I'm quite out of touch with BIAB's current capabilities. I know you could create custom styles for a very long time.
But can you create custom bass lines? Say in bars 1-8 you want a specific, note for note bass line including specific accents. Can you do this in BIAB?
A BIAB user for more than 30 years (if you can believe it) !
BIAB's current capabilities include "Playable Real Tracks" a capability that allows users to edit the real tracks (bass Real Tracks in your case) in their song to make the instruments play something note for note. In my limited experience, doing this is very similar to using the piano roll to edit a midi track (editing midi is something that BIAB has offered to users for as long as I can remember).
With that said, if your bass track is not a RealTrack bass but a midi bass, then the answer is a YES, by using good old piano roll or notation editing.
Others may be able to embellish or add on to these suggestions.
and of course with midi you can record the bass line you want with a midi keyboard.......i normally do it in RB as I find RB nore transparent than BIAB. choose the bass track, delete the notes you don't want and play in the ones you do.
BIAB's current capabilities include "Playable Real Tracks" a capability that allows users to edit the real tracks (bass Real Tracks in your case) in their song to make the instruments play something note for note. In my limited experience, doing this is very similar to using the piano roll to edit a midi track (editing midi is something that BIAB has offered to users for as long as I can remember).
With that said, if your bass track is not a RealTrack bass but a midi bass, then the answer is a YES, by using good old piano roll or notation editing.
Others may be able to embellish or add on to these suggestions.
Thanks Bruce. I am a little confused with your reply.
First it seems you are saying you can edit the Bass Real Track (which is what I'd like to do) even going so far as to say it's similar to editing a midi track (which I'm quite familiar with).
But then in the very next paragraph you seem to counter what you just said! You say with Midi, then YES. It sounds like you are saying with midi Yes, Real Track/audio No. Could you please clarify what you were trying to say?
A BIAB user for more than 30 years (if you can believe it) !
First it seems you are saying you can edit the Bass Real Track (which is what I'd like to do) even going so far as to say it's similar to editing a midi track (which I'm quite familiar with).
But then in the very next paragraph you seem to counter what you just said! You say with Midi, then YES. It sounds like you are saying with midi Yes, Real Track/audio No. Could you please clarify what you were trying to say?
The concept is a bit confusing, rather than Bruce's mention of it.
RealTracks are pre-recordings of a musician playing and are pitch/speed shifted to match your song.
MIDI is a stream of commands to drive whatever sound-engine you are using.
Playable RealTracks are a kind of hybrid.
When you make a section of a RealTrack into 'Playable', it changes the track's behaviour from "pre-recorded, shifted" to pure MIDI, and then uses sforzando to get samples from the RealTrack file to use as its MIDI sound samples. The result is that BIAB plays the RealTrack until it reaches the 'playable' bit, switches essentially seamlessly to the sforzando synth engine to generate the 'playable' bit, then switches back, again essentially seamlessly, to the RealTrack. Because the samples used all came from the RealTrack, tone, timbre, etc. all match nicely with the RealTrack.
It loses a little of the more natural sound of the pure RealTrack, but used in moderation that hardly notices.
Jazz relative beginner, starting at a much older age than was helpful. Kawai MP6, Korg M50, Ui24R, Saffire Pro 40. AVL:MXE Linux; Windows 11; Win8.1: Scarletts BIAB2022 UltraPAK, Reaper, a bunch of stuff.
"Playable RTs" are the best option within BIAB. The process isn't a clumsy as the nomenclature. Aside from playing & recording your own bass or synth it's what exists and isn't too bad. You could fool around with pitch, timing and such in something like Melodyne BUT that will REALLY screw with the sound.
Last edited by rayc; 09/17/2311:44 PM.
Cheers rayc "What's so funny about peace, love & understanding?" - N.Lowe
... The result is that BIAB plays the RealTrack until it reaches the 'playable' bit, switches essentially seamlessly to the sforzando synth engine to generate the 'playable' bit, then switches back, again essentially seamlessly, to the RealTrack. Because the samples used all came from the RealTrack, tone, timbre, etc. all match nicely with the RealTrack.
It loses a little of the more natural sound of the pure RealTrack, but used in moderation that hardly notices.
Thanks Gordon. This is what happens when you take an hiatus from BIAB for a couple of years. You miss these new features and the terminology that goes along with them.
I was quite familiar already with RealTracks, and so when Bruce started talking about 'Playable RealTracks' I just blanked the 'Playable' part and assumed he was talking about just RealTracks.
