"Band-in-a-Box is bad at generating professional guitar solos"
Nope. I'm not talking about notation, I'm talking about the quality of a generated guitar solo. You can sit there for an hour to partial regen, the result is still not guranteed. Try it yourself. I'm not talking about humanization here. RealTracks are already humanized. I'm talking about musicality and quality. Why don't you give yourself less than an hour, generate an easy 16 bar solo, and send me the mixed MP Go with key of C, 65 bpm, even feel, use a typical pop melodic chord progression:
F-G-Em-Am-Dm-G-C-C7 F-G-Em-Am-Dm-G-C-C
Whatever RealTrack you choose, partial regen however you want, get it done in an hour or less. If you can get a decent enough electric guitar solo in your mp3, then you can forget about Guitar Pr and string note input all the nonsense. =======================
Hey MusicVillain,
OK, I generated the solo that you requested, with your exact specs, chord progression, tempo and feel.... and you can listen to it here ...
Just pressed play. The soloist sounds fine to me, actually sounds great. So I don't follow your comments about "Band-in-a-Box is bad at generating professional guitar solos"
(Note: please don’t hijack this thread with a different topic. Start a new thread in this case)
I hate to say this, but that was possibly the most boring guitar solo I've ever heard! I kept wanting to click "Stop" but I thought I should listen to it all the way through if I was going to comment on it.
It was the kind of pentatonic stuff you'd expect to hear from an intermediate player who had just learned his pentatonic scales a couple of weeks ago.
This is just my opinion. Obviously you must have liked it or you wouldn't have posted it.
> This is just my opinion. Obviously you must have liked it or you wouldn't have posted it.
Yes, I do like it. It was requested and intended to be a simple melodic solo following the chord progression, and it does that very well. The style was a Praise and Worship soloist, which plays very melodic solos, consistent with that genre.
I understand your point that it sounds “simple”. So we can just choose a different Realtracks soloist, that’s going to play using all 12 notes. For example, here is "4188:Guitar, Electric, Soloist CountryBalladSlowJohnny Ev16 065". You'll hear lots of chromatics, bends slides etc. This sounds more like something Mark Knopfler might play with Dire Straits.
Solo, take 2, more chromatics/bends/rhythmic variation etc. playing the same chord progression requested above. This was just as generated the first time with BiaB, no editing.
My take on this is yes it is possible to get a good sounding solo. Like anything it takes some work. If you play a live solo you don’t always nail it the first time. Sometimes I generate a solo and it does actually suck, it misses notes in spots, other times it sounds great. Midi based solos are work as well.
BiaB in general is a creative tool, and requires some effort to create. If you work at it you can get some remarkable results.
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
>With creativity and some effort one can produce some fantastic music with BiaB.
Yes. But to be clear, the two solo examples above were just what you get without “creativity and some effort”. I just pressed play.
And there are about 7 tracks in those demos (drums/bass/rhythm/pads etc), not just the guitar solo track. And I didn’t put any effort into any of them, just pressed play once for the whole thing.
I mention that because many people assume we work hard to make our demos. When in reality all we do is type in a chord progression (takes 1-2 minutes), and then press play. The proof of that is that the demo files aren’t frozen, so that when you play them you’ll get a different version than us anyway.
But yes, if you want solos that sound better (or more customized) than my two examples above, you can use “creativity and some effort”. In particular, 1. highlight the region that you want to have a different performance for, and press Ctrl-F8. This will generate a different performance with different notes, and you can keep doing that and get different parts until you get the one you're looking for. This applies to any RealTracks part. 2. If you need to further customize it with specific phrases, you can add playable RealTracks which will use samples to play any phrase you enter.
Biab is wonderful what it can do with audio, that's why I bought it in 2009, that's why I'm still here. The musical programing is great it just needs that greatness in other areas also that are lacking for frustration free creativity, as these are equally important. If you could do the same in Biab/RealBand/Plugin as I can do in Reaper with the track sections it will further improve Biab to allow for more creativity control.
It a shame things take so long to get there that's all.
Hey Peter, yes, Take #2 sounds much better than Take #1. In Take #1, Dave Cleveland's style is just slow scale stacking, while in take #2, Johnny Hiland was going medium speed with slide, vibrato, legato, hammer on and pull off to add more taste.
