Pg Music Band In A Box Realband User Guide PowerTracks Pro Audio
Band in a Box - RealBand - User Guide RealBand_2010_5_windows_en Free User Guide for Band in a Box Software, Manual
2015-07-27
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®
Version 2010.5 for Windows
®
Copyright © PG Music Inc. 2010. All rights reserved.
PG Music Inc. License Agreement
CAREFULLY READ THE FOLLOWING TERMS AND CONDITIONS BEFORE COMPLETING THE
INSTALLATION OF THIS SOFTWARE. USAGE OF THE SOFTWARE INDICATES YOUR ACCEPTANCE
OF THE FOLLOWING TERMS AND CONDITIONS.
LICENSE
A. The program may only be used on a single machine.
B. You may transfer the program and license to another party if the other party agrees to accept the terms of
this Agreement. If you transfer the program, you must either transfer all copies, whether in printed or
machine readable form, to the same party, or, destroy all copies not transferred. This includes all
modifications and/or portions of the program merged into other programs.
C. You may receive the program in more than one media. Regardless of the type or size of media you receive,
you may install or use the media on a single machine.
D. The program (including any images, “applets,” photographs, animations, video, audio, music, and text
incorporated into the program) is owned by PG Music Inc. or its suppliers, and is protected by international
copyright laws and international treaty provisions.
You may not use, copy, or transfer the program, or any copy, modification or merged portion of the program, in
whole or in part, except as expressly provided for in this license. If you transfer possession of any copy,
modification or merged portion of the program to another party, your license is automatically terminated.
LIMITATION OF REMEDIES
PG Music Inc.’s entire liability and your exclusive remedy shall be:
A. The replacement of any media not meeting PG Music Inc.’s “Limited Warranty,” which are returned to PG
Music Inc., or an authorized PG Music Inc. dealer, with a copy of your receipt.
B. If PG Music Inc. or the authorized dealer is unable to deliver replacement media which is free of defects in
materials or workmanship, you may terminate this agreement, and your money will be refunded.
In no event will PG Music Inc. be liable to you for any damages, including but not limited to lost profits, lost
savings, or other incidental or consequential damages arising out of the use or the inability to use such program,
even if PG Music Inc. or an authorized PG Music Inc. dealer has been advised of the possibility of such damages, or
for any claim by any other party.
TRADEMARKS
Band-in-a-Box®, CloudTracks™, CopyMe®, GuitarStar®, JazzU®, PG Music®, PowerTracks Pro®, RealBand®,
RealDrums®, and RealTracks® are either the trademarks or registered trademarks of PG Music Inc. in the United
States, Canada, and other countries. Microsoft® and Windows® are either registered trademarks or trademarks of
Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or other countries. Apple®, the Apple logo, Leopard®,
Macintosh®, Mac®, Panther®, Power Mac®, QuickTime®, Snow Leopard®,Tiger®, and TrueType® are
trademarks of Apple Computer, Inc., registered in the U.S. and other countries. IBM® is the registered trademark of
International Business Machines Corporation. Roland® and “Roland” Logo, EDIROL® and “EDIROL” Logo,
GS® and “GS” Logo, are registered trademarks and “MIDI2” Logo, EDIROL Virtual Sound Canvas Multi Pack,
VSC-MP1™ are trademarks of Roland Corporation. ASIO is a trademark and software of Steinberg Media
Technologies GmbH. VST is a trademark of Steinberg Media Technologies GmbH. Other brands and their
products are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective holders and should be noted as such.
PATENTS
Band-in-a-Box is protected under US Patent 5990407. The TC-Helicon Harmony feature in Band-in-a-Box and
PowerTracks Pro Audio is protected under US Patents 5567901, 5641926, 5986198, 34583, 296.80.173.9,
PI9603819.5, 0368046, 0750776, 6,046,395, and patents pending.
Printed in Canada
2
PG Music Inc. License Agreement
Table of Contents
PG Music Inc. License Agreement .................................................Error! Bookmark not defined.
Table of Contents .......................................................................................................................... 3
Chapter 1: Welcome ..................................................................................................................... 7
About RealBand ........................................................................................................................................................7
Installation .................................................................................................................................................................8
Setup and Configuration ............................................................................................................................................8
Audio Drivers Tutorial ............................................................................................................................................15
Chapter 2: New Features in RealBand 2010 ........................................................................... 19
Chapter 3: Tutorial – Guided Tour of RealBand .................................................................... 21
What is RealBand? ..................................................................................................................................................21
Getting Started.........................................................................................................................................................21
Introduction to the Tracks and Mixer Windows ......................................................................................................23
Creating a New Song Arrangement .........................................................................................................................24
Importing Songs ......................................................................................................................................................33
Mixing in RealBand.................................................................................................................................................36
Chapter 4: The Main Screen..................................................................................................... 38
The Status Bar .........................................................................................................................................................38
The Menu Bar..........................................................................................................................................................38
Toolbars...................................................................................................................................................................38
The Piano Keyboard ................................................................................................................................................43
Windows..................................................................................................................................................................44
Chapter 5: Using MIDI Features............................................................................................... 51
Overview .................................................................................................................................................................51
Using DXi and VSTi Synthesizers ..........................................................................................................................51
Loading and Playing MIDI Songs ...........................................................................................................................53
Conductor Window..................................................................................................................................................58
Tracks Window........................................................................................................................................................61
Chapter 6: BB Tracks and MIDI tracks................................................................................... 70
Overview .................................................................................................................................................................70
Creating a New Song Arrangement .........................................................................................................................70
Table of Contents
3
Recording Your Own MIDI Tracks.........................................................................................................................76
Editing BB Tracks and MIDI tracks ........................................................................................................................79
Split MIDI drums.....................................................................................................................................................83
Chapter 7: Digital Audio Features ............................................................................................ 84
Overview .................................................................................................................................................................84
Loading and Playing Audio Files ............................................................................................................................84
Real Time Effects Plug-Ins......................................................................................................................................86
Chapter 8: Audio Production .................................................................................................... 91
Overview .................................................................................................................................................................91
Generating RealTracks ............................................................................................................................................91
Generating RealDrums ............................................................................................................................................94
Recording Audio Tracks..........................................................................................................................................96
Rendering MIDI Tracks to Audio............................................................................................................................99
Audio Menu Commands..........................................................................................................................................99
Editing Audio Tracks.............................................................................................................................................101
Saving Audio Files ................................................................................................................................................108
Auto-Backup of .SEQ Files ...................................................................................................................................108
Wave Files .............................................................................................................................................................108
Chapter 9: Notation and Printing ........................................................................................... 110
Notation .................................................................................................................................................................110
Lead Sheet Notation Window................................................................................................................................124
Printing ..................................................................................................................................................................129
Chapter 10: Piano Roll Window............................................................................................. 132
Overview ...............................................................................................................................................................132
Note Panel .............................................................................................................................................................134
Graphic Event Panel ..............................................................................................................................................135
Right-click Contextual Menu ................................................................................................................................136
Display Controls ....................................................................................................................................................137
Chapter 11: Mixer Window .................................................................................................... 139
Overview ...............................................................................................................................................................139
Track Controls .......................................................................................................................................................140
Master Controls and Mixer Utilities ......................................................................................................................142
Creating Audio Subgroups in the Mixer................................................................................................................143
Real Time Audio Effects .......................................................................................................................................144
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Table of Contents
Chapter 12: Wizards, Tools, and Plug-Ins ............................................................................. 147
Audio Chord Wizard .............................................................................................................................................147
Conductor Window................................................................................................................................................154
TranzPort Support - Wireless Remote Control......................................................................................................158
Pitch to MIDI Converter........................................................................................................................................160
MIDI Guitar Cleanup.............................................................................................................................................162
Convert to WMA (Windows Media Audio) ..........................................................................................................162
Miniburn ................................................................................................................................................................163
DirectX (Windows Audio Plug-In Format) ...........................................................................................................165
Dynamic 3D Drum Kit Window............................................................................................................................165
Guitar Tuner ..........................................................................................................................................................169
MIDI Monitor ........................................................................................................................................................172
Chapter 13: Reference.............................................................................................................. 177
The File Menu .......................................................................................................................................................177
The Edit Menu .......................................................................................................................................................183
The Audio Menu....................................................................................................................................................199
The Track Menu ....................................................................................................................................................202
The Action Menu...................................................................................................................................................206
The Block Menu ....................................................................................................................................................214
The Options Menu .................................................................................................................................................215
The Window Menu................................................................................................................................................234
The Help Menu......................................................................................................................................................259
Appendix A: PG Music DirectX Plug-Ins............................................................................... 262
PG Reverb .............................................................................................................................................................262
PG Echo Chorus ....................................................................................................................................................262
PG Peak Limit .......................................................................................................................................................263
PG Dynamics.........................................................................................................................................................265
PG Ten Band EQ ...................................................................................................................................................267
PG Five Band EQ ..................................................................................................................................................268
PG Flanger.............................................................................................................................................................269
PG AutoWah .........................................................................................................................................................270
PG Distortion.........................................................................................................................................................270
PG RingMod..........................................................................................................................................................271
PG Tremolo ...........................................................................................................................................................272
PG Real Time Analyzer.........................................................................................................................................272
Table of Contents
5
PG Vinyl Tool .......................................................................................................................................................274
PG Vocal Remover................................................................................................................................................279
Appendix B: Keystroke Commands........................................................................................ 282
Appendix C: MIDI Controller Numbers ............................................................................... 284
PG Music Inc. ............................................................................................................................ 286
Index........................................................................................................................................... 287
Registration Form..................................................................................................................... 296
How to Register .....................................................................................................................................................296
6
Chapter 1: Welcome
Chapter 1: Welcome
Congratulations, and thank you for your purchase of RealBand, your all-in-one
audio workstation and accompaniment program!
RealBand is a program that combines the most popular features from PG Music’s PowerTracks
Pro Audio and Band-in-a-Box programs into an all-in-one sequencing program with automatic
accompaniment.
RealBand offers powerful features for musicians, students, and songwriters. With intelligent
automatic arrangements, RealTracks live instrument tracks, RealDrums live drum tracks, the
amazing Audio Chord Wizard, seamlessly integrated digital audio/MIDI recording, built-in
DirectX effects, and notation, RealBand turns a typical PC into a music production powerhouse.
This documentation will provide you with information on how to get the most out of the great
features that RealBand has to offer.
Updates and improvements to this version of the program are ongoing and are freely available at
www.pgmusic.com.
About RealBand
RealBand is a fully-featured and powerful music arranging, sequencing, and digital recording
program. RealBand is the perfect tool for musicians, students, and songwriters alike.
Features included in RealBand
• Intelligent automatic accompaniment by Band-in-a-Box.
• RealTracks and RealDrums – automatic live instrument parts.
• Audio Chord Wizard interprets chords from audio files.
• 48-track MIDI/audio mixer with multiple FX busses (up to 16 effects per track).
• Support for popular audio file formats – MP3, WMA, WMV, WAV, and CDA.
• Built-in DirectX audio effects.
• DirectX and VST plug-ins supported.
• Band-in-a-Box files load directly.
• Compatible with all Band-in-a-Box styles and Real instruments.
• Shares native .SEQ file type with PowerTracks Pro Audio, directly compatible.
• Support for MIDI and Karaoke files.
• Karaoke lyrics window.
• Piano roll window with graphic controller editing.
• Onscreen notation and lead sheet style printout.
• Virtual guitar fretboard and piano keyboard.
• …and much more!
Have fun!
Chapter 1: Welcome
7
Installation
Minimum System Requirements
-
Windows® 9x/ME/NT/2000/XP/Vista/7.
-
Windows XP or higher is required for some features.
-
128 MB RAM.
-
Digital audio features require a fast Pentium processor. May run on slower computers (untested). MIDI
features require a 486 (or better).
-
75MB hard drive space (much more if recording digital audio).
-
MIDI system (MIDI interface/MIDI synthesizer) or PC sound card.
-
Digital audio system (16-bit Windows compatible sound card).
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Headphones or amplified speaker system.
Installing the Program
Use any of the three methods described. SETUP.EXE will copy all of the program files to your RealBand folder
(usually C:\RealBand) and install icons to a RealBand program group. Click on the RealBand icon or run
RealBand.exe to open the program and configure the setup.
Method 1 – Auto Run.
1.
Insert the program CD-ROM into the CD drive.
2.
In a few seconds, a browser window will open listing the CD contents.
3.
Double click on SETUP.EXE to run the installation program.
Method 2 – My Computer.
1.
Insert the program CD-ROM into the CD drive.
2.
Access your CD-ROM drive from the Windows desktop by double clicking on the My Computer icon.
3.
Then, double-click on the CD-ROM drive icon and double-click again on the SETUP.EXE program found in
the root or main folder of the CD-ROM.
Method 3 – Start Menu.
1.
Insert the program CD-ROM into the CD drive.
2.
From the Windows [Start] button select Run.
3.
Type D:\SETUP in the “Open:” command line box. If your CD-ROM drive uses another drive letter type the
appropriate letter, e.g., E:\SETUP.
4.
If you don’t know the drive letter for your CD-ROM you can use the [Browse…] button to find it.
When installation completes you can select the option to “Launch RealBand” and continue with configuring it to run
on your computer system.
Setup and Configuration
Step One - MIDI Setup
The first time the program runs you will be prompted to select a MIDI device from a list of currently installed
devices (e.g., SB Audigy MIDI IO, Microsoft GS Wavetable SW Synth, etc.). If you don’t see the MIDI Driver
Setup dialog automatically it can be reached by selecting MIDI Devices from the Options pull-down menu. Select
the MIDI device (or devices) that you want to use with RealBand (optionally) set the internal MIDI clock/timer in
milliseconds.
This clock/timer setting determines how often the computer should reset its “MIDI watch.” If you ever find you
need an even higher degree of MIDI accuracy (and your system is extremely fast) you can decrease this number, say
to 5, and the MIDI clock will be checked and reset twice as often. The default is 10 milliseconds (1/100th of a
second) –which is fine for most systems.
8
Chapter 1: Welcome
A MIDI setup using the sound card for MIDI Input with MIDI Output re-routed to a DXi synth.
The MIDI Input Driver is the port that your MIDI controller, for example a MIDI keyboard or MIDI guitar
controller, is attached to.
The MIDI Output Driver selection is the port that your MIDI synthesizer (e.g. Sound Canvas) or an internal sound
card, DXi, or VSTi synth is connected to.
Note: This is a straightforward procedure and you should encounter no difficulties selecting a MIDI driver. However, if you
do experience any difficulties selecting a MIDI driver, or you do not see your sound card’s internal synth or MIDI interface
listed in the MIDI Driver Setup dialog, you may not have the appropriate MIDI drivers installed or configured in your
Windows System.
Software Synthesizers
RealBand supports both DirectX (DXi) and VSTi software synthesizers, which allow RealBand to play high quality
sounds directly through your computer sound card, without requiring any external MIDI hardware.
DXi Synthesizer Support
To use DXi (DirectX instrument) synthesizers with RealBand, you can think of the DXi as a type of “MIDI Output
Driver.” As such, you can either visit the MIDI Driver Setup dialog (Options | MIDI Devices) and select the “ReRoute MIDI Playback to Default DXi Synth” checkbox to send all MIDI playback to the default DXi synth, or you
can assign DXi synths to individual tracks in the Tracks window.
Routing to Default DXi Synth
The “Default DXi Synth:” combo box lets you select which DXi (or VSTi) synth is used as the default software
synth.
Chapter 1: Welcome
9
The “Re-Route MIDI playback to default DXi Synth” setting will cause RealBand to re-route all MIDI playback to
the default DXi or VSTi synth. This is the easiest way to use a DXi softsynth for playback.
If this option is checked, then all MIDI tracks’ playback output will be routed to the default DXi/VST synth
regardless of the individual track’s port number.
VSTi Synthesizer Support
Installing a VSTi Synthesizer
To select a VSTi synthesizer for the first time, click on the [DXi] toolbar button to open the
DirectX/VST Window.
Select >> Synth 16<< in the Track list.
In the Plugin list, select “Add VSTi Plugin...” at the bottom of the list.
Note: VSTi synthesizer plug-ins have the text ““ prepended to the
plug-in name, and VST effects plug-ins have ““ prepended to the
plug-in name.
VST/VSTi plug-ins are often located in the Program Files folder in a subfolder named VST plug-ins, but they
could also be in a folder named Steinberg, or wherever else they have been installed on the hard drive.
Select a VSTi plug-in .dll file in the following Select a VST plug-in dialog, and it is added to the plug-in list. After
you add each VST, the plug-in is permanently added to the list. You only have to add each plug-in one time.
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Chapter 1: Welcome
Now your VSTi synthesizer will be available along with the DXi Synth selections in the MIDI Driver Setup dialog.
Latency Adjustment
Pressing the [Latency Adjust] button in MIDI Driver Setup or the [Soft Synth Latency Adjust] in Options |
Preferences | Audio opens the Soft Synth Latency Adjust dialog. This lets you adjust for fine tuning latency
settings for MIDI (non-DXi, and non-VSTi) soft synths.
This works by playing a song called LatencyAdjust.SEQ (included with RealBand) which contains a MIDI note and
audio note. Pressing the [Start] button starts the playback; you can then tweak the Soft Synth Latency MS setting
until you hear the MIDI and audio tracks are in sync.
Note: If the notes sound in sync but you later play a song and the MIDI and audio still sound like they are out of sync, then
likely you overshot the correct MS setting by 500ms. If this happens, we recommend starting the adjustment again at a
value of zero and increasing it until you hear the MIDI and audio notes in sync.
Step Two - Digital Audio Setup
RealBand includes an auto-configuration utility to profile your computer’s sound card and install optimal parameters
to use when recording and playing back digital audio. Go to Options | Preferences and select the Audio tab to view
and edit these settings. You will see the Audio dialog.
Chapter 1: Welcome
11
Pressing the [Default (MME only)] button instructs the program to analyze your sound card and apply the optimal
values for your system if you are using the standard MME audio drivers. These settings normally don’t need to be
changed.
Project Recording Options
The options you may need to manually adjust in this dialog are:
1.) The “Audio File Type” shown at the top of this dialog. Select the 96 kHz, 48 kHz, 44.1 kHz or 22.05 kHz
sample rate option at either 16-bit or 24-bit depth, depending on your system’s speed and storage capacity,
on the number of tracks, and on the fidelity you wish to record. For CD audio use the 16-bit, 44.1 kHz
setting. If you experience sluggish performance from your computer you could try the 22.05 kHz setting.
2.) The “Audio Driver Type” is MME by default, but if your sound card supports ASIO drivers you can choose
this type. ASIO is an alternate driver system developed by Steinberg. It allows for much lower latency
than ordinary MME drivers. When RealBand detects ASIO drivers it will prompt you to ask if you want to
use them.
3.) The [Drivers] button will bring up either the Audio Drivers dialog if the driver type is set to MME or the
ASIO Audio Drivers dialog if the driver type is ASIO.
If using MME, the Microsoft Sound Mapper is selected by default for both input and output. If you have
multiple sound cards, or a multiple I/O card, you can select more than one input or output. This will affect
the computer performance when recording or playing audio tracks. The more ports that are selected, the
more demand is placed on your computer. This may require a very fast computer.
4.) “Input Channel for MONO Tracks” - Left/Right/L+R (2 Tracks). Since most digital audio sound cards are
stereo you have the option of recording to your project using the left channel, the right channel, or both. To
determine the best setting for your recordings you must consider the audio source being recorded. For
example, if you are recording a single voice with a mono-microphone you would choose either Left or
12
Chapter 1: Welcome
Right channel to record. If your recording source is stereo, such as a guitar preamp or a synthesizer with
stereo outputs, you should select L+R (2 Tracks) from the “Input Channel for MONO Tracks” list box.
Note: If you are using multiple sound cards this setting must be set to L+R (2 Tracks). Also, if performance is sluggish with
multiple sound cards selected you should disable some of the sound cards to free up system resources.
5.) The text box that displays the path of your “Audio Temp Directory” is another important setting.
If you have only one hard drive then you do not need to worry about this setting, just leave it on the default
setting of C:\windows\temp.
If you have multiple hard drives or multiple partitions you should use the [Browse] button to point to the
best performing drive with the most available disk space.
If you don’t know what your “best” hard drive is, we have also included a special hard drive benchmarking utility so
that you can test your hard drive(s) for their audio-recording capabilities to aid you in making this selection.
To test your hard drive(s) for their audio capabilities select the Test Audio Performance option from the Action
menu. This will test your system and give you its findings on the digital audio recording capabilities.
To reapply this benchmark with another drive revisit the Audio dialog and change the path of the “Audio Temp
Directory” to another drive, D:\temp for instance. Then select Test Audio Performance from the Action menu again
and note the difference in the estimated number of tracks for each drive.
Audio performance benchmark results.
Setup for Multiple Sound Cards or Multi –Port Audio Cards
RealBand has the ability to input and output tracks of digital audio through separate channels of multiple sound
cards or multiple ports of a multichannel card. If your computer system has multiple sound cards, or if you have a
multiple channel audio card, you can configure RealBand for digital audio production through a mixer or other
multi-channel system such as the front and rear speakers of a surround sound setup.
1.) To configure for multiple sound cards choose the [Drivers] button from the Audio dialog to bring up the
Audio Drivers dialog.
Chapter 1: Welcome
13
2.) Choose the input and output digital audio devices that you want to use.
Note: The Microsoft Sound Mapper driver option refers to the default Windows sound card setup as configured in the
Windows Control Panel.
3.) In the Tracks window you can choose which sound card to output each track of audio on by clicking on the
track type icon and selecting one of the ports that you activated in the Audio Drivers dialog.
In the Classic Tracks View window you can choose which sound card to output a given track of digital audio on by
double-clicking the Pt column for any given audio track. Here, we have set the Bass, Piano, and Guitar tracks to be
output through the Pt 1 sound card, and the Drums to be output through the Pt 2 sound card.
The Audio Output Port dialog is presented
when the Pt column is double-clicked.
The sound cards/drivers selected in this dialog
will correspond to the number shown to the left
of the driver name and in the Pt column in the
Classic Tracks window.
The Safe boot-up option gives the user the chance to boot-up RealBand with clean configuration and INI files if a
crash occurred during the most recent session. This runs automatically on launching the program after a crash.
14
Chapter 1: Welcome
Audio Drivers Tutorial
MME Audio Drivers
The [Drivers…] button in the Options | Preferences Audio dialog brings the Audio Drivers dialog, which lets you
select Audio Input and Audio Output drivers. This dialog is for MME drivers, and not ASIO.
By default, the Microsoft Sound Mapper is selected for both input and output. If you have multiple sound cards, or
a multiple I/O card, you can select more than one input or output. This affects computer performance; the more
ports that are selected, the more demand is placed on your computer.
Order of Audio Ports
The [Move Selected Devices to Top] button lets you adjust the order of the Audio Output ports. You can choose
which Audio Output devices appear as Port 1, Port 2, etc. within RealBand, and not be stuck with the default
ordering for the ports determined by the Windows operating system.
If the ports are in a different order than the order you want, you can select (highlight) one or more ports, and press
the [Move Selected Devices to Top] button. This will move the highlighted ports to the top of the list.
When you launch the Audio Drivers dialog, all the highlighted ports will always be shown at the top. They will be
in the same order they were before, relative to each other. For example, let’s say you have 4 ports on your system,
and, by default they show up sequentially:
Driver A
Driver B
Driver C
Driver D
In the preceding picture, none are highlighted. Now, let’s say that you highlight the 4th port (Driver D), and move it
to the top, and then you highlight the last port in the list (which is now Driver C, since Driver D was moved to the
top). You now have 2 ports selected, (Driver D at the top and Driver C at the bottom). Driver D and Driver C will
be ports 1 and 2 within RealBand.
Driver D
Driver A
Driver B
Driver C
The next time you launch the Audio Drivers dialog, you’ll see Driver D and Driver C at the top, followed by the
other two un-highlighted ports. The important point here is that the chosen order of the highlighted ports Driver D
followed by Driver C was preserved, as shown in the picture below.
Driver D
Driver C
Driver A
Driver B
The Microsoft Sound Mapper will use the sound card selected as the preferred device in the Control Panel | Sounds
and Audio Devices | Audio tab. You should not select both the Microsoft Sound Mapper and the device it uses. For
Chapter 1: Welcome
15
example, if the preferred output device in the Audio Tab of the Multimedia settings in Control Panel is set to “AWE
64 Wave Out” you should NOT select both the “Microsoft Sound Mapper” and the “AWE 64 Wave Out” as two
output ports in RealBand. You would just select one or the other, but not both. If you selected both you would get
an error message saying you couldn’t open one of the devices.
Recording Tracks in Stereo or Mono
Each Input and Output port is a Stereo pair, with a left and right channel. For example, if you select 4 Input Ports
and 4 Output Ports, then you would be actually getting 8 input and 8 output channels, since each audio port has both
a left and right channel. In the Tracks window, you can select the output port for each track, and in the Mixer
window you can use the pan setting for the track to control where the output gets sent (left or right channel for the
port).
When recording to a stereo audio track, the track will contain both the left and right channels. If you’ve selected
multiple input ports, RealBand will record to multiple stereo tracks and offer to insert stereo track(s) if necessary.
MONO tracks contain only 1 channel per track, but you could record mono tracks in pairs if you’ve set the “Input
Channel for MONO Tracks” to L+R in the Options | Preferences | Audio settings.
When recording to MONO tracks, multiple ports are only utilized if the Input Channel for MONO tracks in the
Options | Preferences | Audio settings is set to “L+R.” This will be set to “L+R” automatically if you select multiple
input ports. The audio data will be recorded as 1 L+R pair per input port with all the data recorded on adjacent
available tracks. Tracks will be inserted if necessary (same method as when recording L+R with a single port).
See the Options - Audio Preferences help topic for more information on stereo recording. Multi-port recording
works the same as stereo recording, except there is more than one pair of stereo tracks being recorded by RealBand.
If the Record Channel is set to “Left” or “Right” only Input Port number 1 (the first input port in the list that was
selected by you in the Audio Drivers dialog) will be recorded onto a MONO track.
Note: Port number 1 is used as a source of timing when syncing MIDI to digital audio. If you are attempting to use two
different brands of sound cards together on one computer as two separate ports, there may be timing problems if the cards
have different DMA buffer sizes, but it is possible you may not encounter any noticeable timing issues. The multi-port feature
is mainly meant for multi-port cards. Feel free to try multiple sound cards, but your results may vary.
MME Recording Offset
The “Recording Offset MS (MME Only)”setting is found in the Options | Preferences Audio dialog. It can be used
to correct an MME timing issue under Windows Vista that can cause recorded tracks to be delayed in time. Should
that happen, you can increase the offset to a setting greater than zero. Usually the delay is around 50 to 60ms.
ASIO Audio Drivers
This dialog lets you choose an ASIO driver. ASIO is an alternate driver system developed by Steinberg. It has
much lower latency than ordinary MME drivers.
You can arrive at this dialog in 3 different ways:
1) If you haven’t used ASIO drivers, but RealBand detected them, and you answered “Yes” when asked if you want
to use an ASIO driver.
2) If, within the Audio Preferences, you change the audio Driver Type from MME to ASIO.
3) If the audio Driver Type is already set to ASIO, but you later press the Drivers button in the Audio Preferences.
The Select one ASIO Driver list box lets you select an ASIO driver to use. You can only select one ASIO driver at
a time.
ASIO4All Driver Warning
There is a warning if the ASIO4All driver is “not connected”
Sometimes the ASIO4All driver will not be connected to an audio driver and output will be silent. This is usually due to a
soft synth already using the audio driver. If RealBand detects that ASIO4ALL isn’t connected, it will warn you about this, so
you are aware of why the audio is silent.
16
Chapter 1: Welcome
Once you have selected an ASIO driver, you will see the Input Port(s) and Output Port(s) list boxes filled with
your driver’s input and output ports. By default, the first of each will be selected. You are allowed to select
multiple ports with a Ctrl+click on the ports you choose in the list, and all the ports you select will be available for
output within RealBand. If you do not hear input or output, then you may need to try different ports than the
defaults. You may need to read your sound card’s instructions to determine the correct ports to use.
The [ASIO Driver’s Control Panel] button launches a settings dialog
specifically provided by your driver manufacturer. This usually lets you adjust
the latency by letting you choose different buffer sizes in milliseconds.
Some drivers might let you choose the buffer size in samples, which is less
convenient than milliseconds.
The smaller the buffer size, the lower the latency, and the faster the response. Smaller buffers require more CPU
power and if you hear dropouts or artifacts, you may need to increase the buffer size.
Since many ASIO drivers do not support multiple sample rates, RealBand has a built-in resampler which lets you
play and record songs that have a different sampling rate than the rate(s) directly supported by your ASIO driver.
Chapter 1: Welcome
17
The Resampler Quality combo lets you choose Fast, Good, Better, or Best. Fast is the quickest but is the lowest of
the four levels of quality. Best is the slowest (uses more CPU time) but the most transparent and accurate quality.
See the following Understanding Latency section.
ASIO always on is normally selected, but it can be disabled if a driver has trouble running ASIO constantly. When
this setting is turned off (unchecked), the ASIO driver is only used for playback and recording and MIDI Thru will
be routed to the default MIDI Output destination as selected in the MIDI Driver Setup. This minimizes MIDI Thru
latency when ASIO is not on, and it is the same way MIDI Thru behaves with high-latency MME drivers.
The Driver Info field shows various characteristics of your driver.
The Name is the driver’s name.
The Version is the version number of your driver.
Input Channels is the total number of mono input channels that your sound card has. (Note: RealBand groups
these into stereo pairs.)
Output Channels is the total number of mono output channels that your sound card has. (Note: RealBand groups
these into stereo pairs.)
The Allowed Sample Rates field shows the sample rates allowed by your sound card’s ASIO driver. RealBand has
a built-in resampler which lets you play and record files that aren’t directly supported by your ASIO driver.
Input data format and output data format is the format of the data that the ASIO driver uses (such as integer or
float, 16 or 32 bit, LSB or MSB which is the ordering of the bytes).
The Buffer Sizes In Samples shows a range of allowed buffer sizes. The Pref is the preferred size, and this is the
size that RealBand uses. Your driver may alter the preferred size if you’ve launched the ASIO Driver Control Panel
and have selected a new buffer size from within the driver’s Control Panel. If your driver changes the preferred
size, then RealBand will be aware of the new preferred size.
Actual ASIO buffer size in MS is the length of an ASIO buffer in milliseconds.
Actual ASIO sample rate used is the sample rate of the ASIO driver itself. If it says (RESAMPLER IN USE) then
the .SEQ file is a different sample rate than the ASIO driver. If it says (RESAMPLER NOT IN USE) then the .SEQ
file and ASIO driver both are using the same sample rate.
Understanding Latency
Latency is based on the buffer sizes. The smaller the buffer sizes the lower the latency. Lower latency lets you hear
mixer volume changes quickly, as well as hear MIDI thru echoed out via a DXi soft synth practically in real time.
The latency, in MS is determined by the buffer size in samples, as well as the driver’s sampling rate.
Note: If your ASIO Driver’s control panel lets you select the buffer size in MS, then you don’t have to pay much attention to
the part of this discussion about converting samples to MS.
Converting Samples to MS: For example, suppose the driver’s sample rate is 48K. A 48K sampling rate means
that it is playing at 48,000 samples per second. If the buffer size were 48000 samples, then the latency would be 1
second, or 1000ms (which is very large and slow, and usually not allowed in ASIO). If the buffer size were 4800
samples, which is 1/10 second, then the latency would be 100ms. If the buffer size were 2400 samples, which is
1/20 second, the latency would be 50 ms. If the buffer size were 240 samples, which is 1/200 second, the latency
would be a mere 5ms which is incredibly low and very fast.
Normally, you can change your driver’s latency by pressing the [ASIO Driver’s Control Panel] button. Normally,
the driver specifies the buffer sizes in milliseconds, which equals the latency.
Low latency is faster and more responsive, but uses more CPU power.
Depending on the speed of your computer, you may find that the playback has dropouts, clicks/pops, or other
artifacts if you set the buffer sizes too small. This is because smaller buffers use more CPU power and if your
computer can’t handle the low latency you will hear artifacts. If this happens, you would need to use larger buffer
sizes. You may need to experiment to find what works well. You may be able to use smaller buffers with songs that
don’t have a lot of tracks and effects, but may find that you need to use larger buffers with songs that have more
tracks and use more effects. This is because more tracks and more effects use more CPU power, which leaves less
CPU power available for the audio routines to keep up with lower latencies.
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Chapter 1: Welcome
Chapter 2: New Features in RealBand 2010.5
Over 30 New Features!
RealBand 2010 added over 30 cool new features to RealBand 2009, and now the update to version 2010.5 adds
many more!
