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Learning more each day I work with the program. Finding out that if I just go ahead and set up a song, I end up learning little things about doing things and the power of BIAB. Today I figured out how to mute certain instruments for particular measures by using the rests feature. In the arranger forums we learn that less is more. By using less parts we end up with less busy arrangements and therefor increase the number of style variations available.
Dell 610 dual Monitor, win 7-10, Sonar Plat, ProTools 10 & 11, Reaper 4, BIAB/real Band 2022, Easy Drummer, Superior Drummer, Kontact Essentials, Personnel Orchestra, Korg Legacy Analog & Digital
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Good to see you're having fun and growing at the same time. I see in your profile you've upgraded to 2021. There's been a great tool enhancement you may want to explore from this year's release that will work well with maintaining less busy arrangements yet allow for greater style variations.
MultiStyles are triggered by Part Markers and Part Markers can be placed on any bar on a Chord Chart. A Part Marker has more functions and uses than just triggering MultiStyles but one function that's beneficial to MultiStyles is each Part Marker has 2 sub-styles and up to 24 different Part Markers can be added to a Chord Chart project.
The simple act of assigning Part Markers throughout a Chord Chart and assigning different styles to some of the Part Markers can efficiently and dramatically add dozens of variations to the Chord Chart and create complex solos, instrument changes, rhythm variations, add and subtract instruments and much more expanding the arrangement in a more musical and dynamic song.
There are hundreds of MultiStyles that have been created by PG Music and they're easy to find in the StylePicker. In the Filter Box - insert the '+' sign and the MultiStyles will populate the results. My version has more than 900. They can be modified the same as any style, replacing one instrument for another, replacing a Midi track with a RealTrack and so on.
PG Music staff have also created hundreds of styles that are similar selections of instruments but may only differ in the soloist instrument. In other words, one style has an electric guitar, another a fiddle, another a mandolin and finally a last style with a Pedal Steel Guitar. The StylePicker makes it easy to find these similar styles from the Chord Chart page by right clicking the small drop down arrow of the style and filter for familiar styles. _BLUGRSF AND _BLUGRSM are two similar styles that demonstrate this technique where everything is the same with the style, the tempo, feel and all instruments except the soloist changes between a fiddle and mandolin triggered by assigned Part Markers.
This is a better method to program a soloist than using Bar Settings and F5 to mute/return normal function between two tracks. First, it only uses one track rather than two or more. Second, this method influences the audio selections made by the BIAB algorithm because it interprets and reacts to these instrument changes in the same manner as it does for other Chord Chart commands like rests, holds, shots, and chord changes and this results in very smooth transitions, intro's and ending's or cross fades.
It's a very powerful and versatile tool that may work well for you in your workflow.
Charlie
BIAB 2025:RB 2025, Latest builds: Dell Optiplex 7040 Desktop; Windows-10-64 bit, Intel Core i7-6700 3.4GHz CPU and 16 GB Ram Memory.
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A couple of good tips there Charlie on multistyles and part markers. Thanks!
Jeff
Win11, Intel i7 7700K 4.2Ghz, 32Gb RAM, 2x1Tb HD, 500Gb NVMe, BIAB/RB 2026, MOTU 828MK3 audio, MOTU Midi Express, Yamaha Montage 7, DX7II, TX802, Motif XS Rack, Roland Fantom XR Rack, Oberheim Matrix 1000, VoiceLive3 Extreme, Kontakt 6, SampleTank 4.3
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Hey Charlie is there a video or section of video that delves into multistyles? I would love to dig in deeper.
HP Win 11 12 gig ram, Mac mini Sonoma with 16 gig of ram, BiaB/RB 2026, Reaper 7, Harrison Mixbus 11 , Presonus Audiobox USB96
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Less is more indeed for us ... that drives our productions. But there are folks here who can produce great BiaB productions in multiple genres using a LOT of tracks and yet they all have the perfect place on the soundstage. And as you get deeper into BiaB you'll find a lot of RT's and RD's that you particularly like and will soon be creating songs with many substitutions in the styles or on occasion creating your arrangement but not starting with a style. The possibilities are endless. Have fun!