However, even in Take #2, it's still very obvious a scale stacking piece with no musical arrangement or motif design. I'm not trying to be picky here, but I don't think I would ever put a 2-minutes-generated solo into any of my songs. Those easy fast generated guitar solos will never stand a chance in the fierce competitions on Bilibili or other platforms.
To give you an idea of what a "designed solo" is, I used exactly the same style "CALM3" of which you chose, with the same tempo, key, feel, and chord progression, to create a 16 bar solo in a Virtual Guitar.
You can tell there are long and short notes combined and repeated in the same pattern to form a motif. By no means this solo is perfect, it needs more work, and the creation process is time consuming. But if a solo can attract viewer's attentions on Bilibili, then it's worth the time.
I'm also trying to use BiaB to do some partial regen (Alt+F8), but haven't got any decent result yet to share.
Peter, it would be kind of you, if you could tell us the BiaB users, how to open and read a .bt0 and .bt1 file. Why? Because these files are RealTrack chord mapping files. If we can read it, we will know which chord is recorded to which bar of the .wma source file in the RealTracks folder, then we can directly open, chop, and comp the wma source files according to chord, works much faster than partial regen twenty times for one bar.
A Canadian music producer, singer songwriter, composer, and professional guitarist.
Given that all the BiaB instruments are based on established relationships, methods and motifs, the soloists sound very credible to me. And some of the individual licks are very, VERY cool. Not groundbreaking and certainly not breathtaking, especially in longer passages as others have noted. But if you want something like that...introduce the human element. The whole basis of BiaB (I think) was to provide an aggravation-free backing band for soloists. (Queue the drummer joke)
Last edited by DC Ron; 08/18/2302:41 PM.
DC Ron BiaB Audiophile Presonus Studio One ASUS I9-12900K DAW, 32 GB RAM Presonus Faderport 16 Too many guitars (is that a thing?)
Peter, it would be kind of you, if you could tell us the BiaB users, how to open and read a .bt0 and .bt1 file. Why? Because these files are RealTrack chord mapping files. If we can read it, we will know which chord is recorded to which bar of the .wma source file in the RealTracks folder, then we can directly open, chop, and comp the wma source files according to chord, works much faster than partial regen twenty times for one bar.
I thought they were just beat files and all the info is in ST2 XT2. If you want all that info just use the track injector.
I might have an easier way to do it all soon rather that having to use the Track Injector. If you use wav files you can also write the info in as cue points that you can see if your DAW will display them like Reaper. All the sections below you can edit to tweak or get the solo you want and be able to change the track to DI <> FX:
Solos are great for the genres BIAB represents. It's ridiculous to expect a software not aimed specifically for guitar to do Van Halen chops. My honest opinion is that while some soloists are far from perfect, they are absolutely usable for sketches, demos, backing tracks, place holders and more advanced music with some editing. A track I am tinkering with now, I have a fantastic soloist RT my Mike Durham (3441).
If I can't find something in BIAB, I go to other sources, not because something is "bad", but because I want something different.
But wait, there is more... There are User Tracks. But that is another discussion.
These are the original solo sections from a Biab track. Any section I can extend or shorten the original playing. If you watch the video where you have the gaps you can manually merge so there's no stop, you can't do that with a consolidated wav or in Biab now how it is: Reaper-RT-Solo-Extend.mp4
These are the original solo sections from a Biab track.
Musocity, I watched your video, and I'm very confused.
How did you get the chord information above the waveform track in your video?
Were these chords extracted from BiaB's source wma material, or simple detected by Reaper?
A DAW's ability of detecting chords on an audio file, is usually inaccurate, especially on non-rhythm RTs, such as a lead guitar RealTrack.
Below picture shows what's in a RealTrack folder: a wma audio and a bt1 mapping file.
I tried to open this bt1 file with Notepad++ to see what's inside, but only get mess codes. I assume you need some special software to view the bt1 file.
Imagine if PG Music allow users to view this bt1 file, that would be a game changer.
If a user knows what original chords were assigned to each bar of the source wma file, he can simple drag the audio to his DAW, cut the bars and put together a Slash like guitar solo in less than a minute.
How cool is that?