Here are the major new features added in RealBand 2010.5:
Conductor - Live Looping/Playback Control
As the song is playing, many "single key" hot keys are now available to control the playback and looping of the
song. This is ideal for live performance or "jam sessions" where you want full control of playback. The loops
happen seamlessly, so are suitable for the "dance floor." In addition, you can control PowerTracks from a standard
MIDI keyboard, pressing MIDI keys that correspond to each of the functions. There are over 80 conductor functions
in all. 2) Shift click
Tempo mapping for MIDI Tracks
Tempo mapping allows you to align a freely recorded MIDI performance (i.e., not recorded to a click track) such
that it displays properly in notation and follows the bar lines correctly, but still sounds exactly the same as how you
recorded it. To do this, select "Align Music to click track" from the Track menu, and choose the option to "Insert
tempo changes."
Plus…
- Double/Half time feature in RealTracks dialog.
- Forced accidentals supported in notation.
- Shift-click extends the highlighted area in the Chords window.
Note: RealBand 2010.5 is a free upgrade for owners of RealBand 2010.
New Features in RealBand 2010
These new features were introduced in RealBand 2010.
There’s a new "Plug-in" mode, allowing you to simply Drag-n-Drop tracks between RealBand and another
sequencer (Sonar, Reaper, ProTools, FL-Studio, Nuendo and more). RealTracks now support Shots, Holds, and
Pushes. Endings are improved, and RealTracks endings are now 4 bars long, giving time for the natural decay of the
instruments.
The New Features in RealBand 2010 for Windows are...
There now is a "Plug-in" mode for use with RealBand and another sequencer (Sonar, Reaper, ProTools, FLStudio, Nuendo and more). With the new plug-in mode, RealBand is open as a small always-on-top window, and
acts as a plug-in for your favorite DAW/sequencer, so that you can Drag-n-Drop MIDI and audio (WAV) tracks
from RealBand to another sequencer (or to Explorer). Work in another sequencer, type a progression in
RealBand, and then simply drag the track from RealBand -in-a-Box to your sequencer's track at the desired track
and bar location.
RealTracks now support new features, including Shots, Holds, and Pushes. Simply type in the chords as you
normally would, adding periods (…) for shots and holds, and the RealTracks will play them.
RealTracks endings have been enhanced, and are now 4 bar endings instead of 2 bar, allowing time for a natural
decay of the instruments.
RealBand main window is now sizable, when size changes, chord sheet, notation, and other windows redraw in
proportion to the new size. This allows you to have BB open as a small window on screen with other programs, and
you still see a full chord sheet. The screen size is remembered between sessions
Double time and half-time support for RealTracks added. Now you can play any RealTracks at half-time or
double time. This allows you to, for example, in a ballad at tempo of 70, to add a RealTracks Sax solo with tempo of
140, and play it as a double time, which will match the ballad tempo of 70. So now all of your existing RealTracks
can be used at 3 different tempos. (normal, half-time, double time)
Chapter 2: New Features in RealBand 2010.5
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Automatic Tempo swapping of similar RealTracks. If you have similar RealTracks available at different tempos,
BB will automatically choose the best one to use. For example, if you have a ballad loaded, with an Acoustic Bass
RealTracks at tempo of 60, and you speed up the tempo to 140, and press play, BB will automatically choose an
Acoustic Bass RealTracks closer to tempo of 140, if it is the same genre and feel. This means you can use a simple
Jazz style, and play it at various tempos, without having to set the best RealTracks based on tempos.
RealDrums picker dialog has been enhanced, with information about Artist name, Artist bio, and Real Drums
Set number.
Support enhanced for non-concert instruments (Bb/Eb sax, trumpet etc.). Now when chord sheet is transposed,
you can type in chords in the transposed key, and they will show up as you have entered them, instead of
requiring you to enter the chords in the concert key.
Lyrics enhanced
Undo added for entry of individual lyrics
‘Enter’ and ‘Close’ button added to lyric entry.
More Soloists are now available, up to 2000.
RealTracks Picker dialog enhanced :
- opens up faster.
- New Columns added (tempo swappable, holds type)
StylePicker is enhanced. Favorites and Recent styles now appear in this dialog as separate lists. It now has the
ability to add/remove styles as favorites. A Favorite Style indication (F) shows up for each style. You can filter any
list by only showing favorite styles. Over time, you can build up a list of favorite styles, and only show them when
needed.
Many messages changed to “yellow alerts” at top right of screen, so that you don’t have to respond to the
message, interrupting work flow.
Delete Key (DEL) for Notation Window deletes currently highlighted section.
Comments window stays on top and has selectable font size, useful for pasting/reading lyrics or comments.
Jukebox now supports BB files (MGU and SGU)
Repeat signs now displayed on notation and leadsheet windows.
Big Clock window has setting to not show ticks or milliseconds during playback. During play, will only show
bars:beats, but while stopped shows bars:beats:ticks
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Chapter 2: New Features in RealBand 2010.5
Chapter 3: Tutorial – Guided Tour of RealBand
What is RealBand?
RealBand is your all-in-one audio workstation and accompaniment program!
You may be familiar with PG Music’s award-winning Band-in-a-Box program for intelligent automatic music
accompaniment in a great variety of styles, and also with our PowerTracks Pro Audio DAW program for solid
sequencing of both MIDI and digital audio at an incredible price. RealBand takes the main features of both
programs and combines them into a full-featured sequencer with automatic accompaniment.
The other chapters in this guide provide detailed instructions and information on RealBand’s features, but if you
want to make real music now this tutorial will show you how to get started with RealBand, how to use its main
features, and how to enjoy it.
Note: References to Help Topics are highlighted in bold green text throughout this tutorial.
Getting Started
RealBand will install by default to its own folder, usually c:\RealBand. To start the program, double click on the
application file RealBand.exe in this folder.
To place a convenient shortcut on your desktop you can right-click on the file name RealBand.exe for a menu of
options. Select Send To and then Desktop (create shortcut).
You can then open RealBand directly from your desktop by double-clicking on the icon, like
any other Windows program.
Note: If RealBand is already installed and set up on your computer you can now jump ahead to the next topic and get
ready to make real music.
The first time that RealBand runs, it will look for ASIO audio drivers on your system and open this prompt screen if
ASIO drivers are found. If no ASIO drivers are present the standard Windows MME driver will be selected by
default.
Chapter 3: Tutorial – Guided Tour of RealBand
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Select [Yes] to open the ASIO Audio Drivers dialog and configure your audio setup, or [No] to use the default
MME drivers.
Click on [OK] when you have made your selections, and RealBand will then prompt you to select your MIDI drivers
in the MIDI Driver Setup dialog. If you have DXi or VSTi software synthesizers installed you can choose to send
your MIDI output to the software synth of your choice.
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Chapter 3: Tutorial – Guided Tour of RealBand
RealBand then prompts you to select the folders for Band-in-a-Box, RealTracks, and RealDrums. These are
important settings, as they enable you to use all of Band-in-a-Box styles, RealDrums, and RealTracks that you have
installed on your system. So if you have the latest Band-in-a-Box SuperPAK, then you also have access to every
style, RealDrums set, and RealTracks instrument there is for use in RealBand too.
Now that RealBand has guided you through the initial setup you can start to have fun. For a start, we could look at
two of the main workspaces, the Tracks window and the Mixer window.
Introduction to the Tracks and Mixer Windows
Although there are many windows you can work in, RealBand defaults to the Tracks window,
which you can also open with the [T] tool bar button, with the hot key combination Ctrl+1, or
with the menu command Window | Tracks.
This window has 48 tracks, each of which can be designated as a MIDI track, a mono audio track, or a stereo audio
track. When starting a new file, any track can be set to any track type in the Tracks window.
Chapter 3: Tutorial – Guided Tour of RealBand
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The default track type is MIDI, as indicated by the MIDI plug icon.
A right mouse click on the track type button opens a whole menu of
track options, and we will reset the track to be a stereo audio track.
The track icon changes to show a pair of audio wave forms. (A mono audio track would show
a single audio waveform.)
The track settings are described in detail in the Tracks Window help topic.
For a quick look at the settings for any track just hover the mouse cursor over the track type icon and a pop-up will
give a summary of the current settings.
You’ll have a great time recording your own audio and MIDI tracks in this window, and you can also import wave
files, MP3s, WMA files, MIDI files, and Karaoke files. You’ll find your Tracks window settings duplicated in the
Mixer window, where you will usually spend more time in the later stages of song production.
The Mixer window opens with the mixer icon, or with the hot key combination Ctrl+8, or with
the menu command Window | Mixer.
A right mouse click on any track strip brings up the same menu of track settings as in the Tracks window. These
settings are explained completely in the Mixer Window help topic. There are many additional, and powerful,
features in the mixer including real time audio effects with lots of routing options. This is where you will put the
professional finishing touches on your song productions. The Chords window is where automatic song
arrangements begin.
Creating a New Song Arrangement
Note: This follows the RealBand tutorial video and expands on some of the topics found there.
To generate a new song arrangement you begin by typing the chords into the Chords window
using standard chord symbols. This window opens with the [C7] button, the hot key combination
Ctrl+3, or the menu command Window | Chords. (Band-in-a-Box users will feel right at home.)
You’ll see the bars of the song displayed in rows. If a bar contains chord symbols they will be displayed to the right
of the bar number.
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Chapter 3: Tutorial – Guided Tour of RealBand
Entering chords
Enter the chords for your song by typing them in using standard chord symbols such as C, or Fm7, or Bb7, or
Bb13#9/E. For example type c6 to get the C6 chord. Note that you should never have to use the Shift key, as
RealBand will sort this out for you.
- Use b for a flat, e.g. Bb7.
- Use # or 3 for a sharp, e.g. F#7. (# is the uppercase symbol of 3, so you can actually type F37 to get F#7 RealBand will sort out the case, saving you the effort of using 3 to type the # symbol.
- Use / for Slash Chords with alternate Roots such as C7/E (C7 with E bass)
- Use a comma to enter 2 chords in a row. In the example below, we would type Ab9,G9 to enter 2 chords at a time
(on beat 3 and 4 of bar 2)
You can use the Delete key to delete a chord, or type a comma and press Enter.
Each measure is divided into Beat Groups, indicated by a highlight cell. A Beat Group consists of two beats. If a
song is in 4/4, then each measure will contain two beat groups. The current beat group will have a rectangle drawn
around it. You can type two chords into the current beat group. For example if you type this: “C7,G7” (without the
quotes) you’ll see the text you’re typing in the white rectangular panel on the toolbar. If you then hit you’ll
see the C7 and G7 chords appear within the current beat group, and the input rectangle will automatically advance to
the next beat group. When you’re in the middle of typing chord symbols, you can use the backspace key to correct a
mistake.
The Left Arrow and Right Arrow keys let you move the input rectangle to a different beat group without entering
chords. You can also click the mouse on a different beat group to move the input rectangle to a new location.
Note: Don’t use the mouse in a situation where you’ve just typed a chord symbol but haven’t yet pressed enter or pressed
the left arrow unless you want your input to go into another beat group.
The help topic Entering Chord Symbols has additional information and a list of the chord spellings that are
recognized by RealBand. The Chords Window topic explains how to enter breaks such as rests and pushes, and how
to copy chords.
Let’s enter some chords in the chord sheet.
We’ll put our highlight cell in the first beat group of bar and type the letters cm7. Press the Enter key and the chord
symbol Cm7 is entered at the start of bar 1.
Press the Enter key again and the highlight cell moves to bar 2. Type f7 for an F seventh chord and press Enter.
Now we’ll use some chord shortcuts. The letter “j” is the shortcut for a major seventh chord. Type bbj and press
Enter to write the chord symbol BbMaj7 on the chord sheet. Move to the next bar and type ebj to write EbMaj7 in
that bar. Advance to the next bar and type the letters ah to write Am7b5 – the h is for a half-diminished chord. In
the next bar type df and the chord symbol D7b9 will be entered, then enter gm for a G minor chord in bar 7. We’ll
stop there for purposes of this tutorial, and here is what our Chord window looks like now.
Now we’ll move on to the arranger toolbar to generate our RealBand song arrangement.
Chapter 3: Tutorial – Guided Tour of RealBand
25
Arranger settings
For our short tutorial song we’ll start at bar 1 and end at bar 8.
The Start of Song Chorus button is set at one by default, so it will stay the same.
The End of Song Chorus button defaults to 32, so we’ll click on the button and type in the number of the new
end-of-chorus bar in the Enter Measure Number box.
We’d like RealBand to add a 2-bar ending to our song, so we’ll check the 2 Bar Ending box.
Next we’ll choose a style for our song by clicking on the style name to open the StylePicker
window. You aren’t required to have Band-in-a-Box for your RealBand styles, but if you do you will see that all of
your styles are available here.
From the Jazz category select the J!Lush style (or any other style of your choosing) and you’ll
see that the style selection box has been updated with its name.
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Chapter 3: Tutorial – Guided Tour of RealBand
The time signature defaults to 4/4, but a new time signature can be set by clicking in this box to open the
Meter dialog. Compound time signatures are supported; in fact the numerator can be any number from 1 to 99. The
denominator is selected from the drop down combo box.
Our song is in C minor, so we could select the relative major key signature of Eb for fewer accidentals in the
notation display. Click in the key box to open the Key Signature dialog.
Real Band will prompt to ask if you also want to transpose the MIDI tracks for your song to the new key.
In this instance we do not want to transpose the MIDI tracks; we just want to change the key signature. Select [No].
Just before we play our song we can set a tempo.
The tempo box has a setting of 120 bpm. To change it to 140 we’ll click in the box to open the
Tempo dialog and type in 140.
We could also set the tempo with the up and down scroll
arrows, or even tap in a tempo with the minus and equals buttons.
Tempo Calculator (File | File Utilities)
The length of a song depends on tempo and number of bars. With
this calculator, found in the File menu under File Utilities, you can
enter 2 of the 3 variables (length of song in seconds, tempo,
number of bars) and the program calculates the third variable for
you.
So we’ve entered our chords in the Chords window, set the length of our song and added a 2-bar ending, chosen a
Band-in-a-Box style, and set the tempo.
We’re ready to generate an automatic arrangement with BB tracks. RealBand can either
generate the whole song or selected portions of the song when the [Generate] button is pressed, but if you use the [+]
Chapter 3: Tutorial – Guided Tour of RealBand
27
button it will always generate the complete song. When either button is pressed we’ll see our new tracks in the
Tracks window.
The track overview shows us that we have five MIDI tracks playing the parts generated by the J!Lush style, and
because RealDrums are allowed in the Preferences | Song Generation settings the BB Drums track is empty and we
have a RealDrums audio track. Notice that the BB track names are in blue, whereas user track names are in black.
BB tracks cannot be moved or renamed, but you can change any of the settings with the right-click menu – for
example the patch, MIDI port, or MIDI channel. These tracks can also be edited in the track overview and in the
Piano Roll or Notation windows. Let’s examine the BB Piano track in the Piano Roll window.
We can select the BB Piano track while
still in the Tracks window, or we can open the Piano Roll window with the piano roll button and then select BB
Piano from the track list.
In the Piano Roll window notes can be dragged and dropped, shortened or lengthened in the Note Panel, which is the
upper part of the window.
The lower panel is for graphic editing of the selected parameter in the View/Edit list. Note velocity is shown, but
parameters such as pitch bend, channel aftertouch, and MIDI controllers can be edited in this panel as well. Please
see the Piano Roll Window help topic for more on this very useful feature. The BB tracks can also be edited in the
Editable Notation window.
Click on the eighth note toolbar button to open the Notation. In the Notation window toolbar, there
are three buttons for different notation modes. Editable notation is the button with dotted vertical
lines crossing the staff lines.
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Chapter 3: Tutorial – Guided Tour of RealBand
In this notation window notes can be inserted or deleted, and dragged and dropped. By right-clicking on any note
head all parameters of the note can be edited and symbols and text can be added.
These features are covered in detail in the Notation Window topic.
Now that you have a RealBand accompaniment, your next step might be to record some audio tracks along with the
BB tracks. The audio tracks could be vocals, live instruments, or the line output from a keyboard, mixer, or direct
box, or digital audio if your sound card has that capability.
Audio Recording
As long as your audio drivers have been set up audio recording is simple and straightforward. If you wish you can
configure the destination track as described in the Tracks Window topic, but if you select any blank track and start
recording RealBand will automatically change it to an audio track with the default audio settings.
To begin, select the track you wish to record in either the Tracks or Mixer window.
Check your recording level with the built-in VU meters, which open with the meter button on the toolbar.
The meters are resizable and can be dragged to any convenient location on the screen.
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Chapter 3: Tutorial – Guided Tour of RealBand
29
The VU Meters window can be left open for monitoring during
recording.
The input levels should normally be active in the mid-range of green
segments with transient peaks in the yellow range. Red indicates levels
that are too high and in danger of clipping, which adds a cracking sound
to your track. When that happens, the top red segment marked “Clip”
will light up. You’ll need to adjust the input level.
To adjust input levels that are either too low or too high just click on this
speaker icon to open the recording control window.
Note: The appearance of this window is different for different sound cards.
The example shown is for a typical Sound Blaster Audigy card.
Our recording input is the analog mix from an external mixer. If you were to select “What U Hear” as your input
you would also be recording the output of the BB tracks to your new track, which is not something your would
normally want to do.
When you’re ready, press on the audio recording button in the toolbar and record your part as the
RealBand accompaniment plays.
You also have the option of using a metronome to count you in and keep time during the
recording using the settings that you choose under the Metronome tab in the Preferences.
Note: During recording, you could follow along with the chord changes in the Chords window, or with a notation part in
either the Notation or Lead Sheet windows.
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Chapter 3: Tutorial – Guided Tour of RealBand
When you’ve finished recording, press the stop button on the toolbar. RealBand will prompt you
to either keep or discard the take.
You can keep recording as many audio tracks as you want up to the limit of the 48 available tracks in RealBand.
Here’s the Tracks window showing an overview of our first recording on track 10 and a second audio recording on
track 11.
“Audio – Stereo” was specified as the track type for track 10 in the right-click Track window menu, but you’ll
notice that Track 11 is a mono audio track. That is because we did not specify any audio settings for this track and
RealBand automatically applied the default audio settings.
If you change your mind about an audio take you can use the Edit | Undo (Keep Take) menu command to clear it.
Or, if you want to remove it at a later session, use the Track | Erase command.
Adding RealTracks
Another way to add live instrumental audio tracks is with RealTracks. To start, right click on any blank track in the
Tracks window. In the menu that opens, click on Select and Generate RealTrack. This opens the Assign
RealTracks to Track dialog.
Note that this is a minimal set of RealTracks for demonstration purposes. There are dozens of RealTracks instruments
available, with many more to come.
Chapter 3: Tutorial – Guided Tour of RealBand
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We’ve selected Tenor Sax for our RealTrack. Click on the [Close] button and the RealTrack will be generated.
Your RealTracks players never complain about do-overs, so if you don’t get what you want the first time a
RealTrack is generated just generate another one. Or generate several more on different tracks and use the one you
like best, or use the choice sections of different tracks, or layer multiple versions.
Regenerating BB Tracks
You can always generate new BB tracks by choosing a new style and
pressing the [Generate] button. Try as many as you like.
But what if there are tracks, or even parts of tracks, that you want to keep? RealBand lets you keep the parts you
like and just regenerate selected bars on selected tracks. You can keep the same style or use a different style all
together. Here’s an example.
We’ll substitute the first 5 bars of the BB Bass and BB Piano tracks by regenerating them in a different style.
Before selecting the region to regenerate, click on the [Snap] button in the Tracks window. With [Snap]
enabled, RealBand will automatically snap to exact beat and bar line boundaries as you drag your mouse in the track
overview to make your selection.
We’ll select the region we want in the BB Bass track overview. Then that exact same region can be selected in the
BB Piano track with a Ctrl+click on the track name.
Now we can pick another style and only the highlighted areas will be regenerated using that
style. The rest of the arrangement will be unchanged. This is a very powerful feature for customizing and tweaking
your arrangements, especially if you have the full collection of Band-in-a-Box styles.
This feature is not limited to BB tracks. You can use it on RealTracks and RealDrums tracks too. This is especially
useful to generate specific RealTracks passages or fills for your song. To do that, use a blank track in the Tracks
window and highlight the range of beats or bars that you want to fill. Then right click on the track and select either
Select and Generate RealTrack to choose an instrument from your full list or Generate RealTrack (Favorites) to
select from a list of recently used Real instruments.
Navigating Tracks
When your song has BB tracks the first eight rows in the Tracks window are reserved for them. Track 9 is used for
RealDrums. This is not always convenient when you have lots of tracks of your own farther down in the window.
The [BB] and [User] buttons will take you directly to either group of tracks without the need to scroll up and down
in the window.
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Chapter 3: Tutorial – Guided Tour of RealBand
This group of buttons will take you directly to the selected BB track in the Tracks, Mixer, or Notation windows.
The letters stand for the track name,
B = bass,
D = drums, the second [D] below indicates that RealDrums are present,
P = piano,
G = guitar,
S = strings,
M = melody,
S = solo.
The name of the BB track is displayed along with the instrument patch assigned to that track. There is a volume
slider that will affect only the selected track. This is a quick and convenient way to adjust BB volume levels while
other tracks are playing.
The [Tr] button opens a drop-down list of all track numbers and names. Just click on the track to make it the active
track in the Tracks or Mixer windows.
The [S] button enables soloing of tracks. When it is engaged only the current track is heard. You can have the song
playing with this button pressed and solo different tracks just by clicking on them while the song plays. Ctrl+click
on additional track names will add or remove them from the soloing selection, so it is possible to audition a few
tracks together.
Solo tracks can also be selected with the BB track buttons.
Song Settings and Song Generation Preferences
There are two types of settings that affect how your songs are generated by RealBand, the Song Settings and the
Song Generation Preferences.
Song Settings are accessed from the [Song Set…] toolbar button. These settings apply only to
the current song, including enabling or disabling RealTracks and RealDrums and specifying a particular RealDrums
set for the song.
Song Generation preferences are found in the Preferences dialog. These settings
affect all songs and also include the path to your \bb RealTracks and RealDrums folders.
Importing Songs
As you can see in the File | Open dialogue, RealBand supports all major audio and MIDI file types, including PG
Music’s PowerTracks Pro Audio files (*.SEQ) and Band-in-a-Box files (*.?G?)
Once you’ve opened your song file in RealBand you can use the full power of the program to add parts, edit, mix,
and finally produce a professional finished recording.
Chapter 3: Tutorial – Guided Tour of RealBand
33
PowerTracks Pro Audio Songs
The PowerTracks Pro Audio .SEQ file is also the native format for RealBand files, so PowerTracks files load and
play exactly as they would in that program.
Band-in-a-Box Songs
When importing a Band-in-a-Box file you have the choice of playing it “as-is” with the arrangement as created by
Band-in-a-Box, or of generating a new arrangement in RealBand.
In this illustration, we see a Band-in-a-Box file that has been opened directly in RealBand. All of the parts,
including the RealDrums track, are present in the blue-labeled BB tracks, 1 through 9.
This arrangement will play exactly as it did the last time it was generated in Band-in-a-Box, which is worth
remembering if you have an arrangement that you particularly liked. To keep it unchanged, you could save all of
your BB tracks as user tracks with the Track menu command Make all BB tracks regular tracks. Or save the song
as a .SEQ (sequence) file in RealBand.
Another option would be to use the Auto Convert Individual MIDI Track to Audio Track feature to render the
MIDI tracks to audio and then save the song as a .SEQ file.
Of course, you can generate a new arrangement with any style and regenerate selected regions, add RealTracks, and
record your own audio tracks, remix, and add effects once your Band-in-a-Box song is in RealBand.
You can see by comparing the BB tracks in this image with the previous one that new BB tracks have been
generated. Both versions use the JAZQUINT style, but any style could be used.
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Chapter 3: Tutorial – Guided Tour of RealBand
If your Band-in-a-Box song has RealTracks they will be generated in RealBand when you open the file. Here is a
Band-in-a-Box song with an “all RealTracks” style that has been opened in RealBand.
The BB tracks, except for the MIDI Melody track, are empty and there are additional blue-labeled BB RealTracks
starting at track 9. The track buttons now show a row of RealTracks buttons below the BB tracks buttons for the
Bass, Drums, Piano, Guitar, and Strings parts.
Note: The instrument on a BB track or BB RealTrack can be different than the track name. For example, the Piano track
might have an acoustic guitar playing if there is no piano part in the style.
This RealTracks arrangement can be regenerated using any RealTracks style, or you could even generate an
arrangement with a regular Band-in-a-Box style and add BB tracks to the existing RealTracks.
Chapter 3: Tutorial – Guided Tour of RealBand
35
If there are any RealTracks that you want to preserve when regenerating the arrangement you can use the Track |
Duplicate feature to make a copy on a blank track.
This copy will be a user track (as indicated by the name in black type) and will not be affected by generating a new
arrangement.
This is a useful way to generate multiple versions of a Real instrument part and then choose the one you like best, or
edit together your favorite parts from different tracks, or even layer multiple tracks.
Additional RealTracks can be added to your song by rightclicking on any blank track and selecting one of the two options for generating RealTracks from the track options
menu.
You can also highlight a region of a track and generate your RealTrack for just that region to “drop in” a Real
instrument lick.
Finally, you’ll want to mix your tracks into a finished recording.
Mixing in RealBand
The Mixer window provides real time control of volume and effects. You can launch it with the fader
button on the toolbar or by typing ALT+WÆ8.
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Chapter 3: Tutorial – Guided Tour of RealBand
With its own real time effects and support for all other DirectX and VST plug-ins, the RealBand mixer is a powerful
production tool. It offers great flexibility in applying these effects to individual tracks, to sub-mixes, and to the final
audio output.
This is an integrated mixer that controls both MIDI and audio tracks. There are sliders for all 48 tracks, 8 auxiliary
effects (Aux) busses, and a combined total of 16 audio output ports or audio subgroups.
The Mixer track strips conveniently show the track name vertically to the left of the volume sliders. This is the track
name that is assigned in the Tracks window, go to that window to add or change track strip names.
When the mouse cursor is positioned over a track number in the Mixer window a popup box will display all of the
Track windows settings for the track - the track name and type, patch name, volume and pan settings, and effects
settings.
MIDI tracks show an output port with an “M” prefix for a MIDI port or an “S” for a software
synthesizer. They have controls for volume, pan, reverb, chorus, modulation, and expression plus a VU
meter, a MIDI patch selection box, and a mute/unmute button.
Audio tracks either have a prefix of “A,” for an audio output, or “G,” for an audio subgroup, on their
output ports. They have volume and pan controls, a stereo VU meter, a mute/unmute button, four
assignable auxiliary sends, and a track-specific FX insert.
In addition to the track specific effects, there are eight global busses that can each have four chained effects each.
You can assign each audio track to four different Aux busses and adjust the amount that each audio track uses the
effects in each assigned bus. If that isn’t enough, you can add four chained effects to each audio subgroup and also
to the main output - this will affect all tracks.
For a full description of the Mixer and the use of its features please refer to the Mixer Window help topic.
Having more fun with RealBand!
You’ve seen how easily you can create music from start to finish with RealBand. But don’t forget that this powerful
program has many more features and configurable settings which are discussed in later chapters.
These features give you the ability to produce great sounding music in your own home “studio” with production
values and effects that once required expensive studio time.
Have fun making your music with RealBand!
Chapter 3: Tutorial – Guided Tour of RealBand
37
Chapter 4: The Main Screen
There are five parts to the RealBand main screen.
1.
The Status Bar shows information about the current project.
2.
The Menu Bar is where menus and commands are accessed.
3.
The Toolbars give information and access to program functions.
4.
The Piano Keyboard displays, and can input, MIDI notes.
5.
The Windows area, the main workspace for all program windows.
1–
2–
3–
4–
5–
The Status Bar
The status bar is the colored header across the top of the screen.
RealBand shows the file name for the currently loaded song in the status bar. It also shows the song title if the song
has been given one, and the name of the current window, e.g., Chords, if the window is maximized. When the
jukebox is playing then Juke Box mode is displayed in the status bar.
The buttons to minimize, maximize, and close the program appear at the right side of the
status bar.
The Menu Bar
Like most Windows applications, RealBand has a pull-down menu interface. You can access the menus by pressing
Alt+ with the letter being the first letter of the menu you wish to activate, e.g., Alt+F for the File menu.
You can also activate a menu by clicking the left mouse button with the mouse cursor positioned directly over the
menu name on the Menu Bar.
The menus list many operations that can be controlled with key strokes. These can save time and it is a good idea to
memorize the ones you use regularly.
Toolbars
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Chapter 4: The Main Screen
Toolbars provide control of the program and access to many of its features.
Toolbars have a choice of 24x24 or 16x16 icon sizes.
24x24
16x16
To select the icon size, go to Options | Preferences and in the General dialog check “Toolbars use large icons”
for 24x24 icons or clear the checkbox for 16x16 icons.
Main Toolbar
This group of buttons will take you directly to the selected BB track in the
Tracks, Mixer, or Notation windows. The letters stand for the track name,
B = bass,
D = drums, the second [D] below indicates that RealDrums are present,
P = piano,
G = guitar,
S = strings,
M = melody,
S = solo.
The name of the BB track is displayed along with the instrument patch assigned to that track. There is a volume
slider that will affect only the selected track. This is a quick and convenient way to adjust BB volume levels while
other tracks are playing.
The [GM] button opens the list of General MIDI
instruments. Click on the name of an instrument in the list
assign it to the current track (highlighted button).
The [F] button opens a short list of favorite instrument
patches for the current track. For instance, this list is for the
Guitar or [G] track.
When your song has BB tracks the first eight rows in the Tracks window are reserved for them. Track 9 is used for
RealDrums. This is not always convenient when you have lots of tracks of your own farther down in the window.
The [BB] and [User] buttons will take you directly to either group of tracks without the need to
scroll up and down in the window.
When using BB styles with RealTracks there will be a button for each RealTrack
below the corresponding button for the BB track, as shown here.
The [Tr] button opens a drop-down list of all track numbers and names. Just click on the track to make it the
active track in the Tracks or Mixer windows.
The [S] button enables soloing of tracks. When it is engaged only the current track is heard. You can have
the song playing with this button pressed and solo different tracks by clicking on them while the song plays.
Ctrl+click on additional track names will add or remove them from the soloing selection, so it is possible to
audition a few tracks together.
Chapter 4: The Main Screen
39
The next group of controls is for song
settings such as title, style, time
signature, key, and tempo.
The title is typed in to the title window as
regular text.
Click on the style name box to open the StylePicker, where you can choose from any of your installed Band-in-aBox styles.
Use this button to load a style (.STY file) from disk.
Double click the mouse in this box to open the
Meter dialog. Odd time signatures such as 5/4, 7/4,
9/16, 11/4, etc. are supported.
The key signature and tempo are set by double clicking in those boxes to open the selection dialog.
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Chapter 4: The Main Screen
The tempo can also be adjusted with these buttons. Hold down the up or down arrows to scroll the tempo
up or down, or click on the arrow to increase or decrease the tempo in single increments.
Tap tempos with the minus [-] and equals [=] buttons. Tapping on the minus sign four times will set the tempo just
as if you had counted it in. Tapping on the equals sign four times will set the tempo at the average speed you tapped
and then automatically begin song playback at that tempo.
These buttons set the beginning and end of the song chorus, which particularly affects how endings are
played. Double click on the button to open a selection dialog.
This group of settings controls how the song arrangement is generated. It is possible to generate the complete song
or just a selected range.
The [Generate] button will generate a complete arrangement if the From: and Thru: settings are both
the same (e.g. -1:01:000). If a partial range is selected only that range will be generated. When the button is pressed
a popup menu of options opens.
Generate BB (All BB Tracks) generates new Band-in-a-Box tracks
using the current style.
Select and Generate RealTrack opens the RB Assign RealTracks to
Tracks dialog for Real instrument selection and options for the
generation of the audio RealTrack.
Generate RealTrack (Favorites) opens a list of recently used Real
instruments for quick selection and generation.
Select and Generate RealDrums opens the RB RealDrums Picker for
selection of a RealDrums style and options for the generation of the
audio RealDrums.
Generate RealDrums (Favorites) opens a list of recently used
RealDrums styles for quick selection and generation.
Generate MIDI Track opens a list box to select the part for a MIDI
track to be generated on the current track.
Regenerate Track
Use this to regenerate an existing track. If a track is a non-BB track, but it was generated individually from one of
the generation options in Tracks window popup menu, or from one of the generation options on the Generate Button
popup menu, then the track name will be displayed in green.
Chapter 4: The Main Screen
41
The track name being displayed in green or blue means that the track can be regenerated using this command. This
feature is useful to regenerate, if you had changed the song’s tempo, or just to generate fresh material.
Generate All
This command will regenerate all Blue and Green tracks automatically, including RealDrums.
The [+] button always generates all of the song.
If the “2 Bar Ending” checkbox is selected RealBand will automatically generate a 2-bar ending for the song.
The [Song Set] button opens a dialog of Song Settings with options that apply only to the
current song.
This song measure offset also affects lead-in generation. For example, if set to -2 the song
will be generated with a 2-bar lead-in.
This button opens the Song Generation Preferences where global settings that apply to all songs can be
made.
The song location slider moves directly to a new place in the song.
Dockable Toolbars
The user can personalize the explorer-style dockable/undockable toolbars. There is also an option to Hide/Show
Toolbar in the Options menu.
