I have been using Biab on and off for quite a few years and have just bought 2018. Though I am yet to install it... So I may not be of much use at the moment in terms of furthering this discussion.

I have always found Biab great fun, but usually find that I fail to really utilise it as a good working tool. Discipline is key!

I'm a guitarist who wants to learn how to play melodies and develop my soloing. I would also like to learn to read music a little better than I do. I can't sight read.

I'm really wanting to get into Jazz but I also love blues and folk.

I have found inputting melodies into the lead sheet a little frustrating, but as I alluded to earlier have not really dedicated myself to improving. I'm sure I could get faster.

I feel like where Biab really lets me down is with melodies and transcription. I understand that this has been improved for different time sigs in 2018. Which sounds good for blues solo transcriptions in 12/8 and waltz.

But ultimately, after carefully putting a melody or a transcription into Biab I struggle to find good synth to play nice sounds!!

I'm no newbie to music technology and in the past have driven synths+sample tank within Logic from biab but I am concerned my current laptop isn't up to the job. I also found it to feel like a very fun but bloated workflow. You spend ages finding fantastic real tracks, then even longer trying out synth sounds!

Does anyone have any advice for generating better sounds and getting more from my midi melodies/transcriptions coming from Biab? I understand that this is easier with better soft synths and samplers. But I'm not really that aware of what is out there these days.

I maybe lazy and not searched properly but has anyone utilised any device to accentuate a melody? I'm thinking of using a touchscreen as a kind of theremin. This could be really useful for giving melodies a more human touch without spending a lot of time fiddling with the midi.

A "riding the faders" type of job. I'm guessing this would have to be in a DAW like Logic/Pro tools or even Garageband.

But maybe this could be saved onto the midi file within Biab? I guess I need to read up on General Midi. It would be handy if I could store everything on Biab and then send it all to a DAW. That way I don't have lots of files and configurations for a single project.

I would really like better Trumpets and Saxophones. Something to give my tracks a little more bite. The real tracks are great but the whole aura is shot if you end up using the biab synth for melodies.

If you're still here thanks for reading it all!

Check out Native Instruments for synths.

They have quite a few and they use samples. I have several of their products that I use on occasion in my DAW. Really good quality stuff.

I also have the Cakewalk Sound Center which came with Music Creator. It too has good quality sounds. Of course, Cakewalk is out of the biz now so unless you can buy a copy from Ebay, it's kinda hard to get.

Hey Guitarhacker,

Thanks for the advice.

My friend has given me some trumpet samples to play with. I plan on trying them out with Logics EXS24 sampler.

Initial tests just using a single sample within that sampler seems promising. If I had a sample for each pitch of the instrument I think it would be even better.

I'm thinking that I could then map the sampler to a touch screen to use as a kind of controller. Still very early days but having played with ESX24 I think it could all come together in a solid workflow.

I'm still yet to install biab 2018 but as soon as I do I will be checking how it deals with midi on it's melody and soloist tracks.

It all comes down to whether I use a controller from within BIAB which I don't think is very likely but may be possible. OR I use the controller within logic.

I would be interested if anyone had any advice regarding workflow.

Should I resign myself to needing a logic project file for each song? Or is it possible to use a template and do all my midi controlling from within BIAB? Assuming a 'riding the faders' mentality to the melody track. (Possible pitch bending, vibrato and volume control)

Well..... now that you bring THAT up....

I construct songs in BB with the mindset that they are only getting started there. I open them in Real Band and render them as audio and add additional tracks also in audio.

I import the tracks into my Sonar DAW.

It's at this point that I can now use my synths and do anything else I want to do. I can replace tracks with live recorded parts, and edit them as needed.

If you have a synth part melody complete with pitch bender wheel activations, volume changes, etc..... the DAW will capture all of that and let you add automation envelopes for additional control. I use volume automation in every song. Panning as well. You can add midi envelopes to control the on/off and levels of things such as reverb and chorus. This is easier done in a DAW.

