Time Signature (range of bars) you can assign a specific time signature at any bar and apply it to a range of bars, as often as you want. For example, to have one 5/4 bar, bar 13, select this menu item, and toggle the 5/4 button. Then, type in the bar beginning (13) and number of bars (1) in the space provided. Time signature changes are printed on the Notation and Lead Sheet.
Song Memo… A song memo of up to 2000 characters may be added. When a song has a memo associated with it the word Memo highlights in blue. Clicking on the [Memo] button launches the Song Memo dialog, where you can type or edit a memo about the song and select an “Auto-open” option that will show the memo each time the song is loaded. The Song Memo has an option to close automatically during playback.
The “Jazz Up” and “Jazz Down” functions are also available from the dialog. Pressing this button will help to normalize a chord progression to the nine most popular chords for Pop or Jazz. RealTracks play better with these “normal” chords. The “Simpler Jazz” option will simplify chords like C13#11#5 to simply C9. Chord Settings… This launches the Chord Options dialog box, where you can put in rests and pushes. You can launch the Preview, Chord Builder, or Chord-Substitution Functions from this window.
Styles Menu StyleMaker This opens a submenu with three StyleMaker options. New - Make A New Style This function allows you to begin to create a new style, using the StyleMaker feature. See online Tutorial #6: StyleMaker - Making a New Style. Edit a Style This allows you to edit an existing style (*.STY) from disk. The resulting style can then be saved with the same name or a different name. This function uses the StyleMaker. See online Tutorial #5: StyleMaker – Editing Styles.
OK to load style with songs This allows you to keep a style in memory. This way, all subsequent songs that are loaded will not change the style (even if they have a different associated style), so you can easily play songs in the same style. If you've found a new favorite style, you can try it out in all kinds of songs without having to reload the style each time. For example, let’s say we’ve discovered the GARNER style, and want to try it out on many different songs.
Find a RealTracks Replacement for current MIDI style This will find the best RealTracks replacement for your current MIDI style and ask if you want to use it. Restore Style Prior to Style Alias reverts to the original MIDI style after you have used a RealTracks replacement. It also turns off the style alias feature for the song. Auto-Replace MIDI styles with RealTracks styles when songs loaded.
What add-ons do I have?… An intelligent dialog, also accessible from the Help menu that will search your directory to tell you which add-ons you have and which you don’t. Utilities Edit Chord Shortcuts file (shortcut.txt)… / Refresh Chord Shortcuts… If you have found a chord that Band-in-a-Box doesn't recognize, you can add your own shortcuts in a text file that you make yourself called c:\bb\shortcut.txt and Band-in-a-Box will allow you to type in that chord in the future.
100ms. The smallest delay setting is 1(ms). Technical Notes: SysEx files are files that can be made with programs such as PG Music's PowerTracks Pro Audio or SC-Pro Editor/Librarian. They begin with a F0(hex) byte and end with a F7 byte. Examples where you might want to use a SysEx file with Band-in-a-Box are: - Employing a custom setting or patch you have made with the SC-Pro Editor /Librarian. - Sending a General MIDI mode ON message automatically when Band-in-a-Box boots up.
Whether you want to load different patches (or ones you have “tweaked” with a patch editor/librarian such as the SC-Pro Editor/Librarian) into your MIDI device or whether you have a synth that requires a SysEx to set it to a certain mode, you can easily send SysEx files with a configurable delay (the default is 100 ms). If you would like to send a SysEx file to your MIDI device automatically at the start of each session, you need to make a file called STARTUP.SYX, and put it in your c:\bb directory.
Keystroke Shortcuts You can open the dialogs with keystrokes by typing the underlined letter shown on the tabs. For example, you can open the “Arrange” Prefs tab by the keystrokes - Ctrl+E to open the Prefs dialog, then - A to open the Arrangement Options. Environment Options OK to Save/Load Reverb, Vol etc.
Older Band-in-a-Box songs had additional extensions for last letter (1-9, A-O) to indicate style type. Setting this will resave those old songs with a “U” extension, MGU or SGU (if no melody is present). At program boot up… On session start, you can elect to automatically load the last song or style that was used. Or not. Boot up in directory of the last session On program boot up, the current directory will get set to the last directory used in the previous session.
Toolbars Toolbar mode settings are for the main toolbar. The Normal mode shows toolbar icons with text labels. Options are Text only, Icons only, or No toolbar. Show on-screen piano shows or hides the on-screen piano. Floating Toolbars Always Show Text toggles floating toolbar text off or on. Song Title area font allows the selection of any installed font the song title. Chordsheet Enable display of Repeats/Endings allows repeats signs and 1st/2nd ending markers to be shown on the chordsheet.
This option allows display of “9sus” chords as “11” (e.g., Bb11 instead of Bb9sus). This only affects how the chord is displayed, not how it is stored. And you can type either C11 or C9sus to enter the same chord. For Roman Numerals of Chords in minor keys, use relative major For minor keys, base roman numerals on the relative major. For example in key of Am, Am is either the Im chord or the VIm chord. Chordsheet Font You can choose the font to use for the chordsheet.
Allow Any Rests You can disable the rests feature. You might want to do this if you’ve got a song with a lot of rests in it, and are then having difficulty recording a melody because you don’t hear the drums providing the beat (due to the drums resting). If so, you can temporarily disable the rests so that you can record and listen to the drums. Allow Any Pushes If for some reason you don't want a style or a song to have pushes, you can set this to no.
Drum Brushes Most GM modules have brushes available on patch 41 on the drums. On some Sound Blasters you need to load a GS sound font for this to occur, and you need to use the Sound Blaster software to do this (AWE Control Panel). On the Yamaha XG, you likely need to send a “GS mode on” message from the GM menu in Band-in-a-Box. But if your module just doesn't have brushes available, then you can set this option, and the style will remap the notes to different drum instruments that don't have brushes.
