PG Music Home Forums User-to-User Post your own Tips and Tricks here Becoming familiar with BIAB

I was going to make a post on familiarization with Styles only, until I remembered all the people here who Know a Whole Lot More than I do about BIAB. So I'm opening it up to BIAB as a whole and hoping that experienced users will add their thoughts. Speak to major topics, but keep it basic. This could become a very interesting and useful thread for newbies. (I suspect we could all learn something.)

New users, look elsewhere in this forum for other information on using BIAB. Questions about BIAB belong in the BIAB Forum.

Thanks,

Richard

Becoming familiar with BIAB Styles.

Here is part of how I did it, anyway. (BTW, I am speaking exclusively to MIDI Styles. Some of this may apply to Real Instruments, some won't.)

Listening is essential to learning music. BIAB is a musical program. Therefore it is essential to listen to BIAB. Stupid-basic, but stay with me.

BIAB is not Artificial Intelligence, although it sounds like it at times; it is an Expert System. (You can find out more than you want to know about expert systems in this Wiki article.) Styles are at the heart of BIAB's expertise.

What other application lets you listen to a Country song, then, with a mouse click, hear it as a Reggae tune? Then--in quick succession--Scott Joplin, an Irish jig, or a Swing tune? I entertained myself for a long time doing just that. It's easy to get lost in this, and I did. But eventually I entered some of my own songs. That's when the first epiphany happened.

I was listening to something I had written--this is important--in one Style, and playing it back in another, when BIAB did something totally unexpected. I think it played a flourish during a turnaround, but it isn't important. BIAB had done something a human player might, something I would not have thought of, and likely couldn't do if I had, since there were five instruments involved. This was my first clue to the incredible knowledge base which has been invested in this program. It's not about coding; it's about putting advanced human skills at your disposal.

Here, IMHO, is the best way to familiarize yourself with what BIAB offers you out of the box (so to speak ). Get a notebook and a sharp pencil, set aside an evening or two and just listen to Styles and Demos. Many of these are amazing, especially through a good synth. When you get ideas, mark them down elsewhere in your notebook, or stop and Follow Your Muse. But know that you are deferring the basic task--listening to BIAB. Get back to it ASAP!

I wanted to introduce a friend to BIAB, so we did a "lightning" session one evening. I'd play a Demo, we'd accompany it for one or two choruses, then do another. (A "video lead sheet" is another amazing feature.) (Did I say BIAB was amazing? It's amazingly amazing!) We went through dozens of Styles and Demos that night. He was amazed because he'd never heard BIAB. I was amazed--again--because, if you let it, BIAB will make you stretch. I played things I never would have otherwise.

To quickly learn how Styles can sound with your music, put in a short, distinctive chord progression with A & B parts at least, set it to Loop and have at it. (I say use "distinctive" progressions because these can bring out embellishments you might not hear otherwise.) Change Styles on the fly and you can hear a lot in a short time. Mute or replace various instrument sounds.

Learn how to make Hybrid Styles. An easy exercise would be to graft a human-type drummer into a Techno Style, or vice versa. Think. Imagine. Ask questions (in the BIAB Forum, please).

I'm really charged up now! I could keep going, but this is supposed to be basic. I hope you've learned something, and that other experienced users will contribute to this thread, too.

Richard

JUKE the BB demo folders in the background when surfing the web or doing other things.

This is how I have gotten my knowledge base of the BB Styles and what they are capable of doing, an ongoing project that has no endpoint in sight, but is fun.

Whenever I hear something that I really like while Juking the Demo folders, I bring BB to the foreground and either jot the particular folder and song filename into a wordpad file I've kept for ages or sometimes I simply resave the Demo song into one of my Work folders for future reference or use.

Also, running the Demo songs from pgmusic WHILE WATCHING THE PROGRAM WORK has taught me many things about BB very quickly. One can see how instruments are Rested, Held, Shots, etc. as done by the pgmusic stylemaking and songplaying pros, as well as a myriad of other tips and tricks by doing this.

And -- While you are listening to the Demo songs, be aware that the chords in many of them are chords taken from standards and famous songs with a new Melody added by pgmusic. Sometimes I just Juke the Demo folders with the Melody track muted, which often makes the target song these were created from just jump out at me. Again, I make a note of it or save the song to one of my work folders or both.


--Mac

Nobody but me could make hide nor hair of my abbreviations, Mike.

Sometimes even I stare at 'em and think, "What the #!$% does THAT mean?"

I don't believe in taking many notes, nor writing down lyrics or chords much anymore when songwriting.

Learned from a past master of songwriting that if you don't remember it then it likely wasn't worth remembering in the first place.

Put another way, "if you have to write it down in order to remember it, then it likely stinks."

At least, that's the way the late great Rich Mullins put it.

He never wrote any of his song lyrics down, always after the recordings were done he'd have to get a big Pepsi and sit with the studio secretary and dictate the libretto for the covers. And what libretto it was.

"if its good, you'll remember it."



--Mac

I had the same problem, John.

As with everything else music, the more I practice this thing, the better I get at it.

Not that I'm all that good, mind you.



--Mac