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Band-in-a-Box for Windows
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OK, I've had my biab for about 24 hours now. I've managed to enter a few chords and the software creates songs ...whoop tee dooo. What I really want to do is create bass tracks and drums. I've went to the Notation mode and entered bass lines , I've saved them...but when I push the play button, the system plays a canned bass line not the one I entered. I tried opening the saved version and the notation still doesnt play...Huh? With the hours spent so far I probably couldl have recorded the bass lines i need.... can this really be this hard? I'm no computer whiz but have usesd Excel, auto cad etc etc for the last 25 years.... how do I create a simple bass line from scratch, save and use it?

Last edited by swivel; 05/11/10 10:49 AM.
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Sounds like since you went ahead and edited the bass line you may want import the song into RealBand. RealBand will play your tracks as you have written/recorded them.

You may want to start like this: Save the bass line notation as a MIDI file and import that MIDI file into a track in the RB session. You can then drag and drop your other instruments that you created using BIAB from BIAB onto RealBand.

One thought since you are wanting to use just bass & drums. This is what I would do to speed up the results. I would create the song in BIAB. Mute the other instrument parts at the top of the window except the drums and bass. Once I found something close to what I liked, I would export it into RealBand. The MIDI will be easy to edit and make changes to both drums and bass to your exact liking.

Let me know if that works for you. And welcome aboard!

Cheers!
RickeG

Last edited by RickeG; 05/11/10 11:19 AM.
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Well swivel a few things first.
1. You didn't read any of the sales lit
2. You need to read the manuals
The whole idea of BIAB is to generate canned parts. If you edit parts that are MIDI and part of a style they will indeed revert back to the "canned" part when you hit play. If you want to make changes to these MIDI "canned" parts you must freeze the track first and then it won't change. I wouldn't get too hung up on this though because if you're like most of us you'll want to use Real Tracks & Real Drums and those can't be changed.

Read the book please


John
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Swivel,
Quote:

...how do I create a simple bass line from scratch, save and use it?




By using a program that was designed to do that. Band In A Box is not that program.

The concept behind Band In A Box is that you want the program to automatically create up to five parts of backing tracks, including the bass line.

You can use Real Band, or PowerTracks Pro Audio to create bass lines that will stay just how you created them. You can even use both Band In A Box and Real Band or PTPA together, i.e., to create a full backing sequence, and the move everything to either RB or PTPA, discard the bass track, and write your own.

But, you can not create a bass track in a Band In A Box song and expect to save it, it will auto regenerate each time. This is what the program is designed to do.

Gary


I'm blessed watching God do what He does best. I've had a few rough years, and I'm still not back to where I want to be, but I'm on the way and things are looking far better now than what they were!
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Hi Swivel

The way I get over this problem is to mute the BIAB bass part and then write a bass Midi part in the Melody or Soloist sections and in Soloist edit transpose the newly written bass part down to suit and then save

The program does not regenerate the Melodty or Soloist sections

Brian


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Gary,
Although as I said it's not going to work with the Real Instruments one of the new features is indeed the ability to change what each instrument is playing via the notation window and then freeze it. It will not change when you hit play and the song can be saved that way. Again this only applies to MIDI.


John
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Band-in-a-Box has 2 tracks that you can use for your own purposes (bass lines etc.). These are the Melody and Soloist tracks (note: MIDI only, not audio). In addition, you can use any track for your own purposes if you freeze it (right click on the the 'Bass" at the top of the screen and you can freeze the bass track. Then notes entered on the bass track will be yours. You can do that after BB has generated a track, in case you just want to tweak it.

If you want to do a lot of your own tracks, I would recommend booting up RealBand, you can record 48 tracks (audio and MIDI) as well as generating BB tracks from that. It is included with Band-in-a-Box.

There is a RealBand getting started video http://64.40.109.185/pgmusic/wmv/RealBand.wmv


Have Fun!
Peter Gannon
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Swivel, welcome to the forum.

I do it exactly as Brian (jazzman) and Dr. Gannon described, although it's really great that you can now freeze any track after editing it.

Sorry you got blasted with 'read the manual' message. Doing so is a good idea, as well as viewing the videos, but so is trying things on your own. From this thread, you have seen that, next time, you may not have to put in as much time struggling before getting the answer from one of us. And in no time, you can return the favor by answering questions of the new users to follow.


