The completely redesigned window shows information for up to 50,000 songs.
The song list build is much faster. Approximately 150 songs get added per second.
A progress bar will appear if the song list build takes longer than 3 seconds.
You can see the chord progression for the selected song in the list. You can copy and paste it to a text file.
Many filters are available. You can filter the list by subfolders, genre, feel, time signature, style, songs with melody, soloist, lyrics, key signature, tempo range, and the year of file dates.
You can search songs that have similar chord progressions and/or melody fragments.
Hotkey! ss+enter opens the SongPicker, ss2+enter opens the Recently Played Songs, etc.
Learn more about the updates with our New Features Video - we've made it easy to find the section you'll need:
The part of the new features video explaining the Custom Chord Progression filter is not quite right. The filter string C F typed in as a sample at 22:13 does not work as expected - the SongPicker shows an empty string with just two vertical lines ("***** list is filtered by this chord progression: | |"). Also the matched songs and also the matching bar#s are not correct.
There should be (either in online help or in the manual) information on how to correctly specify custom chord progressions (the PDF manual does not explain that). What to pay attention to when specifying a progression? Are vertical lines bar or chord separators? As an example entering C F G results in an error message. Is only the first chord of a bar relevant or all 4 possible chords? What chord extensions are relevant?
Biab/RB latest build, German Language Pak, Win 10/64 Pro, 1 TB SSD, 32 GB RAM. Notation SW Finale, StaffPad, SmartsScore – Playing Double Bass, Guitar, Piano
| Vertical lines are bar lines | C | F | would be two bars
/ are beat lines but needed unless you want to specific a chord on a certain beat where the chord durations are not equal | C / / Bb7 | puts the Bb7 in beat 4
|| is a double bar line indicating a bar line (and a new section)
This would be a 12 bar blues
| C | F | C | | F | | C F7 | Em7 A7 | Dm7 / / Ab7 | G7 | C A7 | Dm7 G7 |
You can see examples of his songs look like this in the songpicker window, just highlight a song and it shows at the bottom left. You can copy and paste this text too, so it’s easy to copy a few bars and use it as a template to search for that chord progressiion.
|| is a double bar line indicating a bar line (and a new section)
This would be a 12 bar blues
| C | F | C | | F | | C F7 | Em7 A7 | Dm7 / / Ab7 | G7 | C A7 | Dm7 G7 |
I think I'm having trouble following. What's been described is a 12 bar blues that appears to have three bars in one section, then one bar in another section, and then 6 bars in a third section.
Maybe they are blank bars that look the same as double bars? I wonder if a better delimiter could have been used, or if blank bars could have a character in them to show that they are not new sections ( a tilde perhaps ~ )
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.
I read this as one bar of C, one bar of F, then two bars of C and two bars of F. The song totals 12 bars. Is that what you see?
Well, I can sort of see that, but I can also see how | | could be interpreted as follows:
Quote:
|| is a double bar line indicating a bar line (and a new section)
Why not put some form of repeat character between the pipe characters if the chord is to be repeated, e.g. instead of: | C | F | C | | use: | C | F | C | ~ |
That would make it more readable and remove ambiguity?
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.
We use a courier font so that the text lines up. This is just for the preview
Here's how a typical song looks...
1 || C | | D | G | 5 | C | | F | G | 9 !| C | F G | C | F G | 13 | Am | F | Am G | F G | 17 || C | | D | G | 21 | C | | F | G | 25 !| C | F G | C | F G | 29 | Am | F | Am G | F G |
btw) the default text copy includes bar#s, and also uses || for a 'a' substyle, and !| for a 'b' substyle I can make a copy button that has options to remove the numbers, and always use ||
then it would look like this
|| C | | D | G | | C | | F | G | || C | F G | C | F G | | Am | F | Am G | F G | || C | | D | G | | C | | F | G | | C | F G | C | F G | | Am | F | Am G | F G |
Why not put some form of repeat character between the pipe characters if the chord is to be repeated, e.g. instead of: | C | F | C | | use: | C | F | C | ~ |
That would make it more readable and remove ambiguity?
Makes sense; i thought ~ is a standard repeat sign for handwritten chord leadsheets. Probably hard to program within BIAB.
Then it would look like this if there were minimal spaces
|| C | % | D | G | | C | % | F | G | || C | F G | C | F G | | Am | F | Am G | F G | || C | % | D | G | | C | | F | G | | C | F G | C | F G | | Am | F | Am G | F G |
and this in courier font and lots of spaces.
|| C | % | D | G | | C | % | F | G | || C | F G | C | F G | | Am | F | Am G | F G | || C | % | D | G | | C | | F | G | | C | F G | C | F G | | Am | F | Am G | F G |
Then it would look like this if there were minimal spaces
|| C | % | D | G | | C | % | F | G | || C | F G | C | F G | | Am | F | Am G | F G | || C | % | D | G | | C | | F | G | | C | F G | C | F G | | Am | F | Am G | F G |
Looks more like the way i would hand-write out chord sequences for band rehearsals ...
I agree, the percent sign would be a suitable choice. Much better than a <space> character. (And at 4:30 AM I wasn't perhaps coming up with the best possible suggestion)
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.
This chord text feature is exactly what I have needed to do charts with multiple songs on one page.
Question: Am I doing something wrong because I have to rebuild every time I hit the songpicker. Shouldn't it pull up the last list built and allow me to rebuild on my own timetable?
Peter, Thanks, at least I understand now how the filter should work. But unfortunately it doesn't. There is clearly a real problem with the parser that incorrectly takes over the entered string. See screenshot:
Biab/RB latest build, German Language Pak, Win 10/64 Pro, 1 TB SSD, 32 GB RAM. Notation SW Finale, StaffPad, SmartsScore – Playing Double Bass, Guitar, Piano
Right, it looks like you’re missing a bar line at the start, and that confuses the parser. Instead of
Gm7 C7 | F | .... Put | Gm7 C7 | F |
We can make the code add a bar line in situations like that, but for now, insuring that it starts with a bar line should fix it. And you’re right, one of the examples had that typo too. It’s likely a common thing that people would not put a bar line to start with so that would be a good fix,
This chord text feature is exactly what I have needed to do charts with multiple songs on one page.
Question: Am I doing something wrong because I have to rebuild every time I hit the songpicker. Shouldn't it pull up the last list built and allow me to rebuild on my own timetable?
Peter, unfortunately, after inserting this leading bar line, it does not work properly. It now puts an empty bar in front and searches for songs containing the phrase – but only those which contain the phrase with a preceding "empty" bar!
Biab/RB latest build, German Language Pak, Win 10/64 Pro, 1 TB SSD, 32 GB RAM. Notation SW Finale, StaffPad, SmartsScore – Playing Double Bass, Guitar, Piano
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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
RealDrums Stems Set 9: Cool Brushes
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)
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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.
Whether you're exploring new features, checking out the latest RealTracks or Style PAKs, this is your go-to guide for Band-in-a-Box® 2026.
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