Been a BIAB user since the early days and have upgraded along the way proably every other version, havent upgraded this year yet.

My question is what approch do you use when creating your songs in BIAB?

I have tried the following:

1. Composing writting in the chords into band in a box then picking a style and "tweaking" to get the right sound I want.

2. Using the melodist to generate a chord progression then "tweaking" it to get a sound I like.

3. Using the melodist to autogenerate melody and chords then "tweaking" it.

The above has proved to work really well but I have always felt that a lot of the songs I have done have had that "BIAB" sound about them so for the next CD project I am working on I am changing it up a bit.

I'm composing the tracks in ezkeys, exporting the midi into BIAB adding realtracks, exporting them into Logic and doing the "tweaking" under logic. So far the two tracks I have done are giving pleasing results.

I'm also "stiching" together a melody line from multiple takes of the realtrack soloist.

I just wondered what others were doing to see if there may be another beter way of working and beter workflow.

Kindest Regards
Adrian

I write using BB as the notepaper and pen as I play the acoustic guitar. I try to settle on an acceptable style that doesn't inhibit the groove I feel for the song.

I tweeze the style later. Especially if the ideas are flowing well, there's no need to worry with the style when the ideas are coming. I don't want to interrupt that flow.

All my melodies and chords are from the heart, not from the melodist. There was a time that I used the Melodist quite a bit, but I have stopped composing that way. Nothing I every composed that way involved lyrics. So, should I decide to start working instrumental jazz based stuff anytime soon, that would be an option.

I was never a big fan of using a melody that BB had created. So I don't think I ever really used the melody creation function in BB beyond playing around with it early on.

I will work out a chord progression and/or lead first, usually on a guitar. I then put the chord progression into BiaB and play around until I get a style or styles that I like. I use the plugin mode to transfer everything over to Sonar. In Sonar I will either tweak the BiaB arrangement to my liking, it’s easy as I work mostly with MIDI, or I will replace some tracks with my playing. Sometimes I will bounce back and forth between Sonar and BiaB a couple of times to get exactly what I am looking for by adding or replacing MIDI tracks, styles or RTs.

I am also not a big fan of the melodist when it comes to generating complete melodies. However I have found it to be a very valuable tool for stimulating ideas. That is I will generate a complete lead line and most all of the time I will find a few measures that can become my main theme. Sometimes both a verse and chorus idea can come from one melodist generation.

But because BiaB is such a powerful program the above is not in stone! Sometimes what ever BiaB gives me is perfect as is. Sometimes I will just input chords, select a RT style and just jam along with the pros, i.e. mega-fun!

One thing to remember with Biab is that there is no one workflow that fits everyone. Everybody may have a different workflow. Just don’t forget to experiment with BiaB. You may be surprised at what you find.

What Herb and Mario said....

Also what Herb and Mario said from me too.

Prior to having BIAB, I wrote with a guitar usually developing a song that came to mind as I was driving in my car. Most of my original songs still originate from hums, buzzes, whines or other random, repetitive sounds along the highway. Occasionally, I'll hear a phrase or word that will trigger a lyrical idea, but left to my own devices, that rarely happens. I have found it helpful or less distracting to my thoughts on the song I'm writing to simplify the BIAB tracks so I initially select guitars from the campfire Realtracks. Once I've structured my song, I begin to experiment with different styles, instruments and chord changes and variations. I find for me, I am able to retain more of my original melody and song structure doing it that way rather than being influenced and pulled off track by what BIAB generates.

Since I began using BIAB, I have also found Melodist to be a useful tool in a similar way that sounds from the roadway has worked in the past. I guess that is a good way for me to save on gasoline...

I am constantly changing the way I do things.

Right now I am picking a style I want to work with

picking a root key. I like to use the demo sometimes to get ideas on chord patterns.

Then I copy those to a notepad or text editor and start new with the style. Then I'll jam with my guitar in the root key and add in some of the chords that I copied or add in new ones.

After I get my pattern ok then I put my sub style changes in the sections then num of choruses ecttt.. All my tweaks... Then unfold the song, and copy the tracks into my daw...

We agree on much of the above.
The Melodist feature works very well to create a general song structure.
However, it may be worth the trouble to add a bridge to the song. This is something you have to do by yourself. Usually its a combination of some chords already present in the song, but in a different order.
A real challenge is to create a bridge and do a modulation (higher pitch) after that.
Another tip you may find useful: when you include a solo in the song, using the soloist, you might want to change some chords (or use totally different ones). This works best while playing an acoustic guitar (or keyboard) by yourself to see which chords work well. It's our experience that the solo part doesn't need that many different chords.

regards,
R & AM