In the Notation Window Options dialog, the "Tick Offset" setting can be used to adjust how the notes are displayed. Try setting this to zero; this may allow your triplet to be displayed properly.

Quarter note triplet display will not work as well if you are using an even feel style and are changing an individual beat to triplet feel. It works better if the overall feel of the style is a triplet feel.

Quarter note triplets will never display properly if they span beats 2 and 3 in any measure.

33. Can I make a Band-in-a-Box^® style from a MIDI file?

In Band-in-a-Box^® version 12 or higher, you can make a Band-in-a-Box^® style from a MIDI file automatically by using the Style Wizard (Styles | Style Wizard).

34. Can I notate ties and slurs in Band-in-a-Box^®?

Ties extend the duration of a single note. Band-in-a-Box^® will automatically calculate ties for you, based on standard notation rules and the durations of each note. To change the duration of a note, right-click on the note in editable notation mode to edit the note parameters manually, or extend the duration of the note visually in 'staff roll' mode. To get into staff roll mode, click the button in the Notation Window toolbar (in Band-in-a-Box^® 2006 and higher) or click the [N] button twice from regular notation mode (in Band-in-a-Box^® 2005 and earlier). Then, right-click on the note head and hold the mouse button down while dragging to the right the desired distance.

To delete a tie, you can either insert a rest at the point that you want the tie to end (by checking the 'rest' box and clicking at the desired location), or reduce the duration of the note.

What if you have two existing notes that you want to be tied together? In this case, you would simply delete the second note and extend the duration of the first.

Slurs are notes of different pitches that are played legato, without separation. The slur symbol is a curved line, similar to the tie symbol, except that it connects two notes of different pitches. The two notes are both played, unlike a tied note. To accomplish a slur in Band-in-a-Box^®, change the duration of the note so that it just overlaps with the following note. Band-in-a-Box^® 2005 and earlier do not support the entry of slur symbols. Version 2006 and higher DO support the entry of slur symbols. To insert a slur, right-click on the note in editable notation mode, point to 'Notation Symbols', and select 'Slur'. This will open the Notation Event dialog which allows you to define the properties of your slur.

35. How do I use tag endings? Why does the 'tag exists' box sometimes become unchecked automatically?

In Band-in-a-Box^®, a tag is a group of bars played after the final chorus of a song. You can find tag settings under Edit | Settings (for this song). Set the 'Tag exists' field to Yes and then choose the tag starting and ending bars. If you have "Generate 2 bar ending" selected, the ending will play automatically after the tag.

Note that the tag will only work if there is more than one chorus. If you placed a checkmark in the 'tag exists' box in the song settings dialog, and it became unchecked, this means that your song is set to have only one chorus. In this case a tag is irrelevant because it would simply be the last bars in your chorus.

36. Can I import and play MIDI files with Band-in-a-Box^®?

Yes, Band-in-a-Box^® will import and play entire MIDI files, and there are a number of other ways that you can use MIDI files with Band-in-a-Box^®. However, Band-in-a-Box^® isn't a dedicated MIDI file sequencer. If your goal is to import a MIDI file and view/edit each instrument on a separate track in its original form, you would be better off using PowerTracks Pro Audio. Band-in-a-Box^® is mainly intended to be used as an intelligent arranger and the ways that you normally use MIDI files with Band-in-a-Box^® reflect this.

• Starting with Band-in-a-Box^® 2004, you can import and play an entire MIDI file by using File | Open MIDI file(F7). Band-in-a-Box^® will import the MIDI file into the Melody track, convert the Melody track to a multi-channel track so that it can play more than one instrument, and automatically disable the style (accompaniment).

• You can use File | Import Chords from MIDI. Band-in-a-Box^® will interpret the chords from your MIDI file and write these in the Chord Sheet window, and will also import one or more instruments (usually the Melody and Solo) to the Melody and/or Soloist tracks. Once you do this, you have the chord symbols and Melody, and you can select a style that you want to use to create an accompaniment.

• You can import any part of a MIDI file into the Melody track by using Melody | Edit Melody Track | Import Melody from MIDI file. Usually this feature is used to import only the melody from a MIDI file. If you import more than one instrument to the Melody track this way, you will want to switch the Melody track to a multi-channel track by going to the Melody menu and selecting the 'Track type'.

• You can use the Style Wizard (Styles | Style Wizard) to create a complete Band-in-a-Box^® style based on your MIDI file.

37. Who owns the songs that I create with Band-in-a-Box^®? Are the songs copyrighted?

The arrangements made by Band-in-a-Box^® are yours, and your songs may be used freely as long as they don't infringe upon the intellectual property rights of others.

38. How do I rest more than one bar at a time?

From the Chord entry grid:

1. Click on the bar you want to rest and press Alt+F5.

2. Place the chord, select rest type, and the instruments needed to be rested. Click OK.

3. Highlight all the bars to be rested.

4. Go to Edit | Copy rests. Press OK.

39. How do I create a backup of the MySetup.dk file?

If you take a long time setting up a default setting for how Band-in-a-Box^® starts up (MIDI channels, Patch Map, Drum Kit, Combos), it is probably a good idea to make a backup of this file. That way, if it gets overwritten or you return the program to factory settings, you will not need to reset everything again.

1. Set up your MIDI channels, patch map, drum kit, and combos/favourite instruments, the way you want.

2. Go to Opt. | Utilites | Save Alternate Drum/Patch File.

3. Type in a file name other than 'MySetup.dk'. For example, 'Start.dk'

4. If you ever return the program to factory settings and lose your settings, you can reload your settings by using Opt. | Utilities | Load Alternate Drum/Patch File.

40. How can I easily raise or lower the velocity (volume) of all notes in the melody track?

Choose Melody | Edit Melody Track | Adjust level of Melody, and choose how much you want to increase ALL note velocities on the melody track. You can choose 127, and all notes will be set to maximum velocity (127). For example three notes with velocities 30, 67, and 110 would all be set to 127(maximum). If you choose 10, 10 will be added to all velocities. For example, three notes with velocities 30, 67, and 110 would be set to 40, 77, and 120 respectively.

41.Can I enter a melody into Band-in-a-Box^® using the computer keyboard?

Here is a method that you can use to record a melody into Band-in-a-Box^® using the computer keyboard:

1. Go to the Play menu and make sure 'Wizard Playalong Feature' is enabled.

2. Start recording.

3. Choose any key on your computer keyboard (N for example) and strike it in time with the notes of your melody. The idea here is not to get the note pitches right, just the durations.

4. When you have finished, keep the take. Next, put the Notation Window into editable notation mode. From here, you can step forward or backward note by note using the keypad "Ins" and "Del" keys. While doing so, you can use the up-down arrow keys to change the pitch each note. This method works great for non-keyboardists, and is also useful for adjusting existing melodies.

42. How can I associate my songs and styles with Band-in-a-Box^®?

Starting with Band-in-a-Box^® 11, you can do this by going to File | File Utilites | Associate File types with Explorer.

You can create file associations for any file type with any program, by right-mouse clicking (while holding down the SHIFT key) the file you want to have automatically open with the program (e.g., a .MID file), and select OPEN WITH... in the pop-up menu. Then, scroll down until you find the program name (you may have to press the OTHER button and find the program manually). Ensure that the "ALWAYS OPEN WITH THIS PROGRAM" checkbox is enabled - this will create a file association for that file type.

43. How can I combine multiple Band-in-a-Box^® songs to make a medley, or copy and paste part of one song into another?

There isn't a single feature in Band-in-a-Box^® that will do this automatically, however it can be done in steps. You need to copy the chords separately from the melody, solo, and lyrics.

You can copy the chords from one song to another by simply highlighting the chords in one song, selecting Edit | Copy, then opening the other song and selecting Edit | Paste. Adjust the number of bars per chorus accordingly in the destination song.

There are two ways you could copy the melody/solo/lyrics from one song to another. Say that "song 1" is the file you are copying from, and "song 2" is the file you are copying to (the destination file) and you want to copy the melody:

First Method - Copy and paste notation into song 2. This doesn't copy lyrics

1. In Song 1, open the Notation Window (Melody track), and toggle into editable notation mode by pressing the [N] button.

2. Find the start of the section that you want to copy and highlight a small region (it doesn't matter how much) starting at that location.

3. Hold down the shift key on your keyboard, and click on the end of the section that you want to copy. This will highlight the section (Note: in Band-in-a-Box^® 2004 and earlier you need to click and drag to highlight a region of the Notation Window).

4. Go to Edit | Copy, make sure that the settings in the Copy dialog are correct, and press OK.

5. Load Song 2, open the notation window, and position yourself at the location you want to start pasting at.

6. Go to Edit | Paste, make sure the settings in the Paste dialog are correct, and press OK.

Second Method - Save as MIDI file and import into song 2. This does copy lyrics.

1. Open Song 1.

2. Determine how many bars from the start of the song the part is that you want to copy. If you have "Include 2 bar lead-in in MIDI file" checked in the Opt. | Preferences | MIDI File Options dialog, add 2 bars to account for the lead-in.

3. Take note of how many bars you want to copy.

4. Mute all tracks except for the Melody track. To do this, right-click on Bass, Piano, Drums, Strings, and Soloist in the instrument panel.

5. Click the .MID button to save the song as a MIDI file. Save it to the clipboard.

6. Open Song 2 and determine how many bars from the start of the song you want to paste the section.

7. Go to Melody | Edit Melody Track | Import Melody from clipboard. In the 'Import MIDI file - options' dialog, pay particular attention to the following settings:

   -# bars to offset from start of MIDI file: The number of bars from the start of the song that you found in step 2.
   -How many bars to import?: This is the number you found in step 3.
   -# blank bars to insert at beginning: This is the number of bars you found in Step 6 plus 2 bars if there is a lead-in.
   -'Merge with Existing Data on track': This should be checked unless you want to erase/overwrite any existing notation in the melody track of Song 2.

8. Press OK.

The other thing you may need to do is set up the part of your destination song that came from song 1 with the same style, patches, tempo, etc., as you had in song 1. The Edit | Settings for current bar (F5) dialog will be useful for this.

44. Why does the same song sound different in Band-in-a-Box^® than when I play it with Windows Media Player?

You may be experiencing one of the following:

• If you saved your Band-in-a-Box^® song as a MIDI file that you are playing in Windows Media Player, WMP is probably using a different MIDI driver than in Band-in-a-Box^®. WMP will use the Windows default in the Control Panel | Multimedia -or- Sounds and Audio Devices. In Band-in-a-Box^®, you choose your MIDI Driver from Opt. | MIDI Driver Setup.

• If you imported a MIDI file into Band-in-a-Box^®, you may be either using a different driver (as explained above), or you are hearing the MIDI file along with an unwanted Band-in-a-Box^® style. Disable the style, choose a blank style, or mute all of the tracks except the melody. Also, you may need to set the Melody track to be Multi-channel.

• If you saved your song as a MIDI file, you may not have saved the songs from Band-in-a-Box^® with Patches & Harmony prior to doing this, so the patches are different then you expected.

45. What are the different Track Types for in the Notation Window Options dialog?

Setting the Melody-Track Type to Multi-channel just means that the channels on the Melody trackwon't get re-channelled to the Melody channel. It's used if you want to load a whole MIDI file to the Melody track, and play it as is with all of the channels. It will play at whatever volume change was last sent on the channel in question. If you have 'tab' enabled in the Notation Window Options dialog, setting the track type to 'Guitar' will display guitar tab in place of the Bass clef. You can display Bass, Mandolin, etc. tab by selecting one of those.

46. I am having trouble recording into Band-in-a-Box^® with my Wind Controller.

When using a wind controller with a computer program, make sure to filter out most of the MIDI information that is sent from the controller. The default settings have an 'avalanche' of MIDI information, which can take up much of the CPU time reading it, or overwhelm the MIDI buffer. Other than that, you should be able to use it as a normal controller. There are Record Filter settings in Band-in-a-Box^® that can allow you to choose to ignore much of the MIDI information that gets sent.

47. What are the numbers for in the StyleMaker bars?

The numbers in the style editor have to do with what is referred to as weight, or percentage / randomness of time that this pattern will be played from 1 to 8. If it has a weight of 9, it will always get played if the mask criteria are satisfied. Band-in-a-Box^® uses these patterns to generate musical arrangements. Band-in-a-Box^® houses 1 and 2 bar patterns and 1 and 2 beat patterns in a style on an instrument-by-instrument and sub-style basis. How often each pattern will get played will be determined first by the number of chords in a bar then by the 1 - 9 value. A 2 bar pattern gets played if there is only 1 chord at the beginning of 2 bars. A 1 beat pattern is chosen if there are more than 2 chords close together in a given bar.

48. How do I get chords to sound on the off-beat, or create syncopation in my music?

This can be done by pushing the chords when you enter them into the Band-in-a-Box^® chordsheet. To push chords, enter one caret (^) to play the chord an eighth note early and two carets (^^) to play it sixteenth note early.

You are allowed to enter 4 chords per bar in Band-in-a-Box^®, that is, one on every beat in 4/4 time. If you were 'counting' the timing for the downbeats only, it would of course be 1 - 2 - 3 - 4. If you were counting the timing for the upbeats AND downbeats, it would be 1 & 2 & 3 & 4 & (the "&" being the upbeat). You can enter a "^" (caret) sign before any of the chords in the 4 positions of the bar, and have that chord 'pushed', or played on the "&" count (that is, the upbeat). However, if you change the chord on the upbeat, it will play for a duration of a dotted quarter note. You cannot change it to something else on the NEXT downbeat. In other words it won't play an eighth note by itself.

