PG Music Home Forums PG Music Product Forums Band-in-a-Box for Windows BIAB2019 - Struggles Muting/Unmuting The Solo Track

Hello again. I've wanted to "spice up" my set this weekend with some generated guitar solos to weave into my live horn playing. I see conceptually how to do this but it isn't working.

At first I tried telling the soloist to only play the "last chorus" or only "middle" hoping the generated solo track would lay out when I want to play the head or do my own live solo. None of this worked so I set this setting back to always play. Indeed when I look at the piano roll I see notes generated on the solo track throughout the song. This is fine.

I transitioned to using the bar settings to mute/fade/return to normal (unmute). Some of this is working and some isn't.

I've got a 4bar intro up top that I went ahead and let the realband soloist noodle on and faded (@ "25" rate) in bar 4 as to not clash with the head of the tune that starts on the 1st downbeat of bar 5. This is great and works reliably.

From here the guitarist (solo track) is laying out for the rest of the song. I can't seem to get the levels set to bring the soloist back after the 1st chorus.

If I change bar 5 (first bar of chorus - which repeats 4x) for Chorus #1 using the bar settings and set the volume change to bring the soloist back then I can do this. However, I don't want the 1st chorus to have guitar -- this is where I'm playing the head. I only express this to show that it works only if I set chorus 1's volume.

If I instead set chorus #2 to reset the volume (either using back to normal or setting to +127 or ... no matter what) I will not hear the solo track. Again, I can go to this measure in the piano roll "5a (2)" and see the notes. I can't get the piano roll to show the events which control volume so it's difficult to audit what the bar settings are doing. Still, I haven't found a way to get the level back up for the 2nd chorus so I can give the guitarist (solo track) a ride for a chorus.

Any suggestions?

Hi Jason,

I encourage you to unfold your song and work on it linearly (like a conductor's score) rather than use choruses. This is the mode I always use. Using linear mode would make it much easier to set the bar settings and see all the bar settings in a single view. The command to unfold the song is found in "Edit | Song Form". Before you click on the unfold, though, save the song with a slightly altered name and work on that copy of the music. This will safeguard your original song and allow you to return to it at any time.

In relation to the un-muting of the solo guitar, what bar number and chorus number did you want to to unmute (or return to normal volume)?

Lastly, I've just had a look at the 2019 manual, and it is also possible change the volume of selected regions using Audio Edit. This would be worth playing around with.

I hope this gives some ideas.
--Noel

Thanks for your suggestions. I had worked this out. Since the form is long and one chorus was so many measures where I thought I had the soloist recorded it seemed like I was fooling myself. At least whatever issues I had cleared up after I both manually generated the solo and then edited the bar properties to mute/unmute.

I did find out the trick to measure numbering. Where repeated choruses of a measure start on the first shown measure of the first chorus. I didn't really get this at first (I thought measure 1 of chorus #1 -- but if you have an intro of 4 bars then the first measure of chorus #1 is actually 5).

Although non-linear songs are tricky, I had already figured it out. If I wanted the solo to start after playing the head which took up all of chorus #1 but I wanted some overlap - lets say starting at the last measure of the head (one measure early from chorus #2) then what I did was told the soloist to manually generate a solo starting at chorus #1 measure 68 (last measure of 1st 64 measure chorus with 4 bar intro) then solo for 65 measures which would cover through the last beat of chorus #2.

The combination of manually telling where to put solo data and using the bar edit to mute or fade or unmute seemed to work out fine. I did get the guitarist to fade out in the last measure of the intro and then come back after I played the head once and stop playing after a few rides leaving room for my own solo.

That said - as you suggested, it would have been a lot easier to deal with measures if the whole song was linear. It would have also helped another song where I found out one chorus has an extra 8 bars compared to the rest. I solved this by using different endings but it was difficult to construct the right change vs. just inserting 8 measures then cutting/pasting to fill in those chords and calling it a day. So I'll carry your suggestion into my next project now that I'm finally digging more deeply into a tool I've had on the shelf for so long.