Play Lead-In Even If Intro Present If a song has an intro, it’s usually not necessary to play the 2 bar lead-in count. There's a new option to always OMIT the lead-in if an intro is present. Lead-in type This can be drum patterns instead of “1-2-1234.” You can specify to play two bars of drum patterns instead of the count-in. You may prefer hearing the drum beat to a simple count-in, since it provides more information about the upcoming groove.
(1234, 1-3, 1---, or –2-4). Seeing a metronome on-screen is a great way for a student to learn to keep on the beat, and with a settable size, students can view this from across the room. Audible Metronome The three settings for the audible metronome are None, During Record, or During Record and Play. MIDI File Options The Preferences [MIDI File] button opens the MIDI file options dialog. Include Patch Changes in MIDI files will include the patch (instrument) changes.
Include Forced Channel Meta Event This will include the forced channel META event. It is recognized by PowerTracks Pro Audio and other PG Music Inc. programs only. Include Guitar Position Controller This will insert a controller 84 which PG Music uses to indicate the fret position. Since some synths also use this for Portamento Control, you should use this setting with caution. Write Soloist Part On Channel 5 Normally the program writes the Soloist part on channel 8.
Route MIDI Thru to MIDI Driver If this is unchecked, MIDI Thru (live playing) will be routed to the DXi synth rather than the MIDI Thru drive while the song is playing. (Applies with MME audio drivers only.) DXi Synth Settings To select the DXi synthesizer, click the [DXi Synth Settings] button, which will open the DirectX Plugins window. Select your DXi synth and apply real time DirectX effects.
- No GM2 support: Most sound cards (Sound Blasters etc.) don't have GM2 support yet, so just support the 128 sounds. Band-in-a-Box will use the closest instrument in these cases. The [Audio Settings] button opens the Audio Settings dialog to set up audio drivers. MIDI Options This Preferences button opens the MIDI Options dialog. Send GM Mode On at startup / Send XG Mode On at startup You can elect to have Band-in-a-Box automatically send a GM or XG Mode On command every time the program is started.
Song Patch Changes: Songs can be saved with patch changes. If you want to prevent specific instruments loading for a given song, set this option to “No.” Style Patch Changes: Styles contain patch change information for the instruments that were used when the Style was created. To use your own instrument selection, not the original instruments, change this setting to “No.” Drum Patch Changes: To disable patch changes in Drums, set to NO.
These can use either Controller 0 (Bank 0), which is also know as MSB for Most Significant Byte, or Controller 32, also called LSB for Least Significant Byte, or combinations of the two controllers. Harmony The [Harmony] button opens the Harmony Channels and Settings dialog where settings for the harmonies are made. Harmony Settings OK to Load Harmonies With Songs If set to YES, the harmony settings for each song will be loaded and saved with each song.
Set “Use MIDI Volume for Soloing Wizard” to true if you want MIDI velocity information sent to the Soloing Wizard. If you have a velocity sensitive MIDI device attached to your computer and you want to control the dynamics of the Soloist, you should enable this feature. Set the “Trigger Playback Early” to true to enable song playback to start before the Soloist has actually completed composing a solo. Otherwise, Band-in-a-Box will completely compose a solo before song playback begins.
Patch Map This opens the General MIDI Patch Edit dialog, where you can make a customized General MIDI patch map.
Type in the patch number that your synth uses for each instrument listed. For example, if your sound source has its Acoustic Piano at patch location 41select the box to the left of Acoustic Piano and type 41. Do the same for all of the instruments in the General MIDI patch list. If your synth doesn't have an exact match, use a close sounding patch that it does have.
The default settings are to change the volumes by 0 %, which would leave them as they are. If there were a drum note with a velocity of 50, it would be affected as follows: +40% would change it from 50 to 50+(40%x50)=70 -40% would change it from 50 to 50-(40%x50)=30 The current settings for your drum velocities are saved in the intrface.bbw configuration file. Favorite Instruments This button opens the Favorite Instruments dialog.
The [Patch List] button displays the General MIDI Patch List of instrument names and patch numbers. The [Combos] button opens the Favorite Combos dialog. The Favorite Combos dialog box allows you to save up to 10 of your favorite instrument combos. For example, you could setup Combo #1 to be an Acoustic Jazz combo which would send out patches like Acoustic Bass, Acoustic Piano, Acoustic Guitar, Flute, etc. After you have finished typing in the instrument patch numbers select the [Save] button.
Transpose The Preferences [Transpose] button opens the Settings for transposing songs when loaded or “Do it Now” dialog. When playing along on your MIDI keyboard, you can set the Thru transpose to transpose semitones or octaves. You can define a “favorite key” and Band-in-a-Box will optionally transpose any and all loaded songs to that key. This is a great feature for practicing in a certain key.
Record Filter supports all MIDI controllers and sustain pedal. You can record any type of MIDI information to the melody or soloist tracks by using the Record Filter feature to select which types to include. With this window you can choose what types of MIDI information Band-in-a-Box will record. Notation The [Notation] button opens the Notation Window Options. If the Notation window is not open the program will launch it. These settings are described in the Notation chapter and in the online Help.
These settings are described in the Notation chapter and in the online Help. Audio Settings The Preferences [Audio] button opens the Audio Settings dialog. Audio Driver Type You’ll see the following options for Audio Driver Type: MME or ASIO. MME is the default audio driver type that is used in Windows. MME is good, but there is latency (delay) associated with MME drivers.
For this reason, Steinberg developed a faster type of audio driver system, called ASIO. It allows for much lower latency than ordinary MME drivers do. Note: Most low-end sound cards do not include an ASIO driver, so you may not have an ASIO driver yet. In this case, you’ll need to get an ASIO driver from the Internet. ASIO Audio Driver When you select ASIO the ASIO Audio Drivers dialog will open. This ASIO driver dialog lets you choose an ASIO driver.
output within Band-in-a-Box. If you do not hear input or output, then you may need to try different ports than the defaults. You may need to read your sound card’s instructions to determine the correct ports to use. The ASIO Driver’s Control Panel button launches the Control Panel for your driver. This usually lets you adjust the latency by letting you choose different buffer sizes in milliseconds. Some drivers might let you choose the buffer size in samples, which is less convenient than milliseconds.