Try this example: Open a new song and set the style to Country 4/4 (it's on the Styles drop down menu | Choose from 24 Built-in Styles). For the first bar of the song enter these 4 chords: C,C and C,^F (all 4 chords in the first bar, remember the caret before the F chord). In the second bar, enter F,F and F,F. Now use Ctrl-W to get to the notation display and press Play. Click on the B at the bottom right of the menu bar to display the Bass notes. You will see that there are 3 C notes, being 2 quarter notes, one eighth note and then a dotted quarter F note. The second bar has 4 quarter notes of F - the chord changes from C to F after counting 1 & 2 & 3 (that is, it changes on the & or the upbeat after the 3). Because you have used up the 4th beat in the first bar with your ^F designation, you cannot change the chord to anything else on beat 4

49. Please explain the song structure in Band-in-a-Box^®.

Band-in-a-Box^® uses the Jazz convention that a "Chorus" is the whole song. This topic covers the terminology of:

1. Intro

2. Verse

3. Chorus

4. Bridge

5. Tag

You'll need to use the "Framing Controls" of Band-in-a-Box^®, where you set the chorus begin bar, the chorus end bar, and the number of choruses to repeat. These controls are found just below the song title window on the main screen. The defaults for a new song are [1]-[32]x[3]

INTRO
How long an intro is, and what is included, is determined by what is in the 1st number box of the framing section of Band-in-a-Box^®. So if your first chorus starts at bar #17, you have from bar #1 to #16 (16 bars) to do what ever you want to with. You could create a standard intro, or with instruments coming on one at a time every 4 bars. You may place part markers to go from lighter to heavier feels. You may include as many bars as you need to, but this section will only play once at the beginning of your song.

VERSE/CHORUS Section
"Chorus begins at bar #17" means that everything from bar 17 to the "Chorus ends at" bar (let's choose 48) will play or repeat as many times as you have indicated in "#choruses". In this section it is a good idea to make full use of the part markers, which will give your song a different feel, especially in the bridge.

BRIDGE
Contained within the main framing section of the song between the chorus begin and chorus end bar, the bridge is usually emphasized with the use of the "B" substyle. To make your song even more interesting, Band-in-a-Box^® allows you to do style changes at any bar. Experiment with two styles that are similar, and later with wildly different styles.

THE TAG
The tag can also be used similarly to the intro. You can make it as long as you like. It will fall outside of the "chorus begins at" and "chorus ends at" section, and it will only play once at the end of your song, after the choruses have been played. It could consist of the chords for a bridge, a key change and chorus restatement, then a full ending. To set up the tag ending, click the [S] button found just to the right of the framing controls to bring up the Song Settings window. Place a checkmark in the Tag Exists box and then specify how you want the tag to be played by typing the bar numbers in the 'Tag jump after', 'Tag begin at', and 'Tag ends after' boxes. In our example, say we set those to 40, 49, and 56. This means that the song would play through two chorus, play the third chorus up to bar 40, then jump to bar 49 and play through to bar 56. Note: A Tag will only work if there is more than one chorus set to play. If your song only has one chorus, the a tag isn't needed.

THE 2 BAR ENDING
This automatic feature can be selected if you do not want to create your own ending with held bars/instruments and/or rests. It will add 2 bars to the song and auto-create an ending for you. You can toggle the 2-bar ending on/off in the Song Settings window just underneath the Tag settings.

In summary, the entire song that we have set up in the examples above would play the following way: 1-48, 17-48, 17-40, 49-56, and if we have turned the two bar ending on, bars 57-58 would be the ending.

Band-in-a-Box^® 2004 and higher also have options to use repeats, 1st/2nd endings, and codas in your song. The Repeats/1st-2nd endings/codas feature is mainly used if you need to create printed charts that show those symbols. Click here for more information about this.

50. How do I access higher bank patches in Band-in-a-Box^®? What are MSB and LSB?

There are 3 things that control which sound is played:

1. Patch or Program Change.

2. Bank MSB, or controller 0.

3. Bank LSB, or Controller 32.

Each of these can have a value from 0 to 127. When you are only interested in using the General MIDI instruments on your synth, you only need to worry about the Patch or Program Change. MSB and LSB can be left at 0. However, most synths have patches on higher banks beyond the General MIDI set of instruments, and if you want to access these sounds, you will need to use Bank changes.

At one time, no synthesizer had more than 128 sounds. As technology progressed, musicians demanded more sounds. The MIDI Association then developed a new MIDI command called the Bank Select Command. There are two controller messages in the Bank Select command:

• Continuous Controller 0 (Most Significant Bit or MSB) messages are often abbreviated as CC in manuals (For example: CC0)

• Continuous Controller 32 (Least Significant Bit or LSB) messages are often abbreviated as CC32 in manuals.

Two separate messages allows you to access up to 16,384 banks, of 128 patches each. This creates locations for 2,097,152 patches. Needless to say, we're not aware of any modules with over a couple of thousand patches (yet), let alone two million.

Some modules/synths require both controller 0 and controller 32 together and some require them one at a time. Refer to your manual for accessing patches on higher banks on your particular synth.

In your synth or module's manual, bank is usually listed first. In Roland manuals, it is in the CC00 (BANK) column. Place this value into the Bank Box. The second column in the table is usually the Program Change column. Also known as the GM or GS patch name, choose this patch number from the instrument pull-down menu. Don't worry if the General MIDI instrument name does not match the name of the patch you are trying to access. Just go by the number if it's not a General MIDI instrument you are trying to access. Controller Number 32 or LSB may be needed as well. Although it is not used very much in the Roland line of synths, it is used extensively in some other synths.

Once you have selected the patch (Instrument menu), Bank (MSB) and Bank (LSB), you should hear the higher bank instrument that you are trying to access.

If you are selecting patches from higher banks very much, you may want to learn about "patch maps". Patch maps allow you to choose any patch on your synth by name, using the 'Select Patch from Higher Bank' dialog (click the [+] button next to the instrument pull-down menu).

Note that if you change the default patches used by the style, you will probably need to use File | Save song with patches and harmony to prevent your chosen patches from reverting back to the defaults when you press Play.

51. How do I make a patch map for my synthesizer?

We include some patch maps (.pat files) with Band-in-a-Box^®. Other patch maps are available for download from our website at:https://www.pgmusic.com/support_miscellaneous.htm. In addition, Band-in-a-Box^® 2005 and higher include a utility which will automatically convert existing PowerTracks Pro Audio patch maps (.INI files) and Cakewalk Instrument Definition files (.INS files) to Band-in-a-Box^® patch maps. To run this utility, open the 'Patches on Higher Banks' dialog in Band-in-a-Box^® and press the [INI/INS...] button.

If you cannot find a patch map for your synth, you may wish to create one. We have written a tutorial on patch map creation .

For more information on how to select patches on higher banks, click here.

52. Do you have an advanced tutorial, or more information on the StyleMaker?

We have written an advanced tutorial on the StyleMaker.

1. Using the StyleMaker Part I

2. Using the StyleMaker Part II

The Band-in-a-Box^® help files have detailed information, and we have also made an in-depth StyleMaker video on CD-ROM, titled "Secrets of the StyleMaker". This is part of the Band-in-a-Box^® Video Tutorial PAK, which is included with the MegaPAK. It can also be purchased separately.

53. Can I export my song from Band-in-a-Box^® to PowerTracks Pro Audio or another MIDI sequencer?

Yes you can. You can create a standard MIDI file from your song, which can be imported into any other program that can read standard MIDI files. Click the .MID button on the main screen of Band-in-a-Box^®. This will give you the option to either save the file on disk (this could be anywhere on your hard drive, or a floppy disk.) or to the clipboard.

If you choose 'file on disk', this will bring up the standard Windows 'Save' dialog. Choose the location you want the MIDI file saved to and then hit the save button. Close Band-in-a-Box^® and open PowerTracks. Go to the File | Open. Browse to the location you saved your file to. Select the file, then hit the 'Open' button.

If you choose to save your MIDI file to the Clipboard, click the Clipboard button, then close Band-in-a-Box^®. Open PowerTracks. Use the File | Open from Clipboard command.

If you had recorded an audio track (for example, vocals) with your Band-in-a-Box^® song, Band-in-a-Box^® would have saved this recording as a wave file with the same name, and in the same folder, as your Band-in-a-Box^® song. PowerTracks will offer to import the wave file if it finds this wave file in the same folder as your MIDI file (if you had 'saved the MIDI file to disk'). You can also import your wave file by using the File | Wave files | Import Wave file command in PowerTracks.

54. Can Band-in-a-Box^® input chords for my melody?

Band-in-a-Box^® 2007 (and higher) can do this, using the Reharmonist (under the Window menu). This feature is able to generate chord progressions based ONLY on your melody, and the genre of music you select. Earlier versions of Band-in-a-Box^® did not have this feature.

In Band-in-a-Box^® 11 and higher, there is a feature that will interpret chords from MIDI files. You could attempt to have Band-in-a-Box^® figure out chords for your melody using this feature. To do this, you would first mute all of the tracks except for the Melody track, press the .MID button and save the file to clipboard, then go to File | Import Chords from MIDI file | [Use Clipboard]. Unfortunately though, a single line melody isn't a very good candidate for this procedure. Band-in-a-Box^® needs to have a bit more information in the MIDI file, for example a bass track and some sort of chording track such as piano accompaniment.

One thing you could consider doing is adding some notes to your melody to give Band-in-a-Box^® something to work with. Go through your melody and add one or two notes below selected melody notes that you think "sound good" with your melody. After you have done this, save your song as a MIDI file and use File | Import chords from MIDI file as explained above.

55. Why don't the Styles that I just installed appear in the StylePicker window?

The BBW.LST file located in your main Band-in-a-Box^® folder defines the list of PG Music styles in the StylePicker window. This file is updated when we release new styles so that the StylePicker window will recognize them. Update patches for any version of Band-in-a-Box^® install the latest BBW.LST released with that version.

If your new styles do not show up in the StylePicker window, first try pressing the [Rebuild] button at the bottom of that window. If they still do not show up, here is what to do:

1. Make sure you have installed the styles to your Band-in-a-Box^® folder. This is usually C:\bb. Styles not installed to this folder will not be recognized by the StylePicker.

2. Download and install the latest update patch for your version of Band-in-a-Box^® from our Band-in-a-Box^® for Windows Updates page. This will install the latest BBW.LST released with that version.

3. Launch Band-in-a-Box^®, open the StylePicker window, and press the [Rebuild] button. This will force Band-in-a-Box^® to scan for new styles in the Band-in-a-Box^® folder. (Note: Rebuild is done automatically in more recent versions of Band-in-a-Box^® after you install new styles, but it doesn't hurt to do it manually as well).

4. Check that 'Show all styles' is selected in the pull-down menus at the bottom of the StylePicker window (i.e. make sure you aren't filtering the StylePicker to only show certain styles).

The only reason that PG Music styles would not show up after you have done the four things above is if you purchased and installed a Styles Set that was released during a later version of Band-in-a-Box^® than the version you have. In this case:

• If you have Band-in-a-Box^® 2008, download and install the latest update patch available.

• If you have Band-in-a-Box^® 2007, download this bbw.lst file. Install this to your Band-in-a-Box^® folder (usually C:\bb).

• If you have Band-in-a-Box^® 2006 or earlier, download this bbw.lst file. Install this to your Band-in-a-Box^® folder (usually C:\bb).

  More information: Because of StylePicker improvements in 2008, the most current bbw.lst file (style description file) cannot be used with 2007 and earlier versions. These small downloads will install a bbw.lst file for Band-in-a-Box^® 2007 or earlier that will recognize the styles released with later versions of Band-in-a-Box^®. You would only need to download one of these files if you have an older version of Band-in-a-Box^® (2007 or earlier) and purchased a newer styles set.

  If you do this, you may see some question marks in the StylePicker. This is normal, as some of the information in the StylePicker (such as Styles Set #, suggested tempo, and feel) is built into the Band-in-a-Box^® program (not in BBW.LST). For example, if you have Band-in-a-Box^® 2004 and purchased a Styles Set that was released during Band-in-a-Box^® 2007, the styles will show up and work properly but there will be question marks where the Styles Set # would normally appear. Also, the Load Song Demo button will be inactive for those styles. You can instead load the song demos by opening the song files directly from any of the \bb\stylesxx folders.

Note: This FAQ topic is concerned with PG Music styles. You might have other styles from third parties, or styles that you have made; the BBW.LST file won't automatically recognize these styles, however they can be added to the StylePicker by creating one or more *.LS3 files. Band-in-a-Box^® 2008 and higher will search for styles in the bb folder that aren't in BBW.LST; it will automatically create an *.LS3 file and add the styles to the 'Other Styles' category. Band-in-a-Box^® 2007 and earlier don't have this feature.

Also see FAQ 145.

56. My laptop doesn't have a number keypad. Can I still step-advance through the notes?

You can still step through your song note-by-note by using the Shift+Arrow Keys. Band-in-a-Box^® 2004 also added a feature that allows you to use the regular keypad instead of the number keypad (numpad) for some hotkeys. You can enable this in Opt. | Preferences. If you have Band-in-a-Box^® 2004, you will need the latest update patch for that version for this option to be available to you.

57. How do I enter more than 2 chords per bar in Band-in-a-Box^®?

You can enter a maximum of four chords per bar - two chords per "cell"(first or second half of a bar). To enter two chords in the first or second half of a bar, simply separate the chords by a comma when you type them in. For example, type: Cmaj , Gm <enter>

58. How do I enable and disable the lead-in bars or count-in?

This is set in Opt. | Preferences | [Count-in/Met]. If you want to hear the count-in, make sure that "Allow Lead in Bars" is checked, along with "Play Lead In even if Intro Present," and "Audible lead in." Also, check that the volume is turned up (64 is the default). Uncheck these options if you don't want to hear the count-in.

