When do you think Band In A Box will have the option to play live???
I want to take my macbook, connect it to a keyboard and play as if I'm playing on a One Man Band keyboard!! (Yamaha Tyros, Korg PA ect..)
The technology is there, computers are very fast and there is no reason why Band In A box won't have this option!!!
I have a OMB keyboard, but I travel a lot and renting a OMB keyboard is not always possible everywhere. it will help a lot if I will be able to rent any keyboard whatsoever, connect it to my macbook, and play live with the Band In A Box.
It's the same with Main Stage software, I have a synth, but when I travel, I use the Main Stage as my synth.
If Main Stage has succeeded making it possible to have a real workstation synth in the computer, why not Band In A Box????
People are still buying synthesizers and will continue buying One Man Band keyboards..

It will be a game changer for the live music industry and to you guys in PGmusic!!!!

I'm sure there are thousands of musicians who will agree with me.

Think about it

Thanks

As alternatives, are you aware of vArranger? https://www.varranger.com/

It doesn't offer as good an audio performance as BiaB and RealTracks, it's pretty good and it's agile. It uses a USB dongle, though, which I hate unless I can put it inside a laptop.


Another possibility is the free backupband https://sourceforge.net/projects/backupband/ which is a remarkably effective simple arranger, but it's Linux only. However, it's a vary small software footprint that would likely work on a Raspberry Pi or similar. Again thew audio is less good than BiaB and again it's agile. It might also run on Linux in a VirtualBox on a Windows laptop, but I've never tried that as I normally work Linux native.

Welcome to the forum. This, of course, has been requested. I think one reason it has not been implemented is that this is not what the program was designed to do.

"The technology is there, computers are very fast and there is no reason why Band In A box won't have this option!!!"
"It will be a game changer for the live music industry and to you guys in PGmusic!!!!"

Modifying a version of the BBPlugin Standalone might be the way to go with this ?

Modifying a version of the BBPlugin Standalone might be the way to go with this ?

That is actually a very cool idea. Since the standalone plugin can open BiaB files could be retooled to 1. Read all the instructions so that generation is not necessary, or add to BiaB an render file to a hybrid format where the tracks were WMA with embedded lyrics and chords for a 2. Large lyrics window. 3. Have a juke box feature added, with the ability to switch the set list on the fly.

Okay who knows.

All and the OP.

the following might be the reason/clue why pg cant implement the real time need due to OS design.
ie pg arent dealing with a RTOS ?? but mebe i'm wrong.

https://www.keytechinc.com/2010/09/real-time-operating-systems-rtos/


happiness.

om

You can try it for yourself if you have REAPER.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/g28fd8zss4me8h8/Biab-Live-Arranger-WMA.mp4?dl=0

You can open these in Reaper (versions from 6.57 that is wma compatible)
Right click Save Link/Target As
_TXBLZPN Demo - TexasBlues Rock with acoustic piano.rpp
_BOSSGS Demo (ALL REALTRACKS - ElGuitSolBossa,PianoBossa,AcBassBossa).rpp
It will be looking on Drive E: but you can point it to your bb folder location.
It will load all the tracks but might not have peaks so
In Reaper menu > Actions > Show Action List
Peaks: Build any missing peaks
or
Peaks: Rebuild all peaks

During playback just click on the time line where the region starts and it will change smoothly at the start of the next bar to that region.
No wma files are in Reaper they are all played back from their source location on the Biab USB drive.
This is how the BBPlugin Standalone could work, it would just load all the track data for each track in the styles same as Reaper is doing.

Another way to look at it is if you go to a RealTrack folder and drag all the wma files into Reaper on one track and you chord the regions out, whatever region you enter it will go there smoothly and play.
Or look here https://www.pgmusic.com/forums/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=740677
download one of these and put it in Reaper, it has nearly 5000 bars 2.5 hours of material, if it's playing bar 10 and you click bar 4700 it will go there smoothly.

Try it out and let me know how you go.

In REAPER Options > Preferences > Seeking

Live Arranger using BBPlugin Standalone
This is using a chord pad for the demo but works with midi keyboard In.
This goes directly to the chord change/part change smoothly.
This is just playing the files from hard drive.
It just seems to work as a Live Arranger, I don't know how to get it not to work.

Watch Video: https://www.dropbox.com/s/m8f0ea9laeyw0za/BBPlugin-Live-Arranger.mp4?dl=0

Here's the Midi Chord Detection in Biab, so I'm sending the midi to Biab and the Live Arranger, the Live Arranger BBPlugin Standalone goes straight to the start of the inputted chord region even though it's in standby mode and not play mode, when playing it will change on the next beat or next bar.
It could be made to work in Biab right now if smooth seek is implemented in the Conductor to transition smoothly to another section, as it would just read the inputted midi chord and go to that chord in the chord sheet. Any chord playing will stay on that chord by looping the chord region or going to another section using the same chord if available.
The only issue is you are limited to 255 bars of different chord sections.
This video is playing in linear bars and goes anywhere within the 4700 bars smoothly.
https://www.dropbox.com/s/maqr3azepfuug06/Smooth-Seek-4700-Bars.mp4?dl=0
The BBPlugin Standalone does not have to play in a linear fashion.
It just loads all the RT RD track data of the chosen style and seeks each instrument's chord data separately, playing them all in sync without a linear display. As mentioned before the soloist just plays the riffs in the chosen key.


zOOm++

This is just a simple example how Live Play can work.
I made this for another post but it is applicable here:

Here's a play direct vst, just unzip and drag song.sfz into Sforzando VST or Standalone.
This is playing compressed mp3 sections on demand from different bars in the mp3 file. Hold a key down then move to another key. It will loop 4 bars of the chord when you hold a key down.
This is the same way the BBPlugin can play back wma/m4a direct.

song.zip

Sforzando can use wav, aiff, ogg, mp3 it was made by dropping the Biab song into Reaper and set the time display to Samples so you can set the start-end sample time for the sections in the sfz opened in Notepad, make sure your Reaper session is set to 44100 to get correct samples.

I could make one right now with actual chord input that will go to that chord section as you input that chord, change on next beat or bar and latch so you only need to press the chord and let go and it will keep looping that section until you play another chord, but I would rather see PG do it using the BBPlugin Standalone.

It actually works with wma and flac was another.

song_wma.zip

The same way the Sforzando is playing back the realtracks and realdrums changing instantly from one chord section to another, the BBBPlugin Standalone could work.
So whatever Style you choose it will load those instruments and change to sections of the source files to fit the chord being played same way the pic/video below is doing, it's changing from one source file to another.


Watch: https://www.dropbox.com/s/gk1xggd2z8n2oqx/Sforzando-Drums-Guitar.mp4?dl=0



If you are enthusiastic to help out you can try these:
Right Click Save Link/Target As

Guitar, 12-String Acoustic, Strumming Ev 120 - ram wma.sfz
CountryEven8_120_Style - ram wma.sfz

Copy the sfz into:
bb\RealTracks\Guitar, 12-String Acoustic, Strumming Ev 120
and
bb\Drums\CountryEven8

then drag the sfz into Sforzando and press the keys.
You should get instant playing of RealDrums and RealTracks from different files and sections.

These are for Win wma, if you have a Mac just drop the sfz into a text editor and change all the .wma to .m4a then save.

How's this going ??
Should we pay $5000 for a RealTracks arranger keyboard or just buy Biab and have thousands and thousands of existing RealTracks/RealDrums and Styles and play them direct with my cheap Casio keyboard and my cheap laptop ?