To add or remove buttons from a toolbar click on the More Buttons arrow at the right end of the toolbar.
Click and drag on the vertical divider strips to resize the toolbar and hide or reveal additional toolbar
buttons. This may not be necessary with larger widescreen monitors.
Click on
described in the list.
42
to open a list of the available buttons for that toolbar. Each button is named or
Chapter 4: The Main Screen
Buttons with a check mark in the check box will be displayed on the toolbar. Clear the checkbox to remove a button
from the toolbar.
Click on “Reset Toolbar” to restore the default toolbar settings.
“Now” is the current location in MIDI format - bars:beats:ticks. The “From” and “Thru” values indicate the range
of bars currently selected for editing operations. You can double click in these fields to type in new locations.
When From: and Thru: are set to the same value RealBand always generates a complete song. If they are set to
different values RealBand will generate that specific range.
The CPU Usage Indicator shows total CPU usage and PT (RealBand) usage.
The Piano Keyboard
The re-sizeable piano keyboard is located below the toolbar. There is a setting to Hide/Show Piano in the Options
menu.
Chapter 4: The Main Screen
43
The piano can be “played” by clicking with the mouse, either while a song is playing or when it is stopped, and
clicking on a note while in Editable Notation mode enters that note in the selected track at the current time location.
There is a 1-peg hot key in the Notation window to move current time forward or backward by 1 peg (normally a
16th note). Alt+left arrow moves the current time backward by 1 peg. Alt+right arrow moves it forward by 1 peg.
This makes it easier if you are using the on-screen piano for entering notes into the Notation window.
The on-screen piano also responds to mouse clicks if the current track is an audio track. This is useful if you want to
hear a note played as a reference without having to change the current track to a MIDI track.
You can vertically resize the Big Piano by placing the mouse on the bottom edge of the piano and then clicking and
dragging the mouse up or down.
The Piano Settings are found under the Piano tab in the Preferences.
They include settings for the display mode and the size of the keyboard.
When the display mode is set to “Current Track,” the piano will
display notes as they are being played from the current track. If the
display mode is set to “All notes except for drum channel” the piano
will display notes that are played from all the tracks except for notes
that are on the drum channel.
When the “Big Sizeable Piano” setting is enabled, RealBand will
show a bigger piano below the toolbar, instead of the smaller piano.
For the Big Sizeable Piano, there is also a setting that gives you a
choice of Show Track Number (drawn as a tiny number within the
notes), Show MIDI Channel, or Show No Text.
If “Big Piano Varies Colors By Track” is enabled, then the colors of
the notes drawn on the big piano will vary depending on the track
number. For tracks 1 through 10, RealBand uses 10 different colors,
then repeats these colors for higher track numbers.
These settings are automatically saved to RBW.INI and RB.CFG so that they will remain in effect the next time you
use RealBand.
Windows
Most of the main screen is used for the windows workspace. There are many window views to choose from and you
can open as many as you wish to. The Tracks window is the default view.
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Chapter 4: The Main Screen
Tracks Window
The Tracks window shows the track names, track type (MIDI or audio), instrument settings, and an overview
section showing either MIDI or audio data. This window is described in full detail in the
The Track Number field shows the track number.
If the track is the current track it will be highlighted in red.
When multiple tracks are selected, the track numbers will be highlighted in yellow for tracks other than the
current track. If the track is not selected it will be gray.
Click on the track number field to make a track the current track.
If you click on the track number field while holding the Shift key, this will select a range of tracks from the current
track through the number you clicked on. For example, if track 1 is the current track, and you hold the shift key and
then click on the number field for Track 4, this will make tracks 1 through 4 selected. Track 1 will still be the
current track and tracks 2, 3, and 4 will be highlighted in yellow. You can select/deselect individual tracks by
clicking on a track’s number field while holding down the Ctrl key.
The Track Name field shows the track’s name. You can edit a track name by right clicking on the track name field,
or by double-clicking on it. After you’re done editing, then press Enter.
The Mute button lets you mute or unmute a track.
The Disclosure Triangle will reveal more information about a track by making the track row height taller.
If a track is a MIDI track, you’ll see Vel (velocity offset), Rvb (reverb), Mod (modulation), Loop, Key
(key transpose), Cho (chorus), and Exp (expression) settings.
You can make changes to these
settings by clicking on the edit fields
with the left mouse button, and then
moving the mouse up or down while
holding the mouse button down.
The [Edit DXi] button launches the DirectX Window dialog and will display the settings panel for either the
Default DXi Synth (16th DXi synth slot which is MIDI port 32) or the current DXi port number if the track is set to a
valid DXi port (17-32). Any track’s MIDI Output Port can be set to send to one of the 16 available DXi synth ports
or to any other available MIDI port.
The Volume and Pan sliders let you adjust a track’s volume and pan settings without
having to go into the Mixer window. Below the Volume slider you’ll see two VU
level meters. These give you a general idea of a track’s level during playback.
NOTE: If a track is an audio track, the meter display will be delayed by the size of the audio Output Buffer Milliseconds
setting in the audio settings dialog.
Chapter 4: The Main Screen
45
Drag and Drop Editing
RealBand supports drag-and-drop editing in the Tracks and Audio Edit windows.
In the Tracks window you can easily move tracks up or down in relation to each other by drag ‘n’ drop using the
mouse, e.g., drag track 1 below track 2 to change the order of the tracks.
You can move a highlighted region by holding down the Ctrl key with the left mouse button pressed, and drag the
region to a new location in the song.
After releasing the mouse button, you have four options:
1. Move to new location and overwrite
2. Move to new location and merge
3. Copy to new location and overwrite
4. Copy to new location and merge.
Drag/Drop MIDI or Audio Files Into The Tracks Window
You can drag a file, such as a .WAV file, from a folder directly onto the Tracks window. The file will be placed on
the track you dropped it on, at the location onto which you dropped the file. The types of files that are supported are
the audio files supported by RealBand, such as .MP3, .WAV, and WMV.
In addition to audio files, .MID files can be dropped onto the tracks window too. If the file is a multi-track .MID it
will be imported onto free tracks beyond the highest occupied track.
If you hold the Ctrl key when dropping the file, then the file will be inserted at the time location, and any existing
data moved beyond the end of the file that is being inserted, rather than overwriting any existing data.
NOTE: this feature will only insert files on measure boundaries.
Track Overview Display
To the right of the track info panels, you’ll see the overview display.
This lets you view MIDI or audio data, and select sections for editing.
You can click and drag to highlight a section of the song for editing.
If the Alt key is held when left-mouse clicking on the overview section of the Tracks window the time will be
changed without affecting the currently highlighted region. This lets you quickly adjust the current time without
having to worry about accidentally changing the highlighted region.
Click on [Play Selected Area] to hear the highlighted section being edited.
The [-] and [+] buttons (upper far left corner of the Tracks window) let you zoom in or zoom out the overview
section.
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Chapter 4: The Main Screen
The [Snap] button causes the time indicator to snap to the nearest beat when changing the time location or when
highlighting a region for editing.
Note: If you have selected non-consecutive multiple tracks (e.g., 2, 3, and 5) for editing, you should not click on the track
overview section area directly, since it will cause your track selections to be lost. If you only want to change the edit
From/Thru settings, then you can click on the timeline (immediately above the track overviews) with the mouse, and then
press the F7 key to set the From: location, and then click on the timeline again and press F8 to select the Thru: location.
Big Clock Window
This is accessible from an icon on the toolbar (same section of the toolbar that has the
Tracks, Bars, Chords buttons, etc.).
This window displays the current time location in a large text. It will show Measures:Beats:Ticks, or
Hours:Minutes:Seconds:Hundredths, or Samples. Clicking on the window will toggle the display mode.
Measures:Beats:Ticks
Hours:Minutes:Seconds:Hundredths
Chapter 4: The Main Screen
47
Samples
If you resize the window, then the size of the font will adjust to the new window size.
Other Program Windows
These program windows can be launched by selection in the Windows menu or by clicking on their buttons in the
Toolbar.
48
Bars
The Bars window shows the bars (or measures) of the song. Bars with MIDI data will
be shaded, while bars with audio will show the audio waveform in miniature.
Chords
The Chords window displays the chord symbols of a song. You’ll see the bars of the
song displayed in rows.
Mixer
The Mixer window is a graphical mixer that lets you control the 48 tracks in RealBand.
Piano Roll
The Piano Roll window allows editing of MIDI notes and graphic editing of controllers.
Tempo Map
The Tempo Map is a list of all the tempo changes that occur during the course of the
song.
Comments
The Comments window is a simple text editor, which allows you to edit or view
comments.
Notation
The Notation window displays the notes of a MIDI track on a staff and lets you print
music on your printer.
Lead Sheet
The Lead Sheet window is similar to the Notation window, except that it can display
multiple staves.
Chapter 4: The Main Screen
SysEx
The SysEx window is a built-in system exclusive (SysEx) librarian to transmit or receive
SysEx data.
Guitar
The Guitar window displays notes played in the current track or MIDI Thru on a guitar
fretboard.
Meter Map
The Meter Map is a list of all the meter changes that occur during the course of the
song.
Event List
The Event List window is an event editor that lets you insert, delete, or change MIDI
events.
Audio Edit
The Audio Edit window shows audio data as a waveform. Select a region to edit by
mouse clicking on the waveform and dragging the mouse to the right.
Big Lyrics
The Big Lyrics window will display any existing lyrics in a track and can be resized.
The lyrics highlight and scroll, great for singing along.
Drums
The Drum button launches the built-in 3-D animated Drum Kit plug-in.
Big Clock
The Big Clock window displays the current time location in a large text.
Conductor
This opens the Conductor window for live playback and looping control.
RealBand’s Classic Tracks View is available in the Window menu or with the keystrokes Ctrl+9.
The menu command Window | Show Tools Panel gives quick access to the basic File menu
and Edit menu commands.
The Icon Row
There is a row of icons at the bottom of the main screen window. They give quick access to the most commonly
used windows, and when you minimize any window it appears in the icon row, which makes it easy to restore when
you want to work in that window again. Double click on the icon or use the standard Windows buttons to open a
window from the icon row.
Chapter 4: The Main Screen
49
Other Plug-Ins and Utilities
RealBand includes many more powerful and helpful utilities that are launched by their own toolbar buttons.
In Plugin Mode audio or MIDI content can be dragged and dropped to other DAWs.
The Plugins button opens the Direct/VST window where DX and VST plug-ins are assigned.
Open the control panel for your current DXi of VSTi softsynth with the Synths button.
The Metronome button opens the programmable metronome for playback and/or recording.
Launch the Audio Chord Wizard to automatically figure out the chords from audio files (WAV, MP3,
WMA, SEQ, CDA).
The MIDI button launches the MIDI Monitor plug-in with detailed MIDI data.
The Tuner button launches the built-in Guitar Tuner plug-in.
This launches the MIDI Guitar Cleanup dialog for de-glitching and adjusting latency.
The Markers window, where song markers can be inserted, also opens with the menu command Window |
Show Markers Window.
The VU button opens the VU meters to show Input and Output levels for digital audio.
The Panic! button attempts to shut off any hung MIDI notes.
The Punch button is for punch-in recording to audio and MIDI tracks.
Loop button opens the Endless Loop dialog. When this option is enabled, RealBand will automatically
loop through a section of the song.
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Chapter 4: The Main Screen
Chapter 5: Using MIDI Features
Overview
RealBand is a full-featured MIDI sequencer for Windows with the added ability to create automatic
accompaniments in its BB Tracks. If you want to know how to create MIDI tracks and BB Tracks please see the BB
Tracks and MIDI tracks chapter. This chapter has instructions for using the many powerful MIDI features in
RealBand.
Record and edit music for playback through your sound card or MIDI synthesizer as configured in the MIDI Driver
Setup (see MIDI Setup, Ch. 1). MIDI music can be displayed in standard music notation on the screen, and also
with the on-screen piano keyboard or guitar fretboard. RealBand MIDI sequences are saved in its native sequence
file format with the file extension .SEQ. RealBand also includes full support for saving, playing, and editing
Standard MIDI files (*.MID) and Karaoke files (*.KAR).
Using DXi and VSTi Synthesizers
DXi and VSTi software synthesizers allow RealBand to play high quality sounds directly through your computer’s
sound system without external MIDI hardware. Connecting RealBand to the software synth as a plug-in has several
advantages over connecting as a MIDI driver.
The plug-in allows RealBand to merge/sync in any existing audio file (vocals etc.) with the synth output. You can
also directly render your performance to a .WAV file using the DXi or VSTi plug-in.
To use DXi/VSTi softsynths with RealBand, you can think of them as a type of “MIDI Output Driver.”
You can either visit the MIDI Driver Setup dialog (Options | Preferences MIDI tab, [MIDI Devices] button) and
select the “Re-Route MIDI Playback to Default DXi Synth” checkbox to send all MIDI playback to the default DXi
synth, or you can assign DXi synths to individual tracks with the option to set all MIDI tracks to the same port.
Routing to Default DXi Synth
The Default DXi Synth: combo box lets you select which DXi or VSTi synth is used as the default DXi synth.
Chapter 5: Using MIDI Features
51
The Re-Route MIDI Playback to Default DXi Synth setting will cause RealBand to re-route all MIDI playback to
the Default DXi synth. This is the easiest way to use a DXi or VSTi softsynth for playback. If this option is
checked, then all MIDI playback output will be routed to the default DXi synth regardless of the MIDI track’s port
number.
Assigning DXi or VSTi Synths to Tracks
To assign a DXi/VSTi synth to a particular MIDI track, select the track in the Tracks window and then click on the
Disclosure Triangle.
The Disclosure Triangle will reveal more information about a track by
making the track row height taller.
The [Edit DXi] button launches the DirectX/VST Window.
In the DirectX/VST Window you can select the type of DXi/VSTi softsynth to use and also see a control panel
display of the softsynth that allows you to make settings directly for your DXi or VSTi synth.
The settings panel that opens is either for the default DXi synth (16th DXi synth slot which is MIDI port 32) or the
current DXi port number if the track is set to a valid DXi port (17-32).
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Chapter 5: Using MIDI Features
The DXi/VSTi softsynth will convert the MIDI information to audio, which RealBand will play back through your
sound card to audio speakers.
Note: If using MME drivers, only the MIDI playback output can use softsynths. MIDI Thru, MIDI metronome, scrub mode,
and chord advance/backup will default to a regular MIDI port. With ASIO drivers, MIDI Thru will play through softsynths.
Rendering Songs to Audio with DXi
Rendering songs to audio in RealBand is much easier if the MIDI tracks are using a DXi (or VSTi) synth.
Rendering DXi MIDI tracks to audio is as simple as selecting the Audio | Merge Audio and DXi Tracks to Stereo
Wave File menu command. You will be prompted for a wave file name, and then RealBand will render to the
.WAV file. It’s as simple as that.
Remember that audio tracks will also be rendered, so if you only want to render MIDI, then be sure to mute all audio
tracks first.
Rendering Individual Tracks to Audio
Right-click in the Tracks window to access these audio rendering commands.
Auto Convert Individual MIDI Track to WAV File
Choose this command to convert any MIDI track to a .WAV file. RealBand will automatically render using a DXi
or VSTi synth. WAV files can be exported to other sequencers or Windows Media Player.
Auto Convert Individual MIDI Track to Audio Track
It is easy to convert any MIDI track to an audio track. RealBand will automatically render using a DXi or VSTi
synth and import the audio into the first available track in the Tracks window.
Loading and Playing MIDI Songs
Loading a Song
To load in a new song choose File | Open. You will then see a list of files available for use with the program.
To see the custom Open dialog, go to Options | Preferences (Ctrl+F5) and select the checkbox for “Long File
Names use custom open/save dialog.”
This lets you use a more advanced custom file dialog.
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This dialog lets you choose a font, and it will remember the dialog’s window size and placement along with the
currently selected font. It also has a tree button that lets you view the directory structure, and a button that lets you
chose between details mode and list mode. RealBand will remember these settings the next time you load or save a
file using the custom file dialog.
The font selection button lets you use any font on your system for the file dialog, in your choice of
font size and style.
The find button in the custom Open dialog lets you search for a file within the current folder,
useful when a folder has many files.
The favorite folders button in the custom Open dialog will let you quickly change the current
folder by selecting from a list of “favorite” folders.
RealBand will remember up to 25 folders from which you had previously loaded files. You can quickly select a
folder and instantly go there without having to navigate through the Windows tree structure.
Let’s load in the demo song I Said It Before. The file name is i_said.seq. Open the song as you
would any file, either with a double mouse click on the file name or by selecting the file name
in the dialog and then clicking on the [Open] button.
The song title and file name appear in the status bar at the top of the screen.
The song’s time signature and key signature are seen below the song title and directly above
the on-screen piano keyboard.
The song tempo is seen to the right of the time signature and key signature. Click in the
tempo field to open the Tempo dialog and type in the tempo in beats-per-minute (bpm).
Use the up/down scroll arrows to change the tempo without typing it in again, or click the [-] button four times in
tempo and RealBand will set its tempo to the four beats (three for a waltz) that you just tapped.
If you click the [=] button four times it will set the tempo and start the song playing. You can also use the minus
and equals keys on the computer keyboard to do this.
Use the square bracket [ ] keys to change the tempo by +/- 5 bpm.
Precise “Floating Point” Tempos
RealBand supports precise floating-point tempos, such as 120.514 BPM. This makes it easier to sync MIDI tracks
to prerecorded audio tracks if the audio tracks weren’t recorded exactly at an integer tempo. This also is what lets
RealBand play a song in sync to an existing audio track after the Audio Chord Wizard has worked its magic.
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Chord Wizard
The Chord Wizard is located in the Chords window, which opens with the [C7] toolbar button. Right
click anywhere in the window to open the MIDI Chord Wizard menu.
If you choose MIDI Chord Wizard, RealBand will attempt to automatically detect the chords in the song. You can
use the Undo command if you want to undo this.
The Custom Chord Wizard command works the same as the MIDI Chord Wizard command except that it launches
the Chord Wizard dialog, which lets you customize the settings for chord detection.
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The Options menu item launches the Chords Window Options dialog.
The “Bars Per Line” setting determines how many measures will be drawn per line in the Chords window.
The “Visible Lines Per Screen:” setting determines how many lines (rows) of chords are will be visible per screen.
Each screen will always have 125 lines per screen in the Chords window, but the Visible Lines Per Screen setting
controls how many lines will be visible without scrolling.
The [Choose Font…] button lets you select a font for the Chords window. The font’s overall size will be determined
by the amount of Visible Lines Per Screen, as well as the height of the Chords window.
The “Auto-Interpret Chords” setting is useful in a situation where a file is loaded, but the file doesn’t already contain
any chord symbols. If you set this to “Always,” then RealBand will always attempt to automatically interpret the
chord symbols using the Chord Wizard. If set to “Ask First,” then RealBand will ask before attempting to
automatically interpret chord symbols. If set to “Never,” then RealBand will just load the file without attempting to
figure out the Chord Symbols.
Audio Chord Wizard
The Audio Chord Wizard is an extremely powerful feature that automatically finds chord symbols (C, Fm7
etc.) by analyzing the audio content of a song and displays them in a chord sheet window.
The song can be in a digital file format (MP3, WAV, WMA, or CD audio file), one that you created in RealBand, or
directly loaded from a CD.
In addition to the chords, the Audio Chord Wizard also automatically determines the bar lines and a Tempo map.
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The Audio Chord Wizard imports chord symbols it finds into the Chords window.
Use this feature to instantly play along to your favorite songs, by reading and printing the chord symbols.
Playing a Song
Use the familiar “tape deck” control buttons to Record, Play, Rewind to the
start, Fast
Forward to the end, and Stop song playback.
Playback can be stopped and started anywhere in the song. The fast-forward and rewind buttons jump to either the
end or the beginning of the song.
The red circle indicates the Record button for recording MIDI tracks.
Auto Rewind
Auto Rewind is found in the Options menu. When enabled, RealBand will automatically rewind to the location that
playback or recording was started. The choices are “Recording Only,”“Playback Only,”“Both Recording and
Playback,” or “Disabled.”
Soloing Tracks
You can solo any track or any combination of tracks by pressing the [Solo] button on the toolbar. The
track selection can be changed while the song is playing. Select multiple tracks by holding down the
Shift key and clicking on the track numbers.
Auto-Solo Bass and Drums
If you press the Ctrl key when activating the Solo button,
RealBand will solo the Bass and Drum tracks.
RealBand will detect the drum track based on the Drum channel in the
Piano Settings dialog, located in Preferences under the Piano tab.
RealBand will detect the bass track using an algorithm that looks at
the number of notes vs. chords in a track as well as the average pitch.
In addition, if a track has “Bass” in the name or patch name, then it
will be considered a bass track as well.
Use the slider on the main toolbar to jump to a new song location. Markers
can be inserted anywhere in the song to mark sections, such as Intro, Verse, and Chorus using the Window | Show
Markers Window option. These buttons are used to jump to the next marker in either direction
from the current location.
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The Now: readout gives the current location in the song file. The Now: location is in bars, beats, and MIDI clock
ticks according to the current resolution setting, which could range from 48 to 3840 system clock ticks per quarter
note (ppq).
The From: and Thru: locations define the range of bars and beats that will be affected by the various Edit menu
operations. The settings are made in the Block menu, or by selecting a range of bars in the Bars window, the Audio
Edit window, or the track overview in the Tracks window.
RealBand defaults to showing the Tracks window. Each row in the Tracks window represents a different track of
the song.
Conductor Window
“Conductor”- Live Looping/Playback Control
As the song is playing, there are options to control the flow of playback by one of three methods:
1. Conductor window
2. QWERTY hot keys
3. MIDI keyboard
The Conductor is launched with the Conductor button on the toolbar.
You must enable the QWERTY keys to be active for the Conductor during playback. This is done by selecting the
“Enable Control by QWERTY keys” checkbox on the Conductor Window.
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If you want to control the Conductor using the MIDI keyboard, you need to enable this by selecting the checkbox
“Enable control by MIDI keyboard.” in the MIDI keyboard control box. When this setting is enabled, any MIDI
input will be interpreted as a hot key for the Conductor, and you won’t hear MIDI thru.
If you’d like the ability to switch your MIDI keyboard between Conductor mode and regular playing mode, you
can do this using the lowest “A-natural” MIDI note on your keyboard. This is A1 on an 88-note keyboard. Note
A1 will turn the Conductor off, Bb1 turns it on, and B1 will toggle the Conductor on only when the Bb1 note is
held down. If you don’t have an 88-note keyboard, you can set the octave setting to a number higher than 1, for
example if you set it to “3,” then notes A3/Bb3/B3 will turn the Conductor Off/On/Toggled.
Using the Conductor QWERTY or MIDI keys, you can:
- Define and jump to up to 10 user defined sections in the song,
- Jump back 1 bar/4 bars/# of bars/screen/part/chorus/section,
- Jump ahead 1 bar/4 bars/# of bars/screen/part/chorus/section,
- Loop 1 bar/4 bars/# of bars/screen/part/chorus/section,
- Pause/stop the song.
In addition, using the MIDI keyboard, you can also use the Conductor to:
A1
(note#21) Turn MIDI Conductor OFF
Bb1
Turn MIDI Conductor ON
B1
Turn MIDI Conductor ON only as note is held down
The various functions of the Conductor are available with MIDI keys and QWERTY hot keys, as listed in the
Wizards, Tools, and Plug-Ins chapter.
Customizing the Sections
Sections: This allows you to define up to 10 points in the song that are sections. By default, the following sections
are defined for each song.
- Section 1: Start of song
- Section 2: Intro
- Section 3: First Chorus
- Section 4 :Middle Chorus (i.e. start of chorus #2)
- Section 5: Last Chorus
- Section 6: Ending
- Sections 7-10 are user definable. To do this, type in any bar # using the bar/chorus format (e.g. 21/2 would be
bar 21, chorus 2).
If you prefer to enter custom values for the section numbers, you can do this if you check the “custom” checkbox,
and then type in up to 10 bar numbers for each section.
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The section numbers are saved with the song. Once you have defined the sections, you can jump to a certain section
of the song as the song is playing, simply by:
1. Pressing the 1-9 or 0 key on the QWERTY keyboard or,
2. Opening the Conductor window (~ hot key) and clicking on the section button or,
3. Pressing MIDI keys 77-86 (F6 to D7) corresponding to sections 1-10.
Mode (when to do the action).
By pressing a QWERTY hot key prior to an action, you can control when the action will take place. If no mode hot
key is pressed prior to an action, the default mode will occur.
The default is set in the “Default Mode for section change” or “Default Mode for going back or ahead” combo box.
For example, by default, the section change will occur as soon as you press the key, and it will go to the equivalent
place in the bar immediately before the beginning of the target section (so that the music stays in time, and the next
section begins at the end of the bar). But you can change the default for the action to take place at the end of the
current bar or current part marker etc.
Play Control Buttons
This plays the song. Hot key = F4, MIDI note = F4.
This stops playback. Hot key = Esc, MIDI note = F#4.
Example uses of the Conductor:
In this example, we don’t have custom sections set, so the default sections apply (middle chorus = section 4 etc.).
- Jump to the start of middle choruses during playback (press “4”).
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- Loop the middle chorus (press S, which is Loop Section).
- Jump to the end of the song (press 6 ).
- Go back 1 chorus (Ctrl+A).
- Go ahead 1 chorus (Shift+A).
At the end of the current chorus, go back 1 section, press Y then Ctrl+S.
Note: Pressing the Y sets the mode to do the action at the end of the current chorus
These actions can also be done with the MIDI keyboard. See the section on Conductor Functions with MIDI and
QWERTY Hot Keys in the Wizards, Tools, and Plug-Ins chapter.
Tracks Window
The Tracks window shows the track names, track type (MIDI or audio), instrument settings, and an overview
section showing either MIDI or audio data.
The Track Number field shows the track number. If the track is the current Track it will be highlighted in
red.
If the track is selected the number will be highlighted in yellow. If the track is not selected it will be gray. You can
click on the track number field to make a track the current track (highlighted in red).
If you click on the track number field while holding the Shift key, this will select a range of tracks from the current
track through the number you clicked on. For example, if track 2 is the Current Track, and you hold the Shift key
and then click on the number field for Track 4, this will make tracks 2 through 4 selected. Track 2 will still be the
Current Track and tracks 3 and 4 will be highlighted in yellow. You can select/deselect individual tracks by clicking
on a Track’s number field while holding down the Ctrl key.
The Disclosure Triangle will reveal more information about a track by making the track row height taller.
If a track is a MIDI track, then you’ll see the Vel (velocity offset), Rvb (reverb), Mod (modulation), Loop,
Key (key transpose), Cho (Chorus), and Exp (expression) settings.
You can make changes to these settings by clicking on the edit fields with the left mouse button, and then moving
the mouse up or down while holding the mouse button down. The [Edit DXi] button launches the DirectX
Window dialog and will display the settings panel for either the Default DXi Synth (16th DXi synth slot which is
MIDI port 32) or the current DXi port number if the track is set to a valid DXi port (17-32). Any track’s MIDI
Output Port can be set to send to one of the 16 available DXi synth ports or to any other available MIDI port.
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When you right-click your mouse on a MIDI icon you’ll see a
pop-up menu that lets you set the MIDI Output Port, Program
(Patch) setting, and Bank (MSB) and Bank LSB settings.
Immediately below the Port: menu item is a menu command
that lets you Set All Midi Tracks to the same port used by the
track you are adjusting.
There is also a menu item Patch Select Dialog that launches a
patch selection dialog, which lets you select patches and
variations as well as allowing you to change the track’s patch
list. If the patch list is set to General MIDI, Roland GS, or
Yamaha XG, the track will display an instrument icon
corresponding to the patch. Otherwise, you’ll see the patch
number displayed instead of an icon.
The Track Name field shows the track’s name, which is edited by right-clicking or double-clicking on the track
name field. Type the name and press Enter.
When using the General MIDI patch map the program will
automatically display an icon for the instrument selected.
The Mute button lets you mute or unmute a track.
The Volume and Pan sliders let you adjust a track’s volume and pan settings without
opening the Mixer window. Right-clicking on the Volume or Pan controls will let you
edit the setting by typing in a number.
Below the Volume slider stereo VU meters give you a general idea of a track’s level
during playback.
Track Overview Display
To the right of the track info panels, you’ll see the overview display.
This lets you view MIDI or audio data, and select sections for editing.
Right click anywhere on the track to see more track options.
Right Click Menu for MIDI Tracks
If a track is a MIDI track, and you right click on the track you’ll see a pop-up menu that lets you set
the MIDI Output Port, Channel, Program (Patch) setting, and Bank (MSB) and Bank LSB
settings.
This menu will also open with a left click on the track type icon if “Left click on track-type icon in Tracks Window
shows pop-up menu” has been selected (checked) in the Options | Preferences General dialog.
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There are 32 MIDI Output ports. You can think of each of port as route that the track takes to output sound, whether
through an onboard sound card, software synthesizer, or an external MIDI keyboard or sound module.
The first 16 ports are for either onboard synthesizers or external MIDI I/O connections. Ports 17 through 32 are for
DirectX (DXi) or Virtual Studio Technology (VSTi) instruments. Mouse over the Port menu item to see a list of all
available ports.
At the bottom of the Port submenu, there are additional menu items to Load DXi/VSTi Synth into unused Slot and
Load DXi/VSTi Synth into specific Slot.
Load DXi/VSTi Synth into unused Slot loads in synth into the next available slot (port) and automatically assigns
the track to that port. However, if the synth is already loaded into a port, it will assign the track to that port rather
than loading another instance of the same plug-in. So this command is basically the same as “Specific Synth for
MIDI track.”
Load DXi/VSTi Synth into specific Slot allows you to select the port to load the synth into, and it loads another
instance of the synth.
Immediately below the Port menu item is a menu command that lets you Set ALL MIDI Tracks to>> the same
port as used by the track you are adjusting.
With Specific DXi/VSTi Synth for MIDI track you can assign each track to a specific DXi or VSTi synth. This
allows you to use multiple synths in the same song. Point to Specific DXi/VSTi Synth for MIDI track then select
the synth you want to use from the submenu.
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Open DXi/VSTi Synth Panel Configuration opens the DirectX/VST Window. This allows you complete control
over assigning DXi or VSTi synths to ports, processing the synth output with DX or VST audio effects, and working
inside your synth’s control panel.
The help topic Tutorial: Using DXi and VSTi synths with RealBand provides detailed instructions for installing
and selecting these high quality music synthesizers.
There is also a Patch Select Dialog menu item that launches a patch selection dialog (which lets you select patches
and variations as well as allowing you to change the track’s patch list). As long a track’s Patch List is set to General
MIDI, Roland GS, or Yamaha XG, then the track will display instrument icon corresponding to the patch.
Otherwise, you’ll see the patch number displayed instead of an icon.
In the right-click Tracks window menu, MIDI tracks can quickly be rendered to audio with the commands Auto
Convert Individual MIDI Track to WAV file and Auto Convert Individual MIDI Track to Audio Track as long as the
track is assigned to a DXi or VSTi synth.
Time Stretch and Pitch Shift is an audio feature that lets you stretch (or reduce) the length of the highlighted
section of audio tracks.
Select Whole Track command will select the entire track for editing.
Kill Selected Region will deselect a selected region of a MIDI (or audio) track.
Change Current Time (Alt+Left Mouse Click) – will change the current time without affecting the highlighting of
tracks. This ensures you don’t accidentally de-select a region.
Select and Generate RealTrack opens the RB Assign RealTracks to Tracks dialog for Real instrument selection
and options for the generation of the audio RealTrack. Track names for generated non-BB tracks are displayed in
green. For example, if you had generated a track by right clicking on it and selecting “Generate RealTrack” then the
track name of that track will be displayed in green.
Generate RealTrack (Favorites) opens a list of recently used Real instruments for quick selection and generation.
Select and Generate RealDrums opens the RB RealDrums Picker for selection of a RealDrums style and options
for the generation of the audio RealDrums. Track names for generated non-BB tracks are displayed in green.
Generate RealDrums (Favorites) opens a list of recently used RealDrums styles for quick selection and
generation.
Generate MIDI Track opens a list box to select the part for a MIDI track to be generated on the current track.
Insert Volume Change will insert a MIDI controller into the track at the current location. If a highlighted region
exists, then the program will ask if you want to apply this change to the highlighted region (as opposed to a change
at the location you clicked). If applying the change to a region, then program will insert a volume change at the
beginning of the region, and a 2nd volume change at the end to restore the prior volume.
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If necessary, the program will insert a controller at the very beginning of the song to preserve the original volume
if you insert a volume change beyond the start of the track. This will normally be done the first time you insert a
volume change into a track beyond the tracks’ beginning.
Audio Effects opens the selection list of built-in PG Music audio effects.
Right-Click Menu for Audio Tracks
If a track is an Audio track and you right-click on the track, this pop-up menu opens. This menu will
also open with a left click on the track type icon if “Left click on track-type icon in Tracks Window
shows pop-up menu” has been selected (checked) in the Options | Preferences General dialog.
The Track Type and audio Port settings can be assigned.
Open DX/VST Plugins Configuration opens the DirectX/VST Window where plug-ins can be applied and edited.
