PG Music Home Forums General Discussion Recording, Mixing, Performance and Production Using BIAB in various time signatures 5/4, 12/8, 6/8, 9/8, 11/4 etc.

BiaB can already make music in any time signature, (except the n/8 that are not compund (triplet based) like (1/8, 3/8, 11/8…), or n/16 like 23/16 time sig)

Existing time signatures can include

1/4, 2/4, 3/4, 4/4, 5/4, 6/4, 7/4…. 11/4 etc.
3/8, 6/8, 9/8, 12/8 also supported. (This assumes treated as compound time signatures counted with triplet feel)

The thing that bugs people is that for time signatures higher than 4/4 like 5/4, 7/4 etc. we have a bar of 3/4 + 2/4. So you enter the bar of 7/4 over two bars instead of one. And in the case of 6/8 you enter two bars

On this discussion, people saying that we don’t have 6/8, 9/8, 12/8 time signature support is baffling to me.
For example, for 12/8. You can set the notation time signature to 12/8 and view 12/8 notation. And you can enter 3 chords per beat, which is 12 chords per bar. And more importantly, 100% of the styles, realtracks, realdrums work with these time signatures.

If you’re looking for something like 11/8 or 5/8, you’re correct in that we don’t support those yet.

> Unfortunately, there are not many B & B Styles in 6/8 so they recommend using 4/4 triplet feel. Well... I've tried for 2 days to get a 4/4 triplet feel track to line up with the main beats of a vocal that was recorded in 6/8 at 65BPM. I've checked ChatGPT and been given all these different timings to use but always the 4/4 track plays slower than the original 6/8 in my DAW. I still want to use B & B style so I can add solos etc. but cannot get things to line up. My DAW is Studio One.
Has anyone ever been successful in adding 4/4 tracks to a 6/8 recording? If so, please let me know how to do it.
I have Time Stretch turned off on the tracks in my DAW. I'm recording from B&B at the same bit rate. I'm totally confused.

==== REGARDING 6/8, 9/8, 12/8 in BIAB ===
I’m assuming that your 6/8 time signature is with a triplet feel, meaning 3 eighth notes per beat, and two of those beats make up the bar.

Almost all 6/8, 9/8, 12/8 songs are like that, and they are called compound time signatures.


The common reason that people “run off the rails” and “get all confused” with time signatures like 12/8, is that they mistakenly set their DAW to treating it as two 8th notes per beat, instead of three. That’s a big mistake. The solution is to realize that it is a compound time signature, and set it correctly to three 8th notes per beat.

For example, a 12/8 song with tempo of 60. This means you count and tap your foot at a tempo of 60, and count three triplets for each beat. And there are 4 beats to tsp in the bar. This is exactly the same as 4/4 tempo 60 with a triplet feel.

If the song was instead 9/8 tempo 60, the same reasoning applies and it’s exactly counted and treated like 3/4 with triplet feel
If the song was instead 6/8 tempo 60, the same reasoning applies and it’s exactly counted and treated like 2/4 with triplet feel.

======
REALITY CHECK
If you’re not agreeing with me up to this point, watch a video like this on 6/8, 9/8, and 12/8 (the compound time signatures).

Now: do you agree with me, and this lady in the video that explains 12/8, 9/8 and 6/8. If so, great, we are in the same page.
=======

Here’s how you use that in biab.
For 12/8. Set the notation time signature to 12/8. This is done by pressing the button that says [4/4] on the toolbar for the notation. Then choose any style you want, sewrch for styles with 12/8 in the text, and a triplet feel.
For 9/8, same as above but set notation to 9/8.
For 6/8, same as above but set notation to 6/8. Note that you will be entering two bars of 6/8 in each BiaB bar, and the notation will show you these two bars. (If you insist on seeing one bar represent each bar of 6/8, set the time signature in BiaB to 2/4. I don’t recommend this, since the resultant arrangement will sound worse).

Entering chords. For 12/8 you can enter 12 chords per bar. By default the chords are entered on the first beat of each group, allowing you 4 chords per bar. But if you want to enter three chords you’d enter them with the multi chords dialog which has 12 rows per bar (when set to triplets).