The DMA Size and DMA Offset settings are set automatically by the auto-testing of the sound card. This test can be repeated by pressing the [Get from sound card…] button. The default value for all of these settings is 0 (zero). You can override these settings if required, but it is usually not necessary. The Offset in mS is not a setting that gets set automatically. It defaults to zero. This allows you to adjust the timing that the sound card plays audio in relation to MIDI.
The Guitar Settings dialog allows you the ability to adjust various parameters on the virtual guitar fretboard so that music can be displayed effectively (and easily) on this window, regardless of the original instrument intended for the track data. It also offers the ability to enter notation using the virtual guitar and play back track data in specific fretboard positions for educational and sight-reading purposes. Click on the [Help] button for detailed online descriptions.
- If “Note Guides” is selected guide notes will be shown on the keyboard. The guide notes can be scale tones, chord tones, or roots only. Note Names and Note Colors can be used as in the Notation settings. There is an option to Show Out-of-Scale notes in Yellow. The size of the piano keyboard can be entered in pixels, or set with the preset buttons, or set by dragging the bottom border of the window. Lyric Window Options The [BigLyrics] button opens the Lyric Window Options.
Print Options The [Print] button opens the Print Options dialog. These options are described in the Notation chapter and in the online Help. Overrides Overrides are available to see which other information gets loaded from a file, such as patches, harmonies, volume/reverb/chorus/panning/banks. For example, you can set every song to load with looping ON, and don’t load any reverb settings from songs.
If this is not selected, notation symbols (slurs, staccato, crescendos) will not be loaded from the song. The “Defaults for new songs” are settings from the Song Settings dialog. When “Vary Style in Middle Choruses” is selected (default) the song will play in substyle B throughout the middle choruses, playing substyle A for the first and last choruses only. If this setting is not selected the substyle changes will follow the part markers entered on the chordsheet.
There are several ways to hear RealDrums with your Band-in-a-Box songs. Styles (.STY) can have RealDrums assigned to them (e.g. “–ZZJAZZ.STY”). This is in the StyleMaker’s Misc. Style Settings dialog. We provide many styles that already have RealDrums. These styles can be identified by the style name beginning with a minus sign. For example “-ZZJAZZ.STY” is a version of the ZZJAZZ.STY that uses RealDrums.
When “Enable RealDrum changes at any bar” is checked the RealDrum style can be changed at any bar by choosing a new style in the Edit Settings for Bar dialog (F5 function key). RealTracks The RealTracks Settings dialog lets you control the RealTracks. In the RealTracks Settings dialog you can Enable/Disable the RealTracks feature. RealCharts (notation from some RealTracks) Most RealTracks now display notation, i.e. RealCharts, showing the notes that are being played.
RealCharts are optional and are selected in the RealTracks Settings dialog. ; “Show RealCharts notation from styles and songs” will show RealCharts that have been generated from styles or songs stored with RealTracks. ; “Show RealCharts notation for Soloists” will show RealCharts that have been generated from the Select Soloist dialog. ; “Save RealCharts in MIDI files” will save the RealChart to a MIDI track so you can analyze it in other programs.
“Allow soloing to crescendo” can be applied to some RealTracks to have the intensity of the solo building up, with the flashiest part of the solos playing as the solo builds. If you have similar RealTracks available at different tempos, Band-ina-Box will automatically choose the best one to use.
audio instrument (instead of being quickly faded out). 4-bar endings are on by default. You can disable 4-bar endings globally by leaving this box unchecked or on a song-by-song basis in the Song Settings dialog, Edit | Settings (for this song). When this is set, reverb will be added to the RealTracks and RealDrums. RealTracks support Shots, Holds, and Pushes. Simply type in the chords as you normally would, adding periods (…) for shots and holds, and the RealTracks will play them.
whereas BG057.wma would not be one. We call them RealTracks “+/- files.” They are not included with Band-in-a-Box 2011 because they are not needed and they take up extra space. Q. I bought Band-in-a-Box for the first time with version 2011. Do I need to do anything? No, there are no +/- files included with Band-in-a-Box 2011, so there is nothing to do Q. I have upgraded to Band-in-a-Box 2011, and have existing RealTracks folders with +/- files. Do I need to do anything? You don't need to do anything.
If you want lyrics to display on the TranzPort during playback, set these options. Players of non-concert pitched instruments can use “Transpose the display.” For example, an Alto sax player would press the “Eb Alto” button, and then the TranzPort display would show chords transposed to his key. Practice The Practice Window allows convenient “1-click” access to many Band-in-a-Box features that help you with practicing. There are several purposes for the Practice Window.
One-click access to many of the educationrelated features of Band-in-a-Box (play along soloing, Ear Training, games). Handy buttons for on-screen transposition for non-concert instruments. One button access to many of the Band-ina-Box add-ons “101 Riffs” series and “Master Solos.” N/A indicates other Band-in-a-Box add-ons that are available, but not installed on your computer. One button access to many other PG Music educational programs and lessons.
You can enable/disable the audio reverb. If you disable it, this will save some CPU cycles, so this might be advisable on an older/slower machine if you hear that the audio is clicking or not keeping up. Click on the green Select a Preset button to open the list of presets. This list will show only the “Band-in-aBox Default Reverb” until you save some presets of your own. As you adjust the settings they will be applied to the current song.
Allow Drag n Drop (Default=true). If disabled, the Drag Drop feature will not work. There shouldn’t be a reason to disable this. “Drag Individual MIDI tracks as audio (using VST/DXi)” (default=false). When enabled, the chosen MIDI tracks get converted to audio, using your currently selected VST/DXi (e.g. Roland VSC, or Forte) Drag Combo track as audio (using VST/DXi) (default=true). When enabled, the entire arrangement gets converted to audio using your currently selected VST/DXi (e.g.
