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Here is a recent arrangement called Safe In The Storm BackstoryYesterday I was noodling around on the keyboard exploring and I played a C major cord and wondered what would happen if I flattened the E; it sounded pretty good. I searched it and found it was a C minor (C-Eb-G). Then it was natural to wonder what if I sharpened the E; that also sounded good and I learned that was a C sus4 (C-F-G). So as a progression I played C major, C minor, C sus4 and C major . . . a song was born after I confirmed this worked with other root notes. For you music experts, I know this is childs play but for me it was an eye opener and first departure from hunting and pecking for chords in BiaB that work. For you novices like me, if you don’t have a physical keyboard, consider buying one. Even a $25 model at Walmart will allow you to see and hear chords. The funny thing is that I’ve used minor and suspended chords before in BiaB but never understood how they are made. The Korg keyboard allowed that understanding. BiaB Technicals: _SJCOOLP.STY Smooth Jazz Cool Slow Piano, 90 BPM 1. 1995 Acoustic Piano 2. RealDrums 3. 2819 Guitar 4. 2406 Synth 5. 906 Electric Piano My Contributions:6. Fender Bass (took about 5 takes) 7. Korg: Big Band Brass (took about 10 takes to get the chords, individual notes and timing down) 8. Korg: DW8000 Lead 9. Korg: Noisy Riser & Drop Mixed and rendered in Studio One. Also, this is my first attempt at panning. Comments welcome.
https://soundcloud.com/user-646279677BiaB 2026 Windows For me there’s no better place in the band than to have one leg in the harmony world and the other in the percussive. Thank you Paul Tutmarc and Leo Fender.
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Ain't music theory cool stuff? The more you mess around and experiment, the more you can learn. Take the time as you did to figure out what you did.
Cool jam.
You can find my music at: www.herbhartley.comAdd nothing that adds nothing to the music. You can make excuses or you can make progress but not both. The magic you are looking for is in the work you are avoiding.
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Very nice progression...makes a great jam...throw in a 7th on your Cm and you'll get some butter with that jam 
www.soundclick.com/firesongBiaB 2024, Steinberg Cubase Pro 13, Wavelab 11.2, SpetraLayers Pro 10, Audacity, Steinberg UR44 Interface, Yamaha Genos, Roland FP60 and FP10, Windows 10 You are who you are because you do what you do because of what you believe.
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Hello BT ...
I like it a lot. I'm pretty good with chords but short on musical theory. I just eventually figured out what to do and then what to do with it. It took a while. I made my first dollar (actually $8.00) in August of 1963. Been doing it ever since. Made real good living doing something I truly loved.
I enjoyed this listen a lot. Cool song and easy to listen to. Nicely done! Keep experimenting and learning!
Alan
BIAB 2024 Ultra Plus-all StylePaks*Win11*32GB DDR5*Rhyzen 9745x*AT 2035 Mic*Peavey Nashville 112 Amp*Ibanez ART120* Acoustic/Electric/Washburn D200S Acoustic*Stromberg Monterey Jazz Guitar Loops: https://aldavidmusic.wixsite.com/bestmusicloops
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Nothing quite as good as discovery learning. I'm impressed by the bass tone.
Cheers rayc "What's so funny about peace, love & understanding?" - N.Lowe
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Nice progression and a really cool song.
Another fun progression you may want to experiment with - c, cmaj7, fmaj7 it works well with keys.
Charlie
BIAB 2026:RB 2026, 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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Bass Thumper - I liked it! It was a fun, jam-a-long song. I really liked the bass playing throughout the song, though at times I thought it may have been a little loud in the mix (but that's just me.) It really did give the song a solid platform though. I also liked your panning. I understand the difficulty in this stuff, I'm just learning it all too - good job and nice listen.
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Ain't music theory cool stuff? The more you mess around and experiment, the more you can learn. Take the time as you did to figure out what you did. Cool jam. Hey Hacker, you bet. This theory stuff is cool indeed. I still will be hunting and pecking for the next chord for some time to come, but my toolbox is slowly accumulating useful tools.
https://soundcloud.com/user-646279677BiaB 2026 Windows For me there’s no better place in the band than to have one leg in the harmony world and the other in the percussive. Thank you Paul Tutmarc and Leo Fender.
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Very nice progression...makes a great jam...throw in a 7th on your Cm and you'll get some butter with that jam Thanks for the listen Firesong. My keyboard skills are very basic, and my bass skills not much better. If throwing in a 7th means adding an additional note, that could be challenging. Moving from one 3-note cord to another for the brass section took several attempts to get right; not sure if a 4th finger would decide to cooperate Although, I always wanted to play piano as a kid; but we never had the money.
https://soundcloud.com/user-646279677BiaB 2026 Windows For me there’s no better place in the band than to have one leg in the harmony world and the other in the percussive. Thank you Paul Tutmarc and Leo Fender.