The Track Category item lets you select preset groups of audio effects for the particular category such as guitar,
vocal, keyboard, or your own user assigned effects groups.
Make a New Audio Category opens a dialog where you can name a new category, select an image for its icon, and
assign an audio effects group (*.TGS) preset.
Time Stretch and Pitch Shiftis a dialog that lets you stretch (or reduce) the length of the highlighted section of
audio tracks.
Select Whole Track command will select the entire track for editing.
Kill Selected Region will deselect a selected region of an audio (or MIDI) track.
Change Current Time will change the current time without affecting the highlighting of tracks. This ensures you
don’t accidentally de-select a region.
Select and Generate RealTrack opens the Assign RealTracks to Tracks dialog to select a RealTracks instrument
and generate a RealTrack. Track names for generated non-BB tracks are displayed
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in green. For example, if you had generated a track by right
clicking on it and selecting “Generate RealTrack” then the track
name of that track will be displayed in green.
Generate RealTrack (Favorites) shows a list of recently used RealTracks.
Select and Generate RealDrums opens the RealDrums Picker to choose a
RealDrums set and create a RealDrums track. Track names for
generated non-BB tracks are displayed in green.
Generate RealDrums (Favorites) shows a list of recently used RealDrums.
Generate MIDI Track opens a list box to choose which Band-in-a-Box part to generate for the track – Bass,
Drums, Piano, Guitar, or Strings. When a part is chosen from the list it will
automatically be generated using the current Band-in-a-Box style in use. You can create
tracks in different styles in the same song.
The track name of the generated non-BB MIDI track will be
colored green.
Insert Volume Change will insert a MIDI controller into the track at the current location. If a highlighted region
exists, then the program will ask if you want to apply this change to the highlighted region (as opposed to a change
at the location you clicked). If applying the change to a region, then program will insert a volume change at the
beginning of the region, and a 2nd volume change at the end to restore the prior volume.
If necessary, the program will insert a controller at the very beginning of the song to preserve the original volume if
you insert a volume change beyond the start of the track. This will normally be done the first time you insert a
volume change into a track beyond the tracks’ beginning.
Audio Effects opens a submenu that is the same as the Edit | Audio Effects window. This submenu also contains
Fade In and Fade Out menu items, which launches a FlashMessage w/ instructions, and then launches the GAIN
dialog.
Regenerate Track will regenerate an existing track. If a track is a non-BB track, but it was generated individually
from one of the generation options in Tracks Window popup menu, or from one of the generation options on the
Generate Button popup menu, then the track name will be displayed in green. The track name being displayed in
green or blue means that the track can be regenerated using this command. This feature is useful to regenerate, if
you had changed the song’s tempo, or just to generate fresh material.
Generate All will regenerate all Blue and Green tracks automatically.
Select Area
You can click and drag to highlight a section of the song for editing.
Shift+click (Shift key + left mouse button) support makes it easy to tweak the beginning or end of the highlighted
area.
-
If you Shift+click before the start of the From/Thru range, or after the end of the From/Thru range, the
highlighted area will be extended.
-
If you Shift+click within the From/Thru range, the range will be reduced, and the location you clicked on
will become either From or Thru depending on which boundary was closer to where you Shift+clicked the
mouse.
-
If you keep the left mouse button held after the Shift+click, and you move the mouse you can adjust the
boundary of the range while moving the mouse.
Click on [Play Selected Area] to hear the highlighted section being edited.
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The [-] and [+] buttons (upper far left corner of the Tracks window) let you zoom in or zoom out the overview
section.
The [Snap] button causes the time indicator to snap to the nearest beat when changing the time location or when
highlighting a region for editing.
The [L] button locks the From: and Thru: settings from being changed by the mouse. This prevents accidental
changes to a selected area.
Drag and Drop Features
RealBand supports drag-and-drop editing in the Tracks and Audio Edit windows.
In the Tracks window you can easily move tracks up or down in relation to each other by drag ‘n’ drop using the
mouse, e.g., drag track 1 below track 2 to change the order of the tracks.
You can move a highlighted region by holding down the Ctrl key with the left mouse button pressed, and drag the
region to a new location in the song.
After releasing the mouse button, you have four options:
1. Move to new location and overwrite removes the selected region from the original source track and places it on
the destination track. Existing content on the destination track is overwritten.
2. Move to new location and merge removes the selected region from the original source track and merges it with
the existing content on the destination track.
3. Copy to new location and overwrite copies the selected area and places it on the destination track. Existing
content on the destination track is overwritten. The original source track is left intact.
4. Copy to new location and merge copies the selected area and merges it with the existing content on the
destination track. The original source track is left intact.
Drag And Drop MIDI Or Audio Files Into The Tracks Window
You can drag a file, such as a .WAV file, from a folder directly onto the Tracks window. The file will be placed on
the track you dropped it on, at the location onto which you dropped the file. The types of files that are supported are
the audio files supported by RealBand, such as .MP3, .WAV, and WMV.
In addition to audio files, .MID files can be dropped onto the tracks window too. If the file is a multi-track .MID it
will be imported onto free tracks beyond the highest occupied track.
If you hold the Ctrl key when dropping the file, then the file will be inserted at the time location, and any existing
data moved beyond the end of the file that is being inserted, rather than overwriting any existing data.
NOTE: this feature will only insert files on measure boundaries.
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Classic Tracks View Settings
Click your mouse anywhere on a row to select that track. The number of the currently selected track (Tr) is
highlighted in blue.
The type field determines the track type: MIDI, Mono Audio, and Stereo
Audio. You can’t change the track type if a track already has data in it.
Ty = Type.
MIDI Audio Stereo
P = Play Status.
The Play Status field shows the status of the track as Play (P), Muted (m).
Name = Track Name.
This is any name you want to give to the track.
Ch = Forced MIDI channel.
When not set to zero, all events in a track will be sent out over the selected
channel.
Key = Forced Key Transposition.
This setting transposes the events in a track up or down by the number of
semitones you specify.
Vel = Forced Velocity transposition.
This setting increases or decreases the velocity of the notes in a track by the
amount you specify.
Pt = Port.
Determines the MIDI port, or audio port, through which the data in a track is
sent out.
Prg = Program change.
When this setting is enabled a MIDI patch change will be sent at the start of
the song. When you change this setting, a MIDI program change is sent.
Bank = Bank change.
This is the MSB (Most Significant Byte) portion of the bank change,
controller number 0.
LSB.
This is the Least Significant Byte (controller number 32) portion of the bank change. Some synths
use LSB instead of MSB, and some synths use a combination of the LSB and the MSB.
Loop.
When this setting is enabled, the track will automatically repeat for the number of times specified.
Events.
The number of events in a track.
Selecting MIDI Patches
A double mouse click in the Prg (Program Change) field for any track will launch the Select Patch dialog.
This dialog lets you select a patch from the current patch list shown in the Patch List combo box. For example, if
you select “General MIDI” then the patch list used for current track will be the General MIDI patch list. RealBand
saves the most recently selected Patch List for each track in its native .SEQ files. This example shows Roland GS,
which is an extension of the General MIDI list with variations (alternate choices) for many instruments.
To select a patch, simply click on the patch in the main list box then hit the [OK] button to exit the dialog. The
“Variations” list box shows the variations, which are patches in other banks that have the same number as the
selected patch.
If the “Always Show Bank 0 Names” checkbox is checked, the main list box will be filled with the patches of the
default bank (those patches with both the bank MSB and LSB being 0), and the highlighted variation is the actual
patch that is selected. If the checkbox is unchecked, then the patches in the list box will change to those of the bank
number of the current variation.
Only patches that have names will be in the list box, e.g., if there are only 9 named patches in the current bank, the
list box will only be filled with 9 patches. When you select a patch in the list box, the number of the patch will
appear in the “Patch” edit control.
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You can select any patch by number by typing the number in the “Patch” edit control. You can press the send
button to send the patch change you just typed without having to exit the dialog. The disabled checkbox simply
means no patch change is selected for the current track, and a value of “---” will show in the Prg column of the
Classic Tracks View window.
The [Recently Selected Patches…] button brings up a dialog with a list of the 20 most recently selected patches, if
any recently selected patches exist.
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Chapter 6: BB Tracks and MIDI tracks
Overview
As discussed elsewhere, any one of RealBand’s 48 tracks can be either a MIDI or audio track. And for either type
you have the option of recording and creating your own parts or using the musical intelligence of RealBand to create
professional tracks for you. When working with MIDI tracks, RealBand uses its Band-in-a-Box components to
generate tracks in any of the Band-in-a-Box styles that you have installed on your computer.
RealBand also lets you generate selected sections of tracks and regenerate either complete tracks or selected parts as
often as you want to – and with any style you want to use. This means that your BB Tracks can be assembled from
any number of different styles to add variety and fine-tune the arrangement.
Creating a New Song Arrangement
To generate a new song arrangement you begin by typing the chords into the Chords window
using standard chord symbols. This window opens with the [C7] button, the hot key combination
Ctrl+3, or the menu command Window | Chords. Band-in-a-Box users will feel right at home.
You’ll see the bars of the song displayed in rows. If a bar contains chord symbols they will be displayed to the right
of the bar number.
Enter the chords for your song by typing them in using standard chord symbols such as C, or Fm7, or Bb7, or
Bb13#9/E. For example type c6 to get the C6 chord. Note that you should never have to use the Shift key, as
RealBand will sort this out for you.
- Use b for a flat, e.g. Bb7.
- Use # or 3 for a sharp, e.g. F#7. (# is the uppercase symbol of 3, so you can actually type F37 to get F#7 RealBand will sort out the case, saving you the effort of using 3 to type the # symbol.
- Use / for Slash Chords with alternate Roots such as C7/E (C7 with E bass)
- Use a comma to enter 2 chords in a row. In the example below, we would type Ab9,G9 to enter 2 chords at a time
(on beat 3 and 4 of bar 2)
You can use the Delete key to delete a chord, or type a comma and press Enter.
Each measure is divided into Beat Groups, indicated by a highlight cell. A Beat Group consists of two beats. If a
song is in 4/4, then each measure will contain two beat groups. The current beat group will have a rectangle drawn
around it. You can type two chords into the current beat group. For example if you type this: “C7,G7” (without the
quotes) you’ll see the text you’re typing in the white rectangular panel on the toolbar. If you then hit you’ll
see the C7 and G7 chords appear within the current beat group, and the input rectangle will automatically advance to
the next beat group. When you’re in the middle of typing chord symbols, you can use the backspace key to correct a
mistake.
The Left Arrow and Right Arrow keys let you move the input rectangle to a different beat group without entering
chords. You can also click the mouse on a different beat group to move the input rectangle to a new location.
For a list of the chord spellings that are recognized by RealBand see the help topic Entering Chord Symbols.
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Rests/Shot/Held Chord/Pushes
Rests, Shot, Held Chord, and Pushes are supported by the RealBand generation routines:
A chord can be specified as a Rest by adding a period after the chord.
e.g. “C.” indicates a C chord that is a Rest.
A chord can be specified as a Shot by adding two periods after the chord.
e.g. “C..” indicates a C chord that is a Shot.
A chord can be specified as a Held Chord by adding three periods after the chord.
e.g. “C…” indicates a C chord that is a Held Chord.
Pushes:
^C = 8th push
^^C = 16th push
Note: Pushes, Shots, Rests, Hold Chords can ONLY be entered in the Chords Window.
Part Markers
If you click directly on a bar number, the number will change into a Part Marker. There are two kinds of part
markers:
- an “a” part marker (blue)
- and a “b” part marker (green)
,
.
The part markers choose one of the two substyles available for BB Tracks arrangements. In general these substyles
correspond to the “a” and “b” sections of a song.
Clicking once on the bar number that currently has no part marker will set the bar to “a” part marker. Clicking again
will set it to a “b” part marker. Clicking again would set the bar so it would be back to having no part marker.
The Chords window allows you to toggle the part marker type for a measure during playback. This can be done the
usual way, which is to click on the measure number with the mouse. In addition, you can also toggle a part marker
for the current measure by pressing the 'M' key on your keyboard when the Chords window is the currently active
window (and when not already in the middle of entering a chord within the Chords window).
Entering Chords
Let’s enter some chords in the chord sheet.
We’ll put our highlight cell in the first beat group of bar and type the letters cm7. Press the Enter key and the chord
symbol Cm7 is entered at the start of bar 1.
Press the Enter key again and the highlight cell moves to bar 2. Type f7 for an F seventh chord and press Enter.
Now we’ll use some chord shortcuts. The letter “j” is the shortcut for a major seventh chord. Type bbj and press
Enter to write the chord symbol BbMaj7 on the chord sheet. Move to the next bar and type ebj to write EbMaj7 in
that bar. Advance to the next bar and type the letters ah to write Am7b5 – the h is for a half-diminished chord. In
the next bar type df and the chord symbol D7b9 will be entered, then enter gm for a G minor chord in bar 7. We’ll
stop there for purposes of this tutorial, and here is what our Chord window looks like now.
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Generating the BB Tracks
Now we’ll move on to the arranger toolbar to generate our RealBand song arrangement.
The next thing to do is reset the default song length of 32 bars to 8 bars. We’ll leave the start-of-song chorus
set at bar 1 and click on the end-of-chorus button to type in the number of the new end-of-chorus bar.
For our short tutorial song we’ll start at bar 1 and end at bar 8.
We’d like RealBand to add a 2-bar ending to our song, so we’ll check the 2 Bar Ending box.
Next we’ll choose a style for our song by clicking on the style name to open the StylePicker
window. You aren’t required to have Band-in-a-Box for your RealBand styles, but if you do you will see that all of
your styles are available here.
From the Jazz category select the J!Lush style (or any other style of your choosing) and you’ll
see that the style selection box has been updated with its name.
Note: There is a special feature that will instruct RealBand to change the style selection at any bar. The setting is made by
pressing the F5 function key. It is described under “About BB Tracks.”
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The time signature defaults to 4/4, but a new time signature can be set by clicking in this box to open the
Meter dialog. Compound time signatures are supported. In fact, the numerator can be any number from 1 to 99.
The denominator is selected from the drop down combo box.
Our song is in C minor, so we could select the relative major key signature of Eb for fewer accidentals in the
notation display. Click in the key box to open the Key Signature dialog.
Real Band will prompt to ask if you also want to transpose the MIDI tracks for your song to the new key.
In this instance we do not want to transpose the MIDI tracks; we just want to change the key signature. Select [No].
Just before we play our song we can set a tempo.
The tempo box has a setting of 120 bpm. To change it to 140 we’ll click in the box to open the
Tempo dialog and type in 140.
We could also set the tempo with the up and down scroll arrows, or even tap in a tempo with the minus
and equals buttons.
Tempo Calculator (File | File Utilities)
The length of a song depends on tempo and number of bars. With this calculator, found in the File menu under
File Utilities, you can enter 2 of the 3 variables (length of song in seconds, tempo, number of bars) and the
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73
program calculates the third variable for you. So, for example, if you need a piece of music lasting 60.00 seconds,
and it is 45 bars, you can use the calculator to find the tempo that will achieve that.
So we’ve entered our chords in the Chords window, set the length of our song and added a 2-bar ending, chosen a
Band-in-a-Box style, and set the tempo.
We’re ready to generate an automatic arrangement with BB tracks, and we’ll see them in the Tracks
window when we press the [Generate] button to create our song.
The track overview shows us that we have five MIDI tracks playing the parts generated by the J!Lush style, and
because RealDrums are allowed in the Preferences | Song Generation settings the BB Drums track is empty and we
have a RealDrums audio track. Notice that the BB Track names are in blue, whereas user track names are in black.
About BB Tracks
BB Tracks are MIDI tracks so they can be edited like any other MIDI track with the features described in the
following section. BB tracks cannot be moved or renamed, but you can change any of the settings with the rightclick menu – for example the patch, MIDI port, or MIDI channel.
Settings for Bar
BB Tracks can be generated using more than one style, with volume changes, and with repeats. In the Chords
window, click on the bar where you want to make changes and press on the F5 function key. This opens the
Settings for Bar dialog.
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Use the [STY] button to open the StylePicker and make your selection, and use the [Clear]
button to remove the selection. When the song is generated your new style will be heard playing at that bar. This
feature can be used any number of times in a song.
Volume Changes
Volume changes can be applied at any bar to all BB tracks together, or just to selected instruments. The options are:
Mute, to silence the track.
Back to Normal, to undo a previous change and restore the normal track volume.
Change by, to enter a value in the range of -127 to 127.
Fade or increase volume.
Repeats
You can add repeats to an arrangement.
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The repeats display on the Chords window, and both audio/MIDI play with the repeats. When the number in
“Repeat _ Bars” is greater than zero, a repeat will be enabled, and repeat signs shown in the Chords window.
Now that you have generated BB Tracks for the chords you entered in the Chords window, your next step might be
to record some additional MIDI tracks along with the BB tracks.
Recording Your Own MIDI Tracks
In addition to BB Tracks, MIDI data can be recorded on any track in RealBand. Just select the track by clicking on
the track number, and make sure that the track type is set to MIDI.
MIDI is recorded with the Input driver that is selected in the MIDI Driver Setup dialog. (Go to Options | MIDI
Devices to open the dialog.) If more than one Input Driver is available then choose the one that is connected to your
MIDI keyboard or controller.
Before you start, you might want to select a higher resolution for greater precision. RealBand supports note
resolutions as high as 3840 PPQ.
Note: Higher note resolution reduces the maximum allowed song length, as well as reducing the maximum allowed note
duration length. At 3840 PPQ, the maximum song length of a 4/4 song is around 35 minutes long at a tempo of 120, less at
faster tempos. At 3840 PPQ and a 4/4 time signature the maximum allowed note duration length is around 17 beats
regardless of the tempo.
Then make the necessary settings in the Tracks window to select the port, MIDI channel, patch, etc. for the part you
are recording.
Start recording with the Record button, by pressing the R key on the computer keyboard, or with the
menu command Action | Record.
The Record command starts the count-in according to the settings that
you have made in the Metronome Settings dialog.
To open the metronome settings, go to
Preferences and select the Metronome tab. Click on the [Metronome
Settings] button.
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In addition to the on-screen
countdown, there is an option for a
MIDI drum count-in on any drum
kit instrument. The default note is
F#3, hi-hat.
There is a setting in the
Metronome Settings dialog,
“Keep these settings permanent
(ignore settings stored in .SEQ
files),” that will cause RealBand to
remember the current metronome
settings and ignore any settings
stored in .SEQ files.
Recording is stopped by hitting the spacebar or pressing the Stop button.
When recording is stopped you will be asked whether or not you wish to
keep the take.
Remember that with MIDI recording small glitches are easily corrected; so
you don’t need to discard an otherwise good take because of a minor slip.
Note: If you see a message that audio data was recorded that is because “Always Record Audio too, if current track is MIDI”
has been enabled in the Audio preferences dialog. This is an automatic backup feature in case you wanted to record audio,
but accidentally selected the current track as a MIDI track.
Auto Rewind
Auto Rewind is found in the Options menu. When enabled, RealBand will automatically rewind to the location that
playback or recording was started. The choices are “Recording Only,”“Playback Only,”“Both Recording and
Playback,” or “Disabled.”
It is convenient to rewind to the start of a recording after a take so that you can listen to the result immediately.
Overdubs
If there is MIDI data on the selected track it will be overdubbed, i.e., the existing MIDI notes will not be erased as
the new ones are recorded. This is sometimes useful, but a better way to make overdubs is to select a blank track
and give it the same settings as the track you want to overdub. Then record the overdub part on the new track, using
as many tracks as you need for additional overdubs or layers. This is a great way to overdub drum fills or layer
string parts.
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Then you can delete, edit, or re-record each separate overdub without affecting the original track. Use Track |
Merge to combine all of the overdubs onto a single track.
To clear any previously recorded material from a track go to Track | Erase Data Only. This will erase the recorded
MIDI data on the track, but will preserve all of the other track settings such as volume, patch, and channel.
Punch-In
The Punch-In button allows you to enable or disable Punch-In. If Punch-In mode is active, recording will
erase previously recorded MIDI data in the Punch In range without the need to erase the old MIDI data.
Pressing the Ctrl key while clicking on the Punch button allows
you to enable or disable punch-in mode without having to go into
the Punch In setting dialog.
When Punch In is enabled, recording will take place during the
period between From: and Thru: and will overwrite any existing
events during that time.
The From: and Thru: settings for punch-in recording can be set
in the Punch In dialog, or they can be the settings from the main
toolbar.
When Punch-In is disabled, recording may occur at any time
within the song and data will be merged with any existing events
if the track is a MIDI track, or the data will overwrite existing
data if the track is an Audio track.
Recording Mixer Moves
Any volume, pan, chorus, and reverb mixer adjustments made during recording will be recorded in real time as
MIDI controller messages. Adjustments made in the All column of the mixer will not be recorded, however.
When recording mixer moves for audio tracks, you must move the slider for the current track in order to record the
mixer moves. For MIDI tracks, you could move any slider and the data will get recorded onto the current track, but
normally you’ll move the slider of the current track.
There is a special “Record Mixer Moves” button in the mixer, which will let you record ONLY mixer
moves.
This special button will also let you record mixer moves onto an audio track without the audio being silent during
recording.
In order for the recording of mixer moves to work correctly for MIDI tracks, please make sure each track has its
own unique MIDI channel in the Tracks window. Also, keep in mind that mixer moves will only be recorded onto
the current track, so you can only record mixer moves for one track at a time.
Note: If a track is an audio track, and the regular “Keep Take” is selected, the audio will be deleted for the section of the
track where mixer moves were recorded. You’re better off using the “record ONLY mixer moves” button in the Mixer
window to start recording, and you can then concentrate on recording ONLY mixer moves.
For audio tracks, recorded Mixer moves show up as control changes in the Event List for that track. For example, if
you used the volume slider to fade the song out you will see a series of Controller 7 (volume) changes in the Event
List.
Alternatively, you could just use the Edit | Fill command or insert MIDI controller events into the Event List for the
particular audio track.
SysEx MIDI Events
You can insert System Exclusive data directly into a MIDI track as MIDI events. You can record SysEx data in
real time and when you keep a take, the SysEx data will be added to a MIDI track as SysEx events. You could also
load SysEx data into a SysEx MIDI event by receiving SysEx data from your synth, or by loading the SysEx data
from a file. SysEx MIDI events can also be edited.
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Editing BB Tracks and MIDI tracks
Edit Menu
The Edit menu lists all of the regular editing commands like Cut, Copy, and Paste plus many features that are unique
to RealBand. All editing commands are fully described in the Reference chapter.
Piano Roll Editing
Let’s examine the BB Piano track in the Piano Roll window.
We can select the BB Piano track while still in the Tracks window, or we can open the Piano Roll window with the
piano roll button and then select BB Piano from the track list.
In the Piano Roll window notes can be dragged and dropped, shortened or lengthened in the Note Panel, which is the
upper part of the window.
The lower panel is for graphic editing of the selected parameter in the View/Edit list. Note velocity is shown, but
parameters such as pitch bend, channel aftertouch, and MIDI controllers can be edited in this panel as well. Please
see the chapter titled Piano Roll Window for more on this very useful feature. The BB Tracks and MIDI tracks can
also be edited in the Editable Notation window.
Editable Notation
Click on the eighth note toolbar button to open the Notation. In the Notation window toolbar, there
are three buttons for different notation modes. Editable notation is the button with dotted vertical
lines crossing the staff lines.
In the Editable Notation mode notes can be inserted by clicking on the Notation window with the left mouse button,
moved by dragging with the left mouse button, or edited by clicking on a note head with the right mouse button.
Broken vertical gray lines are shown across the staff to show each note subdivision for either eighth note triplets or
sixteenth notes.
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Editable Notation window in 16th note (even) resolution.
Moving Notes (Drag and Drop)
To move a note, move the mouse cursor over an existing note and then click and hold the left mouse button. The
mouse cursor will change to a different shape. While keeping the mouse button pressed, move the mouse cursor
over to the location you wish to drop the note and then let go of the mouse button. The note will be moved to the
place you dropped it. Certain areas of the screen are not valid locations to drop a note. The mouse cursor will
change to a circle with line through it to indicate an invalid location.
When you click and drag a note with the left mouse button you will hear the note being played as you move it up
and down the screen. The note’s pitch will be increased or decreased chromatically as you move it up/down the
screen.
Entering Notes
Notes can be inserted simply by clicking on the staff in an appropriate location. You will see the name and octave
of the current note location in a box at the top of the window, helpful for inserting a note above or below the grand
staff.
When inserting a note, holding down the mouse button and then pressing the Shift key (click+Shift) will make the
note 1 half-step sharper than the position that you click on. Holding down the Ctrl key and then clicking
(Ctrl+click) will make the note 1 half-step flatter, and holding down the Alt key will make the note a natural. Hold
the key down until after you release the mouse button.
You can also insert notes by clicking on the Piano or the Guitar window. Notes will be inserted at the current
location in the Notation window.
Note: By default, you must hold the Ctrl key before clicking on the Guitar fretboard to insert a note into a Notation window.
If the “Send Notes To Notation Windows” option in the Guitar Settings dialog is enabled, holding the Ctrl key won't be
required, but be careful not to accidentally insert a note when using the mouse to switch to the Guitar window.
Notes can be deleted by holding down the Delete key and then clicking over the note you wish to delete.
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Editing Notes
Notes can be edited with a right click directly on the note with to
launch a menu of Editable Notation commands.
In addition to editing or deleting note events, this menu has
commands for adding section text and notation symbols.
There is also a cleanup tool for controller events and 1 peg
advance/backup to pinpoint the location of inserted notes.
The Notation chapter has full descriptions of these commands.
Click on Edit Note to open the NOTE editing dialog.
The NOTE dialog allows editing of:
−
The MIDI channel for the note.
−
The exact time location.
−
Note name.
−
Velocity of the note.
−
Duration of the note in beats and ppq.
Notes can be Normal, Invisible, or a Guitar Bend.
The [Delete] button removes the note.
Micro-Resolutions
You can change the resolution for any individual beat of a song to a different resolution by clicking with the right
mouse button above that beat on the Notation window’s time line.
For example, if you click on the time line above the 2nd beat in a measure, a dialog box will
pop which will let you set the resolution of the current beat for both clefs.
If you select a resolution of 8, then 32nd notes can be
displayed. You can even select a resolution as high as 32,
which would allow 128th notes to be shown.
When you choose a micro-resolution RealBand will insert a
special controller event into the track as a means of storing
the resolution.
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Highlighting a section of the Notation window.
When the Notation window is in Editable Notation Mode, you can highlight a section of the Notation window, so
that you can cut or copy the section.
To highlight a section of the Notation window:
1) Click and hold the left mouse button at the upper right corner of the rectangular section you want to highlight.
Make sure you don’t click on any existing notes, and make sure you don’t release the left mouse button until
you are finished highlighting.
2) Move the mouse down and to the right to form a rectangle. You will see a rectangular section of the Notation
Window become highlighted in reverse.
3) When you’ve finished highlighting release the left mouse button.
During the process of highlighting a section, you can highlight a section beyond the current notation screen by
moving the mouse cursor beyond the right edge of the notation window. When you do this, the Notation window
will advance to the next screen. The Notation window will continue advancing until you move the mouse cursor
back inside of the Notation window. You should move the mouse cursor back inside the notation window when it
has reached the screen that contains the last measure of the section you wish to highlight. Then you can move the
mouse cursor to the left or right within the Notation window to adjust to make any final adjustments to the
highlighted section.
Event List Editing
An Event List window is an event editor that lets you insert or delete MIDI events, and lets you make changes to
existing events. A list of events is displayed vertically in a window, with each line in the list representing an
individual event. Each event is shown with its track number, time, MIDI channel number, the kind of the event, and
the parameters of the event. The [Ins], [Del], and [Change] buttons may be used to insert, delete, and change events.
You can also type directly in the Ch, Time, and Event fields to change the values of an event.
When an Event List is created by pressing the F2 key, or by using the Window | New | Event List menu, it is based
on the tracks that are currently selected. For example, if only track 1 is selected, and you use the New command to
create an Event List window, it will only deal with events that occur in track 1.
You can also open an Event List while multiple tracks are selected. In this case the Event List will deal with events
in all the tracks which where selected at the time of the creation of the Event List window. For example, if tracks 1
through 3 were selected when you created an Event List window, the Event List will deal with events occurring in
those 3 tracks regardless of what tracks you've selected after it was created.
Events may be inserted by pressing the computer keyboard’s Insert key. After pressing Insert, a menu will pop up,
and you may choose which type of event to insert. After picking the kind of event to insert, an entry box will pop up
which will let you choose the MIDI channel, time, and any other parameters of the event. Events may be deleted
simply by pressing the computer’s Delete key.
Existing events may be edited by pressing the [Change] button. A dialog box will pop up, and you may make
changes to the event. You can also type directly in the Time, Ch, and Event fields in the Event List window. You
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can use either the period (.) or colon (:) key to separate the Measures:Beats:Ticks (or the
Hours:Minutes:Seconds:Frames when the SMPTE display mode is enabled).
Notes can be made into “invisible notes” using the radio button in the edit entry box. Invisible notes will be
invisible in the Notation window when in non-editable notation mode.
You can play events one at a time by pressing the Transmit button. If the event you're playing isn't a note, the cursor
will be advanced to the next event, but if the event is a note, it will be sustained until any other key is pressed. You
can stop a sustained note from sounding by pressing the Silence button. The sustained note will also stop in other
situations, such as when you switch to a different window or choose a different event list command.
Split MIDI drums
The Edit | Split MIDI drums command will split a MIDI drum track to separate tracks, which allows for precise
editing of drum kit balance and dynamics. The “Custom” settings allow you to control which notes go to which
track. This feature acts upon the current track, and is not necessarily limited to drum tracks.
If the “Auto-Fill Tracks for each MIDI note used setting” is enabled, then RealBand will automatically move each
MIDI note over to a new blank track.
If the Custom setting is enabled, you can specify which midi notes go to which track. On the left column of the
Custom section, you will see the track numbers that notes will be placed onto. You can type the note numbers into
MIDI Note Nums edit field, separated by commas. For example, “62,65” would mean that MIDI note numbers 62
and 65 will go onto the track specified on the left field E.g. <7>.
If you press the “...” button a list box will pop up that makes it easier to specify the note numbers. The Note Name
Octave number of each note is shown (e.g. E 5) and, for notes in the GM drum range, the GM drum sound names for
GM drums are shown (e.g. Acoustic Snare, Closed High Hat, etc) .
You could override the track number by enabling the checkbox next to the “Hard Trk” field and typing another track
number in the hard track field. The Hard Track can be any MIDI or blank track that you specify.
Auto-Backup of .SEQ Files
When you save a file, RealBand saves a backup of the file in a c:\RealBand\RBBACKUP folder. This doesn’t add
any time to the file-save command, and the number of backups is configurable. So the next time that you
mistakenly overwrite a file when saving, go the backup folder to look for a saved previous copy!
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Chapter 7: Digital Audio Features
Overview
Audio tracks are great for recording live performances; they work much like tracks on a tape recorder. They are also
used for RealTracks and RealDrums since these parts are created from live audio recordings of studio musicians.
You can edit audio data by cutting and pasting in the Bars window or the Audio Edit window, you can import
.WAV, .MP3, .WMA, .WMV, and .CDA files to be inserted into audio tracks, and you can also process audio tracks
with the professional effects included with RealBand.
Any track of RealBand’s 48 tracks can be designated as an audio track - mono or stereo. Click on the
track icon to set the track type.
Other Audio Formats
RealBand supports .WAV, .WMA, .WMV, .CDA, and .MP3 audio file formats.
These files can be loaded directly with the File |
Open menu option, or they can be imported to an
exact location in a specific track with the Audio |
Import Wave File… command (Ctrl+F3).
Loading and Playing Audio Files
Let’s load an audio wave file and explore the audio features of RealBand. RealBand files have the .SEQ (sequence)
file extension and open in the same way as a MIDI file.
Use the “Open a File” button or the menu command File | Open to go to the RealBand directory. In the
“Samples” folder choose the file tutor2.seq.
Tracks Window
Here’s how the Tracks window looks when the audio file is loaded.
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Press the Play button. You should now be hearing the demo song playing through your computer’s sound
system. What you’re hearing are four discrete tracks of digital audio.
To mute any track, click on the green check mark to
the right of the track name. When you see a red “X”
the track is muted.
Note: If you wanted to add MIDI data to this project you would select one of the empty tracks and press the record button.
You can solo any track or any combination of tracks by pressing the [Solo] button on the toolbar. Select
multiple tracks by holding down either the Shift key or the Ctrl key and clicking on the track numbers.
Mixer Window
To adjust track volume level and panning controls, open the Mixer window by selecting the Window |
Mixer menu item or by clicking the Mixer button on the toolbar palette.
Here, you can change things such as track levels and panning to the left or right speaker as the song is playing.
Select a track view range from the combo list, or use the Mixer window left/right scroll bar directly
above to scroll horizontally across the mixer layout.
The vertical splitter bar between the track strips and the bus strips can be moved right or
left to make a custom mixer view.
