With the release of Band-in-a-Box 2016 for Mac, there are 201 NEW RealTracks available to add to your library! Plus, there are an additional 24 Bonus RealTracks, 11 MIDI SuperTracks, 19 Instrumental Studies (bass, acoustic & electric guitar, piano & saxophone, in a variety of genres), 3 Artist Video Performances, 89 RealStyles, and more – when you add the 49-PAK to your purchase! Learn more about the Bonus 49-PAK purchase option here: http://www.pgmusic.com/bbmac.bonuspaks_2016.htm.

New Features List: www.pgmusic.com/bbmac.new.htm

Learn more about Band-in-a-Box 2016 for Mac with our "Band in a Box 2016 for Mac - Everything you need to know in under 6 minutes" video: www.pgmusic.com/?vid=uofLEnS5_Ug

Information and demos for the 201 new RealTracks released (Sets 228-253): www.pgmusic.com/bbmac.201newrealtracks.htm

Band-in-a-Box 2016 for Mac... New Features:

Chord Sheet has been enhanced with new look, feel, and customization.
  • “Layers" added. Layers are optional rows of information shown above each bar.
    • Bar Lyrics layer is for editable bar-based lyrics (up to 255 characters per bar) that are loaded and saved with the song.
    • Section Text layer is for editable text (up to 255 characters per bar) that is loaded and saved with the song.
    • Section Text and Bar Lyrics layers will attempt to intelligently separate your lyrics into different bars.
    • There is an option to automatically open or close Bar Lyrics and Section Text layers when opening songs.
    • Bar Settings layer shows information about any changes that occur for that bar, as set in the Bar Settings dialog (e.g. tempo changes, key changes, etc.).
    • Additional Chord Display layer shows the chords using an alternative mode of showing root notes. There are 4 modes: Roman Numeral, Nashville Notation, Solfeggio Notation, and Fixed Do (Italy/Europe).
    • All layers can be customized with font and color.
  • Now you see the chord where you are typing it. Previously, chords wouldn’t appear until you hit the Enter key, and sometimes wouldn’t appear at all if you made a typo.
  • Colors for all elements on the Chord Sheet can be customized.
  • Mouse-over indication shows which bar, cell, or part marker you are currently hovering your mouse Part markers can have a gradient look.
  • There is an option to see borders around part markers.
  • You can choose how often bar numbers should appear: never, always, only at part markers, or only at new rows.
  • A vertical line can be drawn next to each bar number.
  • Substyle colors can be used for optional bar lines, bar numbers, and section letters.
  • There is an option to “gray out” bars after the end of the song.
  • ‘9sus’chords can be displayed as ‘11’ chords.
  • The “Display ‘2’ as ‘sus2’” and “Display ‘sus’ as ‘sus4’” settings will show suspended chords more explicitly: ‘sus’ implies ‘sus4,’ and ‘2’ implies ‘sus2,’ but you might want to see the full extension name.
  • The chords beyond the time signature will be grayed out.
  • The “superscript” option shows chord extensions with smaller raised font.
  • You can adjust the chord font size as a percentage.
  • The number of columns can be customized. Previously, there were always 4 columns.
  • You can now choose the number of rows on a screen. Previously, the Chord Sheet always showed 16 rows.
  • When a song is loaded, the number of rows can be automatically set depending on the number of bars in the song.
  • A new part marker can start a new line.
  • Space between columns or rows is selectable.
  • All of the settings and colors can be saved and loaded as a .csc file.

You can enter Bar Lyrics (bar-based lyrics) on the Chord Sheet.

Fake Sheet mode has been added to the Chord Sheet and the Lead Sheet
  • Fake Sheet mode allows display of repeats, 1st/2nd endings, DS/DC al Coda, and more.
  • You can add your own repeats and endings by right-clicking on the Chord Sheet, Notation, or Lead Sheet window and selecting the Repeats/Codas/1st-2nd Endings option in the context menu.
  • There is an auto-detect feature that analyzes the song and adds repeats and endings for you.

The StylePicker has been redesigned and enhanced with new features including:
  • The window is now sizable by dragging the corner.
  • The font size for the styles list is selectable.
  • The styles list can be easily sorted by clicking on a column name.
  • There is a button to quickly set a style in the list as your favorite.
  • Quick filter. Type a text and/or select a category, time signature, feel, tempo, etc., and you will immediately see the filtered list.
  • There is an automatic intelligent sorting of “best style” for the current song.
  • 4-bar preview allows you to hear the first 4 bars of the current song using the selected style.
  • There are buttons to find all style files and rebuilt the list.
  • The style list can be exported to a spreadsheet.
  • The StylePicker Options dialog has been added for additional display options for the StylePicker.

Intelligent style suggestion. Just type a familiar song title, and the StylePicker will list styles whose genre, feel, and tempo are similar to that song.

Generate vocal synth. You can hear Band-in-a-Box singing, with built-in support for the popular online vocal synth “Sinsy.”

Load MusicXML. You can now open a MusicXML file from notation programs such as Finale, Sibelius, and Guitar Pro.

Guitar capo support has been added to the on-screen Guitar Window and the Notation Window.
  • Set a capo value, and a capo gets drawn and guitar display reflects the capo setting.
  • The tablature in the Notation Window will adjust the fret numbers based on the capo setting in the transpose menu.

Plus...
-Lists in various dialogs can be copied to a spreadsheet. This includes the StylePicker, the RealTracks Picker, and the RealDrums Picker dialogs.
-Legato Melody function has been improved, increasing legato of the notes in the Melody or the Soloist track by N ticks, avoiding next note by M ticks.
-Staccato Melody function has been added, reducing the length of notes by N ticks, preserving a minimum of M ticks duration of notes.
-The Lead Sheet Window can display Bar Lyrics.
-Log of flash messages have been enhanced, with an ability to record more message types.
-Changing a dB value in the StyleMaker for a track with loops now works.
-[No Loop] button has been added to the Loops dialog.
-Options (no transpose, no slash chords) have been added to RealTracks.
-A new mode has been added to the woodshed feature; when the tempo reaches max, it stays there.
-Option for relative note says b3, b5, b7 instead of 3b, 5b, 7b.
-Clicking on a piano on the Mixer now adds a note to the notation (if in the editable mode) at the current time.
-New UserTracks templates have been added to the Band-in-a-Box/RealTracks/UserTracks/UserTracks Templates folder (also in Band-in-a-Box/data/TemplatesForUserTracks folder).
-The style demos have been redone with even volumes. Previously, the demos varied in volume from MIDI to RealTracks.
-RealTracks pushes now happen a little later, sounding more musical, and the timing is tempo dependent.
-1,000 Loops have improved. They sound better with styles.
-C7+ is not in holds, C+ is, so it should remap them.
-Stereo UserTracks is now supported.

...and more!