Engineer..... You're new to BB. So... I don't think you understand what you actually have in your hands. I actually do it differently from your proposed way. Several folks here also do it very similar to the way I do.

As a songwriter.... you can do ALL the work using BB easily, and not have to farm it out to others. If you let the studio change the key, add other instruments, and do the work, they will charge you for each and every thing they do for you. Why pay them when you can do it all in BB yourself, easily.

With Band in a Box (BB) , you can do everything yourself, in house, except having a singer sing it if you don't sing. Practically everyone here is doing this very thing... most of us sing our own songs though. Pop in on some of our music sites listed in the links on our posts.

So... here's how I work.

I write and create the song in BB. I set up the key, structure, the tempo, the style and get it 100% like I want. Now... suppose I have an outside singer. I can send them the song as I exported it.... complete with drums, bass, piano, guitars, fiddle, etc.... If it's not in a compatible key, all I have to do is change the key in BB and regenerate the song.... which BB will do automatically. Instantly the whole song with every instrument is now in the key the singer has requested. One of my songs.... Come & Go was sung by 2 different ladies and each one needed it in a different key. No problem... BB did it in seconds.

So.. suppose you don't know how to mix the tracks.... Again, no problem. There are people in the forums who can help you with that. You can learn how to do it yourself.... OR.... you can do all the work in creating the tracks as I mentioned above.... and export each track as it's own file. You send those tracks to a mixing/mastering house and give them instructions on how you hear the mix of the finished song. They can do that much quicker than creating those files and therefore, you have a much lower out of pocket cost for the outside work.

I think there's probably a number of folks here who would jump at the chance to mix someones project for free. So don't overlook that option. Folks here like to help. There are forums for finished projects and there are forums for works in the process on the PG forum site. Ask questions, post links, and let us help you get to where you want to be as a musician and producer.


So... essentially in a nut shell... I write the song in BB setting it up like I want, then I use Real Band to generate audio tracks to embellish the song in the style selected in BB.... then I export all those tracks to my DAW which is Sonar. In Sonar, I mix, add FX like compression and reverb, and also sing and play the live tracks of guitar and piano. The result is a pro sounding mix ready for prime time.

Have a listen to the songs I have done in this manner at the link in my signature.


EDIT: yes... there are styles in BB that are only piano. No other instruments. You can easily change the style... with a simple click on a different style to switch between the piano only style to a full band style. Changing from 4/4 to 3/4 is also as simple to do... you simply select a style in that time signature. Don't like the smooth jazz style? CHange it instantly to funk, rock, country, blues, bluegrass, reggae, Celtic, or any other style that you see listed in your dropdown.

With BB, the only limits, as I like to say, is your imagination.

Last edited by Guitarhacker; 06/13/19 03:36 AM.
You can find my music at:
www.herbhartley.com
Add nothing that adds nothing to the music.
You can make excuses or you can make progress but not both.

The magic you are looking for is in the work you are avoiding.