A Canadian music producer, singer songwriter, composer, and professional guitarist.
I posted more info back a few posts, see below. The ST2 XT2 file for the RealTracks are in the Soloist folder. The regions are just the chord sheet imported from the Biab SGU.
Originally Posted By: musocity
Quote:
Peter, it would be kind of you, if you could tell us the BiaB users, how to open and read a .bt0 and .bt1 file. Why? Because these files are RealTrack chord mapping files. If we can read it, we will know which chord is recorded to which bar of the .wma source file in the RealTracks folder, then we can directly open, chop, and comp the wma source files according to chord, works much faster than partial regen twenty times for one bar.
I thought they were just beat files and all the info is in ST2 XT2. If you want all that info just use the track injector.
I might have an easier way to do it all soon rather that having to use the Track Injector. If you use wav files you can also write the info in as cue points that you can see if your DAW will display them like Reaper. All the sections below you can edit to tweak or get the solo you want and be able to change the track to DI <> FX:
This is wav file cue points written into the wav to show chord changes:
I have sold music to a library in England for TV and Movies, using only BIAB generated parts with very minor editing or none at all in many cases. I would also say, you will never please everyone, ever. It just doesn't work that way. There is a guy here in my town that plays this place regularly, and has for years, and I don't like pretty much anything he plays or sings. But some people must, as does the owner of the place that pays him to play there weekly. That is just how it works.
My wife asked if I had seen the dog bowl. I told her I didn't even know he could.
> MusicVillain: To give you an idea of what a "designed solo" is, I used exactly the same style "CALM3" of which you chose, with the same tempo, key, feel, and chord progression, to create a 16 bar solo in a Virtual Guitar. You can tell there are long and short notes combined and repeated in the same pattern to form a motif. By no means this solo is perfect, it needs more work, and the creation process is time consuming. But if a solo can attract viewer's attentions on Bilibili, then it's worth the time. =====
Your solo sounds great and thanks for posting it. Yes, hand-crafting a solo to fit your song is well worth the time, and allows things like motif/composition development. BiaB’s role isn’t to replace that, but to save you time on your other tracks that don’t require this custom treatment.
>MusoCity: If you could do the same in Biab/RealBand/Plugin as I can do in Reaper with the track sections it will further improve Biab to allow for more creativity control
Agreed, and this is something planned for BB2024 (and BiaB plug-in w/DAWS like Reaper that support these track sections). This will open up lots of additional options when customizing solos and other tracks.
Band-in-a-Box® 2026 for Mac - Special Offers End at 11:59pm PDT on Friday, May 15th, 2026!
Order before 11:59pm PDT on Friday, May 15th and SAVE up to 50% on most Band-in-a-Box® version 2026 for Mac Upgrade packages... and that's not all! With your version 2026 for Mac purchase, we'll include a Bonus PAK full of great new Add-ons FREE! Upgrade to the 2026 49-PAK to receive even more NEW Add-ons including 20 additional RealTracks... that's 222 NEW RealTracks available with version Band-in-a-Box® 2026 for Mac!
Upgrade to Band-in-a-Box® 2026 for Mac® today for as little as $49! Check out the Band-in-a-Box® packages page for all available purchase options.
Learn more about the Free Bonus PAK and 49-PAK here.
If you have any questions about which package is the best option for you, just let us know. We're here to help!
202 New RealTracks Released with Band-in-a-Box 2026!
With Band-in-a-Box® 2026, we've released 202 incredible new RealTracks (in sets 468-488) in a variety of genres—featuring your most requested styles!
Jazz, Funk & World (Sets 468-475):
Our new jazz, funk & blues RealTracks include a groovin’ collection of RealTracks and RealDrums! These include more requested “soul jazz” RealTracks featuring artists Neil Swainson (bass), Charles Treadway (organ), Brent Mason (guitar), and Wes Little (drums). There are new “smooth jazz” styles (4), which include a RealTracks first: muted trumpet, as well as slick new smooth jazz brushes options for drums. Blues lovers will be thrilled—there are more “classic acoustic blues” styles, including guitar (5), bass (4), and drums (10) with blues master Colin Linden, featuring understated and tasty background acoustic soloing, plus brushes drums and acoustic bass. There are also new electric blues RealTracks, including electric blues with PG favorite Johnny Hiland (3) and soulful electric slide guitar from Colin Linden (4). If you love funk & gospel, there are great new options this year, including gospel organ (3) from Charles Treadway, as well as new funk, tango, and rock ’n’ roll drums (3) and bass (1). And for big, bold arrangements, we have uptempo soul horns (4) featuring a three-part hip horn section with options for a full mix or stems of each individual horn — plus an accompanying rhythm section (4) of drums, bass, guitar, and electric piano!