BIAB 2025 Win Audiophile. Software: Studio One 7 Pro, Swam horns, Acoustica-7, Notion 6, Song Master Pro, Win 11 Home. Hardware: Intel i9, 32 Gb; Presonus 192 & Faderport 8, Royer 121, Slate VSX, Adam Sub8 & Neumann 120 monitors.
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Man for bass lines, in the jazz idiom, Realtracks bass is the real thing. Neil S doing his thing to Satin Doll, Oliver Gannon filling on guitar, and Terry Clarke on drums, all real tracks, make a .wav backing file and Bob's yer uncle and Peter is the man.

The program is best used to back your instrument and or voice. And nothing does it better. You can find thousands of songs on-line, try:

http://members.shaw.ca/glitch/bbfiles.html

Thousands just there. Load them up, change the style, make parts louder, mute the melody and play along, mute the bass and add that yourself, the sky's the limit.


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Without wishing to prolong this, perhaps the best analogy (drawing from the original post) is that he is trying to lay out the design for a new house in excel ...

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Well it's a good starting point to work out the number of board feet of which lumber and which sheetings sq. footage of insulation, yards of wiring, etc. Add in the monthly fluctuations for the whims of women involved, the frustration levels of their decisiveness, and your tolerances without resorting to staying at the pub with friends consuming single malts at X * Y and you've a start to the decision to go on vacation and purchase something already built..

LOL.


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Matt,
I might have suggested to read the manual but I also pointed out how to do it as well long before Peter posted his message. I don't think I blasted.
You know sometimes my posts come off as blunt however I'm a 2 finger typist and so I need to say what I want to say in as few words as possible.


John
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Sorry John. You are correct, 'blasted' was too harsh. I was concerned that your blunt reply could potentially drive a new user off the forum, and he hasn't been back.

I have you beat by one finger. On good days, two!

Best wishes.


BIAB 2025 Win Audiophile. Software: Studio One 7 Pro, Swam horns, Acoustica-7, Notion 6, Song Master Pro, Win 11 Home. Hardware: Intel i9, 32 Gb; Presonus 192 & Faderport 8, Royer 121, Slate VSX, Adam Sub8 & Neumann 120 monitors.
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And I did tell him how to achieve what he wanted as well.
He's probably off reading the book.


John
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You can use two fingers?!?!?! Dude!


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Thanks for the help all. I did try to read what looked "most pertinent" in the 257 page manual. Frankly the quik start could be a LOT better. I guess maybe I bought the wrong product according to some... I thought I could create my own tracks as well as use canned tracks if I chose to. Maybe I can with the workarounds mentioned. thanks again

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You certainly can, especially if you use Realband with BIAB. Good luck. We're here to help.


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swivel,
Don't get discouraged. This program is very complex. It's going to take time.


John
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I agree totally with Matt

As a long time user of Powertrax (since version 1.06 - pre windows), last year I decided to purchase & try BIAB for my live performances.

Had a problem regarding Midi "parts" that worked differently in BIAB so thought that I would ask the forum.

Got a bad response here, havent posted or used BIAB since

No whinging, just commenting on the point made by Matt. Quite happy with my PT12 thankyou, just will be more careful when asking for help.

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Thanks for the verification, tuggeranongcc.

Glad you're back.


BIAB 2025 Win Audiophile. Software: Studio One 7 Pro, Swam horns, Acoustica-7, Notion 6, Song Master Pro, Win 11 Home. Hardware: Intel i9, 32 Gb; Presonus 192 & Faderport 8, Royer 121, Slate VSX, Adam Sub8 & Neumann 120 monitors.
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Band-in-a-Box 2026 Video: The Newly Designed Piano Roll Window

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We've just released XPro Styles PAK 10 for Mac & Windows Band-in-a-Box version 2025 (and higher) with 100 brand new RealStyles, plus 28 RealTracks and RealDrums!

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Here’s just a small sampling of what you can look forward to in XPro Styles PAK 10: Soft indie folk worship songs, bumpin’ country boogies, gospel praise breaks, hard rockin’ pop, funky disco grooves, smooth Latin jazz pop, bossa nova fusion, western swing, alternative hip-hop, cool country funk, and much more!

Special offers until December 31st, 2025!

All the XPro Styles PAKs 1 - 10 are on sale for only $29 ea (Reg. $49 ea), or get them all in the XPro Styles PAK Bundle for only $149 (reg. $299)! Order now!

Learn more and listen to demos of XPro Styles PAKs.

Video: XPro Styles PAK 10 Overview & Styles Demos: Watch now!

XPro Styles PAKs require Band-in-a-Box® 2025 or higher and are compatible with ANY package, including the Pro, MegaPAK, UltraPAK, UltraPAK+, and Audiophile Edition.

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