59. Can I sync Band-in-a-Box^® to an external MIDI source?

This cannot be done at present. You would need to save the Band-in-a-Box^® song as a MIDI file and then load it into Power Tracks Pro Audio or another MIDI sequencer to achieve this. Band-in-a-Box^® is able to send a simple start/stop message - this setting is found in Opt. | Preferences | MIDI Options.

60. Why do I hear the drums playing with a piano patch?

This is usually because your drum track is set to a non-drum channel. Most synths/sound cards use channel 10 as the drum channel. On the drum channel, each patch corresponds to a different drum kit, and each MIDI note corresponds to a different drum sound (for example, snare, bass drum, etc.). Very old synths might use channel 16 or another channel. Another possibility is that in the case of some Yamaha synths, you may need to disallow patch and/or bank changes.

Check under Opt. | Preferences | Channels and make sure that the drum channel corresponds to what your synth uses. You may need to check the documentation for your synth. You could also look under the Synthesizer / sound module menu in the MIDI Driver Setup dialog to see if your synth is listed there. When you select a synth from this menu and press [OK], Band-in-a-Box^® will load a .DK file that matches your synth. This file will set up the GM patches, drum kit, and channels to what they should be for that synth. While this is not normally necessary for most modern synths, it may be necessary for some older and non-General MIDI synths. Additional .DK files can be downloaded from our website at https://www.pgmusic.com/support_miscellaneous.htm

If you have a Yamaha synth, try going to Opt. | Preferences | MIDI Options and deselecting "Allow patch changes".

61. Why does Band-in-a-Box^® generate notes below low E (E2) on a bass?

You can set the lowest bass note in the Opt. | Preferences | Arrange dialog. If you have set your lowest bass note to E2, which is the default setting, Band-in-a-Box^® will not play any bass notes below E2, with one exception: Band-in-a-Box^® occasionally produces a short low bass note (usually an octave below the root) to simulate a muted bass note on the third triplet of a walking bass line. These short notes don't get displayed in notation, but do get played.

62. Why does my screen saver not come on when I run Band-in-a-Box^®?

We disabled the screen saver, because Band-in-a-Box^® is a program that you tend to look at without using the keyboard and mouse (i.e. reading notation), so having the screen saver kick in would probably be annoying.

63. Tutorial #2 mentions "L_bomba.mgu" and I can't find it.

LaBamba has been removed to avoid trademark issues. You should still be able to complete the tutorial and build the song.

64. How do I raise or lower the volume of all but one track?

If you hold down the ALT or CTRL key while increasing the volume of a selected track, all of the other tracks will decrease in volume, and vice versa.

65. Why does Band-in-a-Box^® lock up on startup?

This can sometimes be resolved by deleting the file intrface.bbw from your BB folder. To do this you would:

1. Open the Band-in-a-Box^® folder on your hard drive (usually c:\bb)

2. Find and delete the file 'intrface.bbw'.

3. Close all windows and go back to your desktop

4. Try to run Band-in-a-Box^®.

Note that this will return many of the Band-in-a-Box^® settings to their factory defaults. If this doesn't solve the problem, there may be a problem with the way one of your MIDI devices is installed. Try reinstalling the drivers for your sound card or MIDI interface.

66. I want to use 2/4 time in my bluegrass song, but it doesn't 'hold'.

We suggest you use 4/4 for that song. Bluegras1.STY is a 4/4 style, and Bluegrass music is in general 4/4. Almost any 2/4 song can be done in 4/4 and sound the same. (for example, Ragtime works as well in 2/4 as 4/4). The quality of the arrangement you get out of Band-in-a-Box^® will be way better, as will the solos it generates. If this song must use 2/4, just press F5 at bar 1, and type '2' beside '# beats per bar'. You'll see a little red square around the bar numbers after exiting to indicate that you've successfully changed settings at those bars. You could also use Edit | Set Time Signature.

67. How do I set the right key or visually transpose the music for my non-concert instrument?

The key transpose box on the main screen of Band-in-a-Box^® sets MIDI music you hear and the Notation key for viewing and printing at the same time. The 'Transpose' settings in the Notation Window Options dialog affect only the viewable and printable notes, while leaving the MIDI playback in the original key. This allows you to view proper notation for non-concert instruments, such as a tenor sax. Open the Notation Window and press the [OPT] button to open the Notation Window Options dialog. Beside 'Transpose', type in the number of semitones that you want the notation to be transposed. For example, if you have a trumpet, set it to +2. There are also some presets that you can select from the pull-down menu that may work for your instrument.

68. Why is my recorded audio (wave) track empty?

Most likely, your Windows Recording Control is not set up properly. To set it up properly, follow these steps:

1. Go to Audio | Record Audio

2. In the 'Record Audio' dialog, press the [Set Recording Properties] button. This should bring up the Windows Record Control Panel.

3. Select or mute the device(s) you wish or don't wish to record from. ie: If you want to record from the Line in only, make certain just Line in is selected, or all the other devices are muted.

It's also possible that you don't have the correct audio driver selected. With Band-in-a-Box^® 2006, there are two places you can choose your audio drivers, assuming you are using the MME audio driver type:

• In Band-in-a-Box^®: Opt. | Preferences | Audio | [Drivers].

• In the Windows Control Panel: Multimedia (Win 98/ME), Sounds and Multimedia (Win 2000), or Sounds and Audio Devices (Win XP), in the Audio section.

Note that Band-in-a-Box^® versions 2004 and earlier did not have the option of selecting your audio driver from within the program, audio drivers had to be selected from within Windows.

In Band-in-a-Box^®, if you have "Microsoft Sound Mapper" selected as your audio driver, Band-in-a-Box^® will use whatever is selected in the Windows Control Panel. If you have a driver *other* than the Microsoft Sound Mapper selected, Band-in-a-Box^® will use that driver.

Note: You will need to restart Band-in-a-Box^® if you change the audio driver in Windows.

See FAQ 14 for more information on selecting your sound card and setting up the Record Control panel.

69. Why does Band-in-a-Box^® keep looping 4 bars over and over?

Most likely, you have enabled the Loop Screen feature in the Notation Window. Open the Notation Window and un-check LoopScn.

70. Why do I get a "Corrupt Archive File" error when installing the software?

This error doesn't necessarily mean that there is something wrong with the files on the CD.

• You may be almost out of hard disk space. To check how much hard disk space you have remaining, double-click on My Computer. Right Click on your target hard disk, and select 'Properties' from the sub-menu. There will be a chart display with how much disk space is remaining. If you are very low on disk space, you will need to clear off some space before trying to reinstall the program. In general, you will need twice the recommended free disk space to allow the installer to proceed. You can use the Disk Cleanup and Disk Defragmenter utilities, located in Start | Programs | Accessories | System Tools, to remove temporary and unneeded files.

• You may have too many files in the C:\Windows\Temp folder. Delete the contents of this folder and try the installation again.

• Your disc may be damaged. If so, contact us about obtaining a replacement.

71. What is the difference between using "adjust level of audio (quick)" and "adjust level of wave file (permanent) to change the volume of the audio track?

These commands are found under the Audio menu | Edit Audio. The "quick audio adjust" just accesses the same setting that you get using the speaker icon (i.e. the soundcard's volume level). It doesn't affect the actual wave file. The permanent level adjust (in dB) actually affects the wave file itself.

If you set the quick adjust to zero and rendered your song to wave, the WAV file would still get rendered with a normal volume, but if you reduced the dB of it using the other command, it would be quiet.

72. How do I force an accidental, for example Eb to a D#, for easier reading?

Open the Notation Window and click the [N] button one time to get into editable notation mode. Right-click on the note that you want to change to bring up the 'Note Edit' dialog. This dialog allows you to edit specific parameters of any note, such as the time it begins, the duration, pitch, and volume (velocity). You can also use the 'Force Accidental' menu to select if you want the note to be displayed as a sharp or flat.

The main things that determine which accidental is used for any note are: The key of the song, the chord being played at that time, and whether you have 'Use chord scale for enharmonics' enabled or disabled in the Notation Window Options dialog.

73. How can I control Band-in-a-Box^® from an external start switch?

To cause Band-in-a-Box^® to wait to play until a MIDI key is received, go to Opt | Preferences and select 'Pause Play untill MIDI or Key received'. This could be your computer keyboard, an external MIDI keyboard, or even a wind controller or guitar synth.

74. Can I edit tracks other than the Melody and Soloist in Band-in-a-Box^®? Why do the notes I just edited disappear when I press play?

The only tracks that are completely editable are the Soloist and Melody tracks. The reason for this is that the program automatically generates the accompaniment parts for you (Bass, Piano, Drums, Guitar, and Strings). For more advanced editing of the other tracks, we recommend exporting your Band-in-a-Box^® song as a MIDI file, then importing the file into PowerTracks Pro Audio, or another MIDI sequencer.

One way you could edit a particular part (for example, bass) in Band-in-a-Box^®, would be to copy the part that you want to edit to the Soloist or Melody tracks, if one of those tracks is unused. You would then mute the original bass track or rest the bass throughout your song, and set the Melody or Soloist track to a bass instrument. In Band-in-a-Box^® 2004 and higher, there is a specific command to copy tracks (Edit | Copy/Move Tracks).

75. The option to turn on fretboard inlays on the guitar fretboard doesn't seem to work.

The guitar inlays are only supposed to show if you disable "Show Aeolian Position"and "Show Phrygian Position" in the 'Guitar Settings' dialog.

76. Are Mac and PC versions of Band-in-a-Box^® songs compatible?

Yes, Band-in-a-Box^® songs are compatible between platforms, although you may have a problem if you try to use the newest styles with older versions of Band-in-a-Box^®. There have been changes made to the way Band-in-a-Box^® uses styles in the later releases. If both users are using the newest versions of Band-in-a-Box^® for each platform there shouldn't be a problem. The Mac user will need to make sure the Band-in-a-Box^® filename extension (mysong.xxx) uses capital letters, (e.g. mysong.MGU) in the name. Use a PC formatted disk, which can be read by both Mac and PC.

77. How can I adjust the volume of individual harmony parts?

In the 'Select Melody/Thru Harmony' dialog, select the harmony that you want to use and press the [Edit] button to open the 'Harmony Maker' dialog. This will allow you to edit the current harmony. You can adjust the Velocity boost ("V.Boost") for each voice. This allows you to increase or decrease the relative velocity (loudness) of each voice, to make the voice stand out more or less in the harmony.

78. How do I change keys in the middle of my Band-in-a-Box^® song? Can I display more than one key signature?

To transpose to a new key in the middle of a song, you can use the Edit | TransposeFrom...to Dialog. It is not currently possible to have more than one key signature displayed in your song. When you transpose part of your song, the notation will show up with the correct notes and accidentals, but not with the new key signature.

79. What is the difference between "chord step advance" and "note step advance"?

When you step-advance through your song using the Ins and Del keys on the number keypad, Band-in-a-Box^® will highlight either a single note or a group of notes depending on how close together the notes are. This is the "chord step advance" feature. You can tell Band-in-a-Box^® how close the notes have to be to each other to be considered a chord; this is done in the 'Other Notation Options' dialog. Open the Notation Window Options dialog and press [More...]. For example, a high value for 'Chord separation' will force Band-in-a-Box^® to consider a widely spaced group of notes to be a single chord. This setting can also be used to clean up the notation and get it to display the way you want. You can step through individual notes as well by using the "note step advance" feature. This is done using Shift+Arrow keys.

80. I accidentally deleted the BBW.LST file or messed it up. How can I fix it?

We have the latest bbw.lst file available for download from our website here.

This file contains the styles descriptions for all of the latest styles from PG Music Inc. After you download the file, extract it into your c:\bb directory. You should back up your previous version, especially if you have edited/added entries to the file.

81. I made a style with the StyleMaker that uses the bar mask feature, and some bars don't play or only play drums.

You should always have a 'generic' pattern as the first pattern of an instrument in a style. By generic, we mean a pattern with no masks on it, that will work for any chord. You've likely only created patterns with masks on them (for example, only play on a m7 chord, etc) and the style can't find any patterns to play in certain situations.

82. Why do the drums I record in my drum window sound like another musical instrument when I play them back?

All recording in Band-in-a-Box^® is placed on the Melody (or Soloist) track. Even when instruments in the Drum window are played and recorded, they get placed on the Melody track. If you need to add drums this way to a Band-in-a-Box^® song, you need to change the channel on the Melody track to channel 10, the drum channel. You can do this by going to Opt. | Preferences | Channels, and setting the Melody channel to 10.

One alternative is, after recording the drums, swap the Melody and Soloist tracks and change the Soloist channel to 10. You can swap tracks by clicking on Melody | Edit Melody Track | Swap Melody and Soloist. This way you can free up the Melody track for something else.

83. How do I control the MIDI sounds I hear when I record or play live along with Band-in-a-Box^® from my MIDI keyboard?

What you play on a MIDI keyboard gets routed back to your sound card/synth on the THRU track, using the channel and instrument selected for the THRU track in Band-in-a-Box^®. What you record, you hear while recording on the instrument selected for the THRU track in Band-in-a-Box^®. When you play back what you have recorded, it gets played on the melody track. This is the track that affects which instrument you hear your tune in. If you add a Melody harmony, it will betriggered by the Melody track. If you add a Thru harmony, it will be triggered by what you play on your synth/keyboard on the THRU track channel/instrument.

84. Why aren't all of the styles in my BBW.LST file listed in the StylePicker?

BBW.LST contains a list of all possible styles, not just the ones that you have. If the style is found in the Band-in-a-Box^® folder, it will be listed in the StylePicker window. You may need to press the [Re-build] button in the StylePicker window if you have installed new styles.

