RealTrack (Guitar Tab in the Melody or Solo Channels)

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Is there such a feature or if there isnt why not make one:

A RealTrack (guitar 'note by note') that actually creates a Real Track guitar tab (play) using musical notes entered in either the Melody or Solo Channel)

Meaning, instead of some Piano sample like Bandstand etc... BIAB will record all of the possible guitar notes (one by one; fingerpicking) so that if we enter a guitar tab, or guitar musical notation, BIAB will fetch those guitar samples NOTE BY NOTE but this time in REAL Tracks.

(GuitarPro accepts guitar tabs as inputs and plays these notes, one by one with a guitar synthesizer; the result is quite good)

But, we need BIAB to to do it inside BIAB program.

The RealTracks being offered are for Rhytthm and the fingerpicking is generic. Why not a fingerpicking using Guitar tab entries?

I think conceptually this is easy to do because all PGMUSIC has to do is get a guitarist to pluck a string one note at a time an record its corresponding guitar tab position.

This idea has come up before.

Problem with the idea is that it would do no more than current technology MIDI sampler would, likely sounding worse due to the loop point issue.

--Mac

The closest you could get to this is using something like Bandstand or Garritan.

In order for RealTracks to play written melodies, there would have to be an infinite amount of phrase variations recorded so Band-in-a-Box could find and assemble an arrangement seemlessly.

If each note was sampled individually, then it wouldn't sound like a RealTrack (it would sound more like Bandstand).

Somehow I wasnt referrring to "infinite" amount of phrasing variations

Maybe I just dont know how MIDI works.

From a user viewpoint, here's what I had in mind as what I have seen in Guitar Pro:
1. The user inputs the tab arrangement. This is not infinite. There are only a limited number of tab positions. For example in Fret 1, there are only 12 positions (6 open, and 6 closed). For Fret 2, again 6 positions, for Fret 2 until Fret 12 for example (12 x 12 = 144 positions)

2. Whatever the combination is inputted by the user, BIAB does not care. All it does is play the certain tab (e.g. Fret 5, 3rd string, closed) position, singly ONE by ONE.

3. The different b/n Guitar Pro and BIAB is that BIAB can use a real guitar sound (acoustic, for example) and that it can do the synch with other tracks. I was tempted to generated from Guitar Pro from the latter can be recorded only from the Sound Card, and not from the VSTi, and also synching Guitar Pro track with BIAB tracks in a sequencer like Audition or Sonar become a time consuming play or accuracy in positioning the track.

4. Can BIAB assign codes to specific guitar tabs (NOTE by NOTE) and generate it?

That would make BIAB the ultimate music software... because there thousands of Eric Clapton and Eric Burdon and Eric Carmen guitar tabs out there...

Quote:

The closest you could get to this is using something like Bandstand or Garritan.

In order for RealTracks to play written melodies, there would have to be an infinite amount of phrase variations recorded so Band-in-a-Box could find and assemble an arrangement seemlessly.

If each note was sampled individually, then it wouldn't sound like a RealTrack (it would sound more like Bandstand).

Quote:

Maybe I just dont know how MIDI works.

Go with that thought (grin).

What you are leaving out are the critical Note Durations of each sample.

Among a few other things. but let's start there.

I've created soundbanks for MIDI synths (Soundfont, Gigasampler, a few other formats) where an instrument was painstakingly sampled note by note and recorded in a studio setting one note at a time. After the recording process, the real work begins. That is where one must edit each and every note for the critical "loop points" -- places where the sample can be turned on itself to be repeated to make a longer length note duration as specified by the MIDI file or the user playing in real time -- but that loop point must be undetectable in sound. This is not an easy task.

On top of the loop points, there is also the very critical loudness factor of each note, which is typically done by creating LAYERS of samples, corresponding to MIDI Velocity data. An inexpensive sample might have 3 volume layers, more intricate work can involve 9 or more, each a separate sample that is fired depending upon the Velocity data for the specified note. Equivalent of when you choose to pick lightly, pick with a strum motion, or "dig in" with the pick. We haven't even discussed those times when a guitarist might use plectrum plus a finger or two, which would demand some more sample layers -- BUT there is not way to really control that in the aging MIDI standard -- which leads to all sorts of nonstandard workarounds. And then there are thos hammer-ons and pulloffs that you take for granted when you play them. The ADSR of each sample is locked as to what it was when sampled. The same would apply to your scenario of trying to chop up a RealTrack file to do this, only the problem would be much worse simply because of the sheer complexity of trying to chop up the file each time and make everything, loop points, amplitudes, etc. fit together. This is why the RealTracks pick out phrases played over changes rather than single notes.

Anyway, what you are trying to invent has already been invented, it has nothing to do with the concept and sound of RealTracks as invented by PGMusic.

What you are attempting to describe is a rather simple MIDI Sampling device.

The world is full of those and we all know the limitations of them by now.

--Mac

--Mac

Thanks for giving us an idea of how hard it is to do that.

In the meantime, this software called REAL GUITAR, is implementing what we are discussing about.

There has go to be a merger of BIAB and this REAL guitar company...

http://www.musiclab.com/products/realgtr_info.htm?r1=gadw&r2=rg

see the link.. very interesting he has GUITAR samples..

I said:

Quote:

-- BUT there is not way to really control that in the aging MIDI standard -- which leads to all sorts of nonstandard workarounds.

Musiclab says:

Quote:

Our original Guitar Touch technology letting you easily imitate basic guitar techniques (strumming, plucking, sliding, bending, muting, etc..), using standard MIDI keyboard and MIDI controllers, such as Pitch Bender, Modulation Wheel, Sustain Pedal, Aftertouch.

Likely only the Pitch Bend command is actually doing what it is supposed to do under the MIDi standard, the other three must be nonstandard workarounds in the sense that they are doing something other than what they were originally designed to do.

A program like BIAB or RB would have to be programmed to take that into consideration in order to work well with the customized commands.

There have been other attempts to do things such as this with the aging MIDI standard, Garritan comes immediately to mind, problem with all is that one must program the MIDI files specifically for the software instrument(s) in order to hear the differences.

And it is not RealTrack technology at all, it is indeed Sampling.

--Mac

Thanks for the enlightenment Mac!!

Quote:

I said:

Quote:

-- BUT there is not way to really control that in the aging MIDI standard -- which leads to all sorts of nonstandard workarounds.

Musiclab says:

Quote:

Our original Guitar Touch technology letting you easily imitate basic guitar techniques (strumming, plucking, sliding, bending, muting, etc..), using standard MIDI keyboard and MIDI controllers, such as Pitch Bender, Modulation Wheel, Sustain Pedal, Aftertouch.

Likely only the Pitch Bend command is actually doing what it is supposed to do under the MIDi standard, the other three must be nonstandard workarounds in the sense that they are doing something other than what they were originally designed to do.

A program like BIAB or RB would have to be programmed to take that into consideration in order to work well with the customized commands.

There have been other attempts to do things such as this with the aging MIDI standard, Garritan comes immediately to mind, problem with all is that one must program the MIDI files specifically for the software instrument(s) in order to hear the differences.

And it is not RealTrack technology at all, it is indeed Sampling.

--Mac