I am trying to do what I thought would be very simple. Export a song from BIAB with its chords, modify it in a program like Rapid Composer and then import it back into BIAB.
But I know very little about MIDI so I don't know if it is even possible or if it is possible but not with BIAB or whatever!
So, I always start these sort of projects with as simple of a test as I can find. Then if that works I keep adding complexity!
I figured the simplest thing to do would be to export a MIDI song from BIAB and then import that same song back into BIAB. I thought this would be a no-brainer but alas it did not work. Here is what I did...
TO CREATE MY MIDI FILE 1) open BIAB and create new simple song 2) set it to 8 bars and 1 chorus 3) turn off 2 bar ending 4) enter one chord in each bar as follows, C F G F Am Em Dm C 5) select Options/Preferences/OutputCh 6) tick the box for Output Chords and click OK and OK again 7) click the .MID button on the toolbar 8) click File on Disk button and save the MIDI file 9) close BIAB
TO LOAD MY MIDI FILE 1) open BIAB 2) select File/Import/Import Chords from MIDI File 3) click the Open (Change) button to select file 4) select the file I created above 5) click INTERPRET CHORDS NOW button 6) I get a total mess! I get a 2-bar lead-in, an extra bar and a 4 bar ending and the chords are all wrong. Dm C C Fmaj7 G Fmaj7 A Em7 Em7 Em7 G7
If I repeat the import but this time tick the box for "OK to use PG Music Chord names from MIDI file" it does a better job but still has a 2-bar lead-in and an extra bar plus a 4-bar ending.
So, is there a way to make this simple test work? Export MIDI song with chords and then import it back into BIAB perfectly?
End result midi from RC imported to Biab Soloist midi track. Now use SampleTank or any other vsti on the track, you can even create a usertrack and upload it if you like without worrying about IK.
You can also create up your song in RC first, just fill an empty track with chords, do a ctrl+drag export, open in BB or RB and it should read the chords, in the RC settings there is an option to export chords to midi markers, so opening the midi in RB or other DAW's it will give the chords as markers.
Pipeline, I went through all of your steps...installed the beta of RC...followed your excellent screenshots completely...and I still do not get the results you are showing!
I don't think BIAB is outputting chords properly OR RC is not reading them properly.
BUT, if I leave all tracks selected (you said just import the BIAB chords track) then it does import these simple chords. But if I remove even a single track from the import RC is obviously doing a detect and NOT a read of chords in the file.
Maybe I am misunderstanding this. As a programmer I would expect a perfect import of chords if they are indeed being stored in the file. But given that it seems to be trying to detect something is wrong here.
Pipline's instructions are right on the money here, it should be relatively straightforward to export MIDI from Band-in-a-Box and then import it back in. Just keep in mind that when you import MIDI into Band-in-a-Box it puts all the MIDI information on one track. If you bring in a 16 channel MIDI file all 16 channels go onto the Melody track, which makes editing or changing any of that MIDI a bit awkward. Importing MIDI works best if you're just trying to get chords and a melody line, with anything more complex you might want to start moving your project over to RealBand so you can see all the separate MIDI tracks.
Pipline's instructions are right on the money here, it should be relatively straightforward to export MIDI from Band-in-a-Box and then import it back in. Just keep in mind that when you import MIDI into Band-in-a-Box it puts all the MIDI information on one track. If you bring in a 16 channel MIDI file all 16 channels go onto the Melody track, which makes editing or changing any of that MIDI a bit awkward. Importing MIDI works best if you're just trying to get chords and a melody line, with anything more complex you might want to start moving your project over to RealBand so you can see all the separate MIDI tracks.
Thanks Kallum! But "straightforward" is not a term that would spring to mind for me! More like a complex puzzle with pieces spread around.
So, does an exported MIDI file contain the actual chords that are stored in the MIDI file and read upon importing? I thought I understood that MIDI does not store chords. So, is this something proprietary that PG adds to the MIDI file? And, if so, do other 3rd-party programs (like Rapid Composer) read and also save those chords in the MIDI file?
If this is just a detection thing I understand why I am getting screwy results and will probably just give up because I generally find I can input things myself quicker than I can correct what a detection algorithm does.
But, on the other hand, if the PG MIDI file includes chords and programs like RC can read those chords it should be, as you say, "relatively straightforward" and I must be doing something wrong.
PG embed chords in a part of the the midi file, but these can only be read in BB/RB/PT. But the BB Chord Output track are just held chords that are easy to read/detect, it is not trying to detect the chords in a midi song with lot of tracks, just one track with held chords. There is a style with held chords PNOSIMP4.STY but it plays inversions so it don't read them correctly.
If you are still getting incorrect chords you will just have to correct them. To see where it's going wrong google the piano chord and compare it to what BB creates and what RC creates. I tried it with some complex jazz chords and some pg ones were out compared to google and RC, but I'm no George when it comes to chords. If you find ones RC don't detect correctly you can post it to Attila, just send him the midi and chords pdf.
Thank you so much Pipeline! I really appreciate all of your help!
As I mentioned though, in RC it would not import properly when I had only the chords track selected. When I selected them all tracks it got them right.
That's great, I'm glade you are up and running with it now. RapidComposer is working good with Biab and VSTHost Slave, I will try it with RealBand and VSTHost Slave now.
Since this thread is partly about exporting chords, I just tried to look that up in Help and found nothing yet the explanation showing how to do it is right here.
Kallum, how would you find "exporting chords" in Help?
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