Paul,

You may have made a mistake in the DAW when you set the time signature. This is a common mistake.m
6/8 with triplet feel has three 8th notes per beat. So the DAW (e.g. Reaper) typically gives you two options. To either:

For a triplet feel 6/8 song, in your DAW

(Right!) - set 6/8 as a compound time signature with THREE 8th notes per beat, and you tap your foot every three 8th notes. .
Or
(Wrong!) - set 6/8 as TWO 8th notes per beat and you tap your foot every two 8th notes



Here’s an example of someone who has made a mistake in their DAW
“I have a midi track in my DAW that is in 6/8 time. Tempo is set to quarter note = 80; i.e. dotted quarter note = 53.“

Once that mistake has been made, the user will be very confused about tempos. Because almost all 6/8 are triplet feel, which means the tempo of the song is 53. Yet the user is referring to a tempo of 80, and nothing in the song has a tempo of 80. The user needs to set to 6/8 compound time signature, which means three 8th notes per beat. Most DAWS allow this (like reaper)

Peter you say "...your 6/8 time signature is with a triplet feel, meaning 3 eighth notes per beat, and two of those beats make up the bar."

Yes, I concur. But when I "import from my midi file..." to get my chords into BIAB, I end up with four beats per bar [123, 456, 123, 456].
How do I fix that? I have attached the .sgu via link.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1cTi5sqPuVlAVw5esn39n8CvJlWKf8to6/view?usp=sharing

Dan

Thanks for the .sgu. Do you have the midi file to upload as well. So I can hear what it’s supposed to sound like.

You bet I do.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1_Z_aoDU4CdDp13nacyeRlnLKePFY14Qe/view?usp=sharing

If you can help me get these chords into BIAB I will try to follow all other instructions as best I can...

Thanks
Dan

Great. And is the chord progression on the web somewhere? So I can know what the “right answer” should be. If so please point me to the leadsheet.

Thanks I can get you that. I just got on the road but will look into it later in the afternoon. I appreciate your feedback on this.

A good example of the unnecessary confusion over 12/8 time woild be the Song “Blueberry Hill”

Now if i asked you to write out the chords to blueberry hill, I’d expect you would do it in 4/4 time signature and the chords would be in key of C.

Thrill on blueberry hill
4/4 | F | F | C | C |

Easy-peasy

But wait, many people say the song Blueberry Hill is in 12/8, like this leadsheet https://www.sheetmusicdirect.com/en...fPdju4AUL2wOKzmggGn1yWM2EqxoCKYgQAvD_BwE

And so how do enter it now?. The answer is the exact same way, since 4/4 = 12/8. So your chords will look identical, and you just pick any 4/4 song with a triplet feel;

But wait, I’m an avid music reader, and want to see the notation done as 12/8 in BiaB. No problem! Just press the time sig button on the notation toolbar and select 12/8 and you’ll see it notated just like you do on that sheetmusicdirect link I posted above. You don’t have to redo any notation, just select 12/8 or 4/4 as you see fit.

Here’s a nice “proof” that 9/8 is the same as 3/4 time. Look at Bach’s Jesu Joy of man’s desiring.

It’s written out here for lead violin (in 9/8) and trumpet, viola and violin in 3/4. All playing at the same tempo, on the same score. That’s an example of the two time signatures being interchangeable. All that is different is the notation, and BiaB has a button to switch between 9/8 and 3/4 for that purpose.

Same idea makes 12/8 = 4/4
and 6/8 = 2/4
Or better still for BiaB, two bars of 6/8 =4/4

Once you do that, the complicated world of 12/8, 6/8 and 9/8 become your old friends 4/4 and 3/4.

> Thanks I can get you that. I just got on the road but will look into it later in the afternoon. I appreciate your feedback on this.

Great. I expect that much of the confusion results from importing midi files, that may be done various ways. For example if the midi file has it set to two 8th notes per beat, the. 12/8 woild be all screwed up, since there are three eighths notes per beat;

If so, I could add functions to convert the midi data to the correct time base after import.

Here is the chart for the arrangement of the midi file I sent prior.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1OoVnrrL9nfC_PGQdZQg4lQxrLtH2wgUT/view?usp=sharing

Dan,

Thanks for sending the chart. Yes, the BiaB SGU file (in 4/4) matches the chords in the 6/8 leadsheet that you sent.
As mentioned, 6/8 is 2/4, so two bars of 6/8 match 4/4. Now you will be able to choose any 4/4 style with a triplet feel and this will play well over the song. I don’t see anything wrong.

I feel like I am left hanging here...

You are telling me I make no adjustments to tempo (90 in my DAW and 90 in BIAB). OK that sounds reasonable. And I can use any style which is 4/4 as long as it has a triplet feel? How do I query/search the style library for that criteria? And I set BIAB to 2/4. Is that right?