Rock & Pop (Sets 476–482):
Our new rock & pop RealTracks bring a powerful mix of requested favorites, fresh genres, and modern chart-inspired styles! We have more of our popular “Producer Layered Acoustic Guitars (15)” featuring Band-in-a-Box favorite Brent Mason. We’ve continued our much-requested disco styles (10), and added new Celtic guitar (5) with a more basic, accessible approach than our previous Drop-D or DADGAD offerings. There are also highly requested yacht rock styles (17), inspired by the smooth, polished soft-rock sound of the late ’70s and early ’80s — laid-back grooves, silky electric pianos, warm textures, elegant harmonic movement, and pristine production aesthetics. Fans of heavier styles will love our new glam metal (13), capturing the flashy, high-energy sound of ’80s arena-ready guitar rock. We also have a set of rootsy modern-folk rock (18), with a warm, organic sound combining contemporary folk textures and driving acoustic strumming. And we’ve added lots of new modern pop styles (16) — the kinds of sounds you’re hearing on the radio today, featuring exciting new drums, synths, and cutting-edge RealTracks arrangements.
Country, & Americana (Sets 483–488):
Our new country & Americana RealTracks deliver a rich collection of acoustic, electric, and roots-inspired styles! We have new country pop (9) with legendary guitarist Brent Mason. There is also a potpourri (14) of bouzouki, guitars, banjo, and more, perfect for adding texture and character to contemporary acoustic arrangements. We’ve added funky country guitar (5) with PG favorite Brent Mason, along with classic pedal steel styles (5) featuring steel great Doug Jernigan. There are more country songwriter styles (8) that provide intimate, rootsy foundations for storytelling and modern Americana writing. Finally, we have “background soloing” acoustic guitar (12) with Brent Mason — simpler, but still very tasty acoustic lines designed to sit beautifully behind vocals or act as a subtle standalone solo part.
And, if you are looking for more, the 2026 49-PAK (for $49) includes an impressive collection of 20 bonus RealTracks, featuring exciting and inspiring additions to add to your RealTracks library. You'll get new country-rhythm guitar styles from PG Music favorites Johnny Hiland and Brent Mason, along with modern-pop grooves that capture today’s radio-ready sound! There are also new indie-folk styles with guitar, bass, 6-string bass used as a high-chording instrument, acoustic guitar, and banjo. Plus, dedicated "cymbal fills" RealDrums provide an added layer that work very well with low-key folky styles with other percussion.
The 2026 49-PAK is loaded with other great new add-ons as well. Learn more about the 2026 49-PAK!
2026 Free Bonus PAK & 49-PAK for Band-in-a-Box® 2026 for Mac®!
With your version 2026 for Mac Pro, MegaPAK, UltraPAK, UltraPAK+, Audiophile Edition or PlusPAK purchase, we'll include a Bonus PAK full of great new Add-ons for FREE! Or upgrade to the 2026 49-PAK for only $49 to receive even more NEW Add-ons including 20 additional RealTracks!
These PAKs are loaded with additional add-ons to supercharge your Band-in-a-Box®!
This Free Bonus PAK includes:
The 2026 RealCombos Booster PAK:
-For Pro customers, this includes 27 new RealTracks and 23 new RealStyles.
-For MegaPAK customers, this includes 25 new RealTracks and 23 new RealStyles.
-For UltraPAK customers, this includes 12 new RealStyles.
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
Looking for more great add-ons, then upgrade to the 2026 49-PAK for just $49 and you'll get:
20 Bonus Unreleased RealTracks and RealDrums with 20 RealStyle.
FLAC Files (lossless audio files) for the 20 Bonus Unreleased RealTracks and RealDrums
MIDI Styles Set 93: Look Ma! More MIDI 16: SynthMaster
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)
XPro & Xtra Styles PAK Sets On Sale Now - Until May 15, 2026!
