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I am going crazy with the drum fills on my song.
I have set up part markers, and right clicked on the bar and chose Allow drum fill for the bar before the part marker.
This occurs a number of times in the song.
For some sections it works, and for others there is no drum fill.
I made sure the drum track is not frozen, and I click on Generate and Play.
Then I get a fill where it was missing, but then some of the ones I liked before are gone now!
I know BIAB has no current feature to re-generate parts/bars of RealDrum tracks (which would be great!), so I can see that if I Re-generate the whole song it might change some fills to ones i might not like as much, but removing them is a bit much.
I keep thinking there is some setting I'm missing.
Any thoughts or suggestions (other than trying the Copy & Paste of drum parts in RealBand) I would appreciate them.
Thanks all!

Are your part markers a different color then the prior section color? They have to be for a drum fill.

I'm new and probably should keep my mouth shut but . . . In the songs I have done so far in BiaB I get a drum fill the measure prior to every part marker. Doesn't matter if it's the same or different part

I didn't know that.

And I don’t think it’s true. Fills are more exaggerated between changes, particularly green to blue. But my experience is almost exclusively in the jazz and Latin styles, and occasional gentle drum fills are playable within the same part marker type. Plus, as of BIAB 2022, you have control whether a part marker triggers a fill.

I have done songs mostly in MIDI but also with RTs and the color of the drum fill doesn't matter. You will get a drum fill regardless of the drum fill color.

Now having said that some styles, mostly new age and train drumming, the drum fill may only be a cymbal hit or an extra drum hit.

Maybe, I got something mixed up there. But a blue to blue will move the next measure to a new line (if configure to) but will not add a drum fill, while a blue to green will move the next measure to a new line and will add a fill. I just tryed it, and it was as I remember. You guys must know that?

Time to experiment.

And the OP has 2022. EDIT: updated to 2023, it says

Boots.

Re Drum Fills.

there is a trick i use you might try sometime.

1..create a new bb project separate from your song….lets call it Gonzo Drum Fills.GDF.
2..set GDF to same tempo as your song…and drum style(s) you want in song.
3..populate the bb chord sheet all over with x.d
(x = song key it dont matter c or d or whatever). eg c.d means only play drums.
4..put markers everywhere you want…n' any pushes/stops you want etc.etc.
5..generate GDF to hear drum fills play back…
then you can place the fills anywhere you want mate n' move em around.to see where the fills work best in the song against the song arrange bed traks.

between bb n' realband …you can do the following…

..gen loads of midi n' audio drum traks.
(on the midi drum traks you can load in drum plug ins if you wish)
..as above re fills etc .
..as above to do FANCY SHORT n' LOOONG DRUM SOLOS !
..using above ideas you could get rhythms that sync with the real drums.
eg lets say you want a synth rhythm that follows the drums or whatever,as realband has 48 traks you can get very very fancy with genning loads of drum traks n' fills etc etc…
eg rb has a drum pattern generator also that can
be used for instrument rhythms. …the skys the limit.

lots of triks to discover in rb eg sometime check out rb BARS VIEW for moving chunks of drum riffs around not only within a trak but also comping new final drum trak from various drum generations.

for EXAMPLE in rb you could end up with the following..

..end up with a trak with a final comped drum trak (from several gens.)
..have a separate trak for FILLS.
..have a third trak for drum SOLOS.

bars view is very useful in rb.

anyhoo i hope this gives you enough info to start.
lots of drum triks to discover tween bb n' realband.

happiness.

om

ps MATT is spot on with his comment EXPERIMENT.
(in both bb n' rb)

BiaB 2023 UltraPAK - I have a song up right now on the other screen with Blue (a) to Blue (a) and green b to green b several places and I get a drum fill at all of them. I did it that way just to get the drum fills before I knew about the "Allow Drum Fill" check box.

I just ran about 40 styles where I changed every 4 measures, A-A-B-B. I used about 20 MIDI styles and 20 RT styles. In every case there was a drum fill at each A and B.

Yes that would be great. In the mean-time there are various solutions that would involve copying audio here and there, but here is a trick you could use. This isn't something that's normally done but it will work...

But first, a fill SHOULD actually occur in every bar preceding a part marker, unless you disable fills at that bar. Perhaps you are hearing a fill but it's just not as intense as the other fills in the style. If on the other hand there really is no fill at all, that could be a bug in the style.

Here is the trick you could use to select certain fills to play in your song.

1. First you need to find the "definition" file for the RealDrums being used in your song. This is one of the text file in your bb/Drums folder. If the RD has variations (^01, ^02... ) then you need to locate the text file for the same variation. Additionally, it has to be for the same tempo. If your RD has a ~ symbol in the mixer you need to pay attention to that, since that indicates the RD is automatically being substituted for one with a closer tempo. E.G. BluesShuffleHard^4-HHDb,RideDb_120_style.txt ---> this is BluesChuffleHard variation 4, tempo 120.

2. Make a copy of this file so you can restore it later. E.G. BluesShuffleHard^4-HHDb,RideDb_120_style copy.txt

3. Open the file (not the copy, but the original) with a text editor (e.g. notepad) and search for the fill patterns . e.g. pattern,Fill,A,1,0,1,106 --> this is a fill that occurs in the A section (leading to either an A or B section). They are normally grouped together but there might be a few groups in the same text file.

4. Comment out all but one line of the fills by putting a semicolon at the start of the line, then save. Re-generate in BIAB and listen to the fill. Repeat for other fills as desired until you find the one(s) you don't like.

