Band in a Box a great help

[Alpina]

I have posted this here because I feel this is the best place for this thread.
Sorry for the longish post.

Some of you might have read my previous post in the late bloomers section, where I related my frustrations at my lack of progress and how I have spent a fortune on books etc. I was looking for the quick fix.

Well in the last week I firmly believe I have found what I didnt know I was looking for.

Are you newbies sitting up??

Its called Band in a Box. I cannot tell you how great it is. But let me start at the beginning.

I have had Band in a Box (biab) on my pc for ages and ages after my friend sold me his copy. I had looked at it , tried to figure it out , it looked complicated etc and I forgot about it.

Last week I was at a friends house who is a great piano player and he had his pc running biab and he also had it hooked up to his piano

He started a backing track on biab and it sounded like there were guys playing the instruments in his front room. Wow.

Now when I had played my biab at home it sounded like a kids toy.

After rolling my toungue back into my head I asked my friend to show me the in's and outs of biab.

Right here goes. My idiots guide....kinda

Biab is a prog which will play a tune on your pc.
You can see the chords on the screen .
You can adjust the key it plays in.
you can print out the melody in your key... my case Bb
You can turn of the melody
you can enter your own chords
you can generate a solo to keep you company.

And thats .... just the little I know... This is what I have been doing the last week

Firstly I have been downloading songs from here
http://genlink.org/bb/

I choose songs with "m" showing it has a melody.
I then quickly change the key to suit my tenor sax. Print out the melody and then change the key back to its original state. eg C for me and Bb for the biab .

And then I play along for as long as I like. If I want I can watch the melody playing note for note... great for tricky parts... slow it down ... speed it up etc.

Another great thing to do is enter say C chords ...D chords etc and then practice my scales but transpose on the fly.

I mentioned that my biab sounded awfull but once I sorted out some drivers its great.

I dont think I will need to buy sheet music for a long time.

Do yourself a favour and go to
http://www.pgmusic.com/

and download a demo of biab.
that site has some great tutorials too.

I am certain that there will be some of the members on here will be wizz kids with the prog.


Good luck

[gary]

Alpina, that's very nice of you to share that. BIAB is a great tool. So great, that conversations on it have been bouncing around here for some time. You might be able to get more thoughts and helpful information by typing biab into the title search section of the advanced search function. There is a lot of interesting information there.

[Alpina]

Ahh Sensie Gary San.

I knew in my Hara that you would say that...:D

But unless you have prior knowledge, ie even knew it existed ( not a newbie looking in newbie sections then ......


I remember when I was learning my trade I struggled to carry out a task for a looong time. My journeyman said "oh it's made easy with this tool over here you twit"

He knew ... I didnt... Never made that mistake with my apprentices

But you are right the SEARCH function is the way to go .

[gary]

No, no Alpina. I know I'm the "search button" guy, but that post was sincere. Like you implied...a person doesn't know what they don't know until they know it. I was just trying to point the way (and method) to more info on BIAB. Perfectly innocent.

...for a change ;)

[goodsax]

Alpina: Thanks for reminding me that the BIAB tool I bought last month should be put to good use. I downloaded my purchased copy from pgmusic and pretty much have done nothing with it for about a month. My first look at it was a bit intimidating with the myriad features and options one must learn to make it work most effectively. I joined the BIAB forum at pgmusic and that's helped some, but I need to invest more time in it to get more out of it.

[Alpina]

Gary... You the man...:D

[gary]

goodsax (maybe Alpina too) if you didn't get one since you downoaded BIAB, I really encourage you to get 'hold of their tutor CD. These tutorials demystify things. Like I've said, I've had mine forever and I still find that going through the tutorials after I've gotten an upgrade is necessary. BIAB does so much, I just can't keep up with it all.

[goodsax]

Thanks Gary, I'll check it out.

[paplauskas]

There are many, many more features that BIAB has that I have considered very important:

1. Being able to print out the rythmn section comp parts for your band.
2. Using the Melodist feature to generate more lyrical solos for certain genres of music, such as ballads.
3. Creating backing tracks by rendering wav or midi files from the BIAB song, then copying them to CDs or MP3 players.
4. Using the harmony feature to create a horn section intro or interlude.

[Old Charlie]

goodsax (maybe Alpina too) if you didn't get one since you downoaded BIAB, I really encourage you to get 'hold of their tutor CD. These tutorials demystify things. Like I've said, I've had mine forever and I still find that going through the tutorials after I've gotten an upgrade is necessary. BIAB does so much, I just can't keep up with it all.

Gary,

Thanks for the advice. I initially got BIAB to just play along to but I think I can find so much more with the tutorial.

[goodsax]

goodsax (maybe Alpina too) if you didn't get one since you downoaded BIAB, I really encourage you to get 'hold of their tutor CD. These tutorials demystify things. Like I've said, I've had mine forever and I still find that going through the tutorials after I've gotten an upgrade is necessary. BIAB does so much, I just can't keep up with it all.I got home last night and was reminded I didn't get BIAB via download, but had it mailed to me complete with manuals and two CDs. It was like getting a surprise gift. Now, I just have to spend time going through the tutorial and other info.