85. Can I load an audio (.wav) file into Band-in-a-Box^®?

In Band-in-a-Box^® 2006, you can use the Audio | Import audio... menu item to do import a variety of different audio file types, including MP3, WAV, WMA, and CD Audio. This may be useful if you have a Wave file that you want to add audio harmonies to using the TC-Helicon feature. If you want to add the wave file as a track to your Band-in-a-Box^® song, note that the wave file would need to have been recorded at a constant tempo, and you'd need to set that tempo in Band-in-a-Box^® - otherwise the Band-in-a-Box^® generated tracks will not line up with your wave file.

86. Nothing happens when I press the [Test WAV] button in the Render to Audio dialog.

If nothing at all happens when you press the [Test WAV] button, this means that Band-in-a-Box^® is unable to find Windows Media Player on your computer. You should be able to resolve the problem by downloading and installing the latest version of Windows Media Player from Microsoft's website. If the problem persists, exit Band-in-a-Box^® and test the rendered wave files manually with your preferred media player.

If Windows Media Player does come up and looks like it's playing, but you don't hear anything, you should see our tutorial on rendering songs to wave with Band-in-a-Box^®.

87. Why am I receiving an Error 502 message when installing my Styles Set?

This is usually caused by a Firewall or Virus checker. Disable any Firewalls or Virus checkers that you have running on your system, then try the installation again.

88. How do I make a Custom Drum Kit in Band-in-a-Box^®?

You can define a Custom Drum Kit in the StyleMaker by way of Style | Define Custom Drum Kit. Once in the Define Custom Drum Kit window...

1. Check 'Enable Custom Drum Kit'.

2. Select the drum part to change in the left hand field (0-17).

3. Select the drum in the drop-down list (Click [Preview] to audition the drum sound).

4. When pleased with the Custom Drum Kit, select [Save As..] to save it for future use (When saved, your Custom Kit will have a *.CDU extension).

To revert to the Standard Drum Kit, uncheck the Custom Drum Kit checkbox

89. Why can't I open songs in Band-in-a-Box^® over a Windows 2000 network?

If you are not logged on as an Administrator, you will need to contact your Network Administrator to increase the permissions for the following directories:

• C:\bb (the Band-in-a-Box^® directory)

• C:\temp (if applicable)

• C:\Windows\temp

• C:\Windows\System

Any other local or Network directories used for file storage will need to have their permissions increased also.

90. How do I use repeats, 1st/2nd endings, and codas in Band-in-a-Box^®?

We've written a tutorial on this subject.Click here to learn more.

91. When I try to install the program, I get the message "Setup is not a valid win32 application".

If you are trying to install a program that you downloaded, you might get this error if the download did not finish properly or the file is corrupt for some reason. Delete the file that you downloaded, restart the computer, and try downloading it again.

If you get the error when trying to install a program from a CD, your computer may be having trouble reading the CD.

• First, try rebooting your computer and closing all running applications.

• Examine the disc for large scratches and warping. If the disc is dirty, use a disc cleaning kit or wipe the disc surface with a soft, lint-free cotton cloth. Wipe from the center to outer edge of the disc, not in circles.

• If possible, try the CD in another drive. If it works in another drive, the original drive may not be reading it properly.

If it appears that your CD is damaged, you may contact us about obtaining a replacement CD.

92. What can I do to improve my sound quality in Band-in-a-Box^®?

First of all, it's important to understand that Band-in-a-Box^® itself doesn't actually generate the sounds you hear. Band-in-a-Box^® writes the musical arrangements as a series of MIDI messages, and then sends the MIDI information to your soundcard or synthesizer to be played. MIDI is a standard developed in the early eighties to allow electronic instruments made by different manufacturers to communicate using a common language. The information that MIDI sends is simply an instruction to a device to perform a certain event. For example, if Band-in-a-Box^® plays a middle C, it sends a message to your sound card that says 'turn on middle C'. When Band-in-a-Box^® releases the note, it sends a message to the sound card that says 'turn off middle C'. So, the sounds that you hear are really generated by your sound card or MIDI module from instructions received by Band-in-a-Box^®.

You choose what device Band-in-a-Box^® sends MIDI information to by selecting your MIDI Output Driver in the Opt. | MIDI Driver Setup dialog. The sound you get from different MIDI devices can vary quite dramatically. Here are some ideas for how to improve your sound quality:

• Use a Wavetable synthesizer, rather than the FM synthesizer on your sound card. Two ways that MIDI synthesizers generate sounds are FM (Frequency Modulation) Synthesis and Wavetable Synthesis. FM synthesizers are usually only found in older sound cards and some laptops. In general, FM synthesis produces an unrealistic, "computer-like" sound, since the sounds are entirely artificial. On the other hand, Wavetable Synthesis uses digitally stored sound samples of real instruments, so this produces a much more realistic sound.

• Use a Software Synthesizer, such as the Roland VSC rather than your sound card's built-insynthesizer. We include the Roland VSC-3 with Band-in-a-Box^®. A software synthesizer gives you high quality sounds without having to use an external sound source. Software synthesizers are especially useful if your computer doesn't have a dedicated sound card. Click here for sound samples, and more information about the Roland VSC.

• Use a DXi Synthesizer. Many new software synthesizers are being released as DXi plug-ins. Band-in-a-Box^® 2004 and higher are compatible with the DXi standard. Examples of DXi synths are the Roland VSC-3 DXi, and the Roland HyperCanvas. Many DXi synths sound extremely realistic, and some offer the ability to customize the sounds. Check our Products Page for DXi synths that are currently available for purchase from PG Music Inc.

• Use a VSTi Synthesizer. Many new software synthesizers are being released as VSTi plug-ins. Band-in-a-Box^® 2006 is compatible with the VSTi standard.

• Use an external MIDI sound module / synthesizer. There are a large number and variety of MIDI modules on the market that you can connect to your computer via a MIDI interface. Sound quality and price varies widely, but in general, this will give you higher quality sounds than your sound card or a soft synth. Click here for a list of sound modules and MIDI interfaces that are currently available from PG Music Inc.

• Use SoundFonts. If you have a sound card that supports soundfonts, such as a SoundBlaster Live! or SoundBlaster Audigy, you may want to investigate this technology. Soundfonts are sampled sounds that you can load into your sound card in the form of single instruments or entire MIDI banks. There are many free and commercial soundfonts available for download from the internet. Check your sound card documentation for more information. There is also a SoundFont Tutorial on our FAQ page with more information.

Of course, you will also benefit from a good amplified speaker system, rather than using the speakers that came with your computer.

93. What is the best way to enter a melody for the odd and compound time signature styles included in the "About Time" Styles Set?

The styles included in Styles Set 38 - "About Time" were created so that one bar of, say, 5/4 time, would fit into a single 4/4 bar in Band-in-a-Box^® (To get 5/4 in other styles, it is necessary to spread it over two bars: one bar of 2/4 and one bar of 3/4).

Entering a melody for these styles is difficult using only your mouse in editable notation mode, since you need to divide the bar into the appropriate number of divisions and do calculations to determine where to put each note. The easiest way to do it is to record the melody using an external MIDI synthesizer. If you don't have an external MIDI synth, you can do the following:

1. Make sure that the 'Wizard Playalong Feature' is enabled (check under the Play menu).

2. Press Record (MIDI).

3. While the song is playing, tap in the time of your melody on any key in the bottom two rows of your computer keyboard. Band-in-a-Box^® will record what you are tapping. Don't worry about the pitch of each note right now. Just worry about getting the timing right.

4. When you have finished recording, open the Notation Window in editable notation mode.

5. With your mouse, drag each melody note vertically to the proper pitch.

94. When I generate repeats/codas/1st-2nd endings, why do the repeated bars have the wrong chords in them, or no chords at all?

First of all, you should understand that you can either view your song in "Fake sheet" mode or "Linear mode". This setting is found on the main Band-in-a-Box^® screen underneath the song title window. If 'FakeSh' is checked (fake sheet mode), Band-in-a-Box^® will visually hide all of the repeated bars. This makes your song more compact, and more pleasant to read and print out. If 'FakeSh' is unchecked (linear mode), Band-in-a-Box^® will show every bar in your song in linear form, including all repeated bars. In other words, if you play your song while looking at it in linear mode, the cursor will move from top to bottom without jumping around at all. The bars that would be hidden in fake sheet mode are shown in light grey in linear mode.

When you use the 'Repeats\codas\1st-2nd endings' command, you need to tell Band-in-a-Box^® if you want it to generate new bars for the repeat, or if you want it to use bars that are already in your song. In the 'Edit Repeats and Endings' dialog, if "generate (insert) new bars" is checked, Band-in-a-Box^® will create as many new bars as are needed for the repeat, and will automatically insert the chords in those bars for you. If "generate (insert) new bars" is unchecked, Band-in-a-Box^® won't create any new bars; it will use the bars in your song immediately following the section that you have told it to repeat.

For example, say you typed in the chords C - F - G - C in bars 1 through 4, and you want to tell Band-in-a-Box^® to repeat this section so that it plays twice. You could do one of the following:

First Method

1. Go to Edit | Repeats/codas/1st-2nd endings.

2. Enter the following data...
   -Repeat begins at bar: 1
   -# bars in single repeat: 4
   -Repeat: 2 X
   

3. Put a checkmark beside "Generate (insert) new bars".

4. Press [OK-Make Repeat].

If you view your song in linear mode, you will see that Band-in-a-Box^® has generated four bars for you (bars 5 to 8) with the chords C - F - G - C.

Second Method

1. Before making the repeat, type the chords C - F - G - C in bars 5 through 8.

2. Go to Edit | Repeats/codas/1st-2nd endings.

3. Enter the following data...
   -Repeat begins at bar: 1
   -# bars in single repeat: 4
   -Repeat: 2 X
   

4. Make sure there is no checkmark beside "Generate (insert) new bars".

5. Press [OK-Make Repeat].

The final result is the same as the first method, but this time no new bars were created.

Notice that if you were to use the first method, but you left "Generate (insert) new bars" unchecked, bars 5-8 would be empty (no chord symbols). You would see this if you viewed your song in linear mode.

Note: Both the first or second method will work well for Repeats and 1st/2nd endings. for 1st/2nd/3rd endings, 1st/2nd/3rd/4th endings, and D.s/D.C al coda/fine, the second method should be used - in other words, type out your whole song in linear form first.

There is information about Band-in-a-Box^® song structure in FAQ 49, and there is a complete tutorial on entering repeats here.

95. When I try to use the Roland VSC as my output driver, I get the message "...installed properly but currently in use by another program", even though there are no other programs open.

These instructions apply to Windows 2000/XP. Other possible symptoms are:

• "Audio Conversion cannot be started" error message when you attempt to Direct Render your song to a wave file using the VSC.

• When you open the VSC as a stand alone application (Start menu | Programs | Virtual Sound Canvas...), you may get the error "MIDI device or the audio device to be used for VSC's audio output cannot be opened. Playback unavailable at this time"

There are a few possible solutions. You should be able to resolve the problem by following one or more of the suggestions below. Alternatively, use the VSC-DXi instead of the VSC-3 stand-alone version.

Select something other than the VSC as your default MIDI driver in Windows

1. On Windows XP, go to Start | Control Panel | Sounds and Audio Devices | Audio tab. On Windows 2000, go to Start | Settings | Control Panel | Sounds and Multimedia | Audio.

2. Select something other than the Roland VSC for default audio and MIDI playback.

3. Restart your computer.

Make sure vscvol and vsc32cnf are enabled at startup.

1. Go to the Start menu | Run, type "msconfig" and press OK. This should open the System Configuration Utility. Note: Windows 2000 doesn't have the system configuration utility.

2. Click on the Startup tab and make sure there are checkmarks beside 'vscvol' and 'vsc32cnf'.

3. Press [Apply], then [OK], and restart your computer.

Reinstall the VSC

1. Uninstall the Roland VSC using the Add/Remove Programs utility.

2. Right-click on My Computer and select 'Properties'.

3. Click on the Hardware tab and press the [Device Manager] button.

4. Expand 'Sound, Video and Game Controllers' and look for 'Virtual Sound Canvas'. If you see it listed there, right-click on it and select 'uninstall'. Restart your computer.

5. Reinstall the Roland VSC. If you get a message saying that the VSC has not passed Windows Logo Testing, you can "Continue Anyways". You should be prompted to restart your computer again after the VSC has been installed.

6. Go back to 'Sound Video and Game Controllers' in the Device Manager.

7. Right-click on the Virtual Sound Canvas 3.2 and select 'Properties'. Make sure that Device Usage is set to "Use this device (enable)".

Change your audio output device settings in the VSC

1. Click once on the VSC icon in your task bar, point to 'VSC Settings Window' and click on 'Device'. Or: Go to Start | Programs | Virtual Sound Canvas 3.2 | Virtual Sound Canvas 3.2 to open the VSC panel, then click on the [Setup] button and choose the Device tab.

2. If the audio output device is listed as "Selecting Automatically" choose your sound card's audio driver specifically. If that doesn't work, try choosing a different audio output device if available. Press [Apply], then [OK] before trying each selection. You can also try toggling DirectSound to "On" or "Off", as this may improve compatibility with your system.

Remove old and duplicate MIDI entries from the registry

Proceed with this if the suggestions above didn't solve the problem.

There is a limit to the number of MIDI devices that you can have installed. When you install MIDI devices, windows creates a registry entry, starting with "midi" and up to "midi9". Additional MIDI devices are not recognized by Windows. This can be a problem, since new entries may be created when you reinstall MIDI devices or move a hardware device from one port to another. As well, some MIDI device uninstallers do not remove their registry entries. Even if you have not exceeded the limit, the VSC seems to have trouble if there are duplicate or old MIDI entries in the registry.