5. Comment only the ones you don't like, generate, and FREEZE the Drums track.

6. Restore the original text file (if you want, or alternatively continue using yours, but make a backup of it as it might get overwritten in an update.)

This would address the Fill bars but not necessarily the Postfill bars (the bar that the partmarker is on). Postfill tweaking would be much more complicated and you might end up with silent bars.

Well if there is a A-A drum fill or a B-B drum fill, then it must be subtle casue I can't hear it. I do hear A-B or B-A.

But nevertheless, if you have to jump through the hoops discribed here, you may want to check out EZDrummer3 and get the job done right the first time.

Would you post what style(s) you are using? I for one would like to check it/them out.

First off, Wow! Thanks so much for all this great feedback.
It's going to take me a bit to digest all these replies and respond.
I will say that I have to disagree with the one suggestion/assertion that fills only occur when choosing a green part marker.
I have written 15 or so songs in BIAB and found I get drum fills (as long as I allow them by right clicking the part marker) with either Blue-A or Green-B, but I agree that the change/fill is more pronounced when it's before a Green-B part marker, but still there for the Blue-A part.
On this song I get them on either type of part marker, just not all of them, and when I re-generate and play, some appear where there were none, and others that were there before disappear.
One new question: can a drum fill (which is supposed to be in the bar before the part marker) show up as JUST a single cymbal crash on the first beat of the bar with the part marker?? If so, then it is working, but certainly not what I'd call a fill/pick-up setting up the next bar.

Before addressing some of the other thoughts, suggestions and questions, let me give you some information on the song I'm working on with the issue:
Style: CTRWZPS.STY Slow Country Waltz with Pedal Steel. It's in 3/4 time, and although the style tempo is 85, I upped it to 114 for my tune.
Is that a possible problem?
The RealDrums used are NashClassicWaltzSW^

If anyone is interested, I'd be happy to send you the .SGU file.

Again, many thanks to all who responded. I will reply in greater detail tomorrow, as well as report on my further experimenting. (Yes, I do keep looking for other ways to work around as I am still pretty much a novice)
Thanks again!

Testing a jazz style, I do hear fills for each part marker, including several in a row. I can turn off the fills before a part marker, and I can also force a fill where there is no part marker.

I think the subtlety in what you may be hearing is caused by where in the phrase you put the fill, or don't put the fill. I think, with no evidence other than my ears, that the drummer who recorded the RealDrum part just naturally is more likely to put some fill-like pattern every fourth bar, for example. You can ask for a fill in the first measure of a phrase leading to measure two, but it's not as musical and the drummer won't emphasize it.

It is worth more testing.

At the moment you can't cop/cut/paste RealDrum sections like you can RealTracks.
You can load the original RealDrum source file into a Utility track and set it's tempo if different to the project tempo, you can then cut/copy/paste sections, but it will be an attached wav file.
Once non destructive editing is added all this will be just so easy to get what you want:

Yes it can be just a cymbal crash or an extra drum hit depending on what style you are using. That is what I was referring to when I said "Now having said that some styles, mostly new age and train drumming, the drum fill may only be a cymbal hit or an extra drum hit" in a previous post. In other words not all drum fills are flashy.

PS - The best way to hear is to crank up the drum volume so it is the loudest track. It makes it easier to hear those subtle so called drum fills. That is what I did in all of my testing.

[quote=justanoldmuso]Boots.

Re Drum Fills.

there is a trick i use you might try sometime.

1..create a new bb project separate from your song….lets call it Gonzo Drum Fills.GDF.
2..set GDF to same tempo as your song…and drum style(s) you want in song.
3..populate the bb chord sheet all over with x.d
(x = song key it dont matter c or d or whatever). eg c.d means only play drums.
4..put markers everywhere you want…n' any pushes/stops you want etc.etc.
5..generate GDF to hear drum fills play back…
then you can place the fills anywhere you want mate n' move em around.to see where the fills work best in the song against the song arrange bed traks.

Lots of great info there! Thanks!
Regarding your first suggestion in BIAB, if I understand correctly, I should create a new project, i.e GonzoDrumFills.SGU, setting the time sig and tempo as with my original project.
Then create a whole bunch of bars, populating each bar with something like "G.d".
Then create numerous part markers wherever I want, and allow drum fills for them.
Then use Generate and Play to hear the drums and fills play back.
Do I have that so far?
What I'm not sure I'm getting is how to move around the fills, and place them anywhere I want, and then how to get them into my song.
I'm sure it's due to my inexperience but let me know if you can.
Thanks again.
Boots

I tried making a test song using your choice of style, CTRWZPS.STY, at tempo 114.

First off, altering the tempo from expected doesn't seem to matter. RealDrums don't seem to have the same rules for stretching tempos, and they seem to seamlessly substitute something that works when you alter a tempo much from the expected base tempo.

My test song had all kinds of fills for A and B part markers, musically right and wrong, and they rarely made a difference. It's as if I'm the bandleader and I told the drummer what to play, he or she says OK, then plays whatever they were going to play anyway. Now, I'm not entirely kidding. It would really stand out in this simple drumming if any frills were added. At best, I hear an occasional light cymbal hit either on beat 3 before a measure with a part marker, or a slightly heavier cymbal crash on beat one of the measure with the part marker.

But I think I would have heard pretty much that same thing from this drummer no matter whether I inserted fills or not.

Bottom line, either this style just doesn't have fills to play, or less likely, there is something wrong with the programming of the style. As a jazz player, I'm not the one to judge.