Play Menu Note: Most commands in the Play menu are performed by onscreen buttons, or by the keystrokes listed to the right of the menu command. Play Stop Playback - Hold (pause) - Generate (even if tracks are frozen) - Generates a new arrangement and plays the song. Stops playback. To resume either use the Play From Current Position command or the [From] button the play from the start of the current bar, or use the [Play] or Replay [+] buttons to play from the start of the song. Pauses the song.
Tracks (and mute tracks) Un-Render Song from Audio Tracks (Enables tracks, erase audio track) Freeze all tracks - Use to erase a rendered Audio track and restore MIDI playback. - Freezes all tracks – MIDI, RealTracks, and RealDrums – for fast replay without regenerating tracks. Unfreezes tracks to allow normal regeneration. allows the selection of a single track to freeze. Drag the mouse cursor to select a region of bars in the chordsheet and then use this command to play the selected region as a loop.
dialog will then display; see its online Help for detailed instructions. The remaining commands in this submenu are also found in the Loop Section Settings dialog. Tempo Juke Box Play Previous Juke Box Song / Next JukeBox song Wizard Play Along feature - When a new song is started the tempo is set based on Style. This is the tempo that is embedded in the style file. It can be reset to any tempo.
Enter Lyrics at current bar - Opens the Lyric entry box at the current location of the timeline or highlight cell. Big Lyrics Window - Opens the Big Lyrics window for viewing lyrics and, optionally, chord symbols. Lyric Document Window - Displays a full screen of formatted lyrics. Easily copy and paste lyrics to and from your favorite word processor. The lyrics will then display in the Big Lyrics window.
Auto-Update all songs in folder to Note-based Lyrics will update an entire folder worth of songs, copying the Line Lyrics to Note Lyrics. Only Note-based lyrics get displayed in the Big Lyrics Dialog, so this feature will allow you to see these lyrics in the Big Lyrics window. Move Lyrics Up or down row(s)… moves a line of line-based lyrics up/down a number of rows. Erase Line-based Lyrics only erases only the line-based lyrics, preserving the note-based lyrics.
Embellish Melody during playback launches the Embellisher dialog. This optionally embellishes the Melody during playback. Embellish Melody Dialog allows you to customize the settings of the Embellisher, choose an embellisher type from presets, and make a particular Embellishment permanent. Mute Melody during Middle Choruses to allow for soloing. Sequencer Window for multi-Channel Melody There are 2 tracks in Band-in-a-Box to add your own recordings. These are the Melody and Soloist tracks.
There is a small button at the right of the track line that allows you to delete/ rechannel or merge the channel with another channel. You can increase or decrease the velocity of the track and move it to the Soloist track. You can also change the patch (instrument) for that track by using the instrument patch combo box. So now that we’ve customized the display, we are seeing the bass and trumpet on the notation, and hearing the entire track.
- - - - - Resolution. Choose the division you would like the track quantized to. Choosing 16 will Quantize to 16th notes. Starting at Bar# and Chorus #. Quantization will begin at the place you select and applied for the number of bars. % strength. Choose 100% if you want the notes quantized exactly to the division. Otherwise, the notes will be moved the % toward the target quantization. Quantize Start Times. By default, this option is set to “Yes.
Adjust Level of melody allows you to increase or decrease the volume (velocity) of the Melody track without affecting the other tracks. Timeshift Melody (ticks) allows you to move the Melody forwards or backwards in small increments relative to the rest of the song tracks. (Measured in ticks or parts per quarter, PPQ.) Insert Beat(s) in Melody allows you to insert a blank beat or beats into the song relative to the current time signature.
Loosen up Start Times is a dedicated function to vary the start times of notes on the Melody or Soloist tracks, with options for what notes to affect (harmony, chords) and amount of variance. Change Pitch Bend Range… lets you set the range in semitones. Insert Guitar Bend events when pitch bend found… will insert controllers so the guitar will display bends. Transpose One Octave DOWN / Transpose One Octave UP transposes the Melody part one octave in either direction.
Soloist Menu Track Type Normally you'd leave the track type set to Single. But you can set it to: - - - - Multi (16) -Channel – All channels get preserved, and outputted on the channels, this would be useful for importing an entire MIDI file, and playing it from the Melody channel (using a silent style). Guitar – Channels 11 to 16 will display on the guitar as strings 11 to 16, TAB will show, the notation will be up an octave, and the MIDI file will contain the channels preserved.
If you want to make your own soloists or modify an existing Soloist, use the Soloist Maker (edit) module. The Soloist Maker allows you to define the parameters essential to a soloist's playing, such as instrument range (i.e. tenor saxophone), extra legato playing, playing more on top of the beat, playing straighter 8th notes than usual swing 8th notes. In addition, you can set phrasing options, such as how long the phrase should be, and how much “space” to leave between phrases.
842 There are 842 events in the track, usually every note is an event. We have customized the piano track so that it can be heard (Play=True), but not seen in notation (Show=False). There is a small button at the right of the track line that allows you to delete/ rechannel or merge the channel with another channel. You can increase or decrease the velocity of the track and move it to the Melody track. You can also change the patch (instrument) for that track by using the instrument patch combo box.
Quantize Soloist opens the Quantize Soloist Options dialog. The Humanize Soloist Part… feature is an advanced version of this function. Humanize Soloist Part w/Straight Feel / …/Swing Feel. Band-in-a-Box uses intelligent humanization routines, which can humanize a Soloist from one feel to another, from one tempo to another, and vary the amount of swing in 8th notes (but not randomly). The results are very musical, with natural sounding MIDI solos.
