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eddie1261
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eddie1261
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You should have been a Manager Eddie! Heh. I beat players up so bad for not doing their job that I can't keep players. So, yeah, my role would have been more Miles Copeland than Stewart Copeland.
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Joined: Jun 2005
Posts: 7,697
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It's all about money and doing this as a career. If it's a real career then of course everybody is on the same page and working hard every day. We were booked by MusArt Corp and all their acts either did it their way or it literally was the highway. They had dozens of class A rooms all over North America including Hawaii. I got to spend a year there performing 3 hours a night and chasing chicks on the beach during the day. Not bad for a 25 year old. They also had dozens of class A acts that could be plugged into the job we were playing at any time if too many bad reports came in from management at the venue.
After I left all that and became a weekend warrior that all changed. The lack of professionalism will drive me crazy if I let it but what else am I gonna do on a Friday night?
Even decent, so-so performing is better than nothing at least for me. I completely understand your pov too Eddie.
Bob
Biab/RB latest build, Win 11 Pro, Ryzen 5 5600 G, 512 Gig SSD, 16 Gigs Ram, Steinberg UR22 MkII, Roland Sonic Cell, Kurzweil PC3, Hammond SK1, Korg PA3XPro, Garritan JABB, Hypercanvas, Sampletank 3, more.
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Joined: Jun 2012
Posts: 21,029
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In actuality, no songs should be retired. They should just be played less. Some of them 'Much Less' 
BIAB & RB2026 Win.(Audiophile), Windows 10 Pro & Windows 11, Cakewalk Bandlab, Izotope Prod.Bundle, Roland RD-1000, Synthogy Ivory, Session Keys Grand S & Electric R, Kontakt, Focusrite 18i20, KetronSD2, NS40M, Pioneer Active Monitors.
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Joined: Jul 2000
Posts: 6,471
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Joined: Jul 2000
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Something occurred to me that prompted me to add this little footnote to my thoughts. It isn't Mustang Sally that I don't like. It's Mustang Sally done by copy bands. Mustang Sally as done by Wilson Pickett with that great Muscle Shoals house band was killer. <...snip...> Yes, the 'swampers' were among the best studio musicians of the day. Mustang Sally was originally done by Mack Rice (the songwriter) and the second recording was done by The Young Rascals. Wilson Pickett followed with his fine version after the Rascals, but I've always preferred the Young Rascals version. I did my own MIDI backing track, loosely based on the Pickett version, but I sing it in my style and play my own improvised sax solo, which of course to me is the high point of the song. I would have preferred to do it loosely based on the Rascals version, but I've been at this long enough to know what the public wants to hear. I'll completely rearrange a song that isn't requested as often as Mustang Sally, for example we do You Are The Sunshine Of My Life as a swing jazz tune, and people accept it, but for one of the 'standards' I feel it's better to do it closer to the version they want. And I agree with Eddie and Bob about bands that don't rehearse. The majority of the should, and the few that don't need to are a joy to listen to, but they definitely are few and far in between. Jam sessions are different. I belong to a jazz/blues org that holds monthly jams. The house band gets paid well, and most of the players are my buddies. It's a lot of fun making things up as we go along over the changes we all know too well. It's mostly blues and blues that has bled over to rock though. Jazz is pretty much dead around here. Oh how I'd love to do Joy Spring (thanks, Bob - I have the Stan Getz Quartet version playing right now) but there is no audience. The one jazz group that plays for $25/man (they all have day gigs and do it for the love) sticks to the old war horses that most people know. Back in the early 1980s I was in a Sunday jazz band. The leader/guitarist used to teach at the University of Miami and also played with Ira Sullivan for a few years. Monsters came in to sit in that were way out of my league, it was challenging to keep up, and a lot of fun. My jazz chops are all but dormant now. I don't mind, I'm having fun gigging with Leilani. We constantly learn new songs and rehearse them before taking them to the audience. It's the right way to do it. I do my own backing tracks, and it might take a few days to get the track right (depending on the song, some go in a day). I want the groove to be right, the mix to be right, and even the choice of instruments (I have MIDI sound modules with thousands of different variations of the common instruments and plenty of uncommon ones). I play the parts live into a sequencer, sometimes I use BiaB for the comp work (if an appropriate MIDI style is available). I first have to figure out the parts, learn how to play them, then record them. Then I choose the patches. We just learned Seger's Still The Same for a very good customer on our weekly going on 10 year house gig. I played the stock piano figure into the sequencer, and by the time I mixed, I tried about 70 acoustic and bright acoustic piano patches until I found the one that fit the best. This is another good thing about MIDI, and not only pianos, I have about 100 different clean guitar sounds, Teles, Strats, LPs, 335s, and so on. My musician friends who buy karaoke tracks think I'm crazy to do all that work, but it's not work, it's just what needs to be done. When I'm happy with my track, I'll enjoy singing/playing over it. But they don't have a once a week gig that has lasted for 10 years either. I've purchased a couple of karaoke tracks for throw away songs like the obscure first dance at a wedding, and they always pale in comparison. And new songs go through stages. At first a new song is exciting as you are still exploring what you can do, what works, what doesn't work and what you can get away with. Stage two is when the song peaks, you are settling into what works best for you, and you soar through the song like an eagle on the wind. Then the song loses some of it's peak excitement, but it is comfortable, like having dinner with a good friend. I suppose if I had a day job, I could have spent my life doing 'art music' (jazz or whatever), but I would have had to work a day job. Instead I'm not working for anyone other than myself, nobody is running my life, I'm not a wage slave, I'm living it on my own terms. I take the gigs I want, turn down the ones I don't want, play music for a living, whether I'm making a backing track, gigging on stage, or playing music into a sequencer that will eventually become a new BiaB style. I make music with my lover/best-friend/bandmate Leilani, we enjoy life, and are pretty much free. Life is good for me. I'm lucky to have been born at a time where a musician can make a living doing music and nothing but music. And I'll play all those songs until they are retired by the audience. My philosophy: You can play for yourself, you can play for other musicians, or you can play for the general public. If you are good enough, you will get the audience you asked for. Insights and incites by Notes
Bob "Notes" Norton  Norton Music
https://www.nortonmusic.com
100% MIDI Super-Styles recorded by live, pro, studio musicians for a live groove
& Fake Disks for MIDI and/or RealTracks
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Ask sales and support questions about Band-in-a-Box using natural language.
ChatPG's knowledge base includes the full Band-in-a-Box User Manual and sales information from the website.
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Band-in-a-Box 2026 for Windows Special Offers End Tomorrow (January 15th, 2026) at 11:59 PM PST!
Time really is running out! Save up to 50% on Band-in-a-Box® 2026 for Windows® upgrades and receive a FREE Bonus PAK—only when you order by 11:59 PM PST on Thursday, January 15, 2026!
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There's an amazing collection of new content too, including 202 RealTracks, new RealStyles, MIDI SuperTracks, Instrumental Studies, “Songs with Vocals” Artist Performance Sets, Playable RealTracks Set 5, two RealDrums Stems sets, XPro Styles PAK 10, Xtra Styles PAK 21, and much more!
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Happy New Year!
Thank you for being part of the Band-in-a-Box® community.
Wishing you and yours a very happy 2026—Happy New Year from all of us at PG Music!
Season's Greetings!
Wishing everyone a happy, healthy holiday season—thanks for being part of our community!
The office will be closed for Christmas Day, but we will be back on Boxing Day (Dec 26th) at 6:00am PST.
Team PG
Band-in-a-Box 2026 Video: The Newly Designed Piano Roll Window
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Band-in-a-Box 2026 Video: AI Stems & Notes - split polyphonic audio into instruments and transcribe
This video demonstrates how to use the new AI-Notes feature together with the AI-Stems splitter, allowing you to select an audio file and have it separated into individual stems while transcribing each one to its own MIDI track. AI-Notes converts polyphonic audio—either full mixes or individual instruments—into MIDI that you can view in notation or play back instantly.
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You can see all the 2026 videos on our forum!
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- MIDI Styles Set 92: Look Ma! More MIDI 15: Latin Jazz
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