Hello. I use BIAB to create tracks that I then import into my DAW to lay under vocals, etc. Something that I would find INCREDIBLY handy would be the ability to define exactly what measures the soloist should play on, so I can say "these 8 measures of intro, then these two bars at the end of the verse, then this 'solo' section,..." Otherwise I spend time chopping up soloist tracks, muting them out when they aren't needed, and cutting it up so "that great held note" fits at the end of a riff section where the vocals come back in, etc. So I was thinking: What if, for the soloist tracks, you could hit a "play on these measures" button, then go in and click-and-drag to highlight the measures you want (double click to de-highlight), all over the song, and the soloist track would ONLY play on those measures (with the option to sustain over into the measure after). I doodled up a quick graphic to represent what I'm talking about and attached it. Maybe something like this already exists, but I haven't found it. This would be so very helpful for all of my recording projects. Thank you.
Are you familiar with Bar Settings yet? This is very easy to do there, though it's not exactly as you've described.
Right-click in Bar 1 and select Bar Settings (or left-click and hit F5), choose Mute beside the Soloist track, and click OK. Then right-click in bar 10, select Bar Settings, and choose Back to Normal beside Soloist.
You can mute and unmute any track at any bar, on any chorus this way, and it's pretty quick once you get the hang of it.
You can also do exactly what you are asking by using the feature in the soloist screen called Custom. Start at the beginning of the song and just tell the soloist to only do the first 8 bars and generate as many times as you want to get the run you are looking for. Then go back into the same custom screen and say the next bars you want to solo are 16 to 20. Again select them and generate. You can even do 1 bar. It wont erase the previous solo. You can do this to the end of the song. It works great and allows you to fill out the song just like you had a lead player with you. The more you use it the more proficent you will become. This screen is in the Generate solo dialogue.
Automating as describe by Moving_Air above would be a lot better than having to do the F5 manually. I was asking for that in the Keep Whishing List: Biab MultiRiff Demo (SGU+WAV)
I prefer to do this in RB because you've got 48 tracks to mess with. I will select as many different soloist RT's as I want and let them generate the whole song. To be clear, RB will only generate one active track at a time as long as you uncheck the box that says "generate whole song". This is a trick part of RB, it can act as another version of Biab if you want but I never do that. It's a DAW, make it act like a DAW. If you want it to act like Biab then go back to Biab in the first place. Anyway, in that mode you work with one track at a time just like any recorder.
I did one months ago with something like 10 soloist tracks. Then I started chopping them up by deleting bars I didn't like and leaving bars I do like. Then use mute/unmute the tracks while the song is playing and gradually narrow down which parts of those 10 tracks I wanted to keep. After that I consolidated those pieces of 10 tracks down to one track for the final mix.
Believe me, this is way, way easier than trying to use F5 and other stuff in Biab. RB lets you use up all 48 tracks if you like to experiment. One cool trick with RB is you can change the chord grid and generate more tracks in the same song just for fun without changing any tracks you already have. You can change the chords AND change the style just to generate more tracks. Making some appropriate chord subs can completely change what a soloist generates. With the thousands of RT's now available plus thousands of midi styles available the possibilities are endless. I've also mixed in midi soloists with RT soloists because I have SampleTank 3 and I can get real close with the sound of a sax or guitar or piano solo to the sound of an RT solo using the same instruments. You can't begin to scratch the surface of all that in Biab alone.
Thanks Bob, However, that's the workload I've been using and now want to avoid, and it has some serious drawbacks. Not the least of which being it's just a barrage of soloing. It does not stop naturally where it should. So it's by no means 'faster', in my opinion, because you have to find the right parts with the right endings that fit in the right places... I'd rather just say "play to this point then stop appropriately."
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