Eliminate Note Overlap – Preserve Double Stops / Eliminate Note Overlap – Remove Double Stops opens a Choose Range dialog to select the range of bars where note overlap will be eliminated while double stops are either preserved or eliminated. Loosen up Start times Loosen up Start Times is a dedicated function to vary the start times of notes on the Melody or Soloist tracks, with options for what notes to affect (harmony, chords, and amount of variance).
Scale Direction When playing a new scale, either start on the root of the scale (going up), or start with the closest scale tone (moving up or down). The two modes are: 1. Ascending. The scales will always start on the root that is in the octave above the Lowest Note that is set, and will play in ascending order. 2. Walking. The scales will start on the nearest scale tone to the previous tone that was played.
Audio Menu The Record Audio function is used to Record Audio using a microphone plugged into your sound card or a guitar (or mixer) plugged into the line-in on your sound card. This launches the Record Audio Dialog and the Record Audio – Keep Take dialog. The next two items, Record Audio and MIDI (Melody) and Record Audio and MIDI (Soloist) refer to the situation where you want to simultaneously record an audio track (vocals etc.) as well as a MIDI piano part.
The Plugin menu command refers to running a plug-in audio effect. This applies an audio effect such as Reverb or Chorus to the already recorded audio part. Band-in-a-Box comes with a large selection of high quality audio effects built-in, such as Compressor, Gate, Distortion, Reverb, Echo, Chorus, Flanger, Ring Mod, Tremolo, Tone Control, Graphic EQ, Parametric EQ, Gain Change, De-Ess, Auto-Wah, Pitch Shift, Exciter, Enhancer and Hum Filter.
Box, and you've already recorded an audio track, you should insert 2 bars (8 beats in a 4/4 time signature) into the audio track as well. Mute Audio is a toggle switch to mute and unmute the audio track. Render MIDI to Stereo .WAV file etc… This command launches the dialog that allows you to Render (convert) the Band-in-a-Box song (with or without an audio track) to a stereo .WAV file.
Audio Harmonies & Pitch Tracking opens the Generate Audio Harmonies dialog. There are three uses of the Audio Harmonies in Band-in-a-Box, namely: - Pitch tracking (fixing) of the melody. - Harmonizing your voice using Band-in-a-Box harmonies (when a MIDI melody is present). - Harmonizing your voice to the chords of the song (when no MIDI melody is present). DXi Synth Settings opens the DirectX Plugins dialog to the Synth Track where you can select a DXi synth and apply real time effects to its audio output.
Roland GS submenu Reset Roland GS (Quick) and Reset GS (all ID’s) reset the module to factory settings. Set Reverb Type or Set Chorus Type (GS Module): Roland GS instruments allow different type of reverb and chorus settings. These settings boxes allow you to select them. Assign Part/Channel etc. for GS Module The GS Part settings are for GS compatible synthesizers only. These synthesizers have 16 parts. The default is for part 1 to be channel 1, part 2 channel 2 etc.
Master (Combo) Volume Adjust submenu Master Volume uses MIDI messages instead of GS/GM SysEx should be set by all users except if you have a Roland GS synth, Roland Sound Canvas, or Roland VSC. If set, the Combo settings will allow Master Volume and other MIDI settings to work. This submenu allows you to set whether to use Roland - GS or General MIDI for Master Volume messages. Unless you have a Roland you should select General MIDI.
Run Other Application… and Choose [Other Application…] allows you to specify and run any other application (mixer application, PowerTracks etc.). Run DLL or &EXE plugin… and Choose DLL or EXE PlugIn… allows you to run a plug-in that has been made specifically for a PG Music product. Convert Patch list from PowerTracks or Cakewalk… This will let you convert a PowerTracks Pro Audio .INI file or a Cakewalk .INS file to a Band-in-a-Box .PAT file.
Save Harmony with this song Toggle this option “On” to allow Band-in-a-Box to embed the harmony settings for the current song so that they may be recalled automatically at a later time. Change Harmony with new chord Toggle this option “On” to allow the program to vary the harmony characteristics (i.e. inversions) each time a new chord is encountered in the song. Allow Melody Harmony Toggle this option “On” to allow harmonies on the Melody MIDI channels.
Notation Menu Notation/edit/note roll mode moves the notation window through its various entry modes. Print... brings up the print dialog box. Note Insert mode Toggling this to “on” allows you to insert notes graphically with your mouse or keyboard on the notation window. Mono Entry Mode Toggle this “on” if you are inserting single notes (not chords) on the notation window.
Window Menu Notation (or chords) Window toggles between the notation and the chordsheet views. Movable Notation Window opens a movable and resizable notation window. Lead Sheet Window launches the lead sheet notation. Big Lyrics Window launches a window that displays lyrics in a Karaoke format. Lyric Document Window displays a full screen of formatted lyrics. Easily copy and paste lyrics to and from your favorite word processor. The lyrics will also display in the Big Lyrics window.
Moveable Audio Edit Window opens the regular Audio Edit Window but lets you reposition it on the screen. Piano Roll Window launches the Piano Roll window where you can edit the Melody or Soloist track in a traditional piano roll format. Moveable Piano Roll Window opens the regular Piano Roll window, but lets you move and reposition it on the screen. Put Notation/Chords on Top moves the notation window to the top of the main screen and moves the piano roll at the bottom of the main screen.
Chord Builder submenu Chord Builder… Allows you to build up chords using mouse clicks. Play Current Chordsheet Chord This function plays the current chord on the chordsheet. It is most commonly accessed by pressing Shift+Enter on the chordsheet. MIDI Chord Detection… This Window menu command brings up a submenu for entering chords from a keyboard. Select MIDI Chord Detection… and play any chord on your MIDI keyboard.
Plug-in Mode for DAW puts Band-in-a-Box into plug-in mode, open as a small always-on-top window that acts as a plug-in for your favorite DAW/sequencer so that you can drag-and-drop MIDI and audio (WAV) tracks from BB to your favorite sequencer. The DAW Plug-in mode is a mode within the regular Band-in-a-Box program. This mode allows you to transfer tracks, or parts of tracks, to other DAW Sequencers easily, by simply dragging the track icons from Band-in-a-Box (BB) to the tracks window of your DAW.