The Delete button in the mixer will automatically delete all mixer events (volume, reverb, pan,
chorus) that are currently embedded within the song's selected tracks.
The mixer’s Insert button will automatically insert mixer events (volume, reverb, pan, chorus) into
the song’s non-blank tracks.
The Ctrl+M and Ctrl+U hot keys are a convenient way to mute or unmute any track within the Bars or Mixer
window.
Mixer moves can be recorded as the song is playing. There is a special “Record Mixer Moves”
button in the mixer that will let you record ONLY mixer moves. This special button also lets you
record mixer moves onto an audio track without the audio being silent during recording.
Note: This mixer is a combination mixer that controls audio and MIDI data in one integrated console. Therefore, MIDI
tracks have reverb, chorus, modulation and expression controls in place of the Aux sends, and there is no [FX] button.
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Creating Audio Subgroups in the Mixer
Unassigned Outputs Work As Subgroups
When this checkbox is enabled in the Audio preferences dialog, any
audio output ports that do not currently have a driver port assigned to them will function as subgroups. A subgroup
is a bus or signal path that gives you the ability to control several tracks as a group.
The Mixer Window chapter has full instructions for creating audio subgroups.
Real Time Effects Plug-Ins
RealBand supports DirectX and VST effects, which you can apply in real time to the audio tracks. A full range of
PG Music effects is included with the program; you can also use any other third party DirectX or VST effects to add
effects in real time without permanently altering the actual track data.
Installing DirectX Effects Plug-Ins
DirectX effects are installed by default in the Program Files folder on Windows computers. They will be present in
the “Plugin” list in the DirectX/VST window. There is a “Scan” feature in the DirectX/VST Options that will
search for newly installed DirectX plug-ins not on the list.
Installing a VST Effects Plug-In
Click on the [FX] button in the Mixer window or the DX Plug-Ins button on the toolbar to open the
DirectX/VST Window.
In the Plugin list, select the “Add VST Plugin...” item at the bottom of the list.
Select a VST plug-in .dll file in the following Select a VST plug-in dialog, and it is added to the plug-in list. After
you add each VST, the plug-in is permanently added to the list. You only have to add each plug-in one time.
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Remove VST/VSTi Plug-In
You can remove a VSTi or VST plug-in that you have installed. This only removes the VST/VSTi plug-in from
RealBand' list of remembered VST plug-ins. The feature does not uninstall a plug-in or delete any plug-in files.
After you remove a plug-in from view in RealBand, that plug-in still remains usable to any other VST program
where you prefer to have it available.
To remove a VSTi or VST plug-in from RealBand:
Click on the [Options] button in the DirectX/VST Window to launch the DX/VST Options
dialog.
Select the [Remove VST Plugin (from list)…] button.
Select the plug-in to remove so it is highlighted in the list, then click the [Remove] button.
Uninstall a VST/VSTi Plug-In
If you want to permanently delete a VST/VSTi plug-in from your computer, first check if the plug-in has an
uninstaller in the Windows menu “Start | Settings | Control Panel | Add or Remove Programs.” If an uninstaller is
available, that is the best way to get a clean plug-in uninstall.
With plug-ins that do not have an uninstaller, it is safe to drag the plug-in's DLL and any other plug-in support files
to the Windows Recycle folder.
DX/VST Options
The [Options] button brings up the DX/VST Options
dialog where you can manage your real time effects plugins.
[Save Default DXi Synths] saves your plug-in default
settings.
The [Edit DX Exclusion List…] button lets you edit the list of plug-ins to include or exclude in the DirectX editor.
This is useful if you have some plug-ins which were found and which aren’t compatible with RealBand. If you edit
the exclusion list, you’ll see a dialog box with the left side displaying the included plug-ins and the right side
displaying the excluded plug-ins:
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- The [>] button moves a plug-in from the Include to the Exclude list.
- The [<] button moves a plug-in from the Exclude to the Include list.
The [Scan for New Plug-Ins…] button will cause RealBand to scan for newly installed plug-ins.
The [Register a New Plug-In…] button can be used to register a plug-in with DirectX, so that audio applications
such as RealBand can use the plug-in if you have a plug-in that doesn’t automatically register itself.
The [Unregister a Plug-In…] button removes a plug-in from DirectX so that audio applications will no longer be
able to use this plug-in.
The [Run DirectX Diagnostic Tool…] button will run the Microsoft Direct X Diagnostic tool, which checks for
problems with DirectX.
Select the [Remove VST Plugin (from list)…] button to remove a VST plug-in so that it is no longer included in the
“Plugin” list in the DirectX/VST Window.
Note: VST/VSTi plug-ins are added manually to the Plugin list in the DirectX/VST Window. Once added, a VST/VSTi
plug-in is available on the list until removed.
Effects Controls
Track Settings
The [FX] track insert button assigns effects to the specific track alone. Up to four effects can be chained
on the FX insert.
Each of the four Aux control knobs can be assigned to one of the eight auxiliary effects busses. The
position of the control knob determines the amount of the signal that is routed through the auxiliary bus
and how much of the “dry” signal goes directly to the audio output bus.
Auxiliary Effects Busses
Each of the eight Aux busses can have a chain of up to four real time effects. These can be any DirectX or VST
effects that you have installed on your system, either the included PG Music effects or third party effects.
The effects on each bus or insert are chained (in sequence), which means that the processed signal from each plug-in
is then further processed by the chain’s next plug-in. There are no hard-and-fast rules, but a typical effects chain
might start with effects that condition the incoming signal (noise gate, EQ, dynamics), then add effects that alter the
tonal qualities of the sound (chorus, distortion, modulation) and then time-based effects (reverb, delay).
To run effects in parallel, rather than chained, you can assign them to any of the eight auxiliary busses and route
each track individually through any four effects.
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Aux Bus
FX insert window
Choosing and Editing DirectX/VST Effects
The Track field of the DirectX/VST window lets you choose a track in which to select or edit effects. A “track” can
be a Track Insert, an Aux bus, or an Output Insert.
The “Edit” radio buttons let you choose which of the four effects to edit in the group of effects available in each
track. The “Bypass” checkboxes lets you bypass any of the four effects in a group.
In the example, the Melody is the currently selected Track and slot 1 (PG Dynamics) is selected for editing.
The [Load Group] and [Save Group] buttons let you load and save the effects settings for the currently selected
track. The [Load Preset] and [Save Preset] buttons let you save and load presets for the current effect. The [Delete
Preset] button lets you remove a preset from the list of already saved presets.
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VST/VSTi Additional Panel Controls
VST is necessarily different from DirectX/DXi, and some extra controls are available for VST plug-ins.
DirectX/DXi plug-ins save their presets to the Windows Registry and only one setting is “alive” at a time.
VST/VSTi plug-ins save their presets to disk files. VST/VSTi plug-ins contain a bank of presets in memory. You
can switch between presets while editing, and each edited preset is remembered in the current bank.
VST Generic User Interface
VST/VSTi plug-ins are not required to have a fancy graphic control panel. There are many “faceless” VST plug-ins
that have many adjustable parameters, but no fancy control panel. When you open such a plug-in, the control panel
will look like this example. RealBand presents one “generic” slider for each adjustable parameter in the plug-in.
Parameter Name: Simply the name of each adjustable parameter.
Value Slider: Move the slider to adjust the parameter value.
Value Indication Text: Displays the value of the slider, as interpreted by the plug-in. In the above example,
Parameter 0: Bright is interpreted as an ON/OFF switch, but Parameter 1: Volume is interpreted as a value from 0 to
10.
The number of real time effects that you can expect to activate at a time without stressing the system depends on the
speed of your computer. Normally you would mostly be using the Aux busses, since the effects used in the Aux
busses can be applied to multiple tracks efficiently. In other words, it isn’t very taxing on the CPU to apply an Aux
effect to multiple tracks. For example, let’s say you were to select a reverb in the Aux 1 section of the mixer, and
you adjust the Aux1 send knobs for 5 tracks so that they were all using Aux 1 for reverb. In this case, there would
only be one instance of this reverb plug-in active in RealBand, regardless of the number of tracks (5) that were
utilizing the Aux1 bus. What’s nice about this is that you can apply completely different amounts of the same effect
to different tracks, so some tracks can be very “wet” with lots of reverb, while others can be relatively “dry” with
very little reverb.
If you use Track Inserts on multiple-tracks, you will use up CPU processing power relatively quickly and your
computer may have trouble handling this depending on the speed of your CPU. The reason for this is that the Track
Inserts each involve the usage of a unique instance of each effect, since each Track Insert is a unique signal path for
each track.
Note: The more effects you chain together within each Aux bus, Track Insert, or Output Insert, the more CPU power will be
required. For example, an Aux bus with just an EQ will require a lot less CPU power than an Aux bus with chain of 4 effects
such as (Compressor – EQ – Chorus – Reverb).
Reset Effects
The [Reset Realtime Effects] button is found in the Audio preferences dialog. It
removes all real time effects from your project so you can remix your project from
scratch.
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Chapter 8: Audio Production
Overview
The audio production options available in RealBand include RealTracks, RealDrums, and audio tracks plus powerful
audio effects and editing features.
RealTracks are audio tracks generated automatically following the chord changes you enter in the Chords window.
They use the exciting Real Instruments, live recordings of top session musicians. This is the same feature found in
Band-in-a-Box.
RealDrums, also found in Band-in-a-Box, are similar to RealTracks, except that they are generated from live
recordings of top studio drummers.
You don’t need to have Band-in-a-Box to generate RealTracks and RealDrums, but if you have a copy you can use
all of your RealTracks and RealDrums from Band-in-a-Box in RealBand.
Audio tracks are for your own live recordings - such as a person singing or playing guitar – or for imported audio
files in the many formats supported by RealBand.
RealStyles - Styles with RealTracks
Some styles, called RealStyles, use only Real instruments. Every track generated by these styles is a RealTrack,
playing audio from live recording sessions. If you have RealStyles on your system (usually in Band-in-a-Box) they
will appear in a separate list in the StylePicker.
Generating RealTracks
This feature lets you generate realistic instrument tracks using Real instruments. It is selected from the right-click
menu in the Tracks window. You can generate complete tracks or just selected sections of tracks, and you can use
more than one Real instrument in a single RealTrack.
Select an open track for your RealTracks, then right-click and choose either Select and Generate RealTracks or
Generate RealTracks (Favorites).
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Select and Generate RealTracks
This command opens the RB Assign RealTracks to Track dialog. It shows a list of all available RealTracks,
including the RealTracks you have installed in Band-in-a-Box if you have specified your bb\RealTracks folder as
the path for RealTracks in the Song Generation preferences.
When you click on a RealTrack in the list a Memo appears with information about the selected instrument.
The RealTracks have been recorded by top studio musicians. The Artist Bio displays the names and bios for the
RealTracks artist. Double click here to view the full memo.
You can enter your own comments about any style in the User Memo field. The comments are saved in
RTUserMemos.txt
Use the song and style demos to audition RealTracks.
The [Song Demo (MGU)] button will display a list of songs in the bb\RealTracks –
Demos folder that use the selected RealTrack instrument. Click on the song name
and then press the [Play] button to hear it.
The [Style Demo (.STY)] button shows a list of styles that use the currently
highlighted RealTracks instrument. Clicking on a style name will load the style into the current Band-in-a-Box
song. Press [Play] to hear your current song played with the RealTracks style that you want to audition.
This will display installation errors of RealTracks when you open the dialog. Press the
[Rebuild] button for more information, or after you have installed new RealTracks.
With the Timebase option you can play any RealTracks at normal, half-time, or
double time. Half time is used for fast tempo songs when a much slower tempo
RealTrack has been chosen. Double time is used for slow tempo songs (e.g.
ballads) when a much faster tempo RealTrack is chosen. This allows you, for
example, in a ballad at a tempo of 70, to add a RealTracks Sax solo with a tempo of 140, and play it as a double
time, which will match the ballad tempo of 70. All of your existing RealTracks can be used at three different
tempos (normal, half-time, double time).
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The [None] button sets the current instrument to have no override of RealTracks for the song. The style
may still have a RealTrack in it for the instrument.
The [Clear All] button sets all RealTracks for the song to “None.” It will also optionally disable
RealTracks present in the style for the song.
Since RealTracks can be stored in a style you need to set
this checkbox to “Disable” to ensure that the current part will have its RealTracks disabled.
This plays a .WMA demo of the currently selected RealTrack.
To help make your selection you can sort the list by clicking on any of the column headings. As well as Name,
Instrument, Type (Rhythm or Soloist), Feel (Even or Swing), Tempo, Genre, and Number there are more columns
with additional information about each RealTrack instrument.
The tempo shown is the “base” (or typical) tempo for the RealTracks instrument as it is played, but RealTracks have
a tempo stretching capability that enables their application over a wide range of tempos. If saving a song with
RealTracks and the audio base tempo is different than the song tempo, a warning message will show, asking you to
confirm that you want to save it like this.
- The “N/A” column shows “N/A” for RealTracks that you have not installed yet or haven’t purchased, if “Show
RealTracks that are N/A” is checked.
- “Set” is the number of the RealTracks set that includes the instrument.
- The “Stereo” column shows whether the instrument playback is stereo or mono.
- Instruments with an “N” or “Gt” in the “Chart” column will display the RealTrack in notation.
- The “Artist” column has the name of the musician playing on the RealTrack instrument. See the “Artist Bio” box
for information about the player.
- The letter “Y” in the “TS” column means that Tempo Swapping is supported for the instrument. If you have
similar RealTracks available at different tempos, Band-in-a-Box automatically chooses the best one to use.
- “Holds” indicates whether that RealTrack supports shots, holds, and pushes. If there is a number there (other than
a blank field), then they are all supported.
This will show RealTracks that you do not have installed yet, or may not have
purchased. The missing RealTracks will be marked in the N/A column.
Variations of RealTracks use the same performances but with different settings.
This will show RealTracks that wouldn’t work well at the current tempo. The
acceptable range is -15% and +40% of the source tempo of the RealTracks.
The filter is another feature that makes it easier to select a RealTracks
instrument. For example, type “Blues” in the edit control box and press the
[Update] button to see a list of Blues instruments available, including
instruments from other genres that are suitable. The [Show All] button clears any filter and shows all available
RealTracks.
Track names for generated non-BB tracks are displayed in green.
For example, if you had generated a track by right clicking on it
and selecting “Generate RealTrack” then the track name of that
track will be displayed in green.
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Generate RealTracks (Favorites)
This command opens a short list of the most recently used
RealTracks for a quick and convenient selection. Click on your
choice in the list to begin generating the RealTrack.
You can press the Escape key to cancel generation of the track.
Regenerate Track
This will regenerate an existing track. If a track is a non-BB track, but it was generated individually from one of the
generation options in Tracks window popup menu, or from one of the generation options on the [Generate] button
popup menu, then the track name will be displayed in green. The track name being displayed in green or blue means
that the track can be regenerated using this command. This feature is useful to regenerate, if you had changed the
song’s tempo, or just to generate fresh material.
Generate All will regenerate all Blue and Green tracks automatically.
Generating RealDrums
This feature lets you generate realistic drum tracks using
RealDrums styles. It is selected from the right-click
menu in the Tracks window. You can generate a full
track or any part of a track, and you can use different RealDrums styles for different sections of a track.
Select an open track for your RealDrums, then right-click and choose either Select and Generate RealDrums or
Generate RealDrums (Favorites).
Generate RealDrums
This command opens the RB RealDrums Picker dialog. You will see a list of all of your available RealDrums
styles. If you have Band-in-a-Box installed on your computer you can use all of your Band-in-a-Box RealDrums
styles if you have set the path for RealDrums to your bb\Drums folder in the Song Generation preferences.
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The RealDrums Picker has many features to help you choose your RealDrum style.
Enter a filter string like Salsa, Jazz, or congas and the displayed list of styles will be limited to styles/genres
including that name.
The [Update] button applies the current filter in the edit field. [Show All]
clears the filter and shows all styles in the list.
This will show styles that wouldn’t work well at the current song tempo. The
acceptable range is shown in the Lo | Hi columns for the list of styles.
This will show a song where the drums are in Even feel and the style is Swing, or
vice versa.
You can assign a style as one of your favorites by clicking in the first
column on the left, which is headed with an asterisk *. This will place an asterisk to the left of the style name. Then
you can sort by favorites or use this option to only see favorites.
These are styles not found in the \drums folder, likely because they are add-on
styles not purchased yet. If you think that styles that show as N/A should be present press the [Rebuild] button and
confirm the path for the drums folder in the Song Generation preferences.
Set this if you want to use MIDI drums and want to override a RealDrums
that is embedded in the style.
This sets the drums to no RealDrums override for the song, and optionally also forces MIDI drums (i.e.
no RealDrums for style either).
When a RealDrums style is picked in the list a descriptive Memo opens.
Click on the heading for any column in the list to sort the list by that column, such as by name, genre, or feel.
The User Comments field is where you can type in and save your own notes about a RealDrum style.
RealDrums styles ending in a caret ^ have Variations available. These are shown in the list here. For style names
with two variations - such as Brushes, Sticks - the first refers to the “a” substyle and the second is the “b” substyle.
Use these buttons to find compatible RealDrums styles. The [RD Demo]
button loads and plays a demo of the chosen RealDrums style. A list of
demos for the chose style will be displayed.
The [Song Demo] button shows BB styles that will use this RealDrums style. The song demo for the style will get
loaded.
The [BB Styles] button shows BB styles that will use this RealDrums style. The style will get loaded if the menu
selection is made.
The [Audition] button doesn’t load the style, but instead uses Media Player to play a demo .WAV
file for the style.
Use the [Rebuild] button to build the list of RealDrums styles present in the \drums folder. If you
add new drum styles, press this button to update the list.
Track names for generated non-BB tracks are displayed in green.
Generate RealDrums (Favorites)
This command opens a short list of the most recently used RealDrums for a quick and convenient selection. Click
on your choice in the list to begin generating the RealDrums track.
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Press Escape to cancel generation of the track.
Regenerate Track
This will regenerate an existing track. If a track is a non-BB track, but it was generated individually from one of the
generation options in Tracks window popup menu, or from one of the generation options on the [Generate] button
popup menu, then the track name will be displayed in green. The track name being displayed in green or blue means
that the track can be regenerated using this command. This feature is useful to regenerate, if you had changed the
song’s tempo, or just to generate fresh material.
Generate All will regenerate all Blue and Green tracks automatically.
RealDrums Variations, Fills, and Accents
There are “a” and “b” variations for each RealDrums style. They are determined by the part markers assigned in the
Chords window.
To assign the substyles for your song, click on the Chords button to open the Chords window and insert “a”
or “b” part markers.
Click on the desired bar numbers to toggle through the a/b selection or to clear a marker.
Rests, shots, and pushes are supported by the RealDrums generation routines. They are entered in the Chords
window.
Rests and shots are set by adding periods to the chord name.
A chord can be specified as a Rest by adding a period after the chord.
e.g. “C.” indicates a C chord that is a Rest.
A chord can be specified as a Shot by adding two periods after the chord.
e.g. “C..” indicates a C chord that is a Shot.
Pushes are set by entering carets in front of the chord symbol.
^C = 8th push
^^C = 16th push
Note: Rests, shots, and pushes can ONLY be entered in the Chords window.
Recording Audio Tracks
Audio tracks are great for recording live sounds such as a person singing or playing guitar, in a similar manner to
tracks on a tape recorder. You can edit audio data by cutting and pasting in the Bars window or the Audio Edit
window. You can import .WAV files to be inserted into audio tracks. You can also process audio tracks with
effects in the Edit | Audio Effects menu.
Recording will occur over the current track selection, i.e., the track number that is highlighted in the Tracks window.
The track type must be set to “Audio.”
The “Always Record Audio too, if current track is MIDI” setting in the Audio Options dialog (Options |
Preferences | Audio) will cause RealBand to record audio even when the current track type is MIDI. RealBand will
offer to keep the audio take on the nearest available blank track. This can be a “lifesaver” in those situations where
you wanted to record audio, but you accidentally selected the current track as a MIDI track.
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The “Backup Most Recent Audio Take” setting in the Audio Options dialog, when enabled, will always backup the
most recent audio take. This can be helpful if you accidentally recorded audio onto the WRONG audio track, or you
accidentally punched-in instead of recording a regular take. If this happens you can undo the keeping of the most
recent take and then use the Audio | Import Wave File command to insert the recorded audio onto a different track,
by importing the RBBAKx.WAV file from the Temporary Audio Directory.
Setting Audio Levels
There are 2 pairs of VU meters, one pair for audio input, and one pair for audio output. If you re-size the
VU Meters window vertically the height of the meters will expand or shrink to match the new window
height.
The clipping indicator at the top of the meters indicates that clipping has occurred. Try to keep the levels low
enough so they’re safely below 0 db, and so that the clipping indicator doesn’t light up.
To be on the safe side, it’s probably a good idea to adjust the levels so that the meters don’t get close to 0 db even if
the clipping indicator hasn’t yet lit up.
The VU meters have an automatic peak-hold feature with gradual peak
fallback, so it will be easy to see the transient peak levels if you’ve got
your eye on the meters.
For the Output, you may have to adjust your mixer settings within RealBand to keep the levels within a reasonable
range.
For the Input, you may have to press the speaker button to launch the Windows Recording Control
properties and adjust the input level.
Note: The appearance of this window is different for different sound cards. The example shown is for a typical Sound Blaster
Audigy card.
In the example shown of the Recording properties, “Microphone” is the selected audio input for the SB Audigy
Audio device and the Volume fader is at 70% of the maximum level.
If the Input meter were too high, either clipping or getting close to 0 db, then lowering the Microphone volume level
would correct this.
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Start recording by pressing the Record button.
You can press the record audio button instead of record; it will automatically change a MIDI track type to
Audio if the track is blank.
Stop recording by pressing the Stop button or the bar.
When recording is stopped a “Keep Take?” dialog appears that gives you the
option to keep or reject the take.
If you choose [Yes] the audio wave file will be saved and you will see an
added event in the Events column for the track (Classic view).
Auto Rewind
Auto Rewind is found in the Options menu. When enabled, RealBand will automatically rewind to the location that
playback or recording was started. The choices are “Recording Only, Playback Only, Both Recording and
Playback,” or “Disabled.”
Audio Editing
Any of the forty-eight tracks within RealBand can be designated as either mono audio or stereo audio. If you edit a
stereo track in the Audio Edit window, you will see two channels (waveforms) in the window.
The Audio Edit window lets you edit only the left or right channels of a stereo track instead of always editing both
channels. This lets you Cut/Paste just the left or right channel, or you can apply a non-real time effect (Edit | Audio
Effects) to just the left or right channel.
Stereo tracks are normally panned to the center so the stereo signal is centered.
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Loop Record
If you record while in Loop mode (which is activated using the loop button) the music will loop when
recording is started with the Record button. The music that is recording during each loop can be put onto
individual tracks after recording is finished, or the entire take can be put onto a single track like an
ordinary recorded take.
A dialog will pop up giving you a choice of whether the recorded audio will go on separate tracks or on the same
track. If you choose the latter, the take will be kept the same way an ordinary take is normally kept. If you choose
to have the loops put on separate tracks, the program will put each loop on any available track that is greater than
or equal to the Current Track. For example if there are 10 audio loops recorded then program will put the takes
onto 10 audio tracks. If you don’t want to overwrite existing tracks, then make sure the current track, and any
tracks with a higher number than the current track, are blank before recording. For example, if the song already
has 10 tracks used, then start recording on track 11 and the loops will be placed on track 11 and beyond. If the
program runs out of tracks it will attempt to put remaining loops onto the last track.
NOTE: Loop recording will always begin at the start of a loop.
NOTE: Punch-in mode will automatically be deactivated by the program since it is incompatible with loop recording mode.
Rendering MIDI Tracks to Audio
Audio Menu Commands
The Audio menu on the main menu bar has commands to automatically render entire sequences to audio files, or to
export selected tracks to WAV files.
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Rendering MIDI to audio is virtually automatic when using the DXi/VSTi synthesizer support in RealBand. Just go
to the Audio menu and choose Merge Audio and DXi Tracks to Stereo Wave File, or to a WMA file, or to any
compressed format (such as .MP3) that is supported by your computer.
Note: If no audio tracks are present the MIDI tracks will still be rendered to audio using the DXi synthesizer. This feature
requires that you have a DXi software synth assigned to the MIDI track(s) you are rendering.
All levels and effects settings will be rendered exactly as they are in the Tracks and/or Mixer windows.
Auto Convert Individual MIDI Track to WAV File
Invoke this command by right-clicking on the track in the Tracks window and easily convert any MIDI track to a
.WAV file. RealBand will automatically render using a DXi or VSTi synth.
Auto Convert Individual MIDI Track to Audio Track
It is easy to convert any MIDI track to an audio track. RealBand will automatically render using a DXi or VSTi
synth. This command is accessible by right-clicking on the track in the Tracks window.
Manual Rendering of MIDI to Audio
MIDI tracks can easily be rendered (recorded) to audio using your system’s sound card and its onboard MIDI
synthesizer or by recording the audio output from an external MIDI device.
To render MIDI tracks to audio with the internal system sound device:
1. Load the source MIDI file into RealBand.
2. In the Tracks window select a blank track and set the track type to stereo audio.
3. In Options | MIDI Devices verify that the internal MIDI synthesizer is selected. This could be the Microsoft GS
Wavetable SW Synthesizer, any model of Sound Blaster, or another onboard sound device.
4. Click on the VU Meters button on the Tool Bar.
5. In the VU Meters window click on the Windows mixer button to open the Volume Control (see note following).
To see the Recording Control select Options | Properties in the Volume Control window.
6. In the Recording Control select the input source by checking the Select checkbox. Different systems and sound
cards use different labels; you might be selecting “MIDI” as the input source, or “What You Hear,” or “Stereo
Mix.” If you aren’t sure which source to choose, start by eliminating the obvious like CD Player, Microphone,
or Line In.
7. Play the MIDI file and monitor the levels on the Input VU meter. Levels can be adjusted in both the Recording
Control and the Volume (or Playback) control. The levels can occasionally go into the yellow zone, and a
transient peak in the red zone is OK. Consistent readings in the red or lighting up the clip indicator means your
levels are set too high.
8. Unless you want to record the metronome, check to be sure it is disabled in Options | Metronome.
9. Click on the Record Audio button to record the song. The Input VU meters will become active during
recording.
10. When done, click the Stop button and choose to “Keep Take” when prompted. A stereo track will have been
recorded.
You could then use the menu command Track | Save Track to File… to save the recorded audio track as a .WAV
file.
Note: RealBand attempts to open the Recording Control panel associated with the Windows mixer. If you get an error
message when the Windows Mixer button is pressed you probably have a sound card with its own control panel and mixer.
In that case, you need to open the sound card’s software separately to adjust the recording properties.
To render MIDI to audio when you’re using an external synthesizer or sound module you connect its audio output to
the Line In of your sound card and select Line In as your input source in the Windows Recording Control.
Rendering when you’re using an external synthesizer:
1.
Load the source MIDI file into RealBand.
2.
In the Tracks window select a blank track and set the track type to stereo audio.
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3.
In Options | MIDI Devices verify that the external MIDI driver is selected. It could be named MPU-401, MIDI
Out Port or another name with the word “out” such as SB Live MIDI Out, or MIDI IO (input/output).
4.
Click on the VU Meters button on the Tool Bar.
5.
In the VU Meters window click on the Windows mixer button to open the Volume Control. To see the
Recording Control select Options | Properties in the Volume Control window.
6.
In the Recording Control select “Line In” as the input source by checking the Select checkbox. Make sure that
the audio output of your MIDI synthesizer or sound module is connected to your computer’s Line In jack.
7.
Play the MIDI file and monitor the levels on the Input VU meter. Levels can be adjusted in both the Recording
Control and the Volume (or Playback) Control, the levels can occasionally go into the yellow zone, and a
transient peak in the red zone is OK. Consistent readings in the red or lighting up the clip indicator means that
your levels are set too high.
8.
Unless you want to record the metronome, check to be sure it is disabled in Options | Metronome.
9.
Click on the Record Audio button to record the song. The Input VU meters will become active during
recording.
10. When done, click the Stop button and choose to “Keep Take” when prompted. A stereo track will have been
recorded.
You could then use the menu command Track | Save Track to File… to save the recorded audio track as a .WAV
file.
Note: While recording (rendering) the MIDI tracks you can perform real time mixer moves, such as fading volume levels up
or down, which will be recorded to the audio track. These changes cannot be undone, but the tracks could be re-rendered if
necessary.
Editing Audio Tracks
By default the program uses the Windows/Temp directory for temporary audio files created during editing. You can
change the directory in the Options | Preferences dialog under the Audio tab.
Bars Window
The Bars window provides an overview of the data (WAV and/or MIDI) in a song file. This view makes it easy to
select a large region of a track for editing.
Bars view displaying a song with both digital audio and MIDI tracks.
You’ll see that as the song plays the Bars window scrolls along, showing graphical representations of the
waveforms that are contained in the individual tracks. A small cursor at the top of the window indicates the current
bar and the numbers indicate the bar numbers of the song.
If the Alt key is held when left-mouse clicking on the overview section of the Bars window the time will be changed
without affecting the currently highlighted region. This lets you quickly adjust the current time without having to
worry about accidentally changing the highlighted region.
Audio Edit Window
You can open an Audio Edit window for any track that contains WAV data. To view the waveforms of the
individual tracks click on the track that you want and choose Window | New | Audio Edit Window (Ctrl+F2) to
launch the Audio Edit window. This window lets you view audio data as a waveform.
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The Audio Edit window shows graphical representations of the waveforms on the selected track. It scrolls as the
song plays, with a thin red vertical stripe to mark the current song position.
The number-ruler at the top of the window denotes the bar numbers of the current song. Small vertical lines are
displayed at 8th and 16th note boundaries. This makes it easier to align audio to correct timing issues.
The dB Scale on the left side of the Audio Edit window gives you a better idea of the level of an audio track.
By clicking on the [+] and [-] buttons you can “zoom” in or out on the waveform to facilitate very
precise waveform editing.
The large +/- buttons zoom horizontally, the smaller set zooms vertically.
The Snap button will cause the highlighted region to snap to the nearest beat when selecting a region
with the mouse.
The Play Selected Area button will play the highlighted area to let you hear what was
selected.
The Select Whole button selects the whole audio track.
The current time within the song, if visible within the Audio Edit window, will be shown as a vertical line in red.
This will be drawn in reverse video if the current time is within the selected region.
You can select a region to edit with the mouse by clicking on the waveform and dragging the mouse to the right.
Shift+click (Shift key + left mouse button) support makes it easy to tweak the beginning or end of the highlighted
area.
-
If you Shift+click before the start of the From/Thru range, or after the end of the From/Thru range, the
highlighted area will be extended.
-
If you Shift+click within the From/Thru range, the range will be reduced, and the location you clicked on will
become either From or Thru depending on which boundary was closer to where you Shift+clicked the mouse.
-
If you keep the left mouse button held after the Shift+click, and you move the mouse you can adjust the
boundary of the range while moving the mouse.
Alt+click is supported the same way as for the overview section of the Tracks window. In other words, Alt+click
will ONLY move the time marker, which ensures you don't accidentally alter the current selected area.
After selecting a region you can then execute Cut, or one of the audio effects in the Edit menu.
Note: RealBand has support for resolutions as high as 3840 PPQ, which allows for more precise audio editing, since at
higher resolutions each tick spans a finer section of audio. Go to Options | Resolution to make this setting.
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The Audio Edit window lets you edit only the left or right channels of a Stereo track instead of editing both
channels. This lets you cut/paste or apply a non-real time effect (Edit | Audio Effects) to just the left or right
channel.
RealBand supports drag-and-drop editing in the Audio Edit windows. Select the highlighted region by holding
down the Ctrl key with the left mouse button pressed, and then drag the region to a new location in the song.
Right-Click Audio Edit Menu
The right-click menu in the Audio Edit Window is similar to the right-click menu in the Tracks window.
The Time Stretch and Pitch Shift Audio Track feature allows you to permanently change the duration and pitch
of individual audio tracks, or change the speed and pitch of the entire RealBand mix.
Select Whole Track makes it easy to select the whole track for editing.
Change Current Time sets the time to the position where the menu is opened.
Tracks Window Editing
Audio edits can also be performed directly in the Tracks window, although the Audio Edit window offers a larger
view for precision editing.
Drag and drop audio editing in the Tracks window makes it easy to drag a clip from one track to another.
You can select a highlighted region by holding down the Ctrl key with the left mouse
button pressed, and drag the region to a new location in the song.
After releasing the mouse button, you have
four options:
1. Move to new location and overwrite.
2. Move to new location and merge.
3. Copy to new location and overwrite.
4. Copy to new location and merge.
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Audio Edit Commands
Audio editing uses the Edit menu commands. You can Cut, Copy, and Paste audio data just as if it were text.
Each action brings up its own dialog, which can be launched with the standard Windows keystroke commands
Ctrl+X for Cut, Ctrl+C for Copy, and Ctrl+V for Paste.
The cross fade option when pasting audio smoothes out a paste, so that no audible “clicks” are heard at splice points
of pastes.
