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RealBand
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MitchC Offline OP
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In BIAB, is there a way to have instruments hold a chord ie. Dm7... and have other instrument(s) keep playing ? I have a tune where I want the 'band' to hold a chord for a measure BUT I want a synth pad to keep playing normally...

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"Dm7...p" and have other instrument(s) synth pad (p) if you have it in the piano track

or b d p g s m s (bass drums piano guitar strings melody solo)

eg: Dm7...pd only piano and drums tracks play



Rests/Shots/Held Chords/Pushes

Rests, Shot, Held Chord and Pushes are supported by the RealDrums and RealTracks generation routines:

A chord can be specified as a Rest by adding a period after the chord.

e.g. "C." indicates a C chord that is a Rest.

A chord can be specified as a Shot by adding two periods after the chord.

e.g. "C.." indicates a C chord that is a Shot.

A chord can be specified as a Held Chord by adding three periods after the chord.

e.g. "C…" indicates a C chord that is a Held Chord.

Exclusions

Individual track exclusions to Shots/Rests/Held Chords are made by entering the initial of the excluded track after the period(s). For example, C.bdg would cause bass, drums, and guitar to be excluded from a rest.

Pushes:

^C = 8th push

^^C = 16th push

Note: Pushes, Shots, Rests, Hold Chords can ONLY be entered in the Chords window.


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Hi Mitch,
Quote:

In BIAB, is there a way to have instruments hold a chord ie. Dm7... and have other instrument(s) keep playing ?



As solidrock has pointed out, this can certainly be done. An alternative way to do it in Band In A Box is to ...
  • Right-click somewhere on the chord sheet and select "Chord Settings" (as shown below)



  • The dialogue box that then appears allows the user to control each beat and to select what instruments to hold, rest or play as shots, etc.

In the image below, I have an F chord on beat 2 and I'm telling it to play the instruments located on the Bass, Drums and Guitar tracks normally while it holds the instruments that are on the Piano and Strings tracks.



The shortcut keys that solidrock has given makes entering these settings very quick once you get used to them. I've found that I usually set holds and shots, etc., in BIAB before I take my song to Realband.

Regards,
Noel


MY SONGS...
Audiophile BIAB 2026
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MitchC Offline OP
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Thanks guys ! That'll work !

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Not working for me...
I'd like final chord held (fermata). I've tried making it a "Hold chord" in chord settings, I've added 3 dots (Ab...).. the song still stops very abruptly (like Ab.)
Real tracks has holds enabled.

Any ideas?

Also, song was looping (song setting) is the only way to fix that the override command?
Thanks in advance

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If you are working in Midi with NON BB tracks then open up the Notation Window, select the Score Roll Window an physically extend the horizontal lines representing the note length. If you use a Synth Pad then the extension will be heard.

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Have you got the Holds "RealTracks\Library\Holds" ?

Bob..

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Check out "song ending" settings in preferences to see if they are activated or not as well?

Trax

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Very helpful thank you.

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Just my twopennyworth regarding a hold chord ending.
I use this type of ending often.
What I do is this - if your song ends at say Bar 70 with a held chord, type it in as X.... (it goes red after input)and then extend your number of bars in song to, say, 75 or so. Regen the song. It should play the hold at bar 70 and onwards until it crashes into the BB induced ending around bar 74. It will play that ending too and I simply snip that off in DAW.
If you only want, say,a single instrument or selection of your chosen instruments to play from bar 70, use F5 to mute the unrequired ones.
I almost always use RTs but I can't think why it wouldn't work with midi tracks as well.
Bests
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