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Hello BT ... I like it a lot. I'm pretty good with chords but short on musical theory. I just eventually figured out what to do and then what to do with it. It took a while. I made my first dollar (actually $8.00) in August of 1963. Been doing it ever since. Made real good living doing something I truly loved.
I enjoyed this listen a lot. Cool song and easy to listen to. Nicely done! Keep experimenting and learning!
Alan 1963? Yikes that's almost 60 years, my music "career" is coming up on 7 years old and I'm looking forward to being a teenager someday . . . wooo hooo  Thanks for the uplift, coming from a seasoned pro like you means a lot.
https://soundcloud.com/user-646279677BiaB 2026 Windows For me there’s no better place in the band than to have one leg in the harmony world and the other in the percussive. Thank you Paul Tutmarc and Leo Fender.
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If throwing in a 7th means adding an additional note, that could be challenging. Moving from one 3-note cord to another for the brass section took several attempts to get right; not sure if a 4th finger would decide to cooperate With midi there are various ways of adding note upon note to create interesting chords. Sometimes I use programs such as Musescore or Guitar Pro to write the notation. Then I save them as midi files before assigning various instruments to play and record them. That way you can be confident of perfect timing (and you never run out of fingers). Nice track, by the way.
ProTools; Ableton Live Lite; Reaper Focusrite Scarlett 2i2 MK4 interface Novation Launchkey 61 Mk4 midi controller
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Nothing quite as good as discovery learning. I'm impressed by the bass tone. I agree. At some level we are all explorers. Glad you like the tone. My signal chain from the flatwound strings to Studio One and everything in between is serving me well.
https://soundcloud.com/user-646279677BiaB 2026 Windows For me there’s no better place in the band than to have one leg in the harmony world and the other in the percussive. Thank you Paul Tutmarc and Leo Fender.
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Bass Thumper, Neat progression and bass playing. Good musical exercise. Misha.
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Nice progression and a really cool song.
Another fun progression you may want to experiment with - c, cmaj7, fmaj7 it works well with keys. Charlie Appreciate your sentiments Charlie. I checked out your progression and it is smoother than smooth 
https://soundcloud.com/user-646279677BiaB 2026 Windows For me there’s no better place in the band than to have one leg in the harmony world and the other in the percussive. Thank you Paul Tutmarc and Leo Fender.
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Bass Thumper - I liked it! It was a fun, jam-a-long song. I really liked the bass playing throughout the song, though at times I thought it may have been a little loud in the mix (but that's just me.) It really did give the song a solid platform though. I also liked your panning. I understand the difficulty in this stuff, I'm just learning it all too - good job and nice listen. Thanks Brad. Yeah, my bass is a bit hot in this mix. So many details to consider when putting a song together. Thanks for the feedback.
https://soundcloud.com/user-646279677BiaB 2026 Windows For me there’s no better place in the band than to have one leg in the harmony world and the other in the percussive. Thank you Paul Tutmarc and Leo Fender.
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love your bass playing and the progression.
nice sound picture changes.lots of subtleties.
if you dont me saying i hear this as a tv show backing. maybe a cop show.
best
om
my songs....mixed for good earbuds...(fyi..my vocs on all songs..) https://soundcloud.com/alfsongs(90 songs created useing bb/rb) (lots of tips of mine in pg tips forum.)
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With midi there are various ways of adding note upon note to create interesting chords. Sometimes I use programs such as Musescore or Guitar Pro to write the notation. Then I save them as midi files before assigning various instruments to play and record them. That way you can be confident of perfect timing (and you never run out of fingers).
Nice track, by the way.
Ghostgum, I have this self-conflicting view regarding MIDI. On the one hand if I were to become proficient with it my songs would be much cleaner and on the money. But on the other hand I'm just having too much fun and satisfaction not dealing with MIDI. Even though my creations are bit rough around the edges I really enjoy my fingers on a real physical keyboard and pressing down a real physical bass guitar string. I'm probably in a minority in this regard but whenever I can, I try to use a physical instrument. Glad you liked the track, thanks.
https://soundcloud.com/user-646279677BiaB 2026 Windows For me there’s no better place in the band than to have one leg in the harmony world and the other in the percussive. Thank you Paul Tutmarc and Leo Fender.
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love your bass playing and the progression.
nice sound picture changes.lots of subtleties.
if you dont me saying i hear this as a tv show backing. maybe a cop show.
best om
Thanks om. Hmmmm a cop show? That would be my only musical claim to fame. Sign me up !!! 
https://soundcloud.com/user-646279677BiaB 2026 Windows For me there’s no better place in the band than to have one leg in the harmony world and the other in the percussive. Thank you Paul Tutmarc and Leo Fender.
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Wow, the coolest thing you said was that it was an eye-opener for you, Steve. Man, I remember that feeling so many times. It's one of those magnificent hurdles that, once cleared, opens up a whole new field to explore. Excellent chops and a good feel. The Mathematics Of Music --write it, man.
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Very nice instrumental!
This would have fitted right in with TV shows like Starsky and Hutch, Baretta or M*A*S*H.
Rob and Anne-Marie
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