I'm trying to finish a song for my grandson's wedding this Saturday and having trouble with it. It's a straight 4/4 time signature. It's a wedding song I wrote years ago. I'm using the style -P_PHILC. I love the style.
In some measures the bass drops out for certain chords, just for that measure. Also, the style does not change from a to b like I programmed it to. It is random and there seems to be no pattern to it.
Any ideas. I'm running BIAB 2021 on an old computer with Windows Vista OS. I would love to run it on a newer system but don't have the money to. I was told by PG Music it would run fine on Vista.
P_PHILC is a MIDI style. The probable cause of the bass drops is the bass patch isn't playing in the proper octave making some notes be out of the range of the patch.
This can be corrected with editing in the Piano Roll screen or alternately change the Bass to a MST instrument or RealTrack Bass.
I created a song test file and the Style changes between A and B styles worked correctly in the test song. Save your song project, close and reopen the project and regenerate may correct the issue on your system.
As Charlie said the bass may be out of the range of the instrument that you are using. I run into this a lot with bass tracks and some of the bass instruments I use. Tell us what bass sound you are using and it would help us solve that problem.
Dad, how will I know when I've become an adult.
When your day is ruined because they rearranged the grocery store.
64 bit Win 10 Pro, the latest BiaB/RB, Roland Octa-Capture audio interface, a ton of software/hardware
Assuming Charlie is correct that some of the notes are below the lowest note the program expects, you can change the lowest note setting. Go to Ctrl+E > Arrange button and change from the E2 default to E1 or E0.
Depending on what the bass sound source is I would go to options/preferences/channels and change the bass octave from -1 to 0. That would raise the entire bass track one octave. As I said previously I have to raise the bass track an octave for many of my bass presets.
Dad, how will I know when I've become an adult.
When your day is ruined because they rearranged the grocery store.
64 bit Win 10 Pro, the latest BiaB/RB, Roland Octa-Capture audio interface, a ton of software/hardware
its surprising - a bass part that plays fine on my GM synth needs to be raised an octave on some vst bass parts. no idea why and it confused me too.
GM sounds use the entire keyboard range regardless if said range is in the actual instrument's range. Good bass presets come in the actual bass range. This causes a problem at times.
Bass and guitar notation is an octave higher than the actual instrument sounds. This is done to eliminate ledger lines and or the grand staff. BUT BiaB writes bass parts in the actual pitch. Thus it is an octave lower than a bass notation. If your bass VSTi is expecting bass notation and you give it BiaB's actual pitch notation is will play an octave lower , thus your low notes are out of the VSTi's range.
Last edited by MarioD; 02/17/2112:22 PM.
Dad, how will I know when I've become an adult.
When your day is ruined because they rearranged the grocery store.
64 bit Win 10 Pro, the latest BiaB/RB, Roland Octa-Capture audio interface, a ton of software/hardware
Well, I finally just exported it as a midi file, thinking that if any notes were missing in the bass track, I could just copy and paste to fill the empty measures, but lo and behold it worked just fine...no missing bass notes. So it's fine for now. I just need to record one piano track over it and it will be done. The words "thank you" do not come close to how grateful I am for all your help. I wrote the song decades ago for a friends wedding. My grandsons wedding is almost a miracle so this means the world to me.
thanks Mario but my bass lines in GM play at the right pitch - some of the bass vsts i've auditioned played an octave lower and i had to raise them. i was trying to find a better bass sound for the intro of 'stand by me' and a midi aprt i'd played in at the right pitch on a keyboard suddenly played an octave low......maybe there's a disconnect between midi note numbers and the vsts
thanks Mario but my bass lines in GM play at the right pitch - some of the bass vsts i've auditioned played an octave lower and i had to raise them. i was trying to find a better bass sound for the intro of 'stand by me' and a midi aprt i'd played in at the right pitch on a keyboard suddenly played an octave low......maybe there's a disconnect between midi note numbers and the vsts
That is because your bass VSTi is expecting the notes to be written in bass guitar notation, that is one octave higher then it sounds.
For example if the bass plays an A (440, MIDI note 69) in a GM sound source then you will get the right bass note, that is standard notation. But your bass VSTi is expecting MIDI note 81 (an octave higher) then that is bass guitar notation, thus your GM note 69 will be played an octave lower than expected.
I have found that most good bass VSTis expect the notes to be in bass notation.
I know it can get confusing.
Dad, how will I know when I've become an adult.
When your day is ruined because they rearranged the grocery store.
64 bit Win 10 Pro, the latest BiaB/RB, Roland Octa-Capture audio interface, a ton of software/hardware
thanks Mario - its not at all confusing when you explain it!
The bottom line is that if you have good bass sound sources you will have to raise BiaB's bass line up one octave. I do that prior to trying out different bass VSTis. If one has been using GM for a while then getting into the real world of MIDI sound sources can be a bit intimidating. Been there - done that - sometimes still there!
Dad, how will I know when I've become an adult.
When your day is ruined because they rearranged the grocery store.
64 bit Win 10 Pro, the latest BiaB/RB, Roland Octa-Capture audio interface, a ton of software/hardware
i know its all subjective Mario but can you recommend a good free bass sound that will play in sforzando? it would save me downloading and auditioning at random!
i know its all subjective Mario but can you recommend a good free bass sound that will play in sforzando? it would save me downloading and auditioning at random!
I don't do much in sforzando. But I can recommend Ample Sounds free P-bass:
It is a VSTi so it should work in BiaB. I won the entire Ample Sound bass collection and I can say from that that they are some of the best bass guitar sounds around.
Also you didn't specify what type of bass you want. Let me know and I can do some looking around for you.
PS - google/bing free sfz sounds and you will find a ton of sounds.
PPS - if you want send me the bass MIDI track and I will use one of my basses and send you back a MP3. Just be sure to specify what kind of bass you want, i.e. p-bass, jazz bass, upright, etc.
Dad, how will I know when I've become an adult.
When your day is ruined because they rearranged the grocery store.
64 bit Win 10 Pro, the latest BiaB/RB, Roland Octa-Capture audio interface, a ton of software/hardware
Today's the Last Day of the Band-in-a-Box 2026® for Mac Special!
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MIDI Styles Set 92: Look Ma! More MIDI 15: Latin Jazz
MIDI SuperTracks Set 46: Piano & Organ
Instrumental Studies Set 24: Groovin' Blues Soloing
Artist Performance Set 19: Songs with Vocals 9
Playable RealTracks Set 5
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SynthMaster Sounds Set 1 (with audio demos)
iOS Android Band-in-a-Box® App
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MIDI SuperTracks Set 47: More SynthMaster
Instrumental Studies 25 - Soul Jazz Guitar Soloing
Artist Performance Set 20: Songs with Vocals 10
RealDrums Stems Set 10: Groovin' Sticks
SynthMaster Sounds & Styles Set 2 (sounds & styles with audio demos)
XPro & Xtra Styles PAK Sets On Sale Now - Until May 15, 2026!
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With the release of Band-in-a-Box® 2026 for Mac, we’re rolling out a collection of brand-new videos on our YouTube channel. We’ll keep this forum post updated so you can easily find all the latest videos in one convenient spot.
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