First, you should make sure that you have uninstalled any old MIDI devices that you are not using - for example, an old USB interface that you used at some point in the past but are no longer using. If this doesn't help, any old or duplicate entries for midi to midi9 can be removed from the registry. If you aren't comfortable editing the registry, you should get a computer tech to do it for you, since making mistakes can prevent your computer from operating correctly.

Go to Start | Run, type "regedit" (without the quotes), and press OK. In the Registry Editor, navigate to the following location:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\ SOFTWARE\ Microsoft\ WindowsNT\ CurrentVersion\ Drivers32.

When you click on the Drivers32 folder you should see the midi, midi1, midi2... entries on the right side of the window. Look for and delete any duplicates. If you recognize one that may refer to an old MIDI device that is no longer installed on your system, you can remove that entry as well. If you are unsure, you should probably leave it alone.

Use the VSC-DXi version, rather than the stand-alone VSC

If you are still having trouble with the VSC, we might suggest that you use the VSC-DXi instead. Band-in-a-Box^® 2004 and higher support DXi plugins, and the VSC-DXi would have been included with your Band-in-a-Box^® purchase. The DXi version has the same set of sounds as the stand-alone version, but is used a little differently with Band-in-a-Box^®. To use the VSC-DXi, you need to first install it on your computer. To choose the VSC-DXi as your MIDI output device in Band-in-a-Box^®, go to Opt. | MIDI Driver Setup and place a checkmark in the "Use DXi Synth" checkbox. When the DirectX window opens up, choose the VSC-DXi as your plugin. Close the DirectX window, and you should be back in the MIDI Driver Setup dialog. By default, Band-in-a-Box^® will set the Driver Latency to around 2000 milliseconds. This is a high setting, but is safe even on older computers. With most computers, you should be able to choose a Driver Latency of around 200 ms or lower. You can experiment with the Driver Latency until you hear audio glitches. A lower latency will give you a quicker response time.

If you were used to using the "Direct Render to wave" feature of the VSC, you will find that the "DXi Direct Render" feature in Band-in-a-Box^® will give you the same results. It is also a quicker and easier method of rendering your songs to wave.

96. Why do I get an Error Code 5 when I try to install Band-in-a-Box^® upgrades or update patches?

The complete error message is: "An error occurred while trying to replace the existing file: DeleteFile Failed; code 5. Access is Denied". It also refers to a specific file in the error message box.

This happens if a file that the installer is trying to replace happens to be in use by the computer. Usually this happens because you have Band-in-a-Box^® open while you are trying to install the upgrade. It could also happen if one of the PG Music font files is still in memory after closing Band-in-a-Box^®.

Close Band-in-a-Box^® and try installing the update again. If Band-in-a-Box^® is closed and you are still getting this error, reboot your computer and run the installer after rebooting.

97. Why do I get a "GP4.DLL" or "BBWDLL10.DLL" error when I try to run Band-in-a-Box^®?

Complete error message may be: "The application has failed to start because BBWDLL10.DLL was not found.", or "A required .DLL file, BBWDLL10.DLL, was not found."

You may have installed a Band-in-a-Box^® upgrade without installing the previous full version first, or you may have installed the upgrade into the wrong folder. Since the upgrades don't install all of the files required to run Band-in-a-Box^®, you need to make sure to install them to your existing Band-in-a-Box^® folder. By default, the Band-in-a-Box^® folder is C:\BB. If you are not sure where you have Band-in-a-Box^® installed, you can check by right-clicking on the shortcut that you use to open Band-in-a-Box^® and selecting 'Properties'. If you are reinstalling Band-in-a-Box^®, you will need to install starting with a full Pro version or MegaPAK.

You may also get this error message after installing an update patch if you chose the wrong destination directory for the patch. To resolve the problem, reinstall the update patch making sure to specify the correct destination directory.

98. When I try to convert my song to Windows Media format (WMA) I get the message "Windows cannot find 'WM8EUTIL.EXE' ".

Earlier versions of Band-in-a-Box^® used Windows Media Encoder 8 to convert .WAV to .WMA (Windows Media Audio) files. Band-in-a-Box^® 2006 and higher have an improved and updated .WMA rendering feature, so you should not be getting this error if you have Band-in-a-Box^® 2006 or later installed. Check your exact version by going to the Help menu and clicking on About Band-in-a-Box^®.

99. Can I use ASIO drivers with Band-in-a-Box^®?

Yes, Band-in-a-Box^® 2006 supports ASIO. You select this in Opt. | Preferences | Audio. Selecting ASIO as your Audio Driver Type should bring up the ASIO Audio Driver dialog. You will need to select the ASIO device and input/output ports - this varies between sound cards and ASIO drivers - see the sound card documentation and Band-in-a-Box^® help file/manual for details.

100. I am having trouble playing the video tutorials.

If you hear sound but don't actually see the video while it is playing, or if you get an error message when you try to play it, you most likely don't have the TSCC codec installed on your computer. Most of our recent videos use the TechSmith Screen Capture Codec. Click here to download the TSCC codec.

If you are still having trouble playing the videos for any reason, we suggest reinstalling Windows Media Player. This is easiest done by downloading and installing the most recent version of Windows Media Player for your operating system.

Note that If you have downloaded the video from our website, you will need to extract the file with a program such as WinZip. A trial version of WinZip can be downloaded from https://www.winzip.com. Windows XP has a built-in utility for extracting files. You should then be able to then play the file in Windows Media Player. If the video doesn't run automatically when you double-click on it, open Windows Media Player (Start | Programs | Accessories | Entertainment | Windows Media Player), and use the File | Open command to open the file.

101. How do I install Band-in-a-Box^® upgrades?

The way you should install any Band-in-a-Box^® Regular or MegaPAK upgrade is to install it to your existing Band-in-a-Box^® folder. By default, this is C:\bb, however it is possible that you had installed Band-in-a-Box^® somewhere else, or subsequently moved or renamed the folder. An easy way to check where you have Band-in-a-Box^® installed is to right-click on the shortcut that you use to launch the program and select 'Properties'.

There is no harm in keeping a copy of your entire Band-in-a-Box^® folder for the previous version as a backup, aside from the hard disk space it takes up. For example, if you are upgrading to Band-in-a-Box^® 2006 from 2005, you could create a folder called bb2005, copy the contents of your existing bb folder to the bb2005 folder, then install the Band-in-a-Box^® 2006 upgrade into your bb folder.

102. How do I get my chord shortcuts to work?

You can create custom keyboard shortcuts to use when entering chords. For example, if you input the chord Maj9#11 frequently, you could set the single letter 'g' to be used as a shortcut to make it easier for you to enter this chord. You can use a file called "SHORTCUT.TXT" to specify your chord shortcuts:

1. Create a text file using Notepad, or in Band-in-a-Box^® go to Opt. | Utilities | Edit Chord Shortcuts File.

2. Type the shortcuts you wish to use into this text file, with one shortcut per line. For example:
   
   g@maj9#11
   
   

3. Save this file as SHORTCUT.TXT in the Band-in-a-Box^® folder (usually C:\bb). Make sure you correctly spell "SHORTCUT" if you created the file yourself, or it won't work.

4. Either (1) go to Opt. | Utilities | Refresh Chord Shortcuts, or (2) close and re-open Band-in-a-Box^®. This will allow Band-in-a-Box^® to recognize your new shortcut.

Now if you type CG into the Chord Sheet window, Band-in-a-Box^® will automatically enter a CMaj9#11.

103. When I open the Help file, I get the message "Cannot find or load the file Inetwh32.dll.

Click here to download this file. Once downloaded, extract the .zip file to your Band-in-a-Box^® folder (usually C:\bb), or \Windows\System32 (WINNT\System32) directory.

104. I added repeats/1st-2nd endings/codas to my song, but can't get the music to print out with the repeats.

Follow these steps to print your song out with the repeat signs showing:

1. Open the Lead Sheet window (Alt+W)

2. Make sure the "Fakesheet" box is checked.

3. Press [Print] *from the Lead Sheet window*.

105. When I add a harmony to my MIDI melody track, why are some of the melody notes not harmonized?

There are a couple of possibilities.

• You may have added or recorded pitch bend data to the Melody track. The harmony routines are set to "not harmonize" when pitch bend data follows, since they would need to be bending those harmony notes as well. Modulation Wheel would have a similar effect. You can look in the event list window to see if these controllers are present. You can use the Record Filter in the Record Melody dialog if you wish to prevent specific MIDI messages from being recorded.

• Some of the notes may have a very short duration. Band-in-a-Box^® will only harmonize notes that are greater than a certain duration. You can set your own threshold:

  1. Go to Harmony | Melody Harmony (Select).

  2. Select the harmony of interest.

  3. Click the [Edit] button.

  4. Click the [More] button.

  5. Adjust the "No Harmony if duration is less than" setting.

  Note that this will modify the harmony permanently unless you change it back or reinstall Band-in-a-Box^®. You can copy the harmony to one of the "empty" harmony slots and make your modifications there if you wish. That way you don't have to worry about modifying the factory harmonies. You should make a backup of the DEFAULT.HAR file located in the BB folder if you do this. That way, if the file is overwritten, you don't lose your custom harmonies.

106. Why do I get a "cannot make connection" error when I try to choose a plugin in the DirectX window?

That error means that Band-in-a-Box^® was able to find the plugin listed on the system, but when it tried to 'make a connection' to the plugin, an error occurred.

There are a few possible reasons why this could occur.

• A few (but not all) of the third-party-written plugins were coded as copy-protected and bundled with specific software (not PG Music Inc. software). Band-in-a-Box^® can find them from Windows, since they are the right kind of plugin and they exist in the registry. But since Band-in-a-Box^® doesn't know the 'secret handshake', the plugin declines an attempt to connect. You should check with the manufacturer that you obtained the plugin from to find out about this.

• The plugin may have been installed/registered at some time in the past, but was later either deleted or moved on your hard drive. Windows thinks a plugin exists if there are proper entries in the registry. If the registry entry doesn't point to the real location of the plugin (because it was deleted or moved), an attempt to connect will fail. You should try uninstalling and reinstalling the plugin.

• The DXi configuration file could have an error in it. With Band-in-a-Box^® closed, delete the file DXiPluginList.ini from your Band-in-a-Box^® folder (usually C:\bb). If that doesn't help, try reinstalling Band-in-a-Box^®. To make sure that your new installation is a fresh install, rename your \bb folder to \bb_old, and then reinstall Band-in-a-Box^® to the \bb folder.

• There may be something wrong/corrupted with the plugin, or for some reason it is compatible with some host the plugin writer tested with, but doesn't happen to be compatible with Band-in-a-Box^®. Please contact us to let us know about plugins that do not seem to be compatible with Band-in-a-Box^®.

107. Explain the different file extensions that Band-in-a-Box^® uses for song files.

Band-in-a-Box^® song files end in a ?G? file extension.

• If the song has a melody, the extension begins with an 'M'. If the song doesn't have a melody, it begins with an 'S'.

• The second letter of the extension is always a G.

• The third letter refers to the style that the song uses. 1-9 and A-N refer to the original "built-in" styles (for example, ZZJAZZ.STY, ZZWALTZ.STY) and U refers to a "User" style (actually, any other style).

Example 1: MySongTitle.MGU

• The M tells us that the song has a melody.

• The G is always present in song names telling us that it is a song.

• The U tells us that the style is a user style.

Example 2: MySongTitle.SG1

• The S tells us that the song doesn't have a melody.

• The G is always present in song names telling us that it is a song.

• The 1 indicates that the song uses Style #1, which is Jazz Swing (ZZJAZZ).

Another song file you may encounter is MGX. This refers to songs that contain an entire MIDI file on the Melody track. For example, if you had used File | Open MIDI file (Band-in-a-Box^® 2004 or later), or the MIDI file Style Wizard (Band-in-a-Box^® 12 and later).

The song files are quite small. This means that you can store hundreds or thousands of songs without using up too much of your hard drive space.

108. How can I use the 101 Solo and Trio Intros in my songs?

The 101 Solo and Trio Intros are intended to be used as learning tools mainly, however it is possible to use them in your songs. For example, you could use one of the following two methods to start your song with one of the intros.

First method - start with one of the intros and build your song from that.

1. Open one of the intros.

2. Save the intro using File | Save As and type in a unique filename so you don't have to worry about modifying the original intro.

3. If the Intro was an .MGX file (this tells you that the style was disabled), go to the Style menu and click on 'Style is enabled'.

4. In the first bar, type in the same chord as is already there, followed by a period. This will 'rest' the chord.

5. Highlight the first four bars, go to Edit | Copy Rests, and press OK.

6. Change the number of choruses to 1. When asked if you want to "adjust melody to fit new # of choruses", click [Yes].

7. Now frame your song (choose the number of bars and choruses you want in your song).

8. Choose your style, key, type in your chords, etc.

Second method - import one of the intros into a song you already have.

1. Open the Intro that you want to use.

2. Transpose it into the same key as your song.

3. Press .MID to save the song as a MIDI file. Save to Clipboard.

4. Open the song you want to import the intro into.

5. If you have already entered chords and melody without leaving space for the intro at the beginning of your song, you will need to use Edit | Copy (chords and melody), and set first and last bar of your chorus appropriately so that bars 1-4 are available for the intro. For example, you could set the first bar of your chorus to Bar 5 if you have more than one chorus. You will then be importing the intro into bars 1-4.