Click on the [Help] button in each edit dialog for detailed instructions on the settings and commands.
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Audio Effects
This is a submenu that contains all of the permanent audio effects for RealBand.
The audio effects in this submenu are actually external plug-ins that are
transparently integrated with RealBand, but actually aren’t built-in to the program
itself. You’ll be able to use them just as if they were built-in to RealBand.
Unlike the effects that are added in the Mixer window on the FX track insert and
the Aux busses, when the effects in the Audio Effects submenu are applied the
content of the audio track is permanently altered. The effect can be removed with
the Edit | Undo command.
Note: Once the file has been saved the effect cannot be undone.
This command will undo the last edit command executed and restore the track to its
previous state. The number of Undo Levels is adjustable from 1 to 100 in the
General section of the Options | Preferences dialog.
Each effect has its own dialog with custom settings and commands. Click on the [Help] button for a detailed
explanation of the settings and a concise tutorial on how to apply the effect.
Time Stretch and Pitch Shift
This feature is available from the Tracks window by right-clicking with the mouse on any audio track.
It allows you to permanently change the duration and pitch of individual audio tracks, or change the speed and pitch
of the entire RealBand mix.
If an audio track has been inadvertently recorded too flat or too sharp, you can easily modify the pitch without
affecting the track's duration. If the duration of an audio track is incorrect RealBand can change the tempo of the
audio track without affecting the pitch. Tempo can be adjusted from 1/4 speed to 4X speed. Pitch can be adjusted
+/- one Octave, in one Cent increments (a Cent is 1/100 of a Semitone).
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These features are also useful for learning your favorite up-tempo song. Load the file and play it back at half speed.
If the song is in the key of F but you would rather learn it in Eb, transpose it down 2 semitones and continue playing
at half-speed. As you master the song, you can gradually increase the tempo until you can play along at full speed.
The Time Stretch and Pitch Shift dialog lets you stretch (or reduce) the length of the highlighted section of audio
tracks.
Time Stretch (or Reduce)
Enabled: if checked, then RealBand will change the length based on the following settings:
New Length Percentage: The new length as a percentage relative to the original length. For example, a new
length percentage of 200% will result in the section being double the original length.
New Speed Percentage: Time stretching (or reduction) will also cause the section to be played faster or slower. If
you are stretching a section of the song, it will play slower. If you are reducing a section it will play faster. This
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setting is the inverse of the New Length Percentage. For example, a New Speed Percentage of 50% (half speed) will
result in a New Length Percentage of 200% (double length).
Old Tempo and New Tempo: If you specify old and new tempos, this is another way of adjusting the speed, but
this method lets you think in terms of a change in tempo rather than a change in speed as a percentage.
Quality: There are 8 different choices here. The “best” choice depends on the source material. You may need to
experiment to determine the best choice for tracks you are working with. See the explanation that follows.
Pitch Shift
Enabled: If checked, then RealBand will pitch shift based on the following settings:
Semitones: Amount of semitones to pitch shift up or down. There are 12 semitones per octave.
Cents: Amount of cents to pitch shift up or down. There are 100 cents per semitone.
Explanation of Time Stretch Quality
The simplest way to change audio duration is to change the playback rate, exactly like changing the speed of a tape
recorder. Unfortunately, pitch is changed along with the playback rate.
To change audio duration without changing pitch, small snips of audio must be periodically inserted (for longer
duration) or removed (for shorter duration), so that the duration can be modified without changing the pitch.
To transpose audio pitch while maintaining the same playback rate, it is still necessary to change audio duration. To
transpose pitch upward, we can play the audio faster, but playing faster will reduce the song duration. One must
Time Stretch before changing the Pitch, if you want a 3 minute song to take 3 minutes to play after it has been
transposed.
RealBand's Time Stretch and Pitch Shift features work together. You can change duration while keeping pitch
constant, change pitch while keeping duration constant, or change both pitch and duration. Just select what you
want and RealBand will work out the details.
Large changes in pitch or duration have more noticeable artifacts. If you only need to change duration a small
amount, or repair an out-of-tune track by pitch-shifting a few cents, even the fastest methods could be virtually
artifact-free. But large pitch/duration changes are likely to have some artifacts regardless of the stretch method.
Solo acoustic piano may be the most problematic instrument. Piano can be stretched small amounts without much
grief, but it is difficult to get a clean result on extreme piano processing.
Additional time stretch methods may be added in the future, but currently two basic methods are available - SUM
and AUTOCORR.
SUM is a fast loop-finding method which can work well on monophonic tracks, or with multi-band processing.
SUM is pretty smooth with minimal echo-click artifacts. SUM's Achilles’ heel is a fluttery tremolo effect.
AUTOCORR is slow, but finds better loops. AUTOCORR has less tremolo effect than SUM. AUTOCORR's
Achilles’ heel is a hard-edged short-echo artifact, most noticeable on percussive tracks such as drum, guitar, or
piano. The artifacts may not be noticeable on smoother tracks such as vocal or horn.
If multi-band processing is applied to a simple audio track, you may like the effect because if could make a track
sound “fatter.” But if single-band processing doesn't exhibit undesirable artifacts, single band processing on a
simple track may sound more faithful to the original.
1-band, 2-band, 4-band, 8-band, defines how many frequency bands are independently time stretched. Band splits
might add a slight “comb filter” effect. For instance, on guitar, a 2-band method may sound more coherent than a 4band method. But the 4-band method may sound smoother than the 2-band method.
1-BAND_SUM: The fastest method but with the lowest quality. May sound best on simple tracks.
2-BAND_SUM: Fast with better quality than 1BAND_SUM. May sound best on simple tracks.
4-BAND_SUM: Fast with better quality than 2BAND_SUM. Good for simple tracks or mixes.
8-BAND_SUM: This is the best-sounding Fast method, likely to sound good on either simple tracks or mixes.
2-BAND_AUTOCORR: Noticeably slower than the above methods. It may sound much better than 8BAND_SUM
on simple tracks, but it probably will not sound better than 8BAND_SUM on mixes.
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3-BAND_AUTOCORR: Even slower. It may sound much better than the above on simple tracks, but it may not
sound better than 8BAND_SUM on mixes.
4-BAND_AUTOCORR: This method is slow, about the same speed as 8-BANDSUM_HYBRID. It may sound
better than 8-BANDSUM_HYBRID on simple tracks.
8-BANDSUM_HYBRID: This method is about the same speed as 4-BAND_AUTOCORR. If processing speed is
not an issue, 8-BANDSUM_HYBRID is likely to be the best choice for full mixes. It uses AUTOCORR on low
audio bands, and SUM on the high audio bands.
Saving Audio Files
RealBand files are saved in the .SEQ (sequence) file format, which can include both audio and MIDI tracks in the
same file. So you could import a Band-in-a-Box MIDI file into RealBand and then record live parts along with the
Band-in-a-Box accompaniment.
Auto-Backup of .SEQ Files
When you save a file, RealBand now saves a backup of the file in a c:\RealBand\RBBACKUP folder. This doesn’t
add any time to the file-save command, and the number of backups is configurable. So the next time that you
mistakenly overwrite a file when saving, go the backup folder to look for a saved previous copy.
When the Create backup file when overwriting a .SEQ file setting is enabled, RealBand will always create a backup
file (BKS file) when a .SEQ file is overwritten. For songs saved into the same hard drive where RealBand is
installed, the backups are placed into an RBBACKUP subfolder of the RealBand folder. For songs that are saved to
a different hard drive, the backups are placed in an RBBACKUP folder which is off of the root (e.g.
D:\RBBACKUP) The max backups per song setting determines the maximum number of backups to be kept for
each song. If this limit is reached, then RealBand will delete the oldest backup of the song you are overwriting and
create a newer backup. The “Max backups per hard drive:” setting is the maximum total backups allowed per hard
drive. If this limit is reached, then RealBand will delete the oldest backup file. There is also on option for moving
the older backups into the Recycle Bin instead of deleting them when either of the two limits is reached.
Wave Files
To make a .WAV file, and even burn a CD of the song, you can render the MIDI tracks to audio and export the
whole song to a wave file.
RealBand offers a number of options to save or export audio files in different formats. These options are found in
the Audio menu.
Export to Wave File
This command will export the highlighted section of the current track to a wave file, if the current track is an audio
track.
Unlike the Merge Audio and DXi Tracks to Stereo Wave File... command, this command will generate as small a
.WAV file as possible. For example, if you highlight the whole track and there is no audio data until measure
number 12, the wave that is exported is going to begin at measure 12 rather than being padded with 11 measures of
blank audio.
Only the raw wave data is saved, mixer settings and effects are not rendered.
Merge Audio and DXi/VSTi Tracks to Stereo Wave File...
This is an export command that will merge all the audio tracks to a stereo wave file while simultaneously rendering
and merging the MIDI tracks to audio if you have a DXi or VSTi software synth. When played in a wave file player
the file will sound the same as if the audio tracks of the song were being played by RealBand. The volume, mute,
pan, etc. settings of the track will affect the sound of the merged stereo wave file.
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Merge Audio and DXi Tracks to Compressed File...
This command works the same as the Merge Audio and DXi Tracks to Stereo Wave File... command, except that this
will compress the file. When you execute this command, RealBand generates a temporary stereo PCM file, and then
a dialog will pop up which will prompt you to select an audio output format. After you select a format and press
OK, the program will compress the file. If you select an MPEG layer-3 format, RealBand will save the file with an
.MP3 extension instead of .WAV. This format requires that your system have an .MP3 compression codec installed.
Merge Audio and DXi Tracks to WMA File
This command works the same as the Merge Audio and DXi Tracks to Stereo Wave File... command, except that
this will compress the file. When you execute this command, RealBand first generates a temporary stereo PCM file,
a dialog will pop up which will let you save to a .WMA file (Windows Media Audio).
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Chapter 9: Notation and Printing
Notation
Overview
The Notation window displays the notes of a MIDI track on a staff and lets you print music on your
printer. Open the Notation window with
the “eighth-note” button, with the Window | New | Notation menu option, or with the keystrokes Alt+F2.
Notation Window Tool Bar
Opens the Notation Window Options dialog where user settings and preferences are made.
Launches the Print Options dialog to print music.
Opens the Standard notation mode window.
Opens the Editable notation mode window.
Opens the Staff Roll notation mode window.
Enables Chord Entry mode to type chords in the notation.
Name of the current note or the note that will be entered.
The Clean checkbox put the standard notation into Clean Mode. Clean Mode will clean up the
notation in certain situations where there are notes played very close together and are within a
certain interval of each other. The clean option makes the notation more readable when there are a
lot of grace notes (notes leading up or down to the next note) or glitch notes, which are notes that
are short in duration and have a low velocity.
Opens Lyric Edit mode. In the Notation window, lyrics can be entered into a track that already
contains the notes of a melody. When you switch into Lyric Edit mode, a gray edit box will appear
near the top of the Notation window. The closest note or chord to the current time location will be
highlighted.
The Track button lets you choose which track to view.
The Duration Button lets you select the duration of the note. The default duration is Auto. If Auto
is the currently selected duration, the duration will be automatically set by the program so the
note’s duration lasts up to the next note in the measure or to the end of the measure, which ever is
closer.
The Rest checkbox lets you insert a hard rest onto the notation window to force a rest to be shown
at a particular location. For example, if there is a half note at the beginning of a measure, you can
cause it to be displayed as quarter note by inserting a hard-rest on the 2nd beat of the measure.
Hard rests are shown in blue. The Rest checkbox only remains checked until you insert a rest.
Switch between a Notation Window and a Lead Sheet Window.
The Loop Screen button will play the music of the current notation screen in a loop.
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The Zoom Out button reduces the size of the Notation Window’s font.
The Zoom In button increases the size of the Notation Window’s font.
The Section Text button lets you place a text event at any location on the staff window. When you
press this button, you’ll see a dialog box with a list of any existing text events.
The Scrub Mode button plays the notes in the song as you drag the mouse horizontally over the
notation. This can be helpful for learning difficult parts, or for examining recorded tracks for
glitches or wrong notes. Click the scrub mode button and the mouse cursor will change to speaker
icon.
There are three Notation window modes, each with its own toolbar button.
Standard Notation mode,
Editable Notation mode, and
Staff Roll Notation mode.
By default, the Notation window is in Standard Notation mode, which displays the notes as regular music with chord
symbols and lyrics.
Editable Notation mode also displays standard notation but allows you to edit the notation. You will see standard
notation with vertical gray lines that represent possible note locations, either eighth note triplets or sixteenth notes.
The Staff roll mode displays the notes as note heads (no stems) with optional duration and velocity lines. The Staff
roll mode also contains gray vertical lines across the staff.
Standard Notation Mode
RealBand Notation window in Standard Notation mode.
Standard Notation mode is a convenient way of displaying a track as regular music on a staff with chord symbols
and lyrics.
The Notation window will draw
brackets around an accidental (#)
in a situation where the same note in
the previous bar was an accidental
outside the current key.
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This is a courtesy which helps to remind you that the note is now played as expected within the current key.
Entering Chord Symbols
Chords symbols can be entered in the notation for each beat of a song. A beat is equal to the numerator of the
current time signature. For example, if the song is 2/4, you could enter up to 2 chord symbols per bar. If a song is
6/8, you could enter up to 6 chords per bar (although you likely won’t want to enter that many).
Chords are typed in from the computer keyboard using standard chord symbols like C or Fm7 or Bb7 or Bb13#9/E.
Chord entry is enabled when the “Ch” checkbox is checked in the Notation window.
Note: Chords can also be entered by typing them in the Chords window.
To start typing in chords in a Notation Window:
−
Rewind to the beginning of the song.
−
Enable chord entry by clicking on the “Ch” checkbox.
−
You may move around by cursor arrow Keys, Enter key, or mouse pointer click on the time indicator at the top
of the Notation Window. The time line moves 2 beats at a time in response to the left and right cursor keys.
When you have the time indicator at or close to the beat where you want to enter a chord, you then type the name of
the chord. Note that the chord entry works the same as Band-in-a-Box in that the chord you type will go to the first
beat in a 2 beat “cell.” For example, if the time is 1:02:00 and you type the letter c the C chord will be placed on
beat 1. You can enter a chord on beat 2:00:00 with a comma as discussed below.
For example type c6 to get the C6 chord. Note that you should never have to use the Shift key, as RealBand will
sort this out for you.
− Use b for a flat, e.g., Bb7.
− Use # or 3 for a sharp, e.g., F#7. You can actually type F37 to get F#7; RealBand will sort out the case, saving
you the effort of using Shift+3 to type the # symbol.
− Use / for slash chords with alternate roots such as C7/E, C7 with E bass.
− Use a comma to enter two chords in a row. For example, we would type Ab9, G9 to enter two chords on
consecutive beats.
− You can use Ctrl+Delete or the comma key to delete a chord.
The chords are shown in the Notation window above the treble clef:
| C6
AM7
| DM7
Ab9 G9 | C6/E
|
A7#9
|
In the above example, the | symbol shows roughly where the bar lines would be if these chords were entered in a
Notation window. The sequence of keystrokes to enter all the chords in the above line would be:
w c6> am7> dm7> ab9,g9> c6/e> > a739 Enter
W indicates rewind, the > indicates cursor key to the right, and Enter indicates pressing the Enter key.
Hint: The fastest way to type in chords is to use your left hand to type in the chords. Your right hand stays on the cursor
keys (or mouse) to advance the time indicator to the next bar/beat after you've typed in the chords
Entering Lyrics
The [L] button in the Notation window puts the notation into a mode in which you can enter lyrics. Lyrics are
stored as individual track events, which can be accessed in the Event List window like any other events.
In the Notation window, lyrics can be entered into a track that already contains the notes of a melody. In Lyric Edit
mode, a gray edit box will appear near the top of the Notation window. The closest note or chord to the current time
location will be highlighted.
Lyrics are entered by typing a word in the edit box and then pressing Enter. When Enter or Tab is pressed, the
Notation window will advance to the next note or chord of the melody. You can then continue typing lyrics and
pressing Enter to advance forward into the melody. Ctrl+ ← (left cursor arrow) lets you back up to the previous
note or chord, and Ctrl+ → (right cursor arrow) lets you advance to the next chord without saving the contents of
the edit control.
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Note: When creating .KAR files you enter lyrics in RealBand as usual, and if you save as a .KAR file the lyrics will be
converted to the KAR format.
Unlike the .KAR format RealBand lyrics should not be preceded by spaces. Syllables are indicated with dashes, and
paragraphs and lines are indicated with backslashes and forward slashes at the end of a line or paragraph.
Multi-Syllable Words: If a word has two or more syllables, you should follow the syllable with a dash. For
example, the word “crazy” would be entered as two separate lyric events, cra- and zy.
Ending a line when lyrics are displayed in Big Lyrics window:
The Line and Para buttons appear when Lyrics mode is selected in the Notation window. These two convenient
buttons let you enter line breaks (/) or paragraph breaks (\) when entering lyrics.
To end a line and start a new line, enter a break (line or para) at the end of the last lyric in a line. For example, if a
word ends with a backslash, e.g., “town\,” then the next lyric after “town” will be displayed on a new line in the Big
Lyrics window.
If you plan on saving as a .KAR file, you can use a “Para” backslash to indicate the end of a paragraph, and a “Line”
forward slash to indicate the end of a line. In RealBand and in some Karaoke players, both the \ and / characters are
treated the same way.
Time signature display: Time signature changes that occur during the song (1/4 through 4/4) will be displayed in
the Notation window, Lead Sheet window, or printout.
Note: Time signature display works in non-editable Notation mode with engraver spacing enabled. Time signatures are not
displayed in Staff Roll mode.
Time signature change at bar 10 in Standard notation display.
Editable Notation Mode
Editable Notation mode is the same as Standard Notation mode, but notes can be inserted by clicking on the staff
with the left mouse button, moved by dragging with the left mouse button, or edited by clicking on a note head with
the right mouse button.
Broken vertical gray lines across the staff show the position for each note subdivision in either eighth note triplets or
sixteenth notes.
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Editable Notation window in 16th note (even) resolution.
Moving Notes
Notes can be moved via drag and drop. To move a note, move the mouse cursor over an existing note and then click
and hold the left mouse button. The mouse cursor will change to a different shape.
While keeping the mouse button pressed, move the mouse cursor over to the location you wish to drop the note and
then let go of the mouse button. The note will be moved to the place you dropped it. Certain areas of the screen are
not valid locations to drop a note. The mouse cursor will change to a circle with line through it to indicate an invalid
location. If you try to drop a note in an invalid location, nothing will happen.
When you click on a note with the left mouse button, and drag the mouse without releasing the left mouse button,
you will hear the note being played as you move it up and down the screen. The note’s pitch will be increased or
decreased chromatically as you move it up/down the screen.
Entering Notes
Notes can be inserted simply by clicking on the staff in an appropriate location. You will see the name and octave
of the current note location in a box at the top of the window. This helps if you are inserting a note above or below
the grand staff. You can also insert notes via the Piano or Guitar window as discussed later in this section.
When inserting a note, holding down the mouse button and then pressing the Shift key (click+Shift) will make the
note 1 half-step sharper than the position that you click on. Holding down the Ctrl key and then clicking
(Ctrl+click) will make the note 1 half-step flatter, and holding down the Alt key will make the note a natural. Hold
the key down until after you release the mouse button.
You can also insert notes by clicking on the Piano or the Guitar window. If you click on the Piano or Guitar
window, notes will be inserted into any open Notation window at the current location in the Notation window. For
example, if you click on middle C of the Piano keyboard, a middle C will be inserted into the Notation window.
There is a 1-peg hot key in the Notation window to move current time forward or backward by 1 peg (normally a
16th note). Alt+left arrow moves the current time backward by 1 peg. Alt+right arrow moves it forward by 1 peg.
This makes it easier if you are using the on-screen piano for entering notes into the Notation window.
Note: By default, you must hold the Ctrl key before clicking on the Guitar fretboard to insert a note into a Notation window.
If the “Send Notes To Notation Windows” option in the Guitar Settings dialog is enabled, holding the Ctrl key won't be
required, but be careful not to accidentally insert a note when using the mouse to switch to the Guitar window.
Notes can be deleted by holding down the Delete key and then clicking over the note you wish to delete.
Editing Notes
Notes can be edited by clicking on the note with the right mouse button to launch a menu of editing commands.
Select Edit Note to open the NOTE dialog.
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This dialog allows editing of:
−
The MIDI channel for the note.
−
The exact time location.
−
Note name.
−
Velocity of the note.
−
Duration of the note in beats and ppq.
Forced Accidental - If a note is being displayed as a sharp, but
you want it to appear as a flat (or vice versa), you can force
that here.
Note Type - You can choose for the note to be Normal,
Invisible (note will sound but will not appear in regular
notation), or Guitar Bend (a B will appear above the note).
Note that the guitar bend is for notation only and does not
affect the sound of the note.
The [Delete] button removes the note.
Micro-Resolutions
You can change the resolution for any individual beat of a song to a different resolution by clicking with the right
mouse button above that beat on the Notation window’s time line. For example, if you click on the time line above
the 2nd beat in a measure, a dialog box will pop up which will let you set the resolution of the current beat for both
clefs. If you select a resolution of 8, then 32nd notes can be displayed. You can even select a resolution as high as
32, which would allow 128th notes to be shown.
When you choose a micro-resolution RealBand will insert a special controller event into the track as a means of
storing the resolution. If you set the resolution to the same setting as the Options dialog’s resolution setting, then
micro-resolutions won’t be used, and the special controller for the current beat and clef will be deleted.
Highlighting a section of the Notation window
When the Notation window is in Editable Notation Mode, you can highlight a section of the Notation window, so
that you can cut or copy the section.
To highlight a section of the Notation window:
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1.
2.
3.
Click and hold the left mouse button at the upper right corner of the rectangular section you want to highlight.
Make sure you don’t click on any existing notes, and make sure you don’t release the left mouse button until
you are finished highlighting.
Move the mouse down and to the right to form a rectangle. You will see a rectangular section of the Notation
window become highlighted in reverse.
When you’ve finished highlighting release the left mouse button.
During the process of highlighting a section, you can highlight a section beyond the current notation screen by
moving the mouse cursor beyond the right edge of the Notation window. When you do this, the Notation window
will advance to the next screen. The Notation window will continue advancing until you move the mouse cursor
back inside of the Notation window. You should move the mouse cursor back inside the notation window when it
has reached the screen that contains the last measure of the section you wish to highlight. Then you can move the
mouse cursor to the left or right within the Notation window to adjust to make any final adjustments to the
highlighted section.
The highlighted area will include any notes on the first and last pegs (vertical beat division lines) of the highlighted
section. The minimum highlighted section contains two pegs.
Shift+click to adjust the highlighted section of notation
Shift+click (Shift key + left mouse button) support makes it easy to tweak the beginning or end of the highlighted
area.
- If you Shift+click before the start of the From/Thru range, or after the end of the From/Thru range, the
highlighted area will be extended.
- If you Shift+click within the From/Thru range, the range will be reduced, and the location you clicked on will
become either From or Thru depending on which boundary was closer to where you Shift+clicked the mouse.
- If you keep the left mouse button held after the Shift+click, and you move the mouse you can adjust the
boundary of the range while moving the mouse.
Shift+click works in terms of adjusting the top and bottom of the highlighted area, and this affects the range of
notes selected.
Once you have highlighted a section of the Notation Window, you can use the Edit | Cut or Edit | Copy commands
to cut/copy a section of notation. The From/Thru values in the Cut or Copy dialog will automatically be set to
reflect the highlighted area. You can then cut or copy as you would normally.
When you cut or copy after having selected a section of the Notation window and you press [OK], RealBand will
ask you if you wish to apply a Data Filter based on the highlighted range of notes. If you answer “Yes” a Data
Filter will pop up which will be set to include notes based on the vertical highlighted range in the Notation window.
Right Click Pop-Up Menu
This menu of notation commands pops up when you right click on the Editable Notation window.
Note: If you right-click on a note head you will see this menu with two additional commands at the top, Edit Note and
Delete Note.
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Insert Section Text – Launches a dialog that lets you insert a Section Text event.
Section Letters – A submenu will let you select a section letter from A – Z, or Remove, which removes the
nearest section letter to where you right-clicked.
Cleanup Orphaned Notation Controller Events – This will automatically remove stray notation
controller events, such as any that no longer have notes associated with them.
Chord Height Adjustment – Lets you make an adjustment to the vertical position of the chord symbol at
the current beat.
Advance by 1 Peg – Advance the time by 1 peg.
Backup by 1 Peg – backup the time by 1 peg.
If you right clicked on a note, there will also be a menu item at the top that lets you edit the note.
“1-Peg” Notation Hot Key
There is a 1-peg hot key in the Notation window to move current time forward or backward by 1 peg (normally a
16th note). Alt+left arrow moves the current time backward by 1 peg. Alt+right arrow moves it forward by 1
peg. This makes it easier if you are using the on-screen piano for entering notes into the Notation window.
Pop-Up Note Properties Display
When in Editable Notation mode,
if the Show pop-up hint for note properties setting is enabled in the
Other Notation Options a pop-up hint will appear if you move the mouse
cursor over a note and stop.
The hint window shows the note's properties - note name, MIDI channel, velocity, start
time, and duration.
This lets you quickly see a note's properties without having to bring up the edit dialog by
right-clicking on the note.
Notation Symbols for Expression and Articulation
The Notation window now supports many new symbols including section letters [A, B, etc.], slurs, legato, accents,
staccatos, crescendos and more!
The Notation Symbols are entered from the Notation Event dialog, which is accessed from the right-click menu in
the Editable Notation window.
This dialog lets you insert (or remove) notation symbols.
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The symbols supported are:
Slurs
And other accents:
Crescendo
−
Regular
Decrescendo
−
Legato
Staccato
−
Staccatissimo
−
Marcato
Choose the event type (slur, decrescendo, etc.) in the Notation Event list box.
The Length of Event field determines the length of a slur, crescendo, or decrescendo. The length is specified in
beats and ticks. If an event is a “single-peg” event, such as a staccato or accent, then this field will cause multiple
events to be inserted if the range is greater than zero (and the range spans multiple pegs). If you had highlighted an
area of the Notation window prior to right-clicking on it (to launch the pop-up menu and choose the notation
symbols menu item) then this field is set based on the length of the highlighted area.
Note: The highlighted area does not actually include the very last peg at the very edge of the highlighted area.
The Clef field, if present, indicates the clef in which the event will be inserted (or removed from). Most events
affect only one clef at a time, and therefore you must choose the clef and this field will be preset based on where you
had initially right-clicked with the mouse on the Notation window (you did this to get the pop-up menu that launches
this dialog). For example, if you had right-clicked on the treble clef, then this will be set to treble.
The Offset field, if present, lets you make adjustments to the vertical position of an event.
The Start Time field is the start time of the event (in measures:beats:ticks).
OK – Insert Event – exits this dialog and then inserts the event into the notation track.
OK – Remove Event – exits this dialog and then REMOVES the event (if it exists in the specified time range) from
the notation track.
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Chord Height Adjustment
The Notation Event dialog also lets you make an adjustment to the chord symbol height for a beat, by choosing the
Chord Height Adjustment event type.
This setting allows for adjustment of the vertical position of individual chord symbols. This is useful when chord
symbols overlap other aspects of the notation.
Staff Roll Notation Mode
Staff Roll mode is similar to a piano roll, except the notes are shown on a grand staff. Its purpose is to allow for
easy graphical editing of notes, with the Staff Roll you will be able to graphically edit sequences much easier than if
you were using a regular piano roll or an ordinary notation window.
Notes are shown as black dots (note heads) on the staff. Note stems are NOT shown.
If the Show Note Durations option is enabled, the durations of the notes are shown as horizontal lines. The
horizontal duration lines are drawn a little higher or lower if the note is a sharp or a flat, which helps you be aware
of rare situations where notes a half step apart overlap each other. Notes are shown with sharp, flat, or natural
symbols depending on the key signature of the song. Notes are shown exactly where they occur. They are not
quantized.
You can adjust the velocity and duration of a note by clicking on a note head with the right mouse button and then,
while holding the button down, dragging the mouse cursor either vertically or horizontally. The velocity or duration
will be changed based on the location where you release the right mouse button.
You can step forward or backward in the song by one chord by pressing the keypad period (.) and keypad zero (0)
keys. The notes will be highlighted in red and sustained.
Notation Window Options
The Options button launches the Notation Window Options dialog.
The “Bars Per Line – Song” setting determines the horizontal resolution of the screen. For example, with 2 Bars Per
Line, the width of the screen is equal to 2 Bars in length. You can increase this setting to 16 Bars Per Line, although
the screen may look unusual at this extreme since the size of the note heads remains the same regardless of this
setting.
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You can also use this setting to make the resolution equal to between 1 and 4 beats rather than complete bars. This
is mainly for editing purposes. If you use beats with this setting, the program will ignore any “Bars Per Line -| From
This Screen On” markers in order to display the partial bars.
The “Bars Per Line - From This Screen On” setting lets you change the horizontal resolution from this screen on.
This will cause the program to insert a special Bars Per Line marker (Controller Event) into the sequence. This is
useful if you have some sections of the song that you would like to be displayed with a different number of Bars Per
Line than the overall Song setting. The Notation window will then display the number of bars you selected from the
current screen on.
The “Resolution” setting determines how many vertical grid lines will be drawn for each beat. For example, with a
resolution of 1, just one line will be drawn per beat. With a resolution of 4, 4 lines will be drawn, with 1 line being
the beat line drawn in a solid color and the other lines being dashed lines representing sixteenth notes in 4/4. If
you're displaying Jazz Swing or Shuffle music that has a triplet feel to the eighth notes, make sure to set the
resolution to =3 (triplets). This will display the 8th notes and other aspects of Jazz Swing music correctly. You can
also set micro-resolutions by clicking on the time line above any beat with the right mouse button.
The “Chord Vertical Position” setting adjusts the vertical position in which the chord symbols are displayed, which
is useful when chord symbols overlap other notation. This setting can range from 1 to 10, with 1 being nearest to
the staff.
The “Transpose” setting lets you adjust the Notation window to display notes either higher or lower than their actual
pitches. For example, if you're working with guitar music, you could set this to +12 and the guitar music will be
displayed an octave higher, which is the way guitar music is normally notated.
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Hint: This setting is also useful for displaying music for non-concert instruments such as trumpet or saxophone. Trumpet
players (and other Bb instruments) should set transpose to +2; Alto Saxophone (and other Eb instruments) should set the
transpose to -3. The music is then displayed in the correct key for the instrument, but plays in the concert key to the MIDI
card.
The “Show Beat/Bar Lines” checkbox, when unchecked, will cause the staff window to be drawn without beat or
bar lines (Staff Roll mode only, not in Standard Notation mode).
The “Tablature” box gives a choice of tablature for guitar and additional fretted instruments - bass, ukulele,
mandolin, and banjo. The fretboard tablature will show where the bass clef is normally located. Tablature is only
shown in Standard Notation and Editable Notation mode. A track displayed with tablature must be a valid multichannel guitar track, or the tablature won't be displayed properly.
Notation window showing banjo tablature.
“Duration Line” Color selects the color of the horizontal lines that represent note duration and the vertical lines for
note velocity in the Staff Roll notation mode.
The Key Signature is shown if the “Show Key Signature” option is enabled.
If the “Highlight Played Notes” checkbox is checked, notes will be highlighted in red as the notes are played when a
song is playing.
If the “Snap to grid lines” checkbox is checked, the inserted note will be lined up with the closest grid line
(quantized). The duration of inserted notes is determined by the “Inserted Note Defaults” settings in the Other
Notation Options.
The Notation window can be set to scroll ahead of the music without interfering with your view of the current
notation. Use the “Scroll Ahead Enabled” checkbox to toggle this feature on and off.
The “Scroll Ahead Trigger at %” setting adjusts the location where the screen will scroll. A setting of 70 would
cause the notation to scroll when the 70% of the current screen has played.
The “Scroll Ahead Amount %” determines how much the screen will scroll, based on the Bars Per Line setting. For
example, a setting of 50% with the Bars Per Line setting at 4 Bars would scroll the notation ahead by two bars.
If the “Show Note Durations” checkbox is checked, then in Staff Roll Mode the durations of notes will be shown as
either green or blue horizontal lines depending on whether the “Duration Line Color” is set to green or blue.
The “Show Velocity Lines” setting causes the Staff roll mode to display vertical lines in the same color as the
duration lines. These lines represent the velocity of the notes, the higher the velocity the longer the line. The
velocity lines are roughly the height of a staff when a note has a velocity of 127.
The “Lyric Position” lets you adjust the vertical position of the lyrics. When set to zero, the lyrics are drawn
between the staves. The range is -64 to 64.
The “Font Size” setting adjusts the size of the Notation window’s font. The default size is 100%. You can increase
or decrease the font size by changing this setting. You can also use the Zoom In [+] and Zoom Out [-] buttons at the
top of the Notation window.
The “Use Jazz Music Font” setting enables the Jazz Music font for notation instead of the standard font. The Jazz
font will give your lead sheets the appearance of a Jazz lead sheet rather than having a “Classical” appearance.
