Band In A Box

[cdeemer]

Anybody use this? I've been testing a demo and it looks pretty incredible.

[Doreen L.]

Can you give us a link? Thanks.

[Chuck Engels]

There is a great piece of software for the MAC called Garage Band.
I have been wanting to find something similar for the PC and I think Band In A Box might be it.
I sure would love to hear your thoughts on it

[Gerry]

It's been many moons since I used Band in a Box, but when I did, I thought it was great. My favorite thing was to enter in a set of chords for a piece of music, then "page" through the different styles and take a listen. I'm sure it's come a long way since I used it, but it was a long way ahead even back then.

(There's nothing like "Louie Louie" played as a bossa nova... )

[cdeemer]

After trying the demo for a week, I ordered it. I like it both as a creative tool and a learning tool.

Creative tool: It allows you to select from a huge list of music styles for accompaniment to a sequence of chords; it also will creative an endless number of original melodies for such a sequence, all of which you can edit and change (it also will create the chord sequence for you); it allows you to hear and select specific instrument solos for specific parts of a song; you can import and export midi files (for example, I compose in Finale -- I can export what I compose as a midi file, import to BIAB, then add and test a huge variety of musical styles and accompaniments. By the way, these are cool styles: George Shearing sounds like Shearing, Miles like Miles -- it appears to have a jazz emphasis.)

Education tool: I've been studying piano and music theory for a while now ... what I do in BIAB can be printed out as sheet music to learn; moreover, a jazz standards "fake book" compatible with BIAB is very inexpensive (yeah, I ordered it), so I can input a song like whatever, try different arrangements and styles, find one I like, print the music and learn it.

The demo video is 20 mins. long and especially useful. It's at http://www.pgmusic.com/demo.htm
and has both Windows and Mac versions.

[Chuck Engels]

I think you just sold me Charles, sounds like just what I have been looking for

[Chuck Engels]

Charles, what version did you buy and where did you buy it from?

[Doreen L.]

It sounds like it would be a lot of fun to play around with (Just what I need. Another new toy ).

[cdeemer]

I bought the 2008 MegaPak from Music Studio Direct, the seller at Amazon.

Here's something great about the seller. It was a day late being shipped from the estimate, so I called support. They said demand was so great they were behind: but they upgraded me to 2-day delivery without charge, promised it would be out the next day, and as I write I am expecting it this afternoon. They impressed me doing this.

And I'm like a kid at Xmas, waiting for it.

[Doreen L.]

You'll have to give us a review!

[Chuck Engels]

One of the Product Features listed on the 2007 version says
Chords from MP3 ("Audio Chord Wizard").

What does that mean I wonder? Can you import MP3s and somehow make new music with them?
I would love to be able to import an MP3 and create a similar instrumental version of some songs

[Dave McElderry]

When I try to access the download page (for the demo) it tries to load, but nothing happens. IE locks up and in unresponsive to anything. Anybody have any ideas what's going on?

[Chuck Engels]

I just downloaded the demo Dave, no problems here.
Did you go to this page?
http://nn.pgmusic.com/demos/demo_bbw.php

[Dave McElderry]

Finally worked this time, after some delay. Thanks.

[cdeemer]

One of the Product Features listed on the 2007 version says
Chords from MP3 ("Audio Chord Wizard").

Chuck, this is one of the more useful features for my uses. You can import a MELODY and it figures out chords that go with it. You can use other features to embellish or "jazz up" the selected chords. This is very useful in more complex "classical" type melodies, for example. Not so useful or necessary with simple pop songs.

As for a new melody, the Melodizer will create a melody to any chord structure. So you have an existing melody, say, import it and use chord wizard to get a chord sequence, then use melodizer to create a NEW melody to the sequence -- you can do this as many times as you want, a new melody is created each time.