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ENH201: Enhancing a Simple Band-in-A-Box File |
| This is an exercise designed to illustrate how an Accompaniment Program, like Band-in-a-Box version 7.0 (BIAB) can be used to modify a song file, and thus improve its quality. To enhance the file. To make it sound more musical, more professional. | |
| BIAB can be obtained from P.G. Music for a modest outlay. If you have any of versions 7.0 thru 7.0f, you can upgrade to the current 7.0g free of charge. | |
| As with all editing of digital files, the procedures described below are illustrative only. Altering a tempo, substituting different rhythms, varying instrumentation--all these are highly indivualistic choices. They reflect our preferences, our taste... | |
| STEP ONE. Identifying the file: Arbitrarily, we shall be editing the jazz standard, "There Will Never Be Another You". This site (The MIDI Studio Consortium) has a large collection of BIAB files located in the Basement, one of which will serve as the subject of our experiment. To find this file, click on the collection labelled "Standards & Jazz #1--180 KB". This file, a container of BIAB songs, is a zip (compressed) file, as are all the tunes therein. Many of them are old chestnuts, but very melodic (like "Ain't Misbehaving," "Body and Soul." "Cute," "How High the Moon," etc.) (As an alternative your can download this page in .zip format including the .mgu and .mid files used.) Our target has a filename of anotheru.mgu. This 3-letter extension reminds us that it is a BIAB file. | |
| STEP TWO. Selecting the tune; downloading it; unzipping; positioning it in the BIAB directory. All of these actions should be familiar to anyone experienced in the art of computing, so we will not describe that process here. Tip: If you save the collection of .mgu files on your hard disk, you will retain an array of other BIAB songs to tweak further--should you be so inclined. | |
| Here is an example of what might be done to enhance a BIAB file which contains only the chords and a single-note piano melody line. | |
| STEP THREE. Inspecting the song: Having deposited anotheru.mgu in the Band-in-a-Box program directory (usually C:\Bb), we are now ready to scrutinize. As you can see, the chord harmonies look appropriate. Some are distinctive, like a flatted 5th, a flatted 9th, a sharp 11th, etc. The tune is sequenced in the original key (Eb). It has three choruses with looping disabled. | |
| STEP FOUR. Listen to the sequence. Your opinion? Well, it's pleasant, albeit somewhat prosaic. The "Jazquint" style seems to give it a mechanical feel, like something from the 1920's. At 200 BPM, the tempo seems too high. By the end of 96 measure, the piano-lead has become tedious. (If you do not have BIAB 7.0f, you can listen to this version which we have saved as a midi file.) | |
| STEP FIVE. Initial enhancements: Try reducing the tempo to 150 BPM. Less frenetic? Now try substituting another rhythmic style for "Jazquint." Click the STY button. You are offered a range of styles: Classy (with strings), Erroll Garner, Bill Evans, Jimmy Smith... As part of our experiment, select J_BASIE2.STY. This does not eliminate the monotonous piano melody-lead for 96 measures! Suppose we recruit another musician for the melody-lead? Click the M button on the top toolbar; select #28, Miles + Guitar (octaves). Oops, Now Miles is too much. Three choruses too much. | |
| STEP SIX. Adding a soloist. To alleviate this repetitive sound (the trumpet), and thus reduce the risk of boring the audience, we have in BIAB another trick. Let a soloist play, for example, the middle chorus on a different instrument. How? Click the button labelled SOLO. This will introduce a variety of musicians and their respective manners of performing. Like Chet Atkins, Bill Evans, Charlie Parker, Miles Davis, George Shearing... Distinguished company indeed! For our demo, let's click on #56, Joe Pass. Verify that Joe has been instructed to improvise only during the middle chorus. | |
| STEP SEVEN. Saving the soloist. It is ESSENTIAL at this point that you save all the song settings and instrument patches. To do this click on "File" then "Save Song with Patches & Harmony". This will open a Dialogue Box "Assign Instruments & Harmonies to Song". Refer to the illustration below. | |
![[image] Screen shot - Dialogue Box: Assign Instruments & Harmonies to Song.](ENH201_SS1.jpg) |
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| Next, ensure that all the option boxes are checked as per the above diagram. Click on the "Fill w/ Patches" button and your dialogue box settings should be identical to the above. Click on the "Save" button. The "Save As" dialogue will open. Change the file name to "another2" and click on the ''OK" button. | |
| Having been through this exercise many times, a minor "glitch" was discovered in BIAB Versions 7.0 thru 7.0f. In step six we added a Soloist by clicking on the SOLO button and confirmed that the middle chorus was muted. In actual fact, to Mute the middle chorus, you must click on SOLO and then click OKAY in the Soloist Window every time you either load or replay the song. Even though the parameters were saved with the song, they will not have any effect unless you follow this procedure. This also means that when you save the file as a .MID, the middle chorus is NOT muted. We have deleted the Melody line in the second chorus by editing the final version which you can listen to in step ten. This has been reported to, and acknowleded by P G Music on July 15, 1998. | |
| STEP EIGHT. Printing. It's not a bad idea to print a copy of the song we're editing. Later on, we may want to refresh our memory of the chord-progressions. Click on "File," then "Print Song--Chords/Melody". Or, if you prefer, you can simply click the Printer icon. | |
| STEP NINE. Review: Remember that we began this excursion with another.mgu, with its 200 BPM tempo, that long piano melody, the jazz quintet rhythm accompaniment. Now? Well, we've done a bit of tweaking and, in the process, introduced some of the mannerisms of Basie, Miles, and Pass. What next? | |
| STEP TEN. Saving our work. In our quest for music enhancement, and for use in another exercise, it is now time to save another2.mgu as a midi file. Click the .MID button. Click "File on Disk." Save our creation as another2.mid. (You can listen to this file here.) | |
| These are but a few illustrations of how an Accompaniment Program can assist in our goal of improving music files. Band-in-a-Box offers many other ways--within the program itself. | |
| Now if you will take a peek at your computer, you will find something on the hard disk with a filename of another2.mid. Please note the extension. It houses several distinguished people, the Count, Joe, and Miles. And, incidentally, you can play this file simply by using whatever media player you have in Windows. | |
| If you are tenaciously dedicated to further enhancement of music files, then you should head for your local sequencer sofware (on your hard drive) like Power Tracks or CakeWalk. These programs are designed for the editing of midi files. | |
| But that's another story, | |
| in EDT301. | |
| Questions or comments? Contact Les | |
| Download in ZIP format(including images, .mid & .mgu).
THIS PAGE (50 KB) |
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