6. Set the Melody track type to multichannel (Melody | Track type | Multichannel).

7. In the first bar, type in any chord followed by a period. This will 'rest' the chord.

8. Highlight the first four bars, go to Edit | Copy Rests, and press OK.

9. Go to Melody | Edit Melody Track | Import Melody from Clipboard.

10. In the Import MIDI File dialog, you may need to insert 1 blank bar at the beginning to get the intro to line up properly at the beginning of bar 1.

11. Set 'How many bars to import?' to 4. Press OK.

Note that you may need to make minor adjustments to these instructions to get it to work properly for your specific situation.

109. When I try to apply audio harmonies to my song, I get the message "Error or Cancelled out of routine, error code=1".

This may occur if one of the folders that you have your song saved in has a period in its name. To resolve the problem, remove the period from the folder name or save your song in a different folder.

110. How do I access all of the patches available in the Roland VSC and VSC-DXi?

The Roland VSC has two modes.

• GM2 mode gives you access to the 256 GM2 patches.

• GS Mode gives you access to around 900 patches. This is the same sound set as in the SC88Pro Sound Canvas.

To choose the mode that you want to use, launch the VSC controller window and press either the GS or GM2 mode button (stand-alone version), or press the [Setup] button (DXi plugin version). To see a list of instruments included in GS and GM2 mode, click the [Help] button in the VSC, then click on 'Instrument List'.

Click here to download Roland VSC patch maps for Band-in-a-Box^® and PowerTracks Pro Audio. The following two files are included:

• Patches.ini: This is for PowerTracks Pro Audio. Rename the existing patches.ini file in your PT folder to patches.old (this keeps a backup of it), then copy the downloaded patches.ini to the PT folder. You will then be able to choose any patch on the VSC using the Select Patch dialog in PowerTracks. There are two patch lists - one for GM2 mode and one for GS mode.

• Roland_VSC_(GSMode).PAT: This is for Band-in-a-Box^®. Copy this file to your BB folder. You will then be able to select any patch on the VSC by doing one of the following:

  1. If you have the VSC set to GM2 mode: In Opt. | MIDI Driver Setup, under the GM2 Support menu, select 'General MIDI 2 support'. This will allow you to choose any of the 256 GM2 patches by simply using the Instrument pull-down menu or GM2 button on the main screen of Band-in-a-Box^®. (.PAT file not needed for this)

  2. If you have the VSC set to GS mode: In Opt. | MIDI Driver Setup, under the GM2 support menu, select 'Roland GS'. To select one of the 900 patches supported in GS mode, click the [+] button or go to Opt. | Utilities | Choose patch from higher bank and choose the Roland_VSC (GS Mode).PAT file.

111. Can I use the Piano Roll Window to fade out all of the tracks in a song?

One way of doing this is to save your song as a MIDI file, import the file into a MIDI sequencer such as PowerTracks Pro Audio, and use the features in that program to enter dynamics

The Piano Roll Window in Band-in-a-Box^® 2005 and higher now provides another way of adding dynamics from within Band-in-a-Box^®. Here is what you can do if you want your song to fade out at the end. We will use a 50 bar song in our example, which you want to fade out starting at bar 40.

1. Open the Piano Roll window and view the Melody track (you could use the Soloist track instead - it doesn't matter).

2. Go to the Melody menu | Track type, and select 'Multichannel'.

3. Find out what channels Band-in-a-Box^® is using for this particular song. You can check this in Opt. | Preferences | Channels. For example, say your song uses the Bass, Piano, Drums, and Melody tracks. By default, Band-in-a-Box^® assigns these to the following channels: Bass=2, Piano=3, Melody=4, and Drums=10.

4. In the Piano Roll window, select 'Control' from the 'View/Edit' combo box. When you do this, the 'Controller Edit Type' combo box will appear. Choose '11 Expression MSB'.

5. Select one of the channels you found in step 3 from the 'Chan' combo box.

6. In the bottom pane of the Piano Roll window (the Graphic Event Editing area), draw a descending line starting at a value of 127 at bar 40, and ending at a value of 0 at bar 50.

7. Reset the expression back to 127 at the end of your song with a single mouse click at the end of bar 50.

8. Repeat steps 5-7 for each of the channels from step 3.

9. Your song will now fade out from bar 40 to 50.

112. When I open the program, I get error messages such as "Can't find STYLE ZZJAZZ.STY", "No Guitarists will be available. Can't find DEFAULT.GIT", and/or "I/O error 103".

There are important files missing from your Band-in-a-Box^® folder. This usually occurs if you don't install a Band-in-a-Box^® upgrade into your existing Band-in-a-Box^® folder. To resolve this problem, first find out where you have your previous version installed. By default, Band-in-a-Box^® is installed in the BB folder on your hard drive, although it's possible you installed it somewhere else, or moved/renamed the folder. Wherever you have the previous installed, you want to install the Band-in-a-Box^® upgrade into that folder. If you are installing Band-in-a-Box^® on a new computer, you will need to start with a full "Pro" version or MegaPAK, then install the upgrade(s) over that.

113. When I boot my Windows 95/98/ME computer, I get an MSGSRV32.exe error naming devcon32.dll.

Devcon32.dll is a driver for the Creative SoundBlaster Live! sound card. This problem is often encountered when you have the Roland VSC installed on your computer and you are using older SoundBlaster Live! drivers. You should be able to resolve the problem by uninstalling and reinstalling the sound card, using the latest drivers available from Creative. Download the most recent driver updates for your card from Creative's website.

Note: If Windows won't load, you can start your computer in safe mode. This is normally done by pressing F8 repeatedly while booting your computer.

If you are having trouble resolving this problem, we recommend contacting Creative for support or uninstalling the Roland VSC from your computer.

114. After upgrading to Band-in-a-Box^® 2006, I get a "no disk in drive" error when I try to launch the program.

You can resolve this by doing the following:

1. Make sure Band-in-a-Box^® is closed.

2. Open your Band-in-a-Box^® folder. This is usually C:\BB.

3. Locate and delete the configuration file "intrface.bbw".

Note that this will return many preferences to the factory settings.

115. Why do I get an ".ST2 not found" message when I try to generate a solo?

Band-in-a-Box^® may give you the following message when you attempt to generate a solo using the Soloist feature:"xxx.ST2 not found. Cannot write Solo. ST2 files are 'Soloist' files. They must reside in your (home directory)".

.ST2 files are Soloist databases. Each of the Soloists are set up to use one of the .ST2 files for solo generation, and if the .ST2 file is not present in your root Band-in-a-Box^® folder (usually C:\BB), then Band-in-a-Box^® will give you the message above. The list of Soloists that you see in the 'Select Soloist' dialog is defined by the Default.SOL file. This file contains descriptions for all of the Soloists that are available for Band-in-a-Box^® at the time of the release of the version you have; it isn't necessarily a list of only the Soloists that you have.

In Band-in-a-Box^® 2007, the list is filtered to only show Soloists that are available (installed), but if you check the "show N/A" box, Band-in-a-Box^® will show ALL soloists, even ones that aren't available.

Here are some specific reasons that Band-in-a-Box^® might be giving you the error message, or a Soloist is showing up as N/A in Band-in-a-Box^® 2007:

• Band-in-a-Box^® Pro and regular upgrades only include a basic set of Soloist databases (Soloist set 1), while the Band-in-a-Box^® MegaPAK and MegaPAK upgrades include all Soloist databases that are currently available with the exception of the Artist Soloist Series (Andy Laverne and Jeff Lorber Soloists). If you purchased the "Pro" package and you are trying to select a Soloist that is not included in the Pro, you will get an "ST2 not found" error.

• Soloists sets can also be purchased individually. If you have purchased and installed an individual Soloist set, and you get this error when trying to use one of the new Soloists, then you most likely didn't install the Soloist into the correct directory. They must be installed in your root Band-in-a-Box^® directory. The solution is to reinstall the Soloist set, making sure to select the correct destination directory. If you are not sure where you have Band-in-a-Box^® installed, right-click on the shortcut you use to open Band-in-a-Box^®, select 'Properties', and look in the 'Target' field.

• There are some Soloists that have recently been upgraded to use a more advanced and realistic sounding Soloist database not available in the Pro version. If you get a message saying something like "Wynt.ST2 not found" when you try to select a Soloist that you think *used to be available to you* in a previous version, do the following to set the Soloist back to its default database:

  1. In the 'Select Soloist' dialog, choose the Soloist of interest and press the Soloist Maker [Edit] button.

  2. Underneath where it says 'Choose ST2 database', click the [Default] button.

  3. Press OK. You should now be able to generate a Solo using this particular Soloist.

  Note: You should make a backup of the default.SOL file after making edits in the Soloist Maker. That way, if you need to reinstall Band-in-a-Box^® at some point you won't lose all of your edits.

116. How can I return Band-in-a-Box^® to the factory settings?

Band-in-a-Box^® 2006 uses the files listed below for configuration. If you want to restore Band-in-a-Box^® to the factory settings, you can delete or rename these files. The next time you launch Band-in-a-Box^®, new configuration files will be created. This can help solve or troubleshoot odd and unexplainable problems you are having with the program. The files are found in the root Band-in-a-Box^® folder, usually C:\bb, and can easily be found by sorting the files in the bb folder by 'date modified'.

Important: You must have Band-in-a-Box^® closed when you do this, or else it won't work.

We recommend renaming the files (rather than deleting them) or saving a copy of them somewhere else on your hard drive so that you have a backup of your old configuration. For example, you could rename intrface.bbw to intrface.old. Later, if you find that you need to restore your previous settings, you can delete the new intrface.bbw file that Band-in-a-Box^® will have created, and rename intrface.old to intrface.bbw

An alternative way of restoring all factory defaults, is to simply reinstall Band-in-a-Box^® to a new folder. One way of doing this is to rename your current Band-in-a-Box^® folder to '\bb_old', then reinstall the program to the default '\bb' folder. Note that reinstalling Band-in-a-Box^® to the SAME folder will not return the program to factory settings, because Band-in-a-Box^® doesn't change the configuration files when you reinstall it.

• intrface.bbw. This file contains most of the global Band-in-a-Box^® settings in the Opt. | Preferences dialogs, and a list of the most recently accessed song and style files.

• MySetup.DK. This file contains the settings in the following dialogs.:
  Opt.| Preferences | Channels (default MIDI channels, patches, volumes, reverb, chorus, bank)
  Opt. | Preferences | Patch Map
  Opt. | Preferences | Drum Kit
  Opt. | Utilities | Make an Advanced Patch Map
  Opt. | Preferences | Fav. Patch
  

The two files above contain most of your program settings; it is USUALLY only necessary to delete those two files. Other settings files include:

• DEFAULT.ALI. This file contains the information in the Styles | Style Aliases dialog.

• BBToolBar6.INI. This file contains your main toolbar setup.

• DXPluginList.ini. This file has the name and location of the DirectX audio plugins that Band-in-a-Box^® has found on your computer.

• DXiPluginList.ini. This file has the name and location of the DXi synthesizers that Band-in-a-Box^® has found on your computer.

• VSTPluginList.ini. This file has the name and location of the VST audio plugins that you have added to your plugin list.

• VSTiPluginList.ini. This file has the name and location of the VSTi plugins that you have added to your plugin list.

• DX Settings/DefaultDXiSynth.tgs (this is in the 'DX Settings' folder). This file stores the current DXi plugin configuration.

• DX Settings/DefaultDXAudio.tgs (this is in the 'DX Settings' folder). This file stores the current DX plugin configuration.

• $Drumz.cfg. This file contains your Drum Window settings.

• $MIDIMON.cfg. This file contains your MIDI Monitor settings.

• Tuner.cfg. This file contains your Guitar Tuner settings.

• F32I.BIN. This file stores the song and style Favorites window setups.

• SongListTemp4.BIN. You will find this file in any folder that you created a song list for (ie, when you press the [Song] button in Band-in-a-Box^®). It contains a description of the song files in that folder.

Note:

• There is also a menu item within Band-in-a-Box^® to return many settings to their factory defaults (Opt. | Return to Factory Settings). This is an easy way to do it if you aren't concerned about keeping a backup of your current settings. This will not return ALL settings to factory like deleting the files listed above will.

• An easy way to find the configuration files in the bb folder is by sorting the files by 'date modified'. The configuration files will usually be the most recently modified, so will appear at the top.

• Some of the files listed above will not necessarily be present. For example, if you haven't ever used the guitar tuner, you will not find Tuner.cfg in the bb folder.

117. Why do I get a File I/O error when I try to open or rebuild a song list?

This means that either Band-in-a-Box^® is unable to read one or more of the songs in the folder, or Band-in-a-Box^® is unable to read or modify an existing SonglistTemp4.BIN file. Band-in-a-Box^® uses the file SongListTemp4.BIN to define the song list for a particular folder. This file is stored in the folder with your song files. One or more of the solutions below should resolve the problem.

• A File I/O error may occur if the SongListTemp4.BIN file was somehow marked as 'read-only' after it was created. One way this may have occurred is if you had changed the properties of the folder in question to read-only, and said 'Yes' when asked if you wanted to apply the changes to all subfolders and files. Right-click on the folder and select Properties. If Read-only is checked, uncheck it and click [Apply]. If you are asked if you want the changes to apply to all subfolders and files, say yes. If you have multiple song folders, you should change the properties of the folder at the "top level"(the folder that contains all of your song folders within it).

• You may be able to resolve the problem by simply deleting the SongListTemp4.BIN file from the folder you are having trouble with.

• If you have Windows 2000 or XP Professional, one possibility is that an administrator on the computer has changed the permission settings for the folder(s) containing your songs to disallow read or write access. If you are logged on as an administrator, you can check the security and permissions settings by right-clicking on the folder, selecting properties, and clicking on the Security tab.

