Hi there,

I have been studiously watching the tutorials and they are very interesting. However, they seem to be very "feature-based" assuming you know what they are talking about.

I am a singer who is trying to learn Band in the Box but also I am starting to learn how to play the piano. What I really need is a course which teaches you not only how to use Band in the Box but also how Band in the box is used in real life.

Does anyone know of any BIAB teachers or actual BIAB courses ?

Thanks

Hi clarcombe
I'm a newbie too and love this software.
I think however it requires you to at least have a basic knowledge of music/chords to make it work.
In your endeavours of learning piano, it will no doubt get you to understand Band in a box but until you learn chording techniques it's probably not going to do a lot for you.
At the same time I'm probably not too qualified to advise you too much....but just saying.

You're dead right!

I've just bought a Korg PA600 and a chordbook. Its a start but I guess what I'm really after is training on how musicians/songwriters actually use BIAB.

Lets hope someone can point me in the right direction

I think what you'll find is that a thousand different musicians use BIAB in a thousand different ways! It's a very versatile program.

Groove 3 BIAB tutorials are often recommended here on the forum and all the reviews I've seen about them are good. www.groove3.com

I've no affiliation but I do trust the forum members recommendations.

Wish's comments are correct about BIAB requires at least basic knowledge of music and chords to make it work. But you can use BIAB with no knowledge of either. You can successfully use BIAB by knowing where to get music and chords and how to import them into the program. The two easiest methods are importing and opening midi files or locating and opening existing BIAB sgu files of songs.

Opening a midi file in BIAB automatically decodes the chords, key signature, tempo and lyrics if they are included so you can then mute the midi that is located in the melody or soloist slot, choose a style and BIAB will generate a backing track. If you can't find a suitable midi file, search the internet for the chords of the song and manually copy the chords into the program. You would also manually enter the key and tempo. The Stylepicker may have the song or at least a similar one to help you choose a useable style.

Opening a BIAB native sgu file will open ready to generate a backing track.

BIAB is better at helping you practice your instrument rather than teach you how to play. That being said, your teacher will have the musical knowledge to provide you with what you need to create backing tracks for you to practice to. The BIAB Forum recently featured an online music teacher that uses BIAB to do just that. Check out Callie's comments about Eric Blackmon in the "I Just saw this on Youtube" thread in the Forum List. He is on YouTube and according to the video that Callie's forum post links to, he does lessons in piano as well as guitar and bass guitar and other instruments.

Charlie

I'll second the Groove3 tutorials. I've used them for many years. But be aware you are going to get a lot of information thrown at you. The good news is that you can watch the videos multiple times until you get it. Eli Krantzberg does an excellent job of breaking things down.

But it will take some work. There is a lot of complexity to BIAB, so there is no 5-minute "make me an expert" course.

Good luck.

how Band in the box is used in real life

not sure what this means

for example
if you wanted to learn how to play amazing grace on the piano
you could use http://www.pianosongdownload.com/amazinggrace.html as a guide to enter the chords into biab
pick a style
mute the piano part
biab will play the other parts while you play the piano

you can slow the tempo if need be
search the pdf manual located in the bb directory for more info on topics discussed

Hi Clarcombe.
Hope you are well.Biab is great for many reasons including that it gives you a range of great instruments and automatically gives you a backing track to work with.
Im using it two years now and hadnt much clue when I started.My main thing is to create and try not to let anything get in the way of that.I still dont know anything much about Chords to be honest but that hasnt stopped me putting together songs.
I usually do the lay out of my song in midi and use that as a basis for making a backing track with one of the styles.I then change the instruments within the style if I dont like something.After that I recently started transfering over to the DAW for mixing .The layout of my midi is verse/Chorus etc,The guys n girls on this forum and the staff of BIAB have been great I have to say,
Yours Hugh

Thanks for all of your comments. I will definitely check out Groove3 and the other ideas mentioned here

Something like that was what I had in mind posting this BB backing track:

Streets of Bakersfield. I(n Heaven There Ain't No Beer

You can see a standard 16 bar format, 4 lines of 4 measures.
You can see the chord progression.
Nice thing about this song is that the same 4 chords and progression
is used for each line, verse as well as chorus.
I'm curious. Are you able to fit the lyrics into the backing comps?