Essentially, I use each of the 3 software programs for their particular strengths and don't try to make them do things that they don't do very well. Using this method, with few exceptions, the only thing that limits what I can do is my ability to play a given part or to discover how to do something that I want to do.

Sonar may be gone but Cakewalk by BandLab is alive (or it was when I last looked). Cakewalk by BandLab is really Sonar dressed up but missing some of the synths. As far as Synths goes you should have Sforzando which comes with BIAB which is a sample player. There are many samples and SFZ files about.

During the week I had a piano RealTrack with a couple of really annoying notes that stood out. I put the BIAB file into RealBand reregenerated the track using multi riff got roughly what I wanted then exported the midi portion which RealBand generates of the track. Pulled the midi part into Sonar (along with the keeper Realtracks). I was then able to edit the midi track in the Piano Roll view to get shy of the annoying notes and make a few other changes to what I wanted. I used Addictive Keys to play back the midi track and was thus able to really change the piano to what I needed with the brains of BIAB really doing most of the work.

You could probably achieve similar in RealBand by simply muting the RealTrack adding a synth via the FX option on the midi track and editing it in whatever midi editor is in RealBand but I am very used to midi editing in Sonar so that is my editor of choice.

After editing in Sonar I often pull the audio tracks into Reaper which I find easier for editing audio tracks.

I really believe there are many possible work arounds if one looks and thinks outside the box.

My thoughts Tony

.

I often find that the HARMONY feature gives the sound I want for melodies.

At the next-to-the-top line of the main screen, go to HARMONY, then MELODY HARMONY. Try a few of the harmonies in the menu to see what's going on. Try #5 PIANO DOUBLE OCTAVES, especially.
That is my starting point.

The harmony I use most often is a piano (from sample tank) with a unison piano one octave higher and another one octave lower. The upper and lower octaves are a lot quieter than the main voice.
I find this makes the overall piano sound complex, thick and believable.

I create this and save it as harmony #6. There is a learning curve to mastery of the harmony tool, but it is worth it. The harmony you create will work with any synth you choose.

NOTE: The harmonies you create will be erased every time you upgrade BiaB. The solution to this is to save C:/BB/DEFAULT.HAR as C:/BB/YOURNAME.HAR. Then you can restore your file after each upgrade.

Getting it right in performance is certainly easier than "fiddling with MIDI."

For wind instruments, you could consider getting a wind controller. But then you'll have yet another instrument to learn. A better option might be a breath controller. These can be very natural to play.

Typically, you'll have to map them to the volume control, which means that as you blow harder, it turns up the volume knob. This means you won't get the change in timbre as the velocity changes, and you'll need to run the instrument through a separate reverb (instead of the one the VSTi might supply) because turning off the volume at the end of the note means you lose the reverb tail.


No, you can actually do this in BiaB - it'll capture your MIDI performance.

Personally, I prefer to edit in my DAW... but you don't have to.


General MIDI only refers to the set of instruments that come in the General MIDI set. No need to look there - you can use custom VSTis within BiaB. However, you might jBridge for the 32/64 bit bridging, which is why it's offered with the BiaB purchase.


There are tons of libraries out there. What works best for you is a matter of your budget, and what sounds you like.

If you're on a budget, you might have a look at Session Horns, which is good for a "pop" horn sort of sound, but there are no solo horns available - you have to have at least two instruments playing at a time. There's a more complete Session Horns Pro that'll give you more articulations, as well as access to solo instruments.

You can also check out WIVI Band, which is works really well with a breath controller. It's synthetic instead of sampled, but it's very responsive and comes with a trumpet, trombone and tenor sax, so you can build a decent section with it.

If you want a more "classic" horn section, check out Vintage Horns. It's got long notes, short notes, swells and falls. But it's aimed at a section sound - it's not terribly expressive for solos.