All of our XPro Styles PAKs and Xtra Styles PAKs are on sale until May 15th, 2026!
It's the perfect time to expand your Band-in-a-Box® style library with XPro and Xtra Styles PAKs. These additional styles for Band-in-a-Box® offer a wide range of genres designed to fit seamlessly into your projects. Each style is professionally arranged and mixed, helping enhance your songs while saving you time.
What are XPro Styles and Xtra Styles PAKs?
XPro Styles PAKs are styles that work with any version (Pro, MegaPAK, UltraPAK, UltraPAK+, or Audiophile Edition) of Band-in-a-Box® 2025 (or higher). XPro Styles PAKS 1-10 includes 1,000 styles!
Xtra Styles PAKs are styles that work with the UltraPAK, UltraPAK+, or Audiophile Edition of Band-in-a-Box® 2025 (or higher). Xtra Styles PAKs 1-21 includes 3,700 styles (and 35 MIDI styles)!
The XPro & Xtra Styles PAKs are not included in any Band-in-a-Box® package.
The XPro Styles PAKs 1-10 are available for only $29 ea (reg. $49 ea), or get them all in the XPro Styles PAK Bundle for only $149 (reg. $299)! Listen to demos and order now! For Mac or for Windows.
The Xtra Styles PAKs 1-21 are available for only $29 ea (reg. $49 ea), or get them all in the Xtra Styles PAK Bundle for only $199 (reg. $349)! Listen to demos and order now! For Mac or for Windows.
Note: 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.
The Xtra Styles require the UltraPAK, UltraPAK+, or Audiophile Edition of Band-in-a-Box®. (Xtra Styles PAK 19 requires the 2025 or higher UltraPAK, UltraPAK+, or Audiophile Edition. They will not work with the Pro or MegaPAK version as they require the RealTracks included in the UltraPAK, UltraPAK+, or Audiophile Edition.
Supercharge your Band-in-a-Box today with XPro Styles PAKs and Xtra Styles PAK Sets!
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.
Band-in-a-Box® 2026 for Mac is here and it is packed with major new features! There’s a new modern look, a GUI redesign to all areas of the program including toolbars, windows, workflow and more. There’s a Multi-view layout for organizing multiple windows. A standout addition is the powerful AI-Notes feature, which uses AI neural-net technology to transcribe polyphonic audio into MIDI—entire mixes or individual instruments—making it easy to study, view, and play parts from any song. And that’s just the beginning—there are over 100 new features in this exciting release.
Along with version 2026, we've released an incredible lineup of new content! There's 202 new RealTracks, brand-new RealStyles, MIDI SuperTracks, Instrumental Studies, “Songs with Vocals” Artist Performance Sets, Playable RealTracks Set 5, two new RealDrums Stems sets, XPro Styles PAK 10, Xtra Styles PAK 21, and much more!
Special Offers
Upgrade to Band-in-a-Box® 2026 for Mac and save up to 50% on most upgrade packages during our special offer—available until May 15, 2026. Visit our Band-in-a-Box® packages page to explore all available upgrade options.
2026 Free Bonus PAK & 49-PAK Add-ons
Our Free Bonus PAK and 49-PAK are loaded with amazing add-ons! The Free Bonus PAK is included with most Band-in-a-Box® 2026 for Mac packages, but you can unlock even more—including 20 unreleased RealTracks—by upgrading to the 2026 49-PAK for just $49.
One of our representatives will be happy to help you over the phone. Our hours of operation are from
6:00AM to 6:00PM PST (GMT -8) Monday thru Friday, and 8:00AM to 4:00PM PST Saturday. We are closed Sunday. You can also send us your questions via email.
One of our representatives will be happy to help you on our Live Chat or by email. Our hours of operation are from
6:00AM to 6:00PM PST (GMT -8) Monday thru Friday; 8:00AM to 4:00PM PST (GMT -8) Saturday; Closed Sunday.
Dansk
Deutsch - Windows
Español
Français - Windows
Italiano - Windows
Nederlands
Polski
Português
Svenskt
русский
Japanese
Simplified Chinese
Traditional Chinese
Korean