Use this button to refresh the list when additional files have been added externally. Use the filter to search the songs for a particular word or term. The [Clear] button removes the search term. Generate mp4 file(s) There are three options for generating mp4 files for the iPhone. “For selected song” generates an mp4 file for the selected song, you can then send the Band-in-a-Box song and the mp4 to iPhone BB using the Band-in-a-Box service.
Help Menu Index Lists all of the Help topics. Type in a keyword under the “Index” tab to go to the topic you want. Topic Search Opens the Help file where you can search the Table of Contents or the Index, or use the Search feature to find your topic. Using help Has Windows tips for using Help files. How to… Opens a categorized list of topics. It’s a fast way to find out about a particular feature or operation. Basics Goes directly to the “Basics” introduction to Band-in-a-Box.
Show help hints Band-in-a-Box has comprehensive fly-by hints that appear when you move over an item. These include hints for the dialog boxes and various windows. You can set the hints to display none, basic, or detailed information. Update, Add/On and other Product info Other Band-in-a-Box add-ons, PG Music Inc. products, and contact information. ReadMe (for Latest info not in manual) documents the latest features, plus an archive of earlier updates.
Shortcuts: Keystroke Commands - Hot Keys Quick Song Settings Typing special words, instead of chord names, will make the following settings: begin + Enter Sets the beginning of the chorus to the current bar chorusend + Enter Sets the end of the chorus to the current bar end + Enter Sets the end of the song to the current bar tkc + Enter Sets key signature to c, tkbb would set it to bb trc + Enter Transposes song to key of C t125 + Enter Sets tempo to 125 Quick-Load Songs and Styles You can quick-load a son
Use Ctrl+Shift together with the 1-9 and 0 keys on the keyboard to select Favorite Instruments. For example, let’s change the Piano part to Rhodes Piano. 1. Press Ctrl+4 to select the Piano part. 2. Press Ctrl+Shift+2 to select the Favorite #2. That is Rhodes Piano. Use Ctrl+Shift and the [-] and [=] keys to decrease/increase the patch by 1. Volume Settings Ctrl+Alt+Shift+R Ctrl+Alt+A Ctrl+Alt+S Ctrl+Alt+D Ctrl+Alt+Shift Q Ctrl+Alt+Shift W Ctrl+Alt+Shift E Set current part’s volume.
Ctrl+Shift+D Ctrl+Shift+G Ctrl+Shift+J Ctrl+Shift+L Ctrl+Shift+N Ctrl+Shift+S Alt+Shift+L Ctrl+Alt+Shift+L Drum Kit window. Guitar window. Ear training window. Big Lyrics window. Big Piano window. Plug-in mode for DAW. Practice window. Lyric Document window. StyleMaker Hot Keys F1, Shift+F1, Ctrl+F1 F2 Alt+F2 R or F3 or F4 F8 F10 F6 or Shift+F6 Cursor Keys Alt+F4 Help Save style Save style as ...
Shift+F8 Ctrl+Shift+F8 Alt+Shift+F8 Ctrl+Alt+Shift+F8 Alt+S then E Alt+S then W F7 F9 Ctrl+F5 Ctrl+Shift+F5 Ctrl+F9 Shift+F9 Alt+F9 Ctrl+Shift+F9 Shift+F7 Alt+F10 Ctrl+F10 Shift+F10 Alt+F11 Ctrl+F11 Shift+F11 Ctrl+Alt+E Ctrl+Alt+I Ctrl+Alt+Q Ctrl+Alt+T Ctrl+E Ctrl+N Ctrl+Shift+B Ctrl+Shift+F6 F5 F6 Alt+F4 Load next file (alphabetical by file name). Load previous (alphabetical by file name). Load next style. (in alphabetical order). Load previous style. (in alphabetical order). Enable/disable style.
Dominant 7th Chords C7, 7+, C9+, C13+, C13, C7b13, C7#11, C13#11, C7#11b13, C9, C9b13, C9#11, C13#11, C9#11b13, C7b9, C13b9, C7b9b13, C7b9#11, C13b9#11, C7b9#11b13, C7#9, C13#9, C7#9b13, C9#11, C13#9#11, C7#9#11b13 C7b5, C13b5, C7b5b13, C9b5, C9b5b13, C7b5b9, C13b5b9, C7b5b9b13, C7b5#9, C13b5#9, C7b5#9b13, C7#5, C13#5, C7#5#11, C13#5#11, C9#5, C9#5#11, C7#5b9, C13#5b9, C7#5b9#11, C13#5b9#11, C7#5#9, C13#5#9#11, C7#5#9#11, C13#5#9#11 Suspended 4 Chords Csus, C7sus, C9sus, C13sus, C7susb13, C7sus#11, C13sus#1
BBWDLL16.DLL DLL handling playback. BBW.EXE Executable file. BBW.LST This is the text file for the Style List information. BBWRES.DLL DLL required for some graphics. CPALETTE.DLL Required DLL. DEFAULT.HAR These are the default Harmonies. DEFAULT.GIT The default Guitarists. DEFAULT.MEL The default Melodists. DEFAULT.SOL The default Soloists. GP5.DLL Required DLL. PGCHORDS.TTF PG Music chord font. PGJAZZ_.TTF PG Music Jazz font. PGMUS.TTF PG Music notation font. PGTEXT.TTF PG Music text font. ZZ*.
PG Music Inc. Band-in-a-Box ® is protected by copyright and is the property of PG Music Inc. and its licensors. Copyright © 1989-2011 PG Music Inc. All rights reserved. PG MUSIC INC. 29 Cadillac Avenue Victoria, BC V8Z 1T3 Canada Internet: www.pgmusic.com International Pages and Forums: www.bandinabox.com Contacts: E-mail: info@pgmusic.