If i do all that I will be able to generate RTs which I can drag and drop over in Reaper which will sync in time and tempo and groove/feel with my 6/8 song?

OK, it is late at night so I will have to dig into this tomorrow.

Dan

Leave the time sig at 4/4. Each bar will have two bars of your 6/8 song.
To query the library, you can, in the stylepicker

Filter the feel to Swing8
Filter to the tempo you want
Filter to the genre (likely pop)

Then try out styles.
If you want, you can do a text filter of 12/8 or 6/8, that searches the memo, but lots of styles have triplet feels and aren’t described as 12/8 in the memo

I put about an hour plus into this and concluded I can not get it to work for me. That is not saying BIAB will not do its part, I am only saying I can not make it work out for me. I started this 6/8 project specifically to write in 6/8 as a learning exercise. And that objective is being met. What I have concluded so far is that:

1) I understand "most" of what Peter has said about how to count 6/8. And it is clear there is a ready association with 4/4 counted as triplets. I get that...
2) I discovered that designating 6/8 time signature in Reaper or in EZKeys makes absolutely no difference to what you hear, only to how the notation appears. The most immediatly noted difference the number of bars in the song. My demo song in Reaper and EZKeys is 95 bars when set to 6/8 but only 70 bars when set to 4/4. But again, sounds exactly the same.
3) I was able to bring the midi piano track from Reaper into BIAB. However, regardless of time signature, I was not able to duplicate the number of bars. BIAB only shows ~49 bars when 4/4 is specified. This was a serious problem in syncing when I brought any RTs back into Reaper. The track did not line up in time?
4) I do admit, the 90 tempo across Reaper or BIAB seemed to match (I was surprized).

Bottom line for me... I can't do it! Perhaps if I did the entire song from scratch in BIAB I could avoid the problems I had. But that is not my workflow. My chords come from other sources. I wish BIAB would allow cut and paste, cause I believe my problem maybe with the midi input with ACW. We have talked about our wish that BIAB would play better with, as Mario has stated, "the rest of the world". But that is another thread.

> My demo song in Reaper and EZKeys is 95 bars when set to 6/8 but only 70 bars when set to 4/4. But again, sounds exactly the same.

You’re describing a project #2. What happened to project #1, where we left off where you had the chords correctly imported into Biab, and you asked for help on finding a style for it?

Please note that this applies to the .sgu file that you sent to me (for project #1) at https://drive.google.com/file/d/1cTi5sqPuVlAVw5esn39n8CvJlWKf8to6/view?usp=sharing

Did you find a style, and did it sound good in BiaB (as a 4/4 style)?
Here were my suggestions (pasted from my message above)
====

Leave the time sig at 4/4. Each bar will have two bars of your 6/8 song.
To query the library, you can, in the stylepicker

Filter the feel to Swing8
Filter to the tempo you want
Filter to the genre (likely pop)

Then try out styles.
If you want, you can do a text filter of 12/8 or 6/8, that searches the memo, but lots of styles have triplet feels and aren’t described as 12/8 in the memo

====

I wonder if this is the way EZKeys does it?

I mentioned that my songwriting partner often writes in 6/8 and sends me over her piano track, and that for me to create a BIAB track that will match the piano I need to reduce the chord durations by 1/2 and reduce the tempo by 2/3. In the example above 80 *2/3 = 53.333 (which you couldn't do in BIAB actually, because you can't enter fractions, she would need to change the tempo at her end to be 79.5 for me to build a BIAB track at 53)

My point is, if Peter says it's a mistake, does that mean EZKeys is doing it wrong?

I don’t think it’s a mistake in EZKeys.

If your partner has correctly created a 6/8 song at a tempo of 80, you will be tapping your foot at 80 beats per minute. Regardless if the time signature is called 2/4, 4/4, 6/8 or 12/8.

If your partner has selected 6/8 time signature in the DAW, remember there are two variants of 6/8. The usual one has three 8th notes per beat, and the other one has two 8th notes per beat. If your partner has set that up wrong in their DAW, you would see the issue where the DAW thinks it is tempo 80, but the correct tempo if you tap your foot every three triplets is 53.33.

There is only 1 project! The .sgu file from my midi was NOTcorrect. The midi file had 70 bars of 4/4 and only 49 bars of 4/4 in BIAB after import.

Yes I did audition several swing 8 styles. I said they were promising (feasible), but with the missing bars it was near impossible to tell where I would place the RT audio when I dragged to Reaper.