Band-in-a-Box 2011 has over 50 new features and enhancements!

There were more than 90 new features added in Band-in-a-Box 2010 & 2010.5, and now version 2011 adds over 50 more! These include improvements to the sounds of RealTracks, much smaller size of RealTracks, a new Mixer window, and more.

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. And we've made the size of the RealTracks much smaller, so that they now only take up 30% of the space that they used to. The new version will shrink the size of your existing RealTracks too, so that you can free up lots of space on your drive.

We've enhanced RealTracks so that you can now have RealTracks styles changes within a song, generate Soloist Medleys - solos that play RealTracks instruments during the solos, and more. There's a Scales Wizard for practicing, which generates scales for any chord progression. New StylePicker Filters show you only the styles that match your search criteria. And much more!

The new features in Band-in-a-Box 2011 for Macintosh 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. Please watch the demo videos for audio examples of the improvements.

We've made the size of the RealTracks much smaller so that they now only take up 30% of the space that they used to. After you install the program, you can run the feature in the RealTracks Settings dialog that will shrink the size of your RealTracks folders. The previous Band-in-a-Box 2010.5 "EverythingPAK" had 100GB of RealTracks; this now shrinks to 30GB. The Audiophile version also shrinks by 70%, so that it is only 30% of the previous size. And the audio fidelity is improved, since it sounds better over a much wider range of tempos with the élastique Pro V2 time stretching engine!

We've added a new Mixer window, allowing you to quickly set volumes, panning, reverb, tone and patches. The Mixer floats on top of the current window, so you can
place it wherever it's convenient to make quick and easy adjustments to your
Band-in-a-Box track settings.

A huge number of new RealTracks (101), with great new Jazz, Pop, and Country Styles.

33 New Jazz RealTracks! These include:

• Jazz Swing Piano comping and soloing with NY Jazz great Mike LeDonne.
• Vibes Swing/Bossa comping and soloing with Steve Nelson.
• Gypsy Jazz: John Jorgenson (guitar), Gonzalo Bergara (guitar), Tim Kliphuis (violin), Simon Planting (bass), and Rick Reed (drums).
• Smooth Jazz Piano Soloing from Jeff Lorber.
• Smooth Jazz Guitar with Dwight Sills.
• Swing Jazz Guitar with Oliver Gannon.

... 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.
• Pop Waltz, Hard Rock Waltz, and more.
• Brent Mason Pop/Rock Guitar Soloing (3 styles).

33 New Country RealTracks! These include:

• Praise and Worship: Styles: "Shining" and "Uplifting" - 14 RealTracks (Piano, Synth, Bass, Guitar, Drums).
• Brent Mason Pop/Rock Guitar Soloing (4 styles).
• Tex Mex Styles: "2-beat" and "Country" (Accordion, Bass, Guitar, Drums).

More new features in Band-in-a-Box 2011...

Change of RealTracks Styles at any Bar. With previous versions of Band-in-a-Box, you were limited to one RealTracks style per song. Now you can change styles with RealTracks at any bar. Just select the style in the Edit | Bar Settings dialog. For example, switch from Jazz Swing to Bossa style at any bar.

MultiStyles (with up to 16 substyles) can now be made with RealTracks.

Change of individual RealTracks instrument can be added to any track at any bar. You can insert a specific RealTracks instrument at any bar to create a customized performance.

Soloist "Medleys," where the RealTracks is made to switch instruments every "N" bars or every chorus. For example, you can add a Bluegrass Medley Soloist that switches between solos from Mandolin, Guitar, Banjo, and Fiddle every 4 bars. Or a Jazz Medley Soloist that switches between Alto Sax, Trumpet, Piano, and Guitar solos every chorus. Or insert "Silence" as one of the instruments, which allows you to play your own instrument. Use the pre-existing Soloist Medleys that we make by simply choosing a RealTracks, or create a custom one yourself on any track.

Multiple RealTracks at the same time on the same track. You can add up to 10 RealTracks to play simultaneously on the same track. This is useful if you want to generate a lot of RealTracks, the theoretical limit would be 7 tracks x 10 per track = 70 RealTracks instruments playing at the same time.

Re-Generate part of a Soloist track, without erasing the existing part. This allows you to customize your Soloist track by regenerating parts of the solo with the same or different RealTracks. For example, generate a 4-bar clarinet solo at bar 9. Then generate an 8-bar flute solo at bar 49. The file plays back with both solos intact.

Options to auto-replace MIDI styles with RealTracks styles. If you have made a lot of songs using older MIDI styles, and would prefer that they play with RealTracks, you can now do this easily by selecting the menu option Styles | Auto Replace MIDI styles with RealTracks. Then, if you have the needed RealTracks installed, your MIDI style will be intelligently replaced with a RealTracks style. There is also a manual option to do this on as-needed basis, disable the feature for a certain song, or to reverse it if you prefer the MIDI style.

"Triple-Time" RealTracks have been added. These allow you to use fast waltz RealTracks as slow 4/4 RealTracks (with a 12/8 feel). We have made some new 12/8 RealStyles that use this feature.

RealTracks can be made as Half-Time/Double-Time/Triple-Time, so it is easier to select them, and they show up in the RealTracks Picker with tempos indicating when they can be used. For example, Alto Sax, tempo 140 will also show up in the RealTracks picker as Alto Sax, tempo 70 [Double-Time] so you can easily choose it.

Any RealTracks can be made as a "Bluesy" RealTracks by selecting this checkbox in the RealTracks Picker. "Bluesy" RealTracks will play more using blues scales (e.g. Bb note on a C chord).

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.

Scales Wizard added. When students are practicing Jazz tunes, it is helpful to see the scales that are used for each chord. The Scale Wizard allows you to easily generate these scales, which appear as notation on the Soloist track. Options include Instrument Range, Patch Selection, Jazzy Mode (will use Lydian dominant scales for some 7th chords), and Diatonic Mode (keeps scales relative to the song key). Menu items on the Soloist | Edit Soloist Track | Utilities menu allow you to generate scales for a certain song, or generate them for all loaded songs. View the scales in the notation or the on-screen guitar and piano.

StylePicker Enhancements

New StylePicker Filters show you only the styles that match your search terms. These help you to select the style that you want, by allowing you to specify:

• Even/Swing feel,
• 8ths/16ths,
• tempo range,
• # of instruments,
• specific instruments (e.g. styles with "Banjo"),
• specific RealTracks Artists,
• RealDrums Artists,
• Real styles or MIDI styles.

For example, if you are searching for a Jazz Ballad style that is all RealTracks, has bass, drums, and guitar, works for a tempo of 60, with Swing 8ths you can set this filter and then only see styles that match these criteria, instead of a list of thousands of styles.

New StylePicker Columns added

• # of instruments in style, e.g. 4.
• Whether any required RealTracks, RealDrums are not installed, e.g. NA.
• Whether a RealTracks substitute for a MIDI style is available, e.g. sub.

The StylePicker display is wider on bigger monitors.

Auto-Generated style memo added for each style. This lists names of all instruments, # of instruments, RealTracks/RealDrums used, whether any required RealTracks or RealDrums are missing, and more.

Example Memo:

The Select Soloist dialog has a [Show All] button that removes any filters.

The Soloist Editor dialog (Edit Soloist Maker) now allows editing of many RealTracks parameters. Click on the [More] button to open the Extra Soloist Information dialog. In this dialog you can set the Audio Reverb level for the selected RealTrack, set a RealTracks medley, and play RealTracks at normal time, half time, double time, or triple time.