The Steel Guitar Forum

What do you guys think of Band-In-A-Box. Does it really help your practice sessions?
Can it be used on stage with a laptop?
Thanks for the advice in advance.

As a practice and organizational tool it's the best ever! You can do simple charts and try out ideas in the privacy of your computer room. Great for learning to sight read and teaching yourself to improvize over any kind of chord progression.

As a backing track for live or recording puposes, it's a little robotic for my taste.

As far as I'm concerned, BIAB is the best thing that happened since sliced bread! I play primarily gospel music and have worked out arrangements in BIAB for about 50-60 gospel songs. I know it can be used in conjunction with a lap top but I obtained an Alesis unit years ago called "Data Disk". I can download my BIAB midi files to floppy disk and play them back through the Data Disk. I believe the rhythm tracks that Herb Steiner is selling were all created with BIAB.
The only way to fly!!!
Erv<FONT SIZE=1 COLOR="#8e236b"><p align=CENTER>[This message was edited by Erv Niehaus on 09 September 2003 at 01:20 PM.]</p></FONT>

Hi Erv,
Have you thought about selling your BIAB arrangements?, if they are as good as your Tab sheets they will benefit both you and others.

What exactly is Band in a Box guys?? Some sort of music composition software for PC;s??
Haven't encountered this before - thanks.

http://www.pgmusic.com/

Roger

BIAB is a nice program and allows anyone regardless of skill to type in a few chords
select a drum pattern and tempo and hit the play button..quick and dirty..plays back thru you PC or laptop soundcard..

but it will require some minimal expertise to create tracks that are not too stiff and robotic.

Is this a great practice tool ? you bet..Can you create some exotic tracks that are not stiff and robotic ? Yes..with some seat time...

A+ Highly recommended well worth the $50..or whatever it is now..

I use this program to create drum tracks and then play live Bass and Guitars over the drum tracks..For me it's a fine tool.
tp

Roger Davis & Tony Prior, many thanks for that, sounds pretty good. I should be able to figure it all out (I'm a software engineer after all) --- I have been looking for a tool like this for a while.

Get a hold of Big Jim Baron he sells BIAB and can answer any questions you have about the program.

Jim Baron [bigjim4b@madnet.net]

LeRoy

I have been using BINB since about 91. I have about 250 tunes put together and I use it in a dou.It is a great learning tool not only to play with but for music theary.Get it you won't be sorry,it is easy to use, just stay with the basics.
Don

I wish I would have had BIAB 25 years ago. Best tool I've ever had for practicing new tunes. Just select a style, type in the chords and start pickin'.

Ken
http://home.ipa.net/~kenwill

Band-in-the-Box is great but limited. I think it's great for creating a rhythm track. In fact, you can do it in about three minutes, assuming you know the basic chords.

What bugs me is that I want the base to do a certain "thing" and I want the piano or drums to do "that thing". So personally, I use BIAB to create the basic song structure, transfer the results to SONAR II (a real sequencer that gives me total control of MIDI and also allows me to record live sound), and do my tweaks in it. Of course, I not a real steeler and I could be leading you down an alley, but it works for me.

john

I 2nd the motion about Big Jim Baron- he is the king when it comes to Band In A Box for sales and service! BigJim4B@madnet.net

I think it's a GREAT tool for practice, especially if you like to try some rather "alternate" chord progressions (diminished, etc.) I think that the program does much better at faking the tones of drums, bass and organ than it does with piano, guitar and strings. Since you can adjust the volume of each instrument and choose the type of sounds, I usually emphasize the bass and drums, then choose the least cheesy-sounding keyboard and guitar tones (usually jazz organ and muted guitar) and turn them down. Putting bass notes in the chord inversions affects the rhythm instrument's sounds. Using the manual helps with ideas you might not have thought of yourself. I tape my tracks onto one track each of a four track cassette recorder, giving me two hours of tracks on a C-60 cassette. That way I don't have to keep my computer running every time I want to play.<FONT SIZE=1 COLOR="#8e236b"><p align=CENTER>[This message was edited by David Mason on 10 September 2003 at 02:44 AM.]</p></FONT>

best thing that's happened to my playing in 20 years.

Not to get too far into Computers (this thread may get moved to that forum area), does anyone have BIAB on a Mac using OS-X? I just got a Mac G4 with OS-X and bought the BIAB upgrade. Haven't installed the software yet.

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<font size=-1>Bill, steelin' since '99 | Steel page | My music | Steelers' birthdays | Over 50?</font>

Chippy,
I sure would be willing to share my BIAB tracks but I'm not sure of the method to do so.
Erv

Hi Erv,
I think BB (Band in the Box) files are very small so emailing them should work. You can also save BB files as .mid files. I believe BB files have the extention .sgu or .mgu. I would be interested in trying one, so email me if you wish.

Roger

Roger,
My BIAB files are on a computer that isn't connected to the internet. I have a loft over my garage that I keep my "stuff" in. I outgrew a walk in closet a looooong time age. Also, it's easier to sneak a new guitar into the house this way!
I figure the only way I could get my BIAB song files to someone would be via analog burned onto a CD. What do you think?
Erv

Erv,
You could just copy to a floppy disc, and then copy to a machine that is connected to the net. Just a thought.

If you record it as a wave file, two things will result:
1. nobody will be able to use the song in Band in a Box -- to edit, modify, etc. It would essentially be 'read only'.
2. you'll multiply the file size several hundred fold.

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<small>Larry Bell - email: larry@larrybell.org - gigs - Home Page
2003 Fessenden S/D-12 8x8, 1969 Emmons S-12 6x6, 1971 Dobro, Standel and Peavey Amps

Hi Erv,
What Larry said is correct...On your computer that has BIAB, you could save the songs (files) to a floppy disk, then bring that floppy to you web computer, and send the song as an attachment in a email...Does that make sense?

Roger

I'm thinking that the ones requesting my BIAB files are wanting them for accompaniment while playing my gospel tab. They don't have BIAB, they just need them to play along with. I already have the files on floppy disk as that's what I use in my "Data Disk". I feed the info from the Data Disk into a tone generator for playback.
Erv<FONT SIZE=1 COLOR="#8e236b"><p align=CENTER>[This message was edited by Erv Niehaus on 10 September 2003 at 12:11 PM.]</p></FONT>

Hi Erv,
I guess there are 3 possibilities...people who have BIAB would use bb files or midi files...people with a midi setup would use midi files...people with neither would use mp3 or waves on a cd...the last option would be the most time consuming for you to prepare...I would like to try bb files as I have the program...

Roger

I have BIAB 11,, its a great tool for practice, and I just received Big Jim Baron's CD with 4100+ files, it has styles and song files on it. I am just getting into the CD, but man I love it, especially the C_rprice.STY Thanks Big Jim and BIAB

Wayne

Erv,

Just copy the BB files with the Styles from the Floppies to a CD. That is it.

The BB and Style files are very small. You could put more than you have on one CD.

BIAB? I have had it since Version 1. Now at 11? Best practice and demo creation tool ever. I'll even bet some have used it for actual release recording (if programmed well enough) and with a good enough sound card.

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Bill Fulbright
Mullen D-10 8x7; Gibson ES-165; Yamaha SY-77; Peavey Vegas 400;
ICQ# 2251620 My Music Site