J&B
Our albums and singles are on Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon Music, YouTube Music, Pandora and more. If interested search on Janice Merritt. Thanks! Our Videos
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Hey Charlie is there a video or section of video that delves into multistyles? I would love to dig in deeper. The first three minutes of this video explains multistyles. At the 2 minute mark, look at all the drum variations possible... BIAB for Windows: Part Markers Overview
BIAB 2025:RB 2025, Latest builds: Dell Optiplex 7040 Desktop; Windows-10-64 bit, Intel Core i7-6700 3.4GHz CPU and 16 GB Ram Memory.
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Thanks Charlie for the in depth look at multistyles and ways of using them.
I went ahead and did a search with the added + sign and it came up with 946 styles and right from the beginning I can see how these will drastically improve my arrangements. However, I see that ove half of them are listed with only 2 substyles. How do they work?
Last edited by earl kirby; 01/02/21 06:10 PM.
Dell 610 dual Monitor, win 7-10, Sonar Plat, ProTools 10 & 11, Reaper 4, BIAB/real Band 2022, Easy Drummer, Superior Drummer, Kontact Essentials, Personnel Orchestra, Korg Legacy Analog & Digital
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<< How do they work? >>
MultiStyles/Part Markers work as an arrangement layer over the Chord Chart. It is a destructive layer because changing a style or in older than 2021 versions, changing a Part Marker initiates a regeneration of the current Chord Chart and Styles. 2021 has been enhanced to change Part Markers for visual prompts only so there can be Part Markers without applying changes to the Chord Chart.
Part Markers alone provide a visual prompt to section changes in the song form, intro's, ending's, verse, chorus, bridge, interludes, drum fills and style variations.
MultiStyles apply more visual prompts to section changes in the song form but also can change the song tempo, key, instrumentation choices, feel and dramatically add complexity, dynamics and interest to your song. Styles can be designed to make only subtle changes to the arrangement like the PG Music tutorial song did, or be a lot more drastic. These are creative choices for the artist to make.
Every style in a MultiStyle is comprised of two sub-sections and there can be up to 24 additional Part Markers providing a lot of drum variations. A MultiStyle song can have as little as two separate styles or as many as 24, and each of them will have two sub-styles. That's a lot of dynamic variety very quickly, intuitive and it's very stable.
Whenever it's feasible, it's better to use MultiStyles and Part Markers than to accomplish the same equivalent results using bar settings to mute and return to normal to create trade off's between instruments. this is because of the way BIAB selects and assimilates audio for the Chord Chart. BIAB uses Part Markers to construct arrangements and it reads these arrangement instructions prior to selecting audio the same as it does in choosing different audio for additional chords rather than the same audio for the same chord each time. This means fades, transitions, intro bars and ending bars are treated by BIAB the same as Chord changes, rests, shots and holds.
Last edited by Charlie Fogle; 01/03/21 05:52 AM.
BIAB 2025:RB 2025, Latest builds: Dell Optiplex 7040 Desktop; Windows-10-64 bit, Intel Core i7-6700 3.4GHz CPU and 16 GB Ram Memory.
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So, when entering song with 2 substyle style I get a and b but no c and d. You say "A MultiStyle song can have as little as two separate styles or as many as 24, and each of them will have two sub-styles.' I see only a and b with no difference within the a or b. I'm not understanding.
Dell 610 dual Monitor, win 7-10, Sonar Plat, ProTools 10 & 11, Reaper 4, BIAB/real Band 2022, Easy Drummer, Superior Drummer, Kontact Essentials, Personnel Orchestra, Korg Legacy Analog & Digital
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So, when entering song with 2 substyle style I get a and b but no c and d. You say "A MultiStyle song can have as little as two separate styles or as many as 24, and each of them will have two sub-styles.' I see only a and b with no difference within the a or b. I'm not understanding. Right click on any bar number or Part Marker and from the drop down menu select and click Define c/d and this action opens the StylePicker where you make a selection of any Style to be placed at that bar and play through until another style is activated or the end of the song. This is repeatable at any bar and a Style can be used multiple times anywhere in the song. EDIT: After each defining of a letter combination, BIAB advances the selection to the next letter pair.
Last edited by Charlie Fogle; 01/03/21 02:10 PM. Reason: Additional information
BIAB 2025:RB 2025, Latest builds: Dell Optiplex 7040 Desktop; Windows-10-64 bit, Intel Core i7-6700 3.4GHz CPU and 16 GB Ram Memory.
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