The “Lyrics Font,” “Chords Font,” and “Title Font” let you choose a different font for lyrics, chord symbols, and a
song title. The percentage fields are used by RealBand to determine the size of the font (rather than the size in the
font selection dialog).
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The Bar # Font setting lets you choose either the Notation Font, or a different font of your choice. The percentage
setting lets you adjust the percentage relative to the default size.
The following group of settings is for Standard Notation mode only, and don't have any effect in Staff roll mode:
The “Tick Offset” lets you display the music ahead or behind the beat. If you have a tendency to play the music
ahead of the beat, you can specify a setting from 1 to 120 to have the music displayed forward in time. A setting
from -1 to -120 will cause the music to be displayed ahead of the beat (but not before the beginning of the song).
120 ticks equal one quarter note for this setting regardless of the current PPQ setting. Generally you won't need to
use this setting since the notes are rounded when being displayed in standard notation.
Hint: The notation of Jazz Swing music will often be improved by a Tick Offset setting of about -5 because Jazz music is
typically played a little after the beat.
The “Clefs Split At” setting determines the split point for placing notes on the Bass or Treble clef. The default
setting is C5, which is middle C. For example, you can use a higher split point, such as C6 if you want some notes
up to a G above middle C to be displayed on the bass clef with ledger lines instead of on the treble clef. If the split
point is above middle C, and a note in the music is high enough that any of the ledger lines above the bass clef
would overwrite the treble clef, the note will be placed on the treble clef.
The “Minimize Rests” checkbox, when checked, will cause RealBand to display the music with minimal rests. Use
this setting if notes are displayed as shorter than you intended. For example, if eighth notes are displayed as
sixteenth notes because you recorded them staccato.
The “Engraver Spacing” setting, when enabled, will improve the appearance of the standard notation in situations
where the Notation window is crowded. However, you may notice a significant decrease in the speed of screen redraws. You may want to only enable this setting before printing if you find that the screen redraws too slowly on
your computer. When in Editable Notation, the spacing will not be drawn using engraver spacing.
There are now two Engraver Spacing settings, “Enabled” and “Enabled During Playback.” If the “Enabled”
checkbox is checked, then engraver spacing is enabled, but won’t be displayed during playback unless the “Enabled
During Playback” checkbox is checked. If the “Enabled” checkbox is unchecked then engraver spacing will be
totally deactivated.
The “Detect fine resolution notation” setting will allow the Notation window, in Standard Notation Mode (noneditable mode) to detect micro-resolutions automatically. It will detect notes a short as 32nd notes in most
situations.
When this setting is enabled the program will count the number of distinct chords (or individual notes) per beat and
if there are more chords played in the beat than the current Resolution, the program will display the beat at a high
enough resolution to show all of them separately rather than lumped together.
For example, if the Resolution is set to 3 and 4 chords were played on a beat the program will display 4 chords as
16th note chords for that beat even though the song’s resolution is 3.
The “Use Ch 8/9 for Left/Right Hand” checkbox will cause the standard notation to display, within reason, notes on
channel 8 on the bass clef and the notes on channel 9 on the treble clef. Notes on channels other than 8 or 9 will be
displayed on the clef that they normally would be shown.
Other Notation Options
There are some additional settings that can be accessed by pressing the [Other Options…] button.
The “Duration %” setting causes the durations to be set to a percentage of the currently selected duration. For
example, if the current duration is Whole, and you set the percentage to 50, the duration will be 50% of a Whole
note.
The “Channel” and “Velocity” settings determine the MIDI Channel and velocity of inserted notes.
When the “Use Existing Channel” setting is enabled, and you insert a note in the Notation window, RealBand will
intelligently determine the channel number of inserted notes instead of using the Channel setting in the Other
Notation Options dialog. When this setting is disabled, the Channel field is used for inserted notes.
If this setting is enabled, and you then insert a note in the Notation window, RealBand will first try to use the forced
MIDI channel in the Tracks window to determine the channel of the note you're inserting. If there is a forced MIDI
channel setting for the track in the Tracks view, then RealBand will set the channel of the note you are currently
attempting to insert so that its channel is the same as the forced MIDI channel.
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If this setting is enabled, but there is no forced MIDI channel, i.e., the Ch field in the Tracks window is set to zero,
RealBand will search the track for the nearest MIDI event in the track that is located before the time of the note you
are currently attempting to insert. If a MIDI event was found in the track, then RealBand will set the channel of the
note you're currently attempting to insert so that its' MIDI channel matches the MIDI channel of the event which
was found.
If this setting is enabled, but there is no forced channel, and a MIDI event isn't found in the track, then RealBand
will use the “Channel” field of the “Inserted Note Defaults” section in the Other Notation Options dialog.
If the “Play Inserted Notes” checkbox is checked, notes that you insert will sound briefly as they are inserted so you
know that the note is correct.
These are advanced settings for standard notation mode:
- Chord Note Separation in MS is the maximum time span in milliseconds allowed for adjacent notes within a
chord when “Detect fine resolution notation” is enabled. The default setting is 63 milliseconds, around 15 ticks at
a tempo of 120 bpm and a resolution of 120 PPQ. In this case notes further than 15 ticks away will be detected as
separate chords. Increasing this setting will increase the amount of time allowed between notes within each
chord.
- Chord Total Separation in MS in the maximum time span in milliseconds allowed for the entire chords when
“Detect fine resolution notation is enabled.” The default setting is 63, about 15 ticks. In this case, any note
beyond 15 ticks from the earliest chord will be detected as a new chord.
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- Glitch Duration in MS is a setting used by the clean routine to determine which notes are glitches and which
notes are valid. Increasing this setting increases the likelihood that notes will be detected as glitches when clean
mode is checked and the notation is in non-editable Notation mode.
- Glitch Velocity is a setting used by the clean routine to determine which notes are glitches and which notes are
valid. Increasing this setting increases the likelihood that notes will be detected as glitches and not shown when
clean mode is checked and the notation is in non-editable Notation mode.
The Line Thickness Settings (Bar Line %, Stave Line%, Tie %, and Slur %) affect the thickness of the lines
drawn by RealBand. The settings are a percentage, with 100% being the regular thickness.
Notation Controllers
The Notation window’s advanced features use controllers. For example, when you insert a hard rest or change the
resolution of a beat to a “micro resolution” a controller event is inserted into the track. The Notation window
controllers are:
Controller
Value
Purpose
85
1 - 32
Bass clef micro resolutions.
85
34
Invisible Note (Affects note immediately before it in the track.)
85
37
Bass clef hard rest.
86
1 - 32
Treble clef micro resolutions.
86
37
Treble clef hard rest.
88
33 - 48
Bars Per Line From This Screen On (33 corresponds to 1 BPL while 48
corresponds to 16 BPL).
89
0
Slur
1
Crescendo
2
Decrescendo
3
Staccato
4
Staccatissimo
5
Regular Accent
6
Legato
7
Strong Accent (Marcato)
8
Chord Height Adjustment
9
Boxed Section Letter (A through Z)
90
Used to store notation data for events such as slurs, crescendo, etc.
You can prevent RealBand from sending these controllers by checking the “Disable Special Controllers” in the
Options | MIDI Out dialog.
Lead Sheet Notation Window
This window is similar to the Notation window, except that it can display a track in the form of a lead sheet, with
multiple staves per page.
Open the Lead Sheet window with the tool bar button, or the Window | New | Lead Sheet Window menu
option, or with the keystrokes Ctrl+Alt+F2.
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The Lead Sheet window can display notation for up to seven tracks at the same time. In order to display multiple
tracks, you should first select the tracks in the Tracks window or Bars window and then open up a new Lead Sheet
window.
Another way to select multiple tracks is in the Lead Sheet Options window.
RealBand can also print notation with multiple tracks when you press the Print button at the top of a
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Lead Sheet window that is currently displaying multiple tracks.
If you attempt to display multiple tracks and the lead sheet appears overcrowded, you should reduce the Font Size
setting in the Lead Sheet Options dialog. This will solve the problem of staves bumping into each other.
Note: When printing, the Font Size in the print options dialog controls the font size for printing. Generally, you’ll fit more
tracks at a 100% font size when printing than would fit in the Lead Sheet window, due to the different dimensions of a
printed page.
You can switch between the Lead Sheet window and a regular Notation window by pressing the eighthnote button at the top of the Lead Sheet window.
The Loop Screen button will play the music of the current lead sheet screen in a loop.
Although the Lead Sheet window has its own Options dialog, many of the settings in the Notation
window’s Options dialog also affect the Lead Sheet window.
Lead Sheet Options
The “Track-Specific settings” section lets you adjust settings for individual tracks. The “Selected” checkbox
determines if a track is displayed in the current Lead Sheet window; use this to display multiple tracks of notation.
The combo box with the track numbers will show an asterisk (*) for tracks that are selected.
The “Include Bass Clef” and “Include Treble Clef” settings determine which of the clefs will be displayed for each
track.
The “Show Tablature” checkbox lets you enable or disable the display guitar tablature for each track.
Note: When a Lead Sheet window is launched the selected tracks will be based on the selected tracks in the Tracks
window.
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The “Clef Sign Every Line” and “Key Signature Every Line” checkboxes let you decide if the lead sheet should
show the clef sign and key signature on every line. These two settings are the same settings as found in the Print
Options dialog of the Notation window.
The “Bars Per Line” setting determines how many measures are drawn on each line of the lead sheet in 4/4. If the
Bars Per Line is set to 4, you will get 8 measures per line if the time signature is 2/4. Note: This setting is the same
setting as found in the Print Options dialog of the Notation window.
The “First Bar is Lead In” setting causes the program to display an extra bar of music on the first line of the first
page displayed. Use this setting in combination with the “Bar # Offset” setting if the song has a lead in. This setting
is the same setting as found in the Print Options dialog of the Notation window.
The “Resolution” setting determines the resolution of each beat. Normally you’ll keep this set to either 4 (sixteenth
notes) or 3 (triplets). In the Notation window you can select micro resolutions for each individual beat.
When the “Chord Symbols” checkbox is checked, the program will show the chord symbols of the song, if there are
any. This setting is the same setting as found in the Print Options dialog of the Notation window.
When “Chords Above Each Track” is checked the chord symbols (if present) will be seen above each track. This is
helpful for following the chord changes on tracks farther down the screen, but it makes the overall appearance of the
window “busier.” If left unchecked chords will only show above the top track.
The “Bar # Offset” setting is an advanced setting that you can use to decrease all the measure numbers of the lead
sheet. It decreases the numbers that are displayed at each measure. For example, if you specify a Bar # Offset of -2,
all the measures numbers will be shown as 2 less than their actual numbers. So, measure 3 would be shown with a
number of 1, and the number for measure number 4 would be shown as 2. Any number that is reduced to 0 or less
isn't shown, so in this case measures 1 and 2 would have no number, useful if the song has a 2-bar lead in. This
setting is the same setting as found in the Print Options dialog of the Notation window.
The “Clefs Split At” setting determines the split point for placing notes on the Bass or Treble clef. The default
setting is C5 that is middle C. For example, you can use a higher split point, such as C6 if you want some notes up
to a G above middle C to be displayed on the bass clef with ledger lines instead of on the treble clef. If the split
point is above middle C, and a note in the music is high enough that any of the ledger lines above the bass clef
would overwrite the treble clef, the note will be placed on the treble clef. This is identical to the Clefs Split At
setting in the Notation Options dialog.
The “Show Bar Nums” setting lets you choose how often bar numbers are displayed. This setting is the same setting
as found in the Print Options dialog of the Notation window.
The “Show Title” checkbox lets you see the song title on the top of the first page of the song.
The “Margins” button lets you adjust the margins of the Lead Sheet window.
You can select the “Staves per page” and “Font Size.” The bigger the font, the fewer staves you'll be able to fit on
each page. If you select a higher number of staves than will fit with the current font size, the Lead Sheet window
will only display the maximum number of staves that will actually fit on the page. Use the combo box to select from
several presets.
Double Bar Lines
Double bar lines supported in the Lead Sheet and for staff printout.
RealBand will automatically display double bar lines when a new part marker is reached.
Note: the part markers are entered in the Chords Window.
RealBand will display a double-fat bar line at the beginning of the 1st part marker, except when the First Bar Is
Lead-in Checkbox is enabled, in which case the double-fat bar line will be displayed at the beginning of bar 2.
RealBand will also display a double-fat bar line at the end of the printout. Double-bar lines of normal thickness will
be displayed at part-marker section changes in the middle of a printout.
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Copy/Paste Song Lyrics to Lead Sheet
Easily copy and paste lyrics from other applications, to be appended to your lead sheet for display and printout,
with selectable font.
Pressing the Memo button on the Lead Sheet window will launch the Lead Sheet Memo Dialog.
In this dialog you can type in a memo, such as extra lyrics, etc. The memo will show up after the last line of
notation in Lead Sheet or notation printout. The Choose Font... button lets you choose which font is used to display
the memo.
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Printing
The [Print] button lets you print out music. When you press the print button, the Print Options dialog
will pop up.
Print Options Dialog
This dialog lets you change various settings that affect the printout. These settings will remain in effect until you
exit the program. Almost all of these settings are saved to RealBand .SEQ files.
The “Include Bass Clef” and “Include Treble Clef” checkboxes let you decide whether the printout should contain
the Bass Clef, Treble Clef, or both. Note that both the bass and treble clefs are always printed in Staff roll mode
regardless of these settings.
The “From” and “Thru” settings determine the range of measures that are printed. By default, “From” is set to 1 and
“Thru” is set to 1000. This will cause the entire song to be printed (unless the song really goes beyond 1000
measures). The program won't print beyond the end of the song. If there are sustained notes that go beyond the
measure in the “Thru” setting, the program may print extra measures. For example, if the “Thru” setting is set to
measure 5, and there is a note that is sustained until measure 6, the program will print measure 6.
The “Bars Per Line” setting determines how many measures are drawn on each line of the print out in 4/4. If the
“Bars Per Line” is set to 4, you will get 8 measures per line if the time signature is 2/4.
The “Clef Sign Every Line” and “Key Signature Every Line” checkboxes let you decide if the printout should print
the clef sign and key signature on every line.
The “First Bar is Lead In” setting causes the program to print an extra bar of music on the first line of the first page
printed. Use this setting in combination with the “Bar # Offset” setting if the song has a lead in.
The “Margins” setting lets you change the left and right margins of the printout in inches. When the margins are set
to 0, the program will print as wide as your printer will support. Therefore, there may still be margins if your printer
can't print on the edges of the paper.
The “Show Bar Nums” combo lets you choose where you want bar numbers to be printed.
When the “Include Notes” checkbox is checked, the program will print the notes of the track. The only reason for
un-checking this would be to print blank paper, with just the key signature. (You would also have to make sure the
Bars Per Line is set to 1, and un-check the Bar Numbers and Chord Symbols checkboxes.)
The “Staves Per Page” setting lets you determine how many staves will be printed per page. Normally, you'll want
to leave this at 10, but you can decrease this setting if the song has a lot of very high or very low notes so that there
is room between staves for them. If you increase this setting beyond 10, there may not be enough room for all the
staves on the paper depending on the size of the paper in your printer. If the printout has a song title, the first page
printed out will be limited to 8 staves so that there's room for the title.
When the “Chord Symbols” checkbox is checked, the program will print the chord symbols of the song, if there are
any.
The “Bar # Offset” setting is an advanced setting that you can use to decrease all the measure numbers of the
printout. It decreases the numbers that are printed at each measure. For example, if you specify a Bar # Offset of -2,
all the measures numbers will be printed as 2 less than their actual numbers. This setting is useful if the song has a
lead in, because, for example, a setting of -1 would cause the first measure to be printed with no number and the rest
of the measures will be printed with their numbers starting with 1.
The “Clefs Split At” setting determines the split point for placing notes on the Bass or Treble clef. The default
setting is C5, which is middle C. For example, you can use a higher split point, such as C6 if you want some notes
up to a G above middle C to be displayed on the bass clef with ledger lines instead of on the treble clef.
The “Title,” “Composer,” “Style,” and “Copyright” settings let you insert text onto the first page of the printout.
The “Title” field is for a song title. The “Composer” field is for the author's name, and will appear to the right of the
title. The “Style” field is for the style of the music such as Slow Blues, and will appear to the left of the title. The
“Copyright” field is for a copyright notice and will appear at the bottom of the first page of the printout.
The “Font Size” setting lets you adjust the size of the font used for the printout. A value of 100 % is normal size.
You can make the font smaller or larger by increasing or decreasing this setting.
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The “Number of Copies” setting allows you to easily print out multiple copies of notation. You can print any
number of copies from 1 to 1000.
Select the “Bar Numbers” checkbox to print only the range of bars defined by the Print Options’ “From” and
“Thru” boxes.
The “Setup Printer” button lets you configure your printer. The changes to the printer configuration will be in effect
for printing music until you exit the program.
The “OK – Print Preview” button launches the Print Preview. Unlike most other dialogs, this one has a [Close]
button in addition to [Okay] and [Cancel]. The [Close] button works the same as [Cancel], except that any changes
you've made to the settings will be saved.
Print Preview
When you press the [Print] button to print from the Notation window, you can print to a Print Preview window.
This lets you view what the printout will look like without having to waste paper. To access the Print Preview
window, you print as you normally would, except you press the [OK- Print Preview] button. When you’ve pressed
the [OK – Print Preview] button, the Print Preview will be shown. At the top of the Print Preview window, you
will see a toolbar with various buttons.
The [Prior] and [Next] buttons will go to the prior page or next page of the
printout.
The [First] and [Last] buttons will jump to the first or last pages of the printout.
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The [Opt] button will access the Preview Options, such as the bitmap
dimensions and the type of file used if you wish to save a page to a graphics file.
The [Screen Width] button will make the size of the pages in the preview equal
to the width of the screen.
The [Full Page] button will make the size of the pages just big enough to see the
entire image in proportion without having to do any scrolling.
The [Print…] button returns to the Print Options dialog.
The [Print Page] button prints the currently displayed page directly to the default
printer, unless you select a different printer in the Print Options dialog.
The [Save…] button lets you save the current page to a graphics file. You’ll see
a dialog with some of the same settings as the Options dialog.
The [Save Range…] button saves a range of pages. The pages will be named
SONGNAMEXXX.BMP with SONGNAME being the name of the song, and
XXX being the page number.
The [Close] button closes the Print Preview.
Print to Graphics Files
Use the [Save] button to save your song as a graphics file. Graphics files can be inserted into
documents, uploaded to the Internet, or sent as email attachments.
You can choose to print to BMP, JPG, TIF, and
other graphic formats as grayscale or color files
with either low or high resolution.
The JPG Save Smooth and JPG Save Quality
settings affect the quality of JPG files.
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Chapter 10: Piano Roll Window
Overview
The Piano Roll window enables precise graphic editing of note timing and duration. You can also graphically edit
Note Velocity, Controllers, Program Changes, Channel Aftertouch, or Pitch Bend. There are 2 panes in the window
– one for notes and the other for controllers, velocity, and other data.
The Piano Roll may be opened as a movable window, which floats above the main RealBand window, or it may be
opened embedded, in the same position as the Chordsheet/Notation panels in the RealBand main window.
Track Selection
This is a window for editing notes and controllers on
MIDI tracks.
Click on the drop down arrow to choose a track to view and edit.
Audio tracks are edited in the Audio Edit window, but Audio Track Volume, Pan, and Aux Send automation can be
edited in the lower Graphic Data panel of the Piano Roll window.
Snap-to-Grid
Selections, Inserted Notes, or Edited Notes will snap to the grid spacing. If
you do not want snap-to-grid, select [NONE] in the drop-down menu.
View/Insert Channel
If a track contains multiple channels, “All” will display MIDI events on all channels.
Otherwise, select the Channel which you need to see. If “All” is selected, new MIDI events
are inserted on the RealBand track's assigned channel.
Except for perhaps multi-channel Guitar tracks, RealBand plays all track events on the
assigned track channel. Therefore, in almost all cases, the channel of track events does not
matter.
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Note Duration
Set the default duration of new inserted notes. It is easy to mouse-edit a
note's duration after a note is inserted, so it is usually sufficient to select a
typical note duration that makes sense for your purposes and then mouseedit the duration of “exception” notes after they are inserted.
View/Edit Graphic Data
Determine what graphic data to view or edit in the bottom Graphic Data
panel. Choose Velocity, Controller, Program Change, Channel Aftertouch,
and Pitch Bend. If Chan is not set to “All,” only the selected channel events
are displayed.
Controller Type
If “View/Edit” is set to “Control,” the Controller Type becomes visible. The
Graphic Data panel will display the chosen controller type. If Chan is not set
to “All,” only the selected channel events are shown.
Cursor Location Info Panel
The Info Panel shows the cursor's Bar:Beat:Tick and MIDI note or controller value
(depending on the cursor location).
In cursor locations where a value would be nonsensical, this appears blank.
For instance, in the Note panel, Bar:Beat:Tick and Pitch are displayed. In the Ruler panels, only Bar:Beat:Tick is
displayed. In the left Piano panel, only Pitch is displayed. In the Graphic Event panel, Bar:Beat:Tick and Event
Value are displayed.
Chord Ruler and Note Time Ruler Panel
There are two top rulers. The top Chord Ruler displays chords and the Playback Location Indicator. The Note Time
Ruler displays bars and bar subdivisions. When zoomed-in, more subdivisions are displayed. When zoomed-out,
fewer subdivisions are displayed.
Click or drag in the Chords Ruler to set the Insertion Point (useful if you wish to use the menu Edit/Paste (Ctrl+V)
to paste into the Piano Roll). If a song is playing, a Chords Ruler click will stop playback.
Double-click the Chords Ruler to start playback at the indicated bar. You can also set the Insertion Point and then
tap Ctrl+G to start playback at the desired location.
Notes can be selected with the Note Ruler. However, the Note Ruler does not select non-note events such as
controllers or pitch bend.
1
Click+drag on the Note Ruler to select a time-range of notes.
2
Shift+click+drag to add a time-range of notes to the selection.
3
Ctrl+click+drag to invert the note selection of a time range.
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For instance, you could drag to select all notes in bars 2 thru 7. Then you could Ctrl+drag to toggle off note
selections in bar 4. By using the Shift and Ctrl keys, very flexible time selections can be made.
Keyboard Pitch Panel
1.
Click on a single note of the keyboard to select all notes of the clicked pitch.
2.
Click+drag on the keyboard to select all notes in a pitch range.
3.
Shift+click+drag to add another set of notes to the selection.
4.
Ctrl+click+drag to invert a pitch selection.
For instance, you could drag C5 thru C6 to select an octave of notes. Then Shift+click A3
to add all A3 notes to the selection. Then Ctrl+click F5 to remove all F5 notes from the
selection.
Note Panel
Horizontal bars represent notes. Notes can be selected, edited (start time, pitch, duration), inserted, and deleted.
Note Selection
Selected notes are Red.
1.
Click on individual notes to select.
2.
Shift+click on individual notes to add to the selection.
3.
Ctrl+click on a note to invert (toggle) its selection.
Click on white space and then drag a rectangle select a group of notes. Only notes which start within the rectangle
are selected. If the left edge of a note is not inside the rectangle, it will not be selected. This is a feature, not a bug!
1.
Shift+drag a rectangle to add another group of notes to the selection.
2.
Ctrl+drag a rectangle to toggle the selection of the notes in the rectangle.
Note Editing
Edit Note Time Stamp (start time): Move the cursor over the left of a note. A left-right cursor appears. Then
horizontally click+drag the note to a new time.
If multiple events are selected, and you want to move all selected events, use Shift+click+drag. Otherwise a click
on a note will deselect the previous selection, and it will only select/edit the clicked note.
Edit Note Pitch: Move the cursor over the middle of a note. An up-down cursor appears. Then click+drag the
note pitch (vertical dragging).
If multiple events are selected, and you want to transpose all selected events, use Shift+click+drag. Otherwise a
click on a note will deselect the previous selection, and it will only select/transpose the clicked note.
Edit Note Duration: Move the cursor over the right of a note. A right-arrow cursor appears. Then click+drag
the note duration (horizontal dragging).
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If multiple events are selected, and you want to change duration of all selected events, use Shift+click+drag.
Otherwise a click on a note will deselect the previous selection, and it will only select/edit the clicked note.
Insert a Note: Hold the Shift+Ctrl keys. The cursor becomes a pencil. Click where you want the note and it is
inserted with a duration from the Dur drop-down menu, and on the channel selected by the Chan drop-down menu.
If Snap is enabled, the note is inserted at the nearest grid boundary. For instance, if Snap is set to quarter note,
inserted notes will snap to the nearest quarter note boundary.
There are many on-screen visual cues to assist cursor positioning. The Cursor Position Time Markers in the Time
Rulers can assist time positioning. The Cursor Pitch Marker in the Keyboard can assist pitch positioning. The
Cursor Location Info Panel gives precise time and pitch info. Also, the Note Panel has time grid markings, and
pitch accidentals are marked in light gray on the background.
If you make a mistake inserting a note, you can hit the Delete key to remove the new note. Alternately, it is very
easy to immediately drag the note to correct mistakes in time, pitch, or duration.
Delete a Note: Select a note (or group of notes), then tap the Delete key. Alternately, select some notes, rightclick, and choose the “Delete Selected Events” item in the popup menu.
Splitter Bar
A vertical Splitter Bar sits between the Note Editing and Graphic Event panels. If you want to maximize the Note
Editing panel to see more notes, drag the Splitter down. If you want to maximize the Graphic Event panel for more
accurate event editing, drag the Splitter up.
Graphic Event Panel
Graphically display and edit non-note MIDI events. This panel only shows MIDI events specified in the Chan,
View/Edit, and Controller Type controls.
Except for Velocity data, the view is drawn staircased. Blue lines extend between events. This makes it easy to see
the persistent effect of events, if they occur to the left of your current viewing location.
Zero-value events are drawn as small hollow squares, making them easy to see.
With events such as Pitch Bend, or controllers like Modulation and Sustain, it is important to take care to end a
“gesture” with a zero-value event. Otherwise, subsequent notes will be affected, with an unwanted “hanging” Pitch
Bend, Vibrato, or Sustain Pedal locked down. To fix this, move the mouse cursor where the gesture should have
ended, and click in a single zero-value event.
Event Selection
Selected Events are red.
Graphic Event Ruler Time Selections:
The Graphic Event Ruler will only select non-note events. In addition, it will only select the type of MIDI events
specified in the Chan, View/Edit, and Controller Type controls. When you make a Ruler Time selection only the
visible events in this time range are selected. Click+drag on the Ruler to select a time range.
1 Shift+click+drag to add another time range to the selection.
2 Ctrl+click+drag to “invert” the selection of events in the time range.
For instance, you could drag to select bars 2 thru 7, then option-drag to toggle off selections for bar 4. It is very
flexible.
Individual Graphic Event Selections
1 Click on an event to select it.
2 Shift+click on an event to add it to the selection.
3 Ctrl+click on an event to invert (toggle) the selection of that event.
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Edit Events
Edit Event Value: Move the cursor over the top half of an event. An up-down cursor appears. Click+drag
vertically to scale event values. To scale a selected group of events, Shift+click+drag vertically on one of the
events in the selection.
Edit Event Time: Move the cursor over the bottom half of an event. A left-right cursor appears. Click+drag
horizontally to slide the event in time. To slide a group of events, Click+drag on one of the events in the selection.
Insert Events
Line Tool: With no modifier keys, when the cursor is over “white space” in the Graphic Event panel, it becomes a
Line Tool. Move the cursor to white space and then click+drag to draw a line. When the mouse button is released,
a series of events are inserted which follow the line slope.
To avoid choking the MIDI stream, the maximum event density is one event per 10 ticks. Repeated events of the
same value are not inserted. Therefore, long gradual Line Tool fades have a lower density than short extreme Line
Tool fades.
Pencil Tool: Move the cursor over white space and hold the Shift+Ctrl keys. A Pencil Tool appears.
Shift+Ctrl+drag to freehand-draw a curve. If you don't get the curve right on the first pass, keep holding the mouse
button and move the mouse back-and-forth to draw your desired freehand curve. When the mouse button is
released, a series of events are inserted to follow the freehand curve.
To avoid choking the MIDI stream, the maximum event density is one event per 10 ticks. Repeated events of the
same value are not inserted.
Delete Events
Select events with the Ruler or by clicking on them, then tap the Delete key. Or right-click and choose the “Delete
Selected Events” item in the popup menu.
Right-click Contextual Menu
The popup menu can be accessed by right-clicking on the notes, graphic events, or any of the rulers.
Undo: Duplicates the RealBand Edit | Undo (or Ctrl+Z) action.
Delete Selected Events: Deletes any selected events (highlighted in red). This can also be accomplished by
tapping the Delete key.
Select All Notes and Graphic Events: If the Chan combo box is set to “All,” this item will select ALL EVENTS
on ALL CHANNELS (all events in the track). Otherwise, ALL EVENTS that match the CURRENT MIDI
CHANNEL are selected.
Select All Note Events (Of Current Channel): right-click the Note Panel or Note Ruler.
If the Chan combo box is set to “All,” this item will select all notes on all channels, but it will not select any nonnote events. Otherwise, all notes that match the current MIDI channel are selected.
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Select All Graphic Events (Of Current Channel): right-click the Graphic Event Panel or Graphic Event Ruler.
If the Chan combo box is set to “All,” this item will select all graphic events of the current view/edit type on all
channels. Otherwise, all graphic events of the current view/edit type that match the current MIDI channel are
selected. For instance, you could select all channel 4 modulation events, then Delete, to easily remove all of those
events from the Track.
Cut: Copy selected events to the clipboard and then remove them from the track. If you wish, it is possible to Cut
from the Piano Roll, and then Paste into the Notation window, or vice-versa.
Copy: Copy selected events to the clipboard. If you wish, it is possible to Copy from the Piano Roll, and then
Paste into the Notation window, or vice-versa.
Paste - Replace: If no events are on the clipboard, this item is dimmed.
The Paste occurs at the time location of your right-click. Move the mouse cursor to the desired insert location.
Right-click on the Note Panel, the Graphic Event Panel, or any of the Rulers. Then choose this item from the popup
menu. Any previous event types in the paste range which match event types in the clipboard are removed before the
clipboard data is added to the track.
If the Chan combo box is set to “All,” pasted events keep their original (copied) MIDI channel. Otherwise, the
pasted events will be re-channeled to match the Chan combo box.
Paste - Merge: If no events are on the clipboard, this item is dimmed.
The Paste occurs at the time location of your right-click. Move the mouse cursor to the desired insert location.
Right-click on the Note Panel, the Graphic Event Panel, or any of the Rulers. Then choose this item from the popup
menu. Events from the clipboard are merged with whatever data may already exist in the track.
If the Chan combo box is set to “All,” pasted events keep their original (copied) MIDI channel. Otherwise, the
pasted events will be re-channeled to match the Chan combo box.
NOTE: If you use RealBand’s top Edit Menu Cut (Ctrl+X), Copy (Ctrl+C), or Paste (Ctrl+V) commands, the conventional
Cut, Copy, or Paste dialogs appear, with the Piano Roll Time Selection automatically entered. This gives you a choice of
two different styles of Cut, Copy, or Paste; either the conventional RealBand Cut-Copy-Paste dialogs which use a Time
Range, or the Piano Roll right-click menu Cut-Copy-Paste methods which use Selected Events.
Re-Channel All Events to the Track Channel
Re-channel all notes and graphic events (the entire track) to the MIDI output channel assigned for this track.
For instance, though the track output channel might be channel 4, meaning that RealBand transmits any events in the
track on channel 4, the actual events in the track might be channel 1, or a mixture of several channels.
Ordinarily it doesn't matter if the event channels are mixed up, as long as you have the View Channel set to ALL.
But if you wish to use Paste | Replace, this function is smart enough not to “stomp on” a track's events which differ
from the channels of the clipboard MIDI data. So if you force all events to the track channel, the Paste - Replace
function will always replace appropriately.
Re-Channel Selected Events to the Track Channel
Re-channel only the selected events to the track channel.
Re-Channel Selected Events to the View Channel
This command may be useful when editing a multi-channel guitar part or editing an imported multi-channel MIDI
file. Beware that it might initially appear confusing.
For instance, one might set the View Channel to ALL, and make a selection (intending to set these events to channel
12). Then set the View Channel to 12, and of course the selected events disappear (if the events had some other
MIDI Channel). But then when you invoke “Re-Channel Selected Events to the View Channel” the MIDI events
will re-appear on the Piano Roll.
Display Controls
Horizontal Scroll Bar, [+] and [-] Buttons
Scroll in time, and zoom the horizontal display.
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Vertical Scroll Bar, [+] and [-] Buttons
Scroll to see different note ranges (does not scroll the Graphic Event Panel) and zoom the vertical display.
Zoom to Selection Button
Make a selection of notes, and then click the Zoom To Selection button. The vertical pitch range and
horizontal time range adjusts to fill the note panel with the selected notes.
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Chapter 11: Mixer Window
Overview
The Mixer window provides real time control of volume and effects. You can launch it with the toolbar
button or by typing ALT+WÆ8.