118. "Can't find winprint.drv" error when trying to print.

To resolve this problem:

1. With Band-in-a-Box^® closed, go to the Start menu | Printers and Faxes (Windows XP), or Start | Settings | Printer (Windows 98/ME/2000).

2. If you have more than one printer installed, check to see if the printer that you want to use with Band-in-a-Box^® is set as your default printer. If not, set it as your default by right-clicking on it and selecting 'Set as default'.

3. Now set any other printer as your default printer.

4. Next, set the printer that you want to use with Band-in-a-Box^® as your default printer (again).

5. Open Band-in-a-Box^®. You should be able to print now.

119. When I play my external MIDI keyboard, why don't I hear the sound through my selected DXi synth?

Band-in-a-Box^® 2006 supports ASIO or MME audio drivers (earlier versions of Band-in-a-Box^® only supported MME). If you are using MME and playing into Band-in-a-Box^® from an external MIDI controller, you will not hear the sound being played through the DXi synth. You will actually hear the sound played on whatever synth you have selected as your MIDI Output Driver in the main MIDI driver Setup dialog. The reason for this is that the latency is too high when using MME.

If your sound card supports ASIO, and you have ASIO drivers installed on your computer, you can play through your DXi synth with hardly any latency. To set this up, go to Opt. | Preferences | Audio and choose ASIO as your audio driver type. You will also need to set up the ASIO Audio Driver dialog - there is more information in the Band-in-a-Box^® help file and manual about doing this.

Additional information - 'ASIO Always On' setting in the ASIO Audio Driver dialog: If this is selected, then no matter what, live playing will be through the DXi synth. If unselected, there are certain cases when live playing will *not* be through the DXi synth, such as if you don't have a song currently playing.

120. When using a DXi synth, the Soloist harmony doesn't sound right and is out of time with the rest of the music.

Note: This problem would not occur in Band-in-a-Box^® 2007 (and higher).

Band-in-a-Box^® 2006 doesn't support DXi play-thru with MME audio drivers, however if you use ASIO drivers this isn't an issue. ASIO drivers are supported in Band-in-a-Box^® 2006 (and higher). See FAQ #119 for more information.

If you are using MME: The Soloist/Thru harmonies are also routed to the MIDI Output Driver, not the DXi synth, because these harmonies are used when playing live. So if you select a Soloist/Thru harmony for your Soloist track, you will either not hear it at all, or hear it play early with different sounds than the DXi synth, depending on what MIDI Output driver you have selected. (You will hear it early because your Output Driver most likely has a lower latency than the DXi synth. It *is* possible that you would hear the harmonies late, if your selected Output Driver had a higher latency than the DXi synth).

The best solution is probably to write your Soloist harmony permanently to the Soloist track. To do this, go to the Harmony menu and select Convert harmony to Soloist Track. The Soloist harmonies will now use the Soloist track channel, which is routed to the DXi synth. If the Melody track is not being used, another option would be to copy the Solo to the Melody track and apply Melody harmonies.

121. How is pitch bend data transmitted and interpreted by a MIDI synth?

A Pitch bend message is encoded with two 7-bit data bytes (as per the MIDI spec). All MIDI data bytes have a range of 0 thru 127. The MIDI status bytes all have values between 128 and 255, so it is illegal to send data bytes bigger than 127, or they will be misinterpreted as status bytes (note on, note off, controller, etc). So if you want to encode values bigger than 127, the MIDI spec uses two or more data bytes. Pitch Bend uses two data bytes. The 7 bits of the MSB (most significant byte) and the 7 bits of the LSB (least significant byte) are combined to make a 14 bit possible range of values. Fourteen bytes can count from 0 thru 16383. A Pitch Bend of zero is considered to be halfway up in that range, so most software subtracts 8192 from the 'true 14 bit value' to display the pitch end value. That's why most programs, including Band-in-a-Box^® and PowerTrack Pro Audio, display the pitch bend range -8192 thru +8191.

There is a pitch bend range controller message that tells a synth how far to stretch a note in response to pitch bend messages. Many synths have a front-panel setting for that if you push enough buttons. The most common setting is +/- 2 semitones, which is the GM standard, but some synths have a default of +/- 3 semitones, and some guitar controllers/synths use +/- 12 semitones. You should probably set the synth to a pitch bend range of +/-2 if you want to play third party files. The pitch bend data is the same number range in all cases (0 thru 16383), but the synth just stretches its pitch a different interval in response to the pitch bend data.

Some synthesizers may ignore the LSB in Pitch Bend messages, and only have 256 actual pitch bend locations. Even if a synth doesn't transmit or receive the LSB, that data value is just treated like it is zero. So if you had a controller that only sends 128 pitch values, the received numbers (if you slowly move the pitch bend wheel up) would be 0, 128, 256... on up to 8191. If you slowly move the pitch bend wheel down, the received numbers would be 0, -128, -256, on down to -8192. A synth which ignores the LSB would pretend that the LSB is always zero, regardless of what value the sequencer is actually transmitting.

Both Pitch Bend data bytes are encoded in each single Pitch Bend message. The MIDI spec also provides for higher-resolution of other controllers if you send two consecutive messages. It is questionable how many synths can respond to hi-res information. The first 32 controllers are MSB's, and the next 32 controllers are LSB equivalents. For instance, in theory you could transmit continuous values 0 thru 16383 for controller 1, if sending message pairs of controller 1 for the MSB, and controller 33 for the LSB. The trick would be finding a synth that does something other than ignore controller 33.

122. Error message: "Canvas does not allow drawing"

This may occur on Windows 98 and ME with Band-in-a-Box^® 2004 or higher, or PowerTracks Pro Audio 9 or higher. It most likely means that your system resources are low.

You should be able to resolve the problem by closing programs you are not using and/or restarting your computer to free up resources. If you continue to experience problems, close background programs before running the program. On Windows 98/ME:

1. Press Ctrl-alt-del to bring up the Close Program dialog.

2. Click on each item listed in the window, except for "Explorer" and "Systray", and press [End Task]. You have to do this one item at a time. When you are finished, only Explorer and Systray should appear there.

3. Try running Band-in-a-Box^® again.

There are some additional suggestions for freeing up system resources in FAQ 22.

123. Can I print out multiple verses or lines of lyrics on the same lead sheet?

Yes, Band-in-a-Box^® 2005 and higher support multiple lines of lyrics in the Lead sheet window and printout. If your song has repeats, 1st-2nd endings, or multiple verses of lyrics, multiple lines of lyrics can be displayed so you'll see all verses on the same lead sheet. Here are the basic steps:

1. Type your lyrics using Note-based Lyric entry mode in the Notation Window. The Notation Window shows your whole song in linear form, including all choruses and repeated bars. You must use Note-based lyrics, and not Line-based lyrics.

2. Open the Lead Sheet window and make sure that "Fake Sheet Mode" is enabled.

3. Click the [OPT] button to open the Lead Sheet Options dialog and make sure that "Fake Sheet displays multiple lines of lyrics" is checked. Press [OK].

4. Press [Print] from within the Lead Sheet Window.

You should now be seeing your multiple lines/verses of lyrics in the Lead Sheet window and on your printed lead sheet. If you are having trouble, note the following:

• If any four bar line of lyrics is *exactly* the same as the four bar line or lyrics at the same bar in the previous chorus/repeat, it will not be displayed. This is intentional. If you want it to be displayed, modify one of the lines of lyrics so that it is slightly different - for example, you could add a space or hyphen (-) somwhere.

• You must print *from the lead sheet window* for "Fake Sheet Mode" printing. If you press [Print] from the Notation Window or use File | Print, the printout will be in linear (non-Fake Sheet) mode and multi-line lyrics will not be displayed.

  Band-in-a-Box^® 2007 and higher also support printing additional verses of lyrics as a 'text block' at the end of the Lead Sheet.

124. Error message when trying to close Band-in-a-Box^®: "Cannot create file ... BBToolBar6.INI"

This error message means that Band-in-a-Box^® is unable to write or modify this configuration file. This may happen if the file is marked as read-only, or if you do not have "write" access to the Band-in-a-Box^® folder.

Right-click on the Band-in-a-Box^® folder (usually C:\bb), and select Properties. Make sure "read-only" is unchecked, and press [Apply]. You may be asked if you want the changes to apply to all subfolders and files. Yes, you do.

If that doesn't resolve the problem, you may be running Band-in-a-Box^® on Windows 2000 or XP Pro under a limited (non-administrator) account. If this is the case, you may not have "write" access to the Band-in-a-Box^® folder. The solution is to log onto the computer as an administrator and change the security settings for the Band-in-a-Box^® folder. For instance, on Windows XP Professional, you would:

1. Right-click on the Band-in-a-Box^® folder (usually C:\bb) and select Properties.

2. Click on the Security tab.

3. Select the Group or User name that pertains to the limited account you are running Band-in-a-Box^® on.

4. In the Permissions window, make sure that "write" access is not denied for that group.

5. Press [Apply].

Band-in-a-Box^® should now work properly under the limited account(s). Note that the the steps above for changing security settings apply to Windows XP Professional, but not to Windows XP Home edition. Windows XP Home doesn't give you the same control over permissions for individual user accounts, because "Simple File Sharing" is always enabled. For limited users, you may need to copy the bb folder to the Shared Documents folder. All user accounts can read and modify any folders or files that are in the Shared Documents folder. For more information, right-click on a folder, select 'Sharing and Security', and click on the 'Learn More' link in that dialog. There is a way you can disable simple file sharing on Windows XP Home, however that is beyond the scope of this article.

125. The chord symbols in my song don't show up when I save the song as a MIDI file and import it into another program.

The standard MIDI file specification doesn't include a universal way to embed this type of information, so the chord names are stored in the MIDI file from PowerTracks Pro Audio and Band-in-a-Box^® as 'manufacturer specific' MIDI META-events. The chord symbols will show up in all PG Music Inc. programs that display notation. Note that if you load a .MID file that contains these META events into a non-PG Music Inc. program/sequencer, and re-save the file, the META event (i.e. Chords) will not be saved into the new file.

126. Error message: "Your current drum kit has no bass drum note assigned".

Symptoms

You get one of the following error messages when you try to play a song:

• "Warning: Your current drum kit has no bass drum note assigned".

• "Warning: Your current drum kit has no snare drum note assigned".

Solution

One possiblility is that you have modified your drum kit, but you did not assign a MIDI note number to one or more of the drum sounds. Go to Opt. | Preferences | Drum Kit, and check to make sure that none of the drum sounds have been assigned to "0". For General MIDI drum kit definitions, the default note number for the Bass drums is 35, and the default note number for the Snare drums is 38. Assuming that you are not using a non-General MIDI synth, you can set the bass and snare drums to those values.

Another way to resolve the problem is to close Band-in-a-Box^® and delete the file MySetup.dk from your Band-in-a-Box^® folder (usually C:\bb). Note that this will return some settings back to factory defaults. See FAQ 116 for information on which settings are affected by this file. If you have previously modified/customized any of these settings, you should make a backup of your .dk file before deleting it.

127. When I render a song to wave, why do I not hear my audio track in the rendered wave file?

There are three methods you can use to render your song to wave:

1. You can record the MIDI performance in real time as a stereo .WAV file ("Re-Render to WAV file").

2. You can "Direct Render" the performance to .WAV using the RolandED VSC-3 ("Render [Save WAV] w/Roland VSC").

3. You can Direct Render to WAV using a DXi synth ("DXi-Direct Render [save WAV file]")

We have a tutorial explaining in detail how to render MIDI to wave using each of these methods. This also covers the most frequently encountered problems. See FAQ 16.

If you have recorded an audio track with your Band-in-a-Box^® song (for example, you may have used a microphone to record a vocal track), Band-in-a-Box^® can merge the audio track with your rendered wave file. If you do not hear the audio track when you play the rendered wave file, or if it plays back at the wrong speed, here is what you need to do:

• First, make sure you have the latest update patch for Band-in-a-Box^® installed. You can check your exact version by going to Help | About Band-in-a-Box^®. Update patches for Band-in-a-Box^® can be downloaded here. If you have an earlier build than the latest available, download and install the update patch. In some earlier versions of Band-in-a-Box^®, *stereo* audio tracks were merged at the wrong speed (you can check to see if your audio track is stereo or mono by going to Opt. | Preferences | Audio). There were some other improvements to the "merge audio" routines that improved compatibility on certain systems and added a progress indicator to the Band-in-a-Box^® title bar.

• In the Render to Audio File dialog, make sure that "Merge in Audio Track" is checked. Also, if the problem is that the audio track volume is too low relative to the MIDI, use the "Adjust Audio Track volume by" setting to correct this. For example, a setting of 6 dB would make the audio track twice as loud.

• If you are using method 1 or 3 to render your song to wave, the audio track will be merged automatically at the end of the rendering process. While this is happening, you should see a progress indicator in the main Band-in-a-Box^® title bar showing the percentage of the audio merge complete. If you are using method 1 (Re-Render to WAV file), you *will not* hear your audio track while the song is being rendered. It will be merged at the end.

• If you are using method 2 (Render [Save WAV] w/Roland VSC), the audio track *is not* merged automatically, since this feature uses the Audio Conversion utility in the Roland VSC-3, and that utility does not merge audio. You must merge the audio track manually after audio conversion is complete by pressing the [Merge Aud.] button and selecting the rendered wave file. You could also install the DXi version of the VSC and use DXi-Direct Render instead.

Please note: If the problem is that you can hear the audio track in the rendered wave file, but *not* the original MIDI tracks, see FAQ 128.