What I don't get with your explanation above is why the end result loses a little of the pure RealTrack natural sound? Heck I don't even know what the 'sforzando synth engine' is. I assume it's yet another synth sound. Midi plays synth sounds and then you have real audio sounds. Those are the BIG TWO and there really isn't anything else right?
So it seems you are saying Playable RealTracks splice together real audio sounds with synth sounds (in my case my bass line)? But you say it's very subtle and most people wouldn't notice the difference in sound. I can hear the difference between the two and that's why I always prefer working with real audio.
So we haven't yet reached the stage with BIAB where you can have it play real audio lines (with accents) that you have input?
Last edited by BIABman; 09/18/2306:38 AM.
A BIAB user for more than 30 years (if you can believe it) !
"Playable RTs" are the best option within BIAB. The process isn't a clumsy as the nomenclature. Aside from playing & recording your own bass or synth it's what exists and isn't too bad. You could fool around with pitch, timing and such in something like Melodyne BUT that will REALLY screw with the sound.
Thanks Ray!
A BIAB user for more than 30 years (if you can believe it) !
What I don't get with your explanation above is why the end result loses a little of the pure RealTrack natural sound? Heck I don't even know what the 'sforzando synth engine' is.
The RealTracks have the full playing style of the musician; the "playable" part is played from a MIDI segment, so any "live" expression can't easily be included. For that short part you get the slightly more robotic sound of a MIDI player, rather than the RealTrack.
Sforzando is a soundfont player rather than an, e.g., Moog-type synthesiser. It's perfectly capable of playing pretty good sounds of traditional instruments. It's the engine that PG use in the "Hi-Q" sounds. Much better than CoyoteWT.
The answer of course is to try it for yourself and see if it behaves as you want. It has its limitations, but pretty much everyone seems to think the "Playable" feature is a plus.
I presume in this case that "Hi-Q" refers to "high-quality" sounds. [For me as an engineer, the term implies a narrow-band filter.]
Jazz relative beginner, starting at a much older age than was helpful. Kawai MP6, Korg M50, Ui24R, Saffire Pro 40. AVL:MXE Linux; Windows 11; Win8.1: Scarletts BIAB2022 UltraPAK, Reaper, a bunch of stuff.
The RealTracks have the full playing style of the musician; the "playable" part is played from a MIDI segment, so any "live" expression can't easily be included. For that short part you get the slightly more robotic sound of a MIDI player, rather than the RealTrack.
OK so if I understand you correctly, when you add Playable Real Tracks you are adding the standard RealTracks plus a midi component (which is the 'playable part')?
The two are blended together?
I was hoping that the part that was played (midi) was then somehow turned into an audio track and merged with the RealTrack, so the net result would be all audio.
Perhaps this will happen in the next version or sometime in the future?
A BIAB user for more than 30 years (if you can believe it) !
The RealTracks have the full playing style of the musician; the "playable" part is played from a MIDI segment, so any "live" expression can't easily be included. For that short part you get the slightly more robotic sound of a MIDI player, rather than the RealTrack.
OK so if I understand you correctly, when you add Playable Real Tracks you are adding the standard RealTracks plus a midi component (which is the 'playable part')?
The two are blended together?
I was hoping that the part that was played (midi) was then somehow turned into an audio track and merged with the RealTrack, so the net result would be all audio.
Perhaps this will happen in the next version or sometime in the future?
You do get continuous audio. The method by which it's generated is what changes.
BIAB switches essentially seamlessly from RealTrack sound to a section of audio generated using MIDI to control audio extracted from the same RealTrack source file, then switches back to RealTrack. What you get out of the end of that is continuous audio.
It's the sforzando synthesiser that interprets the MIDI data into the audio, pretty much like any MIDI would interpreted.
I'm starting to recognise here that the words I use are sometimes confusing for people, partly because of language differences (British/American) and partly because I ascribe a specific meaning to a word that is perhaps unclear, i.e., in this case, I think "segment". In a 40-bar song, we might have 18 bars of RealTrack, two bars of "playable RealTrack" (MIDI) and 20 further bars of RealTrack. There would then be three segments of respectively 18, 2 and 20 bars duration. The first and last would be normal RealTrack play and the two-bar segment between them would comprise audio generated by sforzando.
Jazz relative beginner, starting at a much older age than was helpful. Kawai MP6, Korg M50, Ui24R, Saffire Pro 40. AVL:MXE Linux; Windows 11; Win8.1: Scarletts BIAB2022 UltraPAK, Reaper, a bunch of stuff.
MIDISuperTrack is a performance by a session musician but the performance is recorded midi data instead of audio. Band-in-a-Box then pairs the midi data with a Hi-Q instrument.