As far as audio edit - I had explored that (before) to see if it would play any role into visualizing the muting/unmuting that the bar edit was doing. And after your suggestion I've taken another look at it. I just can't see how it would help editing the soloist track. It seems like audio edit is for the audio track which I have not used. So if I look at audio edit I see flat lines at "~" which is silence. I guess maybe what you're getting at is that I could somehow take my soloist track and print audio (mute all but the soloist) then import this into the audio track and then use the audio editor to pseudo-conduct the soloist. At least this would provide the visualization I didn't see in the other method - but it's a lot of steps and prone to running into the other issue I have where my BIAB install directory is used for temp files of audio manipulations. And this is gets slow. Although there are workarounds for some of this - it's more overhead even than managing the non-linear song form which I've finally thought-to-have figured out.

I will be upgrading to a new version since there are features particularly in the granularity of pushes/etc in newer versions that I value. So probably next year-ish I'll have overall a sharper tool to utilize that may (or may not) remedy some of the perceived clunkiness of some features.

I'm really digging being able to construct a show of backing tracks for a 1-person performance. The ability to add some good-enough-for-the-gig solos adds great variety to add another layer of variety. This is always what I saw using BIAB for and I'm finally doing it.

Right now I've got the entire show "in the can" except after reviewing the hour+ of music I assembled to an mp3 I noticed a few endings aren't right. A few where the last chord is wrong and a few where I should probably tag and do something different. So that will be my final polish if I get around to it before charting up what I need to in order to come in at the right spots. And chart up a few tunes I'm not familiar with. Endless fun - really. Such a privilege to be a musician.

Hi Jason.

I didn't realise that Audio Edit is for the audio track only in 2019. In 2024, it's possible to use Audio Edit on any track. It is possible to copy or move the Soloist track to the Audio track using "Edit | Copy special | Copy/move".

You've really been working hard. I'm impressed with what you've accomplished You won't regret getting a later version of BIAB. There have been many changes since 2019. The best deals have always occurred when a new version of the program is released. That's usually at the start of December. I suggest you make a note in your calendar and have a look at the deal on offer at the end of this year.

All the very best with your journey.
--Noel.

P.S. I agree with you. It really is such a privilege being a musician with programs like BIAB. I've been using it since 2006 and every day, I'm still amazed at what it can do.

There are multiple ways to construct and edit a soloist in BIAB. It's one of the major strengths of the program. Which method you choose depends on one's familiarity with the program and the degree of complexity you want the BIAB algorithm to create the solo.

If your 2019 version of BIAB Bar Settings menu has the multiple Chorus drop down option, and I believe it does. If your version Bar Settings menu has the RealTracks button, and I believe it does, then you may want to try this easy, fast method to have your session musician RealTrack player play the solo you want, following your instructions rather than post edit the track.

What's occurring in the background is you have assigned two RealTracks to the same track for BIAB to follow. In this instance, the second RealTrack is Silence. Every region throughout your song that you don't won't the soloist playing, assign Silence to that region of bars. When you want the soloist instrument to play out again, change out the track to the soloist instrument again. The main benefit of using this method is the BIAB algorithm is seeing both instruments and is selecting audio snippets based on the interactions between both instruments. RealTrack 1152:Silence is a special RealTrack that is exclusive to the main flagship program for the type circumstance you're have.

The operation is done from the Bar Setting menu and is the same as mute/back to normal process except you select the RealTracks Button to exchange the two RealTracks rather than the mute/return to normal drop down. It operates the same regardless if the SGU Chord Sheet is linear or multiple Choruses. Everything is done in the Bar Settings Menu.

For example, using soloist RT 3618 electric guitar and RT 1152 Silence RealTracks with the solo guitar placed on the Guitar Track in the Mixer. Open Bar Settings. to silence bars 9-12 in Chorus 1. Chorus 1 and bar 9 should be in the selection - Select the RealTracks Button
Select the Guitar Track and type in 1152 in the lower box
Change the bar to where you want the soloist guitar to resume playing. In this example: Chorus 1, Bar 12. Select RealTracks Button, Guitar Track and type 3518 to reverse the two RealTracks.

This process can be repeated as desired with any Chorus/ bar combination.