User Guide

Chapter 12: Wizards, Tutors, and Fun
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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 Band-
in-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. The suggested bars are bars
with all of the “BB Part”
instruments.
Usually you'll want to customize these snapshot bars to control which bars get included in the “a” or “b” substyle.
In the Violet.MID style, the Style Wizard has offered to include Bars 9-101 (inclusive) and wants to put them all on
the “a” substyle. Continuing on, we want to make a great sounding style, so it is important that we have the
following two items correct:
The “BB Parts” have to be correct. We can audition the MIDI file by playing a loop and listening
to the MIDI file and muting channels by clicking on the “Channel” checkboxes. From that, we can
hear the individual parts and assign them correctly, as we would like them in the style. By playing
the MIDI file inside the Style Wizard we can tell which bars to use for the “a” and “b” substyles.
Note: The Style Wizard has entered some of these settings automatically – but you'll have to type in the data as shown.
The Snapshot Bars should be correct for the “a” and “b” substyle. You need to tell the program what bars to
use for the “a” substyle and for the “b” substyle. The program makes an attempt to guess at this, but since MIDI
files can contain many different substyles (and a Band-in-a-Box style allows only 2), you'll likely want control over
these snapshots yourself.
Tip to help you choosing which bars to use:
To listen to the MIDI file, you can either exit the Style Wizard dialog
and just play the song like any other Band-in-a-Box file, or play a
looped section inside the Style Wizard using the [Play], [Stop], and
“Loop at Bar” settings.
OK, the Style Wizard has already made the correct settings for the “BB Parts” for us, so we don't need to make any
changes there. Let's move to the Snapshots section, and enter the bar numbers that correspond to the substyles that
we'd like for the Jazz tune. After listening to the tune, we notice that there is a “2-feel” Jazz section, and a “4-in-the-
bar” section. We want those as “a” and “b” substyles, so we enter the bar #s that correspond to these settings.