PG Music Home Forums General Discussion Off-Topic New gig last night - first question - "Are you doing karaoke?"

Wow! What an ugly mess I started. Sorry about that.

This is long, sorry about that, but I believe necessary.

I thought I was being helpful.

BTW, Peter Gannon has always allowed me to announce new style and fake disks plus new demo mp3s here. I appreciate that and thank him for that. I asked for permission and was granted that leeway back in the early days of this forum which was in the latter part of the 20th century.

I also enthusiastically support PG Music on this and other forums. I talk it up to musicians and have sold either directly or indirectly a couple of hundred people on BiaB. I used to re-sell them from PG Music before PG started the direct download (first on floppy disks and later CDs) and now I simply give them the PG Music website. I also mention Band-in-a-Box on all of my magazine ads, giving the product national exposure. Plus it boosts the brand name to know that other people are writing aftermarket products for it. It's a sure sign of success. PG Doesn't need that, but I'm sure it helped a great deal in the early days, and still helps to some extent now.

I love PG Music and I love BiaB. I don't use all the features of BiaB, but I really love the ones that I use, and those are the ones I tend to talk about on these forums.

The post did not carry an ad for my products, and did not dis PGs products. The Karaoke duo as far as I know was not using BiaB but I do know they purchase karaoke tracks and those audio loop disks to make their backing tracks. Thus it is in the Off Topic forum where other musical applications are supposed to be discussed.

I've heard them, they are decent musicians/singers, their tracks do sound like karaoke tracks though. An entertainment purchaser noticed that and will not hire them again. So I though a word to the wise for those people who gig in public might be helpful.

If you want to follow the advice, go ahead, if not, please ignore it. There is more than one right way to make music, and what is right for one isn't necessarily right for another.

And although I don't believe the duo in question was using BiaB nor did I state they were using BiaB, perhaps they should..........

And conversely, I do not use BiaB for every one of my backing tracks. I use it when appropriate, and sequence from scratch when it is not appropriate. Often it's a combination of BiaB and sequencing. But I always use MIDI for my voices. I tried audio loops but didn't think they were the best tool for me.

As most people know, I am a MIDI person, and I enthusiastically support MIDI in this and other forums. Other people support audio loops and Real Tracks. If we both weren't allowed to enter the discussion, there wouldn't be a discussion at all. I also promote BiaB in other forums. What's good for PG is good for me, since I ride on their proverbial coat tails.

If some people can expound on the benefits of RTs, why can't other expound on the benefits of MIDI? Just because I sell MIDI product does that disqualify me from entering the discussion? If that were the case, everybody who has used RTs for commercial benefit, whether it be song writing or gigging should also be disqualified from the discussion.

Band-in-a-Box does support MIDI, as well as RTs. There are people who tell the world how great the RTs are, and they expound on the good qualities of them. I agree and have frequently stated that I am extremely impressed with the wonderful job PG has done with the RTs. It's almost magic.

But there is more than one tool in the PG Music tool box. What's wrong with stating the benefits of one of the other tools?

Nothing I hope.

Use the right tool for the job.

If I was sending songwriting demos to Nashville or LA, I'd probably use Real Tracks as I know that the people who audition songwriting demos have a bias against 100% MIDI tracks. Like many musicians, they listen to the tone as much as the content. If that were the case, I'd probably be telling you about my successes and hopefully offering you a helping hand on that area of the biz.

If I were playing in a big band on a cruise ship (or other similar venue), I'd probably be playing along with a click track that has real musicians and possibly even vocalists on it. I've played as a duo on cruise ships and watched the 'orchestra' play along with click tracks for the main show. All the vocals except for the lead production singer were even done via lip sync by the dancers.

But since I play in a duo for Yacht Clubs, Country Clubs, Retirement Communities, and other adult venues (Florida is full of them and they pay well), I use MIDI tracks. One reason is to avoid being confused with a karaoke act, another is that they allow me to edit the tracks to my hearts content to personalize the output of BiaB and turn what I feel is a very good output into something better (hopefully my audience will agree).

As a duo performer, I am very close to the audience. They walk right up to us and talk to use between songs (and sometimes during the song, which I try to discourage). Some of them even ask how we sound like more than two pieces. I ask them about their involvement in music and give them the appropriate explanation.

I am (hopefully) middle-aged and I grew up in the pre-Internet age and when neither rock or contemporary jazz was taught in school (with the exception of Berklee). Musicians shared their tips and secrets with each other, and we all learned from our collective experience. I am the player I am today because I learned so much from other musicians. I try to help as much as I get.

If you go to my site, you will see commercial products designed to put a few dollars in my pocket and a lot of other information that is of no benefit for me to share. In fact, my competitors can read that information and help their acts compete more successfully with me. But when I was young I learned a lot from my competitors sharing information with me, and now that I'm middle aged I still learn from others, the main difference is that with years of experience, I have more to share.

If the moderators or Peter Gannon think any of my posts are out of line, I would hope they would send me a PM or an e-mail letting me know that, so that I would refrain from posting again.

So if the original post helped another duo to get gigs, it has done the purpose it was posted for. Since it obviously irritated some others, I hope this settles you down, if not, please accept my apology.