This is an integrated mixer that controls both MIDI and Audio tracks. There are sliders for all 48 tracks, 8 auxiliary
effects (Aux) busses, and a combined total of 16 audio output ports or audio subgroups.
The Mixer track strips conveniently show the track name vertically to the left of the volume sliders. This is the track
name that is assigned in the Tracks window, go to that window to add or change track strip names.
When the mouse cursor is positioned over a track number in the Mixer window a popup box will display all of the
Track windows settings for the track - the track name and type, patch name, volume and pan settings, and effects
settings.
MIDI tracks show an output port with an “M” prefix for a MIDI port or an “S” for a software
synthesizer. They have controls for volume, pan, reverb, chorus, modulation, and expression plus a VU
meter, a MIDI patch selection box, and a mute/unmute button.
Audio tracks either have a prefix of “A,” for an audio output, or “G,” for an audio subgroup, on their
output ports. They have volume and pan controls, a stereo VU meter, a mute/unmute button, four
assignable auxiliary sends, and a track-specific FX insert.
In addition to the track specific effects, there are eight global busses that can each have four chained effects each.
You can assign each audio track to four different Aux busses and adjust the amount that each audio track uses the
effects in each assigned bus. If that isn’t enough, you can add four chained effects to each audio subgroup and also
to the main output - this will affect all tracks.
Mixer Controls
To use the knobs, click and hold the left mouse button while the mouse cursor is inside the knob
and move the mouse cursor in a circular motion. The knob’s pointer will follow your mouse
cursor movements. In this follow mode you can even move the mouse cursor off the knob so that it isn’t obscuring
your view of the pointer.
Knobs
As you move any Mixer knob or slider a continuous readout of its
setting displays at the bottom of the window. At the desired position simply release the mouse button to set the
value.
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To use the slider controls, simply click, hold and drag the control knob using the mouse
or click on the control strip above or below the knob to move the slider in small
increments. Holding the mouse button down on the control strip causes continuous
movement of the control in small increments until the mouse button is released.
Volume
Slider
If you need to see or edit the precise value of a knob or slider you can right mouse click on
the knob to pop up a dialog box which displays the exact setting as a number, allowing
you to manually type in a new numeric value (e.g., 80, 28, 12, etc.).
Pan
Slider
These knobs and sliders can be automated with MIDI controller messages for volume, pan, chorus, and reverb that
are present as events in a song.
Track Controls
The Mixer has different controls for MIDI tracks and audio tracks.
MIDI Track Strip
This is the Mixer strip for a MIDI track.
-
control knobs for Reverb, Chorus, Modulation, and Expression effects have a smooth “real
feel” response. Right-click on these control knobs to type in an exact controller value.
-
click on the green checkmark or red “x” above the fader to turn tracks on and off, i.e., to
toggle between active and mute states.
click on the patch number box to see the Select Patch dialog where the name of the patch will
be highlighted. You can select a new patch from this dialog.
right-click on the sliders to type in an exact fader level.
the track name (from the Tracks window) is shown vertically to the left of the Volume slider.
each track strip has its own stereo VU meter.
-
the LR stereo pan slider also has a smooth, even response with the option to right-click and
type in an exact value.
click in the “Out” box to assign the track to a MIDI output port. DXi and VSTi synths are
identified with an S. For example, the default DXi synth or VSTi synth is S16.
selected tracks are highlighted in red or yellow, as in the Tracks window.
Hover the mouse over any track number to see a summary of the track settings (MIDI or audio).
A click in area around the track number will open the context menu with a full list of commands and
settings for the particular track. This is the same menu that opens with a right-click in the Tracks
window, so it reduces the need to switch back and forth between windows.
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Audio Track Strip
This is the Mixer strip for an Audio track.
-
-
the [FX] button opens the DirectX/VST Window where up to four real time effects can be
inserted into the track.
each track has four auxiliary effects sends that can be assigned to any four of the eight
available Aux busses. Each Aux bus can have up to four chained effects.
the rotary knobs set the send level to each Aux bus. Right-click on a knob to enter an exact
level for the send.
use the green checkmark or red “x” above the fader to turn the track on and off, i.e., to toggle
between active and mute states.
the track name displays vertically to the left of the volume slider. The track name is entered
in the Tracks window.
right-click on the volume slider to enter an exact fader level.
each track strip has its own stereo VU meter.
the LR stereo pan slider also has a smooth, even response with the option to right-click and
type in an exact value.
tracks can be assigned to audio subgroups using audio output ports that do not currently have
a driver port assigned. This track is assigned to subgroup 2.
when using audio subgroups the Aux busses should also be sent to that subgroup, so auxiliary
busses 5, 6, 7, and 8 would be assigned to Subgroup 2 (G2) in this example.
Press the [FX] button to bring up the DirectX/VST Window, and you can select/edit the effects you
wish to insert.
A click in area around the track number will open the context menu with a full list of commands and
settings for the particular track. This is the same menu that opens with a right-click in the Tracks
window, so it reduces the need to switch back and forth between windows.
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Master Controls and Mixer Utilities
The two knobs in the All column serve as master reverb and chorus settings. These controls will affect
the overall level of Reverb and Chorus without changing the settings on individual tracks.
◄ Reverb
◄ Chorus
The volume slider control in the All column is the master volume control.
The [Pan] control in the All column will change the settings for all 48 tracks at the same time.
When a .SEQ file is saved, all of the Mixer’s current volume, pan, chorus, and reverb settings are also
saved. These settings will be restored when the file is reloaded.
The current mixer track corresponds to the current/highlighted track in the Tracks and/or Bars windows. You can
change the current track in the Mixer window simply by clicking on the track number.
The Mixer’s Range Combo settings are determined by the display configuration you set with the splitter bar. These
two examples show the Range Combo settings with the splitter bar set to show 12 or 16 tracks at a time, but you
could use different settings depending on the size of your display or on what
combination of track strips, Aux busses, and output ports you want to see.
This panel is scrollable, so if you can’t see all of the faders just use the scroll bar to get to the one you want.
The [Default] button located on the lower-left of the Mixer will reset all mixer parameters to the
default settings.
The [Tune] knob lets you fine-tune your synth or MIDI sound source. When you click on the Tune
knob you’ll hear an “A” note sent out through the current part. Adjust the knob until the module is
set to the desired tuning and release the mouse button.
This button launches the Select .DLL or .EXE dialog that lets you select a .DLL or .EXE that was
written specifically to work with RealBand. The name of the button changes from .EXE to .DLL
depending on the plug-in that is running.
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All .DLLs or .EXEs that begin with the “$” character, e.g.,
$GS.DLL, will show up in the dialog (without the “$”
character).
This run button (to the left of the [.EXE] [.DLL] button) changes to show the name of the
currently running .DLL or .EXE plug-in, such as the GS Settings dialog or the RealBand
built-in Tuner. Click on this button to open the window displaying the currently running
application.
These .DLLs and .EXEs are small plug-in programs that have been specifically designed to work with the program
to extend functionality and features, such as the .DLL plug-in that is used to edit Roland GS settings (gs.dll). All of
these special .DLL/EXE plug-in files should reside in the RealBand default directory, e.g., c:\RealBand. A list of all
plug-in files will be displayed automatically.
Clicking on the Record Mixer Moves button starts the song playing and lets you record only mixer
moves. The controller moves are saved as MIDI events in the selected track (including audio tracks).
The Delete button in the mixer will automatically delete all mixer events (volume, reverb, pan, chorus)
that are currently embedded within the song's selected tracks.
The Insert button in the mixer will automatically insert Mixer Events (volume, reverb, pan, chorus) into
song’s non-blank tracks.
Sometimes a stereo mix will have problems when it is played back in mono. Use this checkbox to hear
the mix in mono and check for problems such as flanging or canceling.
Creating Audio Subgroups in the Mixer
Unassigned Outputs Work As Subgroups
When this checkbox is enabled in the Audio preferences dialog, any
audio output ports that do not have a driver port assigned to them will function as subgroups. A subgroup is a bus or
signal path that gives you the ability to control several tracks as a group.
Let’s suppose you only have one audio Output Driver port installed in RealBand and you’ve enabled the
“Unassigned Outputs Work As Subgroups” checkbox. Audio Output Ports 2 -16 can then become subgroups.
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Note that this panel is scrollable, so if you can’t see all of the faders just use the ◄ ► scroll arrows to get to the one
you want.
If you were to then set the output ports of tracks 2, 3, and 4 to G2 (i.e., port 2, which
is now called Subgroup 2), and you were to adjust the volume of Subgroup 2 in the
mixer the same way you do for output ports, this will affect the volume of all 3 tracks
as a whole.
You could also add effects to the subgroup in the mixer the same way you do for
output ports. For example, you could apply an EQ to the subgroup as a whole.
The final output of the subgroup (G2) is sent to the audio output port (A1).
Real Time Audio Effects
Real time effects will let you add your favorite effects (such as chorus, reverb, EQ, etc.) at the same time that the
audio tracks are played without permanently altering the actual track data. You can apply real time DirectX and
VST effects to the audio tracks, Aux busses, audio subgroups, and audio output ports.
Track FX Inserts
On the mixer, there is an [FX] button at the top of each channel (track) strip of the mixer. Press the
[FX] button to bring up the DirectX/VST Window and you can select/edit a chain of up to four effects
plug-ins you wish to insert for just that particular track.
The “Track” field of the DirectX/VST Window lets you choose a track in which to select or edit
effects. The “Edit” radio buttons let you chose which of the four effects to edit in the group of effects
available in each Track.
DirectX/VST Window
In the illustration, the Melody is the currently selected Track, and slot 1 (PG Dynamics) is selected for editing.
Note: A “track” can be a track FX Insert, an Aux bus, or an Output insert.
Effects Groups and Presets
The [Load Group] and [Save Group] buttons let you load and save the effects settings for the currently selected
track. The [Load Preset] and [Save Preset] buttons let you save and load presets for the current effect (such as
Echo/Chorus). The [Delete Preset] button lets you remove a preset from the list of already saved presets.
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Options
The [Options] button brings up the DX/VST Options dialog:
These options are for managing the real time DirectX and
VST effects plug-ins on your system. The chapter on
Digital Audio Features has complete details.
Mono Tracks Can use effects in Stereo Mode
This setting in the Audio Options dialog allows mono audio tracks to
use the real time effects track inserts in stereo mode for better sounding mixes.
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Note: This feature only applies to track effects inserts. Aux busses have always worked in stereo mode (if the effects were
stereo). This feature, when enabled, will also cause RealBand to use up more CPU processing power.
Aux Busses
Each track's mixer channel strip also has four assignable AUX knobs that let you individually
control the send levels for up to four auxiliary effects on each track.
There are eight Aux (auxiliary) effects busses in the Mixer window. Each allows a chain of
up to four effects.
You can adjust the Send level, Return level, and output port destination (audio port or
subgroup) for each bus.
The [FX] (effects) button at the top of each Aux strip brings up the DirectX/VST Window so
you can select effects or edit effects settings.
Effects can also be applied to the individual audio subgroups and output ports.
Each subgroup and audio port has an FX insert, with slots for four chained effects.
This is useful if you wish to apply special effects to a selected group of tracks, or apply them
globally to the final stereo output.
Real Time Effects Reset
The [Reset Realtime Effects] button is found in the Audio preferences dialog. It will
remove any real time effects from your project so you can begin remixing from
scratch.
Notes on Performance
The number of real time effects that you can expect to activate at a time without stressing the system depends on the
speed of your computer. Normally you would mostly be using the Aux busses, since the effects used in the Aux
busses can be applied to multiple tracks efficiently.
Let’s say you were to select a reverb in the Aux1 section of the mixer, and you adjust the Aux1 send knobs for five
tracks so that they were all using Aux1 for reverb. In this case, there would only be one instance of this reverb plugin active regardless of the number of tracks (5) that were utilizing the Aux1 bus, since the signals of all tracks
utilizing Aux1 share the same Aux1 signal path.
Note: The more effects you chain together within each Aux bus, Track Insert, or Output Insert, the more CPU power will be
required. For example, an Aux bus with just an EQ will require a lot less CPU power than an Aux bus with a chain of four
effects such as (Compressor – EQ – Chorus – Reverb).
Recordable Mixer Moves
Audio track mixer moves (Vol/Pan/Aux1/Aux2) are now recordable, and you can insert/delete/edit the associated
MIDI controller events in the Event List. To record Mixer moves the current track should be set to the track in
which you want to record the moves.
- Rehearse the Mixer move while playing the song, noting the “begin” and “end” points for the move. It’s often
useful to enable the metronome for reference during playback and recording.
- Start recording with the Mixer moves record button and perform the Mixer moves as rehearsed. Stop
recording.
- Answer [Yes] to “Keep Recorded Mixer Moves?” They will show up as a series of MIDI controller events in the
Event List for the selected track.
Alternatively, you could just use the Edit | Fill command or insert MIDI controller events into the event list for the
particular audio track.
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Chapter 12: Wizards, Tools, and Plug-Ins
Audio Chord Wizard
Overview
The Audio Chord Wizard is an extremely powerful feature that automatically finds chord symbols (C, Fm7 etc.) by
analyzing the audio content of a song (MP3/WAV/WMA or CD-audio file). The song can be in a digital file format
(MP3/WMA/WAV), one that you created in RealBand, or directly loaded from a CD.
In addition to the chords, the Audio Chord Wizard also automatically determines the bar lines and a Tempo map.
Use this feature to instantly play along to your favorite songs, by reading and printing the chord symbols.
Improvements in Audio Chord Wizard 2.0 (from Version 1.0) include:
- Detection of up to 2 chords per bar
- Much improved chord detection accuracy
- Improved tempo tracking, ability to tap in a few bar lines during playback and tempo often locks to bar lines for
the whole song.
- Faster operation, including screen redraws and analysis.
The File | Open Audio w/Chords (WAV/WMA/MP3/CDA)... menu command will open an existing audio file into
RealBand, and then immediately launch the Audio Chord Wizard.
Note: The Audio Chord Wizard estimates the chord progression of an audio file. It is NOT an Audio-to-MIDI transcriber,
which would be a much more elaborate program.
Tutorial
The Audio Chord Wizard button on the toolbar launches the Audio Chord Wizard. This button will pop up
a dialog that gives you two choices: “Open Audio File” or “Use Existing Song.”
If you choose the “Use existing song” option, then RealBand will launch ACW using whatever song is currently
loaded into the program. You will also be asked a question about whether or not to preserve the existing bar lines.
If you choose to preserve existing bar lines, then ACW will only attempt to automatically detect chord symbols
rather than bar lines and tempo information. The Audio Chord Wizard opens the audio file and makes initial
calculations, finding audio beats and estimating a tempo map. And then Audio Chord Wizard displays your audio
file.
Primary Program Controls
Toggle Play/Pause (Space bar or Play/Pause key).
Stop play, rewind to start with Esc key.
Moves nearest bar line to current play position. F8 key or Enter key also set bar
lines.
Exit and send chords to RealBand.
Exit without sending chords to RealBand.
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Average tempo, right-click for options.
Song time signature, 2/4 to 12/8 supported.
Song key signature (set by user).
Use to correct pitch of song if necessary.
Chord Detection accuracy depends on the accuracy of the bar lines. If bar lines are not well-aligned then the Chord
Detection can be expected to be rather poor. It is quick and easy to align the bar lines on most songs, once you get
the hang of it.
The first task is to locate the beginning of Bar One. Since an audio file could have an arbitrary amount of silence at
the beginning of the song, and many songs begin with a pickup partial bar, ACW cannot easily guess the first bar
without a hint from you.
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The shortcut keys and mouse playback controls make it easy to find Bar One. Tap the space bar to begin play,
watch the Location Cursor, and listen for the downbeat. If the Location Cursor passes the downbeat and you were
not completely certain of the location, you can tap the W key to rewind to the song beginning and replay the first
part of the song, to audition the downbeat as many times as necessary to make sure of its location.
You can also single-click in the Chords panel to jump the playback position. If the rhythm is unusually complicated
near the downbeat, you could repeatedly click just a little before the suspected Bar One location, to zero-in on the
exact downbeat.
In the following example song, we have discovered the downbeat of Bar One, so we Right Click on that location to
Set Bar One.
Now the Bar One bar line is red (shown below). The red
Triangle bar indicator indicates that we have edited that
bar line. The Red Triangles are called Good Bar Lines
(GBL's). The green Triangle bar indicators are bar lines
which ACW has automatically inferred from its automatic
tempo detection PLUS your edited Good Bar Lines.
We call the green automatic bar lines Inferred Bar Lines (IBL's).
On this example song, the initial automatic tempo detection did a pretty good job. Simply setting Bar One has
caused the first four bars to be properly aligned to the music. On some songs, Set Bar One is the only action
necessary to get good bar alignment for the ENTIRE tune.
As playback continues in this example (below), we notice that ACW has made its first error approaching Bar 5.
Audio Chord Wizard has estimated the tempo of Bar 4 too slow. But that is easy to fix. If you prefer real-time
control, just tap F8 or the Enter key where the downbeat should actually be.
If you prefer stopped-time editing, you can either mouse-drag Bar 5 to its desired position, or drag the Playback
Location Cursor to the desired position and then tap F8 or the Enter key.
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When satisfied with the Bar lines and Chords, click the [OK] button to return the Chords and Tempo Map to BandIn-a-Box or RealBand.
Keyboard Shortcuts
Keyboard shortcuts make it easier to navigate the song and tap in bar lines without having to work the mouse with
start/stop/scroll actions.
Play/Pause- SPACE BAR, or Multimedia keyboard PLAY/PAUSE key or (certain keyboards) PLAY key.
Stop- ESC key, or PAUSE key, or Multimedia keyboard STOP key
Tap Bar line- F8, or ENTER key
Jump To Song Start- W key, or HOME key
Jump To Song End- END key
Jump Forward One Bar- RIGHT ARROW key
Jump Back One Bar- LEFT ARROW key
Jump Forward Four Bars- PAGE DOWN key, or DOWN ARROW key, or Multimedia keyboard NEXT TRACK
key
Jump Back Four Bars- PAGE UP key, or UP ARROW key, or Multimedia keyboard PREVIOUS TRACK key
Special Cases
Time Signature:
If a song is not in the default 4/4 time signature, set the Time Signature very early before you do anything else.
Bad Initial Tempo Estimates:
Double/Half Tempo:
Sometimes Audio Chord Wizard will guess double or half of the tempo you might prefer.
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Slightly Wrong:
Sometimes syncopated songs can have musical anticipations which make ACW guess a tempo slightly too fast or
slightly too slow.
Completely, Horribly Wrong:
Some songs have rhythms difficult for a computer to understand. Sometimes a song's rhythmic beats are spaced in
such a way that a song with a perfect Tempo of 120, might mathematically BETTER fit the audio beats at some
simple (but wrong) related ratio such as 80, 100, 160, or 180 BPM.
If the initial Tempo Estimate is pretty good, the Tap Bar line function will be the easiest way to fix such errors,
requiring only a few keyboard taps during playback.
But if the initial tempo estimate happens to be horribly wrong, it helps to make the initial tempo “in the ballpark”
BEFORE you tap a few F8's to make it completely right.
Right-click the Avg Tempo control for some easy automatic fixes.
Note: If you want to use the Avg Tempo Menu functions, use the menu very soon after you have opened a song,
before you have done much bar editing. If you invoke the Avg Tempo Menu functions after you have laboriously
edited a lot of bar lines, the automatic nature of these functions can ruin your previous editing.
Note: Here is a good reason (in some cases) to initially set the tempo artificially slow by using the “Find Best Half
Tempo” function.
If the initial tempo estimate is considerably faster than the tempo which you want to tap-in, the Tap Bar line function
can mistakenly think that you want a very fast tempo, which fills the remainder of the song with unwanted fasttempo bars. In that case, if you initially set the tempo very slow, ACW will be unlikely to misinterpret your Tap Bar
Lines.
Set Key Signature
Once the chords look reasonable-- For instance if your song looks like it is probably in the key of F-- Set the Key
Signature control to F for better chord spelling. This only affects the cosmetic display of notes and chords (flats and
sharps). The Key Signature control does not currently affect the basic accuracy of Chord Detection.
Adjust Fine-Tuning
If a song is significantly mistuned from concert pitch, the notes are “in the cracks,” which makes Chord Detection
less accurate.
If your Chords look reasonable, there is no need to bother with Tuning. Most songs are recorded pretty close to
Concert Pitch.
But if you see numerous Chord errors, it may help to adjust the Fine Tuning control.
If you are playing along with a song on your keyboard, you might decide to make an ear-estimate of how far out-oftune is the song:
For instance, you could adjust the fine-tuning control on your keyboard until your keyboard matches the song's pitch
(according to your ear). Then you could look at your keyboard's tuning readout, and adjust ACW's Fine Tune
Control to match. Either click-drag ACW's Fine Tune control (like a slider control), or right-click the Fine Tune
control then type in a number.
The Fine Tune Control currently does not change the pitch of playback. Currently, the ACW's Fine Tune control
only improves Chord Detection on mistuned songs.
The Fine Tune control is calibrated in cents, 1/100th of a semitone. Therefore, if a song is perfectly in the key of C,
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but if you set Fine Tune to +100 Cents, ACW would display chords in the key of B. Similarly, if you set Fine Tune
to -100 Cents, it would display that song's chords in the key of C#.
That simple use of the Fine Tune control is just a backwards way to transpose the Chords. But if you set Fine-Tune
somewhere in the middle, ACW looks for notes that are somewhere “in the cracks” between the piano keys. For
instance, if your song SHOULD be in the key of C, but it was unfortunately recorded 50 Cents sharp-There could be many reasons that a song was recorded off Concert Pitch. Maybe the recording studio had a broken
tape recorder, or the singer couldn't quite hit the highest note. Maybe the vinyl record cutter was off-speed, or some
Record Executive decided that the song was 10 seconds too long for airplay, and instructed the Mastering Engineer
to speed it up a little bit. In such cases ACW can get confused, misidentifying some pitches too high and other
pitches too low, detecting nonsense Chords.
So if your favorite song was unfortunately recorded 50 Cents sharp, you can set the Fine-Tune control to +50 Cents
so that ACW will properly display in the 'original' key.
Auto Estimate Tuning
ACW can automatically estimate the tuning, which helps in some cases. Since the
Estimation is math-intensive, ACW only analyzes one bar of music at a time.
Right-click somewhere inside a bar and pick the Estimate Tuning function.
After the process is finished, up pops the results dialog.
As advised in the dialog, results can be improved by carefully picking the bar. Bars
with relatively long notes are easier to analyze, compared to bars containing flashy
fast melodies.
It can be useful to spot-check a few bars. If several spot-checks give similar answers
(within a few cents), you have good confidence that the results are actually
meaningful, not being randomly affected by out-of-tune melodies or loud drums.
However, if the first estimate reads +43 and the next measurement reads -12, then it
probably means that your song is not a
good candidate for automatic Tuning
Estimation.
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Odd-Length Bars and Drastic Tempo Changes:
If a 4/4 song contains occasional bars of 3/4, 5/4, or whatever, or if there are sections where the music has an
extreme ritard or accelerando, sometimes you can just Tap Bar Lines to adjust it.
But it is sometimes more convenient to manually add or delete bar lines. The following example song has an overall
Time Signature of 4/4, but Bar 9 should have a time signature of 2/4. If you simply Tap Bar Line on 9:3 to shorten
the bar, then ACW will mistakenly decide that you wish to make all the following bar lines double-tempo 4/4.
Solution
First, Right-Click on the beat 9:3, and Insert a bar line.
Now a new bar line is added, and three new GBL bar lines are flagged red.
Right-Click on the new shortened Bar 9 and set the Time Signature to 2/4.
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Change Bar 10 to its desired duration. Hover the mouse over the red triangle marker at Bar 11, and the mouse
cursor becomes a drag cursor. Click and drag the bar line to the location marked 11:3
Now we have edited bar 9 to have its proper 2/4 Time Signature and preserved the song tempo on both sides of the
2/4 bar.
Precise “Floating Point” Tempos
RealBand supports precise floating-point tempos, such as 120.514 BPM. This makes it easier to sync MIDI tracks
to prerecorded audio tracks if the audio tracks weren’t recorded exactly at an integer tempo. This also is what lets
RealBand play a song in sync to an existing audio track after the Audio Chord Wizard has worked its magic.
Notes Display
The Notes Display looks like a MIDI Piano Roll, but it is not exactly the same as a MIDI Piano Roll. Audio Chord
wizard detects the strongest frequencies found in each eighth-note time slot, and displays them in the Notes Display.
Sometimes the displayed frequencies REALLY ARE instrument notes played in the audio file. But they could be
spurious information, such as the accidental loudest frequency of a drum beat. A midrange frequency note-bar
might be showing the sum of harmonics from several instruments, each instrument's harmonics contributing to the
strength of that frequency.
The Notes Display information is real and useful, but try not to assume that every displayed note-bar is a real note in
the audio.
Horizontal Scroll Bar
Scroll forward/back in the wave file.
Plus/Minus Zoom Buttons
Zoom the display to show more or less detail.
Conductor Window
“Conductor”- Live Looping/Playback Control
As the song is playing, there are options to control the flow of playback by one of three methods:
1. Conductor window
2. QWERTY hot keys
3. MIDI keyboard
The Conductor is launched with the Conductor button on the toolbar.
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You must enable the QWERTY keys to be active for the Conductor during playback. This is done by selecting the
“Enable Control by QWERTY keys” checkbox on the Conductor Window.
If you want to control the Conductor using the MIDI keyboard, you need to enable this by selecting the checkbox
“Enable control by MIDI keyboard.” in the MIDI keyboard control box. When this setting is enabled, any MIDI
input will be interpreted as a hot key for the Conductor, and you won’t hear MIDI thru.
If you’d like the ability to switch your MIDI keyboard between Conductor mode and regular playing mode, you
can do this using the lowest “A-natural” MIDI note on your keyboard. This is A1 on an 88-note keyboard. Note
A1 will turn the Conductor off, Bb1 turns it on, and B1 will toggle the Conductor on only when the Bb1 note is
held down. If you don’t have an 88-note keyboard, you can set the octave setting to a number higher than 1, for
example if you set it to “3,” then notes A3/Bb3/B3 will turn the Conductor Off/On/Toggled.
Using the Conductor QWERTY or MIDI keys, you can:
- Define and jump to up to 10 user defined sections in the song,
- Jump back 1 bar/4 bars/# of bars/screen/part/chorus/section,
- Jump ahead 1 bar/4 bars/# of bars/screen/part/chorus/section,
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- Loop 1 bar/4 bars/# of bars/screen/part/chorus/section,
- Pause/stop the song.
In addition, using the MIDI keyboard, you can also use the Conductor to:
A1
(note#21) Turn MIDI Conductor OFF
Bb1
Turn MIDI Conductor ON
B1
Turn MIDI Conductor ON only as note is held down
The various functions of the Conductor are also available with MIDI keys and QWERTY hot keys.
Customizing the Sections
Sections: This allows you to define up to 10 points in the song that are sections. By default, the following sections
are defined for each song.
- Section 1: Start of song
- Section 2: Intro
- Section 3: First Chorus
- Section 4 :Middle Chorus (i.e. start of chorus #2)
- Section 5: Last Chorus
- Section 6: Ending
- Sections 7-10 are user definable. To do this, type in any bar # using the bar/chorus format (e.g. 21/2 would be
bar 21, chorus 2).
If you prefer to enter custom values for the section numbers, you can do this if you check the “custom” checkbox,
and then type in up to 10 bar numbers for each section.
The section numbers are saved with the song. Once you have defined the sections, you can jump to a certain section
of the song as the song is playing, simply by:
1. Pressing the 1-9 or 0 key on the QWERTY keyboard or,
2. Opening the Conductor window (~ hot key) and clicking on the section button or,
3. Pressing MIDI keys 77-86 (F6 to D7) corresponding to sections 1-10.
Mode (when to do the action).
By pressing a QWERTY hot key prior to an action, you can control when the action will take place. If no mode hot
key is pressed prior to an action, the default mode will occur.
The default is set in the “Default Mode for section change” or “Default Mode for going back or ahead” combo box.
For example, by default, the section change will occur as soon as you press the key, and it will go to the equivalent
place in the bar immediately before the beginning of the target section (so that the music stays in time, and the next
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section begins at the end of the bar). But you can change the default for the action to take place at the end of the
current bar or current part marker etc.
Play Control Buttons
This plays the song. Hot key = F4, MIDI note = F4.
This stops playback. Hot key = Esc, MIDI note = F#4.
Example uses of the Conductor:
In this example, we don’t have custom sections set, so the default sections apply (middle chorus = section 4 etc.).
- Jump to the start of middle choruses during playback (press “4”).
- Loop the middle chorus (press S, which is Loop Section).
- Jump to the end of the song (press 6 ).
- Go back 1 chorus (Ctrl+A).
- Go ahead 1 chorus (Shift+A).
At the end of the current chorus, go back 1 section, press Y then Ctrl+S.
Note: Pressing the Y sets the mode to do the action at the end of the current chorus
These actions can also be done with the MIDI keyboard.
Example using the MIDI keyboard:
Assume Charlie is a piano player who uses his MIDI keyboard with RealBand, and would like to play his keyboard,
but also use it to control RealBand.
He sets the conductor to allow his MIDI keyboard lowest notes A/Bb/B to turn the Conductor mode
OFF/ON/Toggled-when held.
When he turns it off (low A note), he can play his keyboard normally.
If he wants to pause the song, he holds down the low B3 note as he presses the MIDI key for pause, which is G4.
The song will pause, and the conductor mode turns off as he lets go of the B3 key, and he can resume his piano
playing. If Charlie didn’t plan on using the MIDI keyboard for piano playing, he could leave it in conductor mode
by turning it on with the A3 key.
Conductor Functions with MIDI and QWERTY Hot Keys
MIDI Note
Function
QWERTY Key
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F4
Play
F4
F#4
Stop
Escape
A4
MIDI panic
F12
Bb4
Previous Jukebox song
Ctrl+Shift+F8
B4
Next Jukebox song
Shift+F8
Db5
Open Notation window
Ctrl+W
D5
Lead Sheet window
Alt+W
F6 to D7
Jump to sections 1-10 of the song
1-9 and 0
Eb7
Loop current chorus
A
E7
Loop current section
S
F7
Loop current bar
Z
F#7
Loop current 4 bars
X
G7
Loop current part
C
Ab7
Looping ON, previous setting
V
A7
Looping OFF
B
Bb7
Go Back 1 Chorus
Ctrl+A
B7
Go Back 1 Section
Ctrl+S
C8
Go Back 1 Screen
Ctrl+D
Db8
Go Back 1 Bar
Ctrl+Z
D8
Go Back 4 Bars
Ctrl+X
Eb8
Go Back 1 Part marker
Ctrl+C
E8
Go Ahead 1 Chorus
Shift+A
F8
Go Ahead 1 Section
Shift+S
F#8
Go Ahead 1 Screen
Shift+D
G8
Go Ahead 1 Bar
Shift+Z
Ab8
Go Ahead 4 Bars
Shift+X
A8
Go Ahead 1 Part marker
Shift+C
In addition, using the MIDI keyboard, you can also use the Conductor to:
A1
(note#21)Turn MIDI Conductor OFF
Bb1
Turn MIDI Conductor ON
B1
Turn MIDI Conductor ON only as note is held down
®
TranzPort Support - Wireless Remote Control
158
Chapter 12: Wizards, Tools, and Plug-Ins
TranzPort Support - Wireless Remote Control support for RealBand!
The Frontier Design TranzPort® is a wireless remote control hardware unit (Electronic
Musician Editors’ Choice 2006) that now allows you to control RealBand from 30 feet
away!
The backlit LCD provides a two line readout. Buttons and a wheel allow control of many RealBand features. Select
songs and control Play, Stop, Pause, and Loop. Select, Mute, and Solo tracks as well as Volume and Tempo
changes are all supported.
You can, for example, put the TranzPort unit on your piano at home (or your music stand on a gig) and
load/play/control songs, all while far away from your computer – all wirelessly up to 30 feet – even through walls!
The TranzPort also works “right-out-of-the-box” with Band-in-a-Box.
Note: the TranzPort is sold separately by PG Music Inc. www.pgmusic.com
Using TranzPort with RealBand
To use the MIDI TranzPort with RealBand, first make sure the Frontier USB wireless receiver is plugged into a
USB port of your computer.
The “Enable TranzPort (if present)” checkbox must be selected under the MIDI tab in Preferences. If this checkbox
is unchecked, then RealBand will not attempt to look for and initialize the TranzPort. By default this checkbox is
enabled, which means that, by default, RealBand will always try to find and initialize the TranzPort.
You should see a TranzPort icon on the Windows task bar. RealBand should then automatically connect to
TranzPort when you start-up RealBand.
To verify that the TranzPort is installed, you can visit the MIDI drivers dialog and see if TranzPort shows up as a
MIDI In and MIDI Out driver. Do NOT select the TranzPort in the MIDI drivers dialog.
To start using the TranzPort
While RealBand is running, “wake up” the TranzPort by pressing a key on the TranzPort (e.g. the STOP key). The
TranzPort display will show
“Title of RB song” on top row of LCD
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