Appendix: RealTracks Sets There are one hundred and one sets of RealTracks available for Band-in-a-Box! The basic Band-in-a-Box Pro package includes a basic set of RealCombos for Pop, Country, and Jazz. In addition, there are hundreds more RealTracks instruments available in one hundred and one different sets. RealTracks Set 1: The Originals, New and Improved Improved versions of the original RealTracks – Tenor Sax, Tenor Sax (Bluesy), Pedal Steel, and Acoustic Guitar.
This authentic sounding Latin-Jazz set includes a balance of piano, acoustic bass, and electric guitar RealTracks for use in all keys. Combine with RealTracks Set 17: Bossa - Soloists for your dream Bossa band! RealTracks Set 17: Bossa - Soloists This set includes hours of trumpet, trombone, alto sax, and even acoustic bass soloing. You'll have all the tools available to generate a killer Bossa solo with the most authentic sounds available.
RealTracks Set 33: Bluegrass (Medium Tempo) All you need to play a medium tempo Bluegrass song. This set of RealTracks is full of awesome features like A and B substyles for the fiddle and banjo as well as RealCharts for the acoustic guitar soloist. RealTracks Set 34: Country Train Beat Solid train rhythm that doesn't miss a beat plus RealCharts to see the notation for all of the instruments.
and the 3, which is one of the most common ways to play pop music. The alternate, 'PopHalfNotesPush is the same basic pattern, but doesn't restate the note on beat 3, driving the song with a pushed feel. RealTracks Set 47: Slow and Fast Pop - Harmonica & Organ Covering the whole even 8ths tempo spectrum, our B3 Organ styles can provide that growling B3 sound whether you've written a slow ballad, or a rockin' fast pop tune. For the fast tunes, we've also got a background Pop Harmonica style.
With RealTracks Set 58, we provide both Jazz and Pop Waltz styles. On the Jazz front, a Tenor Sax soloist is included, which can be used with some of our previously released Jazz Waltz rhythm section instruments. For the Pop fans, we've provided Acoustic Bass and Piano styles playing a slow even 8ths Pop Waltz. RealTracks Set 59: Crossover The RealTracks you need for the popular sound of Swing 16ths Crossover between Country Music and Hip Hop.
Northern Rock and classic 80s Texas Blues-Rock grooves. 8 different guitar styles include quarter-note variations, strummed patterns, offbeat & syncopated grooves. A variety of guitar tones are employed including mellow fuzz, an edgy, gritty sound, and different registers of that Texas Rock ‘n’ Roll sound. All styles are equipped with RealCharts, so you can see the notes you're hearing either in TAB, notation, or on the on-screen guitar fretboard.
choose from with the Electrics too, with both clean and distorted guitars, playing syncopated patterns, classic riffs, palm-mute, and twangy variations. All of these styles are equipped with RealCharts, so you can see exactly what's being played by these world-class studio musicians! RealTracks Set 80: Fast Country Boogie This set features 6 up-tempo Country Boogie guitar RealTracks including 2 acoustic guitars and 4 electrics.
RealTracks Set 88: 12-String Electric RealTracks Set 88 offers some unique, clean 12-string electric guitar tones. The styles are split into two main categories: strumming and fingerpicking. The strumming styles offer a silky, sustained, solid rhythm while the fingerpicking styles deliver an open and bright feel that fills in the eighth notes.
RealTracks Set 95: Jazz Rhythm Guitar: Bossa and Swing Included are four electric guitar styles that cover a large range of tempos, as well as two bossa styles, and a fast “Freddie” Acoustic Guitar. The Electrics are split into “FreeComp” and “GrooveComp” styles. The FreeComp styles are intended to be the sole comping instrument (no piano) featuring sophisticated rhythms and harmonies.
style. The fiddle and guitar have the added bonus of having RealCharts enabled, which allows you to view the notes being played in notation, on the on-screen piano keyboard, and on an on-screen guitar-fretboard. RealTracks Set 102: Uptempo Reggae This set includes Electric Bass, Electric Guitar, B3 Organ, Acoustic Piano, and a brand new Reggae Classic RealDrums style.
RealTracks Set 110 includes Acoustic Bass, Acoustic Guitars, Fiddle, and a brand new Gypsy Jazz Swing RealDrums style. Whether you need some laid-back comping Nylon Guitar, a lovely Fiddle or Guitar solo, or a melodic Acoustic Bass, each of these styles offers a lot. To add variation throughout your songs, the Bass plays “in2” for the A section and switches to “walking” at B. The RealDrums also follow the changes at part markers.
string picking will blow you away! And if that is not enough, Band-in-a-Box's RealCharts allow you to watch how these solos are played in notation, TAB, or on the on-screen guitar fretboard. RealTracks Set 119: TexMex 2-Beat This set includes Electric Bass, Accordion, Electric Guitar, and a brand new TexMex RealDrums style that makes you want to get on your feet and dance! These styles work great as a full band, or individually to compliment any of your older RealTracks.