Blue Street Brass is a relatively inexpensive library (Indiginus makes some great cheap stuff) that has some nice "vintage" horns, but no saxes. A bit synthy, but you might like the sound.

But... like many inexpensive sample libraries, it requires the full version of Kontakt, which I suspect that you don't own.

I've heard good things about Broadway Big Band, but it's not cheap. There are the lower-priced and cut-down versions Broadway Lites and Broadway Gig.

The Samplemodeling saxes are ranked highly, but were recently discontinued because of a licensing issue with AudioModeling. You can still get the horns from SampleModeling, but the saxes are now only distributed through AudioModeling. They are running a 20% off until June 30th, 2018. These work really well with breath controllers.

There's Garritan Jazz and Big Band, but although I really, really want to like it, I've always been disappointed when I've used it. Maybe it's just me, but getting something good out of that library seems to require a huge amount of tweaking, and the sounds aren't really inspiring.

You might want to check out this Pop/Brass Sample Library Buyer's Guide, which covers the libraries I mentioned, and more.

For trumpet, there is also Realitone's "Screaming Trumpet". It's just trumpet, but it gives you a lot of keyswitch options to control the sound.

Link to Screaming Trumpet

Yes, and watching Mike Greene's demo videos is always a blast.

However, the library also needs to the full version of Kontakt to run, so that's an additional expense.

That said, if you purchased a Kontakt libraries that requires authorization, you're probably eligible for a crossgrading from Kontakt Player to Kontakt full. So instead of paying the regular $399, you can get it for $249.

Plus, Native Instruments is running their 50% crossgrade promotion until July 1, 2018, so a crossgrade is only $124.50. I happened to have a couple of eligible libraries, so I finally upgraded to Kontakt full the other day.

Now I don't have to keep reloading Kontakt every 15 minutes when my inexpensive libraries time out!

I should note that Embertone has a couple of very cool (and inexpensive) instruments that require the full version of Kontakt - Chapman Trumpet and Sensual Sax.

Finding the right RT's. If your song sounds like a famous band/song/instrumental etc, you can simply do a style search for the name. Once you have found a similar song/band style, you would then use the PROTOTYPE button in style search to eliminate all the other styles that won't fit with the selected prototype style. All styles listed with an * before their name will be all of the styles that matched your prototype style.

Using the prototype button saves time and takes you directly to the styles that match.

Trax

I love the "prototype" button. It went away for awhile in the redesign of Style Picker, but PGMusic added it back in on my suggestion. It's a feature that has been around since the very earliest versions of BIAB.

Hello again everybody.

I'm really sorry for the lateness. 10 months! Thank you for all the feedback, particular @ dcuny who has left a really useful post regarding soft synths and samplers.

Unfortunately I haven't really had the time or been in the right frame of musical mind to make the most of BIAB this year. Work just gets in the way.

I have however been playing around a little recently and figured I would share some of my thoughts.

I am still wanting to do all of the things I explained in my original post. Guitarist wanting to learn how play melodies and solo better.

However, the real subject being discussed in this thread is about using BIAB and other software to generate more realistic melodies.

I used my friends horn samples alluded to in my first post using this sampler. It is surprisingly feature rich allowing each key and sample to be customised in a multitude of ways. Though I have hardly played around with it. The samples I have seem very effective for playing jazz heads, straight after mapping the samples to a key.

https://www.tx16wx.com/

Unfortunately it is very buggy for me. It doesn't allow me to save presets. So I haven't tried playing around with any kind of automation or using touch screens to affect the sampler or midi channel.

I intend to buy Logic Pro at some point soon. As the ESX24 sampler is hopefully a lot more reliable. Logic Pro allows for receiving multiple MIDI channels from BIAB. Garageband only allows for one.

I have also had some success with the BIAB embellish melody feature. This enables users to humanise a melody. It's really impressive. It has many features that can be controlled and a load of presets giving a range of options. From subtle touches to crazier embellishments.

I intend to come back to this thread once I have EXS24 up and running! Exciting times.