MidiSuperTracks can be edited just like regular midi.
You do get continuous audio. The method by which it's generated is what changes.
BIAB switches essentially seamlessly from RealTrack sound to a section of audio generated using MIDI to control audio extracted from the same RealTrack source file, then switches back to RealTrack. What you get out of the end of that is continuous audio.
It's the sforzando synthesiser that interprets the MIDI data into the audio, pretty much like any MIDI would interpreted.
... In a 40-bar song, we might have 18 bars of RealTrack, two bars of "playable RealTrack" (MIDI) and 20 further bars of RealTrack. There would then be three segments of respectively 18, 2 and 20 bars duration. The first and last would be normal RealTrack play and the two-bar segment between them would comprise audio generated by sforzando.
OK thanks Gordon! It sounds like this Playable RealTrack might actually work for me. But it seems I'll need to upgrade before I can try it out. I have BIAB v. 2021.
A BIAB user for more than 30 years (if you can believe it) !
MIDISuperTrack is a performance by a session musician but the performance is recorded midi data instead of audio. Band-in-a-Box then pairs the midi data with a Hi-Q instrument.
MidiSuperTracks can be edited just like regular midi.
Thanks Jim for this additional option. I'll have to look into it too.
A BIAB user for more than 30 years (if you can believe it) !
User Video: Next-Level AI Music Editing with ACE Studio and Band-in-a-Box®
The Bob Doyle Media YouTube channel is known for demonstrating how you can creatively incorporate AI into your projects - from your song projects to avatar building to face swapping, and more!
His latest video, Next-Level AI Music Editing with ACE Studio and Band-in-a-Box, he explains in detail how you can use the Melodist feature in Band-in-a-Box with ACE Studio. Follow along as he goes from "nothing" to "something" with his Band-in-a-Box MIDI Melodist track, using ACE Studio to turn it into a vocal track (or tracks, you'll see) by adding lyrics for those notes that will trigger some amazing AI vocals!
Wir waren fleißig und haben über 50 neue Funktionen und eine erstaunliche Sammlung neuer Inhalte hinzugefügt, darunter 222 RealTracks, neue RealStyles, MIDI SuperTracks, Instrumental Studies, "Songs with Vocals" Artist Performance Sets, abspielbare RealTracks Set 3, abspielbare RealDrums Set 2, zwei neue Sets von "RealDrums Stems", XPro Styles PAK 6, Xtra Styles PAK 17 und mehr!
Add updated printing options, enhanced tracks settings, smoother use of MGU and SGU (BB files) within PowerTracks, and more with the latest PowerTracks Pro Audio 2024 update!
Download and install this to your RealBand 2024 for updated print options, streamlined loading and saving of .SGU & MGU (BB) files, and to add a number of program adjustments that address user-reported bugs and concerns.
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For the larger Band-in-a-Box® packages (UltraPAK, UltraPAK+, Audiophile Edition), the hard drive backup copy is available for only $25. This will include a preinstalled and ready to use program, along with your installation files.
Backup copies are offered during the checkout process on our website.
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Handy flash drive tip: Always try plugging in a USB device the wrong way first? If your flash drive (or other USB plug) doesn't have a symbol to indicate which way is up, look for the side with a seam on the metal connector (it only has a line across one side) - that's the side that either faces down or to the left, depending on your port placement.
Update your Band-in-a-Box® 2024 for Windows® Today!
Update your Band-in-a-Box® 2024 for Windows for free with build 1111!
With this update, there's more control when saving images from the Print Preview window, we've added defaults to the MultiPicker for sorting and font size, updated printing options, updated RealTracks and other content, and addressed user-reported issues with the StylePicker, MIDI Soloists, key signature changes, and more!
A few excerpts:
"The Tracks view is possibly the single most powerful addition in 2024 and opens up a new way to edit and generate accompaniments. Combined with the new MultiPicker Library Window, it makes BIAB nearly perfect as an 'intelligent' composer/arranger program."
"MIDI SuperTracks partial generation showing six variations – each time the section is generated it can be instantly auditioned, re-generated or backed out to a previous generation – and you can do this with any track type. This is MAJOR! This takes musical experimentation and honing an arrangement to a new level, and faster than ever."
"Band in a Box continues to be an expansive musical tool-set for both novice and experienced musicians to experiment, compose, arrange and mix songs, as well as an extensive educational resource. It is huge, with hundreds of functions, more than any one person is likely to ever use. Yet, so is any DAW that I have used. BIAB can do some things that no DAW does, and this year BIAB has more DAW-like functions than ever."
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