Hi. My first post on the BIAB Forum and I hope someone can help with my problem.
I'm a jazz singer (started fairly recently) and purchased BIAB through LearnJazzStandards.com to generate some backing tracks to practice some material to sing at jam sessions. The musicians I play with all use IReal Pro so they can alter the key to suit the range of my voice.
Here's an example of a typical problem:
The chords in the LJS backing track of "Autumn in New York" in key of C are different from those in iReal Pro (C)
LJS first bar - Gm7 Bm7
IReal first bar Dm7 Em7
This difference applies to all the LJS songs I have looked at so far.
As I'm very new to BIAB, is there something I need to do to correct this?
Any thoughts, comments or suggestions would be very welcome.
Thanks
Charles
Welcome to the forum.
I have found the chords in the iRealPro app to be correct most of the time. You have to realize that users can upload songs of various accuracy, but the standards like this one are usually OK. In this case, "IReal first bar Dm7 Em7" is correct for the key of C.
I never heard of LJS so I looked at their website, but I would have to join to be able to see a chart. In this case, the first two chords could not be correct for any key of Autumn in New York. If the song were in F, it would start Gm7, Am7.
There are many standards available online for BIAB as well. Search for them using Google. A user, Notes Norton (nortonmusic.com) also offers fakebooks for sale of songs already in BIAB format.
Since everybody is using iRealPro I advise you to use it too. It's $14 and is either IOS or Android. I use Android. For that little money you're on the same page as everybody else and all you need to do is copy the chords from iRealPro into Biab and everybody's happy. I agree maybe 90% of the jazz standards are close enough for beginners. BUT...
If you want to get a bit advanced none of those charts are correct. The majority of these are taken from various editions of the Real Books and those books are done by musicians listening to the original recordings. Since those recordings were done by the absolute best players in the world they are never exactly correct because every bar a monster pianist, bassist or guitarist is changing things up. Yes, the "basic" chord could be a Gm for two bars but what he's actually doing is all kinds of different voicings, inversions, chromatic approaches, substitute chords. It's impossible to write that stuff out in a chord chart so they just use the basic stuff. In other words the Real Books are dumbed down and iRealPro can be dumbed down even further.
I'll give you a simple example with iRealPro, Autumn Leaves. I did a gig a few years ago where that tune was called and I hadn't played it in a long time. The chart in the book I had starts on Am but he called it in Cm so I thought I would just pull it up iRealPro on my phone and I wouldn't have to transpose it in my head. Several of the chords were wrong especially leading to the turnaround at the end! As I was playing I had to use the Am chart and it worked out. How can somebody upload a messed up Autumn Leaves? Another time it was another famous jazz standard and the whole 2nd ending was missing! And the Coda! What idiot posted that on the iRealPro forum?
Having said that I've found iRealPro to be pretty useful, it's bailed me out on some gigs, most of the charts are in fact good enough. Tell your friends to not count on iRealPro too heavily, check out the changes with the record and see if they work or not. If not work it out and correct it. It's clunky but you can correct those chords in the app.
Oh yeah, it's the same with many Biab songfiles you find on the internet. Some are great, some just OK and some are terrible. It's entirely possible somebody had an old version of Biab, he downloaded a bunch of Biab jazz songfiles and all he did was copy the chords and posted them on iRealPro. He many not even be a player, he's just a fan.
Bob
I completely agree with Bob here.
Notes Norton would be a very reliable source, though.
I completely agree with Bob here.
Notes Norton would be a very reliable source, though.
Yes, I have a few of Notes' fake discs and they are spot on.
Also...
You can enter the chords into BIAB in any key and then transpose those chords to any other key with a couple of clicks of the mouse.
Welcome to the forum.
I have found the chords in the iRealPro app to be correct most of the time. You have to realize that users can upload songs of various accuracy, but the standards like this one are usually OK. In this case, "IReal first bar Dm7 Em7" is correct for the key of C.
I never heard of LJS so I looked at their website, but I would have to join to be able to see a chart. In this case, the first two chords could not be correct for any key of Autumn in New York. If the song were in F, it would start Gm7, Am7.
Thanks for the reply. I made a typo. The LJS does start Gm7, Am7 not (Bm7) so in the key of F