Band-in-a-Box 2017 New Feature - Drums Track Enhancement

There are many RealDrums enhancements including selectable timebase (half/double/triple-time), Multiple Drum/Percussion/Loops tracks, and more.

[Multi-Drums]

This allows you to put multiple drum/percussion parts, drum loops, UserTracks drums, and even RealTracks on the same Drums track, with volume mixer adjusting levels.

[Single Drums]

These are RealDrums that just have a single percussion instrument like tambourine, shaker, or bongos. You can easily add the single drums to Multi-Drums in the Create Multi-Drums dialog.

For example, you can add single drums instruments (e.g. Tambourine and Shaker), a bass drum loop and/or UserTracks drums to BossaBrushes Drums track. To do this, click on the Drums track button and go to Multi-Drums | Edit-Multi Drums for this song. You will then see the Create Multi-Drums dialog.

Make sure that you enable the "Enable Multiple Drums" checkbox. Then, enter a title in the "Title for Multi-Drums" text control.

To add drums, click on the […] button on an unused slot. This will show you a menu where you can choose a second RealDrums, [single] drum/percussion (e.g. tambourine), loop, UserTracks, or RealTracks. You can adjust volume for each with the "dB Offset" option.

If you want to use a pre-made Multi-Drums, select the Choose Existing Multi-Drums menu option from the Drums track button menu.

Drums can have selectable timebase: double-time (cut-time), half-time, or triple-time.

For example, if you have:

- an even 16ths Folk drums track at tempo 90, then you can choose Half-Time, and it will play even 8 feel with a style at tempo 180.

- an even 8 feel style at tempo 180, then you can choose Double-Time, and it will play at tempo 90 (Cut-Time) even 16ths feel.

- a fast waltz style at tempo 150, then you can choose Triple-Time, and it will play with a slow 4/4 style at tempo 50, which gives a triplet 12/8 feel.

Timebase can be stored with song, style, or RealDrums.

To select a timebase for the current song, right click on the Drums track button and go to Track Settings | Track Timebase, and click a timebase.

Or use the "Timebase" option in the RealDrums Picker.

To select a timebase for styles, go to the StyleMaker, open the Misc. Style Setting dialog, and use the "Timebase" option.

If the RealDrums is named with the timebase appended, it will function in that time base. For example, "BossaBrushes" is a normal Ev8 timebase, but "BossaBrushes [Double-Time]" would play this in a Cut-Time Ev16 feel.

RealDrums can be added to any track, not just the Drums track, so you can have more than one drums track.

To do this, right click on the track radio button and select Choose RealDrums from the menu. For example, let's add drums to the second track (which is usually called the Piano track). Click on the Piano track button and select the Choose RealDrums menu item. When the RealDrums Picker opens, select a RealDrums style and press the OK button. You will then have two Drums tracks.

When there are multiple drums tracks in a song, they will be automatically called Drums 1, Drums 2 etc.

RealDrums Shots/Pushes/Rests work with style changes and frozen Drums track.

Previously, this was not supported. No action is needed for this to work. Just add period(s) to chords, and the Drums track will follow them.

RealDrums Picker window now opens up much faster despite having more entries.

Previously, it took up to 5 seconds for the window to open on slower machines. Now, it opens up in less than a second.