Index more features, 164, 304 notes display, 311 settings, 164, 303 special cases, 308 drastic tempo changes, 310 odd length bars, 310 zoom, 311 Audio Controls, 196 Audio Features Applying Plugins, 292 Audio Harmonies, 166 harmonize to chords, 289 harmonize to MIDI, 287 melody pitch tracking, 289 Audio Harmony Pitch Styles, 288, 290 Audio Menu, 506 Edit Audio, 507 plug-ins, 507 Audio Playback, 281 Audio Rendering batch convert, 296 Audio Settings, 472 Auto Song Memo, 51, 444 Auto-endings, 337, 400 Automatic
Combos Favorite, 469 Conductor window, 84 customize sections, 87 MIDI keys, 85 mode, 88 patch changes, 86 QWERTY keys, 85 uses, 88 Convert patch lists Cakewalk to BB, 69 PowerTracks to BB, 68 Copyright, 528 Count-in and Metronome options, 457 Coyote WT install, 347 selecting, 347 settings, 349 Custom file selection, 57 Descriptive hints, 41 Digitech Vocalist, 74 DirectX Plug-Ins PG Real Time Analyzer, 364 Display options, 453 Display Options, 40 Drag and drop, 344 Drum Fills, 54, 99 Window, 355 Drum Kit, 46
Roland VSC3, 66 settings, 18, 66 GM2 button, 66 Graphics File, 235 Guitar Controller, 462 enhancements, 80 Macros, 385 pitch bends on fretboard, 80 Styles, 383 Comping, 334 Guitar Macros strummed chords, 386 Guitar Settings, 475 Guitar Style options, 386 override, 386 Guitar Tutor alternate tunings, 334 chord tutor, 333 Guitar Window Toolbar, 83 Guitarist Dialog, 256 Hard drive version, 13 Harmonize to Chords, 289 Harmonize to MIDI Melody, 287 Harmony, 45, 129, 464 creating, 421 octave doubling, 421 selecti
Local ON, 510 long file names, 57 Loop button, 71 Loop Keystroke Commands, 72 Loop region, 55, 71 Loop Section button, 71 checkbox, 71 enable, 71 looping status, 72 Presets, 72 settings, 71 Looping keystroke commands, 72 Screen, 200 Song, 51 looping status, 72 Lyric Window Options, 477 Lyrics, 228 document window, 228 Event List, 226 line-based lyrics, 493 lyric edit window, 156, 226 menu, 227 Menu, 225 Notebased Lyrics, 226 Lyrics enhancements Karaoke file lyrics, 230 MIDI file lyrics, 230 multiple lines,
MGU files, 169 MIDI Channels Setting, 463 Files, 203 Standard, 270 Keyboard, 517 Local On, 462 Note Offs, 462 Sync, 462 Thru, 333 Controllers, 462 Setting, 462 MIDI drivers wizard, 14 MIDI drivers, 14 MIDI File Karaoke, 172 MIDI File Chord Wizard, 313 MIDI file options, 459 MIDI File to Style Wizard, 334 MIDI Keyboard Wizard, 266 MIDI normalize, 74, 457 MIDI options, 462 MIDI/Audio drivers setup, 460 Minimize Rests, 203 MultiStyles + styles, 114 in songs, 65, 115 making, 114 Music Replay, 324 Mute All, 69 N
PG RTA plug-in, 364 PG Vinyl plug-in, 360 PG Vocal Remover operating principle, 365 reverb reduction, 365 PG Vocal Remover plug-in, 365 Piano Hand-Split, 214 manual, 255 Piano roll enhancements, 147, 153 eraser tool, 150, 276 graphic editing modes, 150, 275 Piano Roll chord ruler, 149 delete events, 151, 276 edit events, 151, 276 event selection, 148, 277 graphic event panel, 147, 276 horizontal scroll bar, 153 insert events, 151, 276 keyboard pitch panel, 147 note editing, 150 note panel, 147, 275 note sel
Printing Chords Only, 236 graphics file, 235 Lead Sheets, 231 Notation, 231 options, 231 printer setup, 234 range, 233 Pushes, 99 keystrokes, 99 Quantize, 271 QuickStart, 23 QWERTY, 354 Randomization, 271 RealCharts, 179, 481 RealDrums, 189, 479 edit text, 406 how to hear, 74, 117 recording wave, 404 settings, 75 style changes, 145 style template, 404 testing user style, 407 tutorial, 403 RealTracks, 76, 178 +/- files, 182, 484 3 ways to use, 183 Assign RealTracks, 183 assign to tracks, 76 auto reverb, 198
options, 99 Soft Synth latency adjust, 18 Solo One Instrument, 69 Soloist, 464 Custom Solo Generation, 428 Editor, 252, 253 Exporting, 425 filter, 247 genres, 247 Maker, 252, 253 melody influence, 250 Mode, 249 ReFresh, 253 Slash Chords, 429 Style, 247 Technical Notes, 253 trade bars, 249 velocities, 249 Soloist Maker, 425 10 steps, 428 phrasing, 425 Soloist Menu, 500 Edit Soloist Track, 502 Soloist Maker, 500 track type, 500 Utilities, 503 Soloist note density, 255, 428 Song arranging, 120 automatic intro,
bass patterns, 375 drum patterns, 371 hot keys, 524 hybrid styles, 395 making RealDrums, 403 overview, 367 patterns editing, 393 erasing, 371 recording, 376 velocity adjust, 393 Patterns Sliding, 398 piano, guitar, string patterns, 381 toolbar, 370 StylePicker add RealDrums, 107 applying styles, 102 categories, 105 columns, 106 editor, 108 favorites, 105 filters, 103 memos, 106 more settings, 107 prototype, 103, 106 RealDrums, 106, 188 RealStyles, 105, 188 RealTracks, 105 recently played, 105 settings, 105
Transpose THRU Part, 470 Transpose when loaded, 470 Transpose auto, 470 TranzPort controls, 351 dialog, 351 using, 350 TranzPort Settings, 485 TranzPort®, 350 Substitutions, 330 SubStyles Changing, 100 Sync, 462 Synth Window, 42, 65 System Requirements, 13 Table of Contents, 3 Tag Settings, 122 TC-Helicon harmonies choir mode, 290 unison, 289 TC-Helicon Harmony, 287 dry voice, 287 level, 287 octave, 287 preview, 288 voices, 287 Technical Support, 528 Tempo Change at bar, 144 Tempo Control, 51 Thru Setting,
PG Music Registration Form Please register your program. Registering your PG Music software entitles you to free, unlimited technical support, advance notice of product upgrades, and news about new product releases. If you haven't registered your PG Music software yet, please take a few moments and do so now. How To Register Mail to PG Music Inc., 29 Cadillac Avenue, Victoria, BC V8Z 1T3, Canada Fax to 1-250-475-2937 or toll-free to 1-877-475-1444. On-line at www.pgmusic.