128. When I render a song to wave, why does the rendered wave file play back silently or with only the audio track?

There are three methods you can use to render your song to wave:

1. You can record the MIDI performance in real time as a stereo .WAV file ("Re-Render to WAV file").

2. You can "Direct Render" the performance to .WAV using the RolandED VSC-3 ("Render [Save WAV] w/Roland VSC").

3. You can Direct Render to WAV using a DXi synth ("DXi-Direct Render [save WAV file]")

In this particular case, you almost certainly used method 1, but you didn't select the correct input in the Record Control panel. Therefore, you have recorded a wave file that has nothing in it. See our tutorial in FAQ 16 and follow the instructions there for method 1 to resolve the problem. Alternatively, use one of the other two methods to render your song to wave.

Note that the goal (for method 1) is to get your sound card to record what's being played by the MIDI Output device you have selected in Band-in-a-Box^®. Usually this is a simple matter. You may be getting your sound card to record its MIDI synthesizer (as is the case for sound cards that have a built-in MIDI synth) or you may be getting your sound card to record its audio output (if you are using a software synth that uses the audio portion of your sound card).

With some sound cards and audio interfaces (for example some M-Audio, Terretec, and Tascam cards) you may need to connect an audio cable from the audio ouputs to the inputs on that sound card. If you are not sure how to do this, consult the documentation for the card or contact the manufacturer to find out how you can get the sound card to record itself. It may be helpful for you to understand how the Windows sound card mixer works, and how to select your audio input and output drivers. See FAQ 14 for more information on this.

129. In the StyleMaker, what is the difference between a drum grid pattern and a live drum pattern?

There are two types of drum patterns - (1) patterns that you input into the drum grid editor, and (2) "live" drum patterns that are imported from MIDI files, usually after having been recorded using an external synth/drum machine.

Many of the newer Band-in-a-Box^® styles use live drum patterns, which are identified in the main StyleMaker window with a red outline around the pattern. To edit an existing live drum pattern, select the pattern and click on the Notation button to open the StyleMaker Pattern Editor. You will notice that each different MIDI note is for a different drum sound. Live drum patterns cannot be edited using the drum grid editor.

To record a new live drum pattern, you must first record the drums outside the StyleMaker. You can use either Band-in-a-Box^® or a MIDI sequencer such as PowerTracks Pro Audio. Save the recording as a MIDI file, then use the Pattern | Import Pattern from MIDI file command to import it into the StyleMaker.

Note that by default all drum patterns are 4 beat (1 bar) patterns but you can specify any live drum pattern to be an 8 beat (2 bar) pattern by checking the "2 bar pattern OK" box in the Pattern Options dialog.

130. My volume, reverb, chorus, and pan settings are not saving with my songs.

The Volume (Controller 7), Reverb (Controller 91), Chorus (Controller 93), and Pan (Controller 10) settings saved with your song are sent to your MIDI device when you load the song into Band-in-a-Box^®, or when you change the settings while the song is loaded. You set the volume, reverb, chorus, and pan for any part (Bass, Piano, Drums, Guitar, Strings...) in the control panel at the top of the main Band-in-a-Box^® screen. For example, to change the volume for the bass part, select the 'Bass' radio button and adjust the volume control.

The change you make will "stick" during the session, but is *not automatically saved with your song*. To save your settings, you need to use File | Save Song with Patches & Harmony, making sure that the appropriate boxes are checked.

In some cases, your volume settings may not "stick". This is a style specific problem. It can occur with a limited number of styles if Volume Changes are enabled in the Style. In this case, the style is sending a Volume (Controller 7) message when you press Play, which is causing your volume setting to revert to the default volume for the style.

There are two things you can do. The first is to edit the style (Styles | StyleMaker | Edit Current Style), press the [MISC] button, and uncheck "Allow Volume Changes with Style". Note that this is a permanent change to the style. You may want to make a backup of the style before changing it. The second option is to go to Opt. | Preferences | MIDI Options, and uncheck "Style Volume Changes". This may not be desirable because it is a global setting and may have other unintended effects.

Another possible source of confusion may be if you are trying to set the "Master Volume", using Ctrl+Alt+D, or the "Combo" part. This function sets every part to the same volume, so you normally wouldn't use it if you are adjusting the relative volumes of the parts.

If you are experiencing unwanted volume changes, a good way to troubleshoot the problem is to open the MIDI Monitor, filtered to show only controller 7.

If you are having trouble saving patches with your song, see FAQ 31.

131. Can I get Band-in-a-Box^® to display more realistic guitar tab and correct fingerings in the Fretboard Window?

For the most realistic representation of a guitar part in the Notation Window (tab) and Guitar Fretboard window, the MIDI note data needs to be on multiple channels. Usually, channel 11 is used for a note that should be played on the 1st string, channel 12 is used for the 2nd string, and so on up to channel 16. If multiple channels are not used, there is no way for Band-in-a-Box^® to know for sure which string each note is supposed to be played on. Band-in-a-Box^® will do its best to figure this out and this will be adequate in many cases, but you may find some places where a "live" musician would use a different string.

Most Band-in-a-Box^® styles use multi-channel note data for the guitar part; when you use these styles, Band-in-a-Box^® will display the guitar part intelligently (how a real musician would be most likely to play it). This is because the guitar patterns have either been recorded by a human using a MIDI guitar controller, or guitar macros have been used in the style. If you have entered a melody into Band-in-a-Box^® and you are finding that it doesn't display as intelligently as you want it to, this is because it doesn't have multi-channel note data. You can change your Melody track into a guitar-type track by going to the Melody menu | Track Type, and selecting 'Guitar'. This will show you tab, but will not modify any of your note events. You would need to either use a MIDI guitar to record your melody, or go through each note one at a time by right-clicking on the note in editable notation mode and editing the channel used by the note.

Another thing you can do is to enter the melody by opening the Guitar Fretboard window and clicking on the strings. This will input the notes into the notation window as long as (1) you are in editable notation mode, and (2) you have 'Send Notes to Notation Window' checked in the Guitar Fretboard Settings window. You need to move to the position in the Notation Window where you want each note to be inserted.

132. Why does the Melodist generate notes outside the "Melody Note Range" specified in the Melodist editor?

Band-in-a-Box^® will use notes outside of the specified range (within about an octave) so that a more natural melody line can be created. The intention is not to get Band-in-a-Box^® to stick precisely to the specified range. If you want, you can manually edit any of the notes that are created by the Melodist.

133. Why do I hear a buzz or hum when my computer is connected to an external speaker system?

This could be caused by a "ground loop". This happens when the ground on your computer and the ground on your external amplifier have a difference in potential. If you are using a laptop with a 3 prong plug and are connected to AC power, try unplugging the power cord (use battery power) and see if you still hear the buzz. If not, chances are you have a ground loop. You may be able to use an isolation transformer or even just a 3 prong to 2 prong adaptor to resolve the problem. There may be safety issues to consider, so you should consult a technician or the computer manufacturer for more specific advice.

134. How do I get a simple metronome or click track in Band-in-a-Box^®?

Go to Opt. | Preferences | Count-in/Met. to open the 'Count-in and Metronome Options' dialog. The three settings for the audible metronome are 'None', 'During Record', or 'During Record and Play'. The option for a metronome during playback (Record and Play) is useful if the drums are muted, or for students learning to count beats. If you want to record melodies without any accompaniment, you can use one of the blank styles: BLANK.STY (even 4/4), BLANK34.STY (even 3/4), BLANKSW.STY (swing 4/4), or BLANK3SW.STY (swing 3/4).

Alternatively, download this "click-track" style. This style has a rim shot on each beat with beat one accented, and no guitar, bass, strings, or piano. You should place this style in your bb folder, and it can be accessed by pressing F9 (Load User Style).

135. Why are there multiple instances of a single driver showing in my MIDI Driver Setup window?

Other symptoms: You might also get a message saying that a driver is "...installed properly but currently in use by another program".

Band-in-a-Box^® is having trouble making the proper connection to one or more MIDI devices that are installed on your computer.

• If you have a MIDI interface installed and connected to an external synth, make sure the interface is connected to your computer and the synth turned on before you start Band-in-a-Box^®.

• One of the Band-in-a-Box^® settings files may have become corrupt. Close Band-in-a-Box^® and delete the file "intrface.bbw" from your bb folder. Note that this will return many program settings to their factory defaults and Band-in-a-Box^® will create a new intrface.bbw file the next time you run it. You may wish to make a backup of this file before deleting it so you can restore your previous settings if this suggestion fails to resolve the problem.

• If the previous suggestions didn't help, there is most likely a problem with the way one of your MIDI devices is installed. Try reinstalling the drivers for your sound card and MIDI interface, and uninstall any old MIDI devices that you aren't using.

One of the most frequent causes of this problem that we encounter is an improperly uninstalled Yamaha USB interface. Sometimes the uninstaller fails to remove a registry entry, which confuses Band-in-a-Box^®. To correct this problem you need to use the registry editor. The procedure isn't difficult, but since incorrect registry modifications can cause serious problems with your computer, you have to do this at your own risk.

Go to Start | Run, type "regedit" (without the quotes), and press OK. In the Registry Editor, navigate to the following location:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\ SOFTWARE\ Microsoft\ WindowsNT\ CurrentVersion\ Drivers32.

When you click on the Drivers32 folder you should see midi, midi1, midi2... entries on the right side of the registry editor window. Look for and delete entries that may refer to an interface that is no longer installed on your computer. If you had a Yamaha interface, you might see an entry similar to "xgusb.cpl". Deleting this should resolve the problem after a reboot.

136. Error message when trying to record audio: "Format unsupported. Your sound card is not allowing or set for 44K audio".

The sample rate/bit depth that Band-in-a-Box^® uses for digital audio is 16 bit/44.1 KHz. If your sound card is somehow locked at a different bit/rate setting, you may get this error message.

We have most frequently seen this error in conjunction with the Line 6 GuitarPort. The order that you open Band-in-a-Box^® and the GuitarPort software is important. You should most likely open Band-in-a-Box^® first, and then the GuitarPort software; this should configure your drivers for 16/44.1 automatically. If this is the order that you are already using to open the programs, try opening the GuitarPort software first instead.

A similar solution may apply to other audio devices. If you are still having difficulty, open your sound card software and manually set it to 16/44.1.

137. How do I monitor myself while recording audio with an M-Audio sound card?

This is set up in the M-Audio control panel. Open the M-Audio control panel, usually by clicking on an icon in your task bar. The specific steps may vary between cards, but the basic steps are to choose the Patchbay/Router tab, and select 'Monitor Mixer' underneath the ports that you want to monitor on. Then, click on the Monitor Mixer tab and ensure that the appropriate mixer controls are not muted and set to a good level.

Also, in Band-in-a-Box^®, check that you have the correct audio drivers selected in Opt. | Preferences | Audio | Drivers.

138. Error message: "There is a problem with your sound hardware. To install mixer devices, go to Control Panel, click Printers and Other Hardware, and then click Add Hardware."

Symptoms: When you open the Render to Audio File dialog, click on the [Set Recording Properties] button in the Render to Audio File dialog, click on the [Set Recording Levels] button in the Record Audio dialog, or go to the Audio menu and select Recording Mixer, either you get this error message or nothing happens at all.

This message is given by the operating system. There may in fact be a problem with your sound card installation, but this is not necessarily the case. When you do one of the things listed above, Band-in-a-Box^® is trying to open the Record Control panel of the Windows sound card mixer so that you can select your recording input and set the volume level. If there is a problem accessing the mixer, either nothing will happen or you will get the error message above. This means that there isn't a Windows recording mixer installed for the currently selected Sound Recording device (you select this in the Control Panel | Sounds and Audio Devices | Audio tab). Some sound cards install their own proprietary control panel/mixer utility that you need to use. Usually there will be an icon in your task bar to access this, or you may be able to get to it via the Windows control panel. Otherwise, select a different driver for sound recording if you have the wrong one selected.

If you continue to get the error message after your recording settings are correct, and you are in fact able to record, you can just ignore it.

139. I can hear the Band-in-a-Box^® accompaniment tracks during regular playback, but not while I am recording audio.

The reason for this is most likely that you are using a DXi synth with an MME audio driver. If you are not sure if you are using a DXi synth, you can find out by going to Opt. | MIDI Driver Setup and looking to see if the 'Use DXi Synth' box is checked. If you not sure whether you are using an MME audio driver, you can find out by going to Opt. | Preferences | Audio and checking to see which 'Audio Driver Type' is selected - either MME or ASIO.

While you are recording audio, the MIDI tracks (Band-in-a-Box^® style accompaniment tracks) are played through the MIDI Output Driver that you have selected in the MIDI Driver Setup dialog, rather than through your DXi synth. This is because the high latency of MME drivers wouldn't allow you to record your audio track in sync with the accompaniment. If you don't have an appropriate output driver selected there, or if you have 'No MIDI/Sound Output' selected and don't have an appropriate MIDI driver selected in the Sounds and Audio Devices Properties window (which is where BIAB defaults to if you haven't selected a driver), you won't hear MIDI playback during audio recording.

To resolve the problem simply select any MIDI Output Driver, preferably not a software synth. For example, for the SoundBlaster cards, "SB Synth A" would work well since it isn't a software synth and has no latency. You will still hear the MIDI tracks play through the DXi synth when you play back your song after recording.

A better solution which allows you to hear the DXi synth while you are recording, is to use low-latency ASIO drivers rather than MME. Not all sound cards come with an ASIO driver, although the free ASIO4ALL driver works well on most computers.

140. Why is my recorded audio track out of sync with the MIDI accompaniment?

Symptoms: You recorded an audio track. For example you may have used a microphone to record vocals. Everything sounded fine as you were recording it, but when you play it back the audio track is out of time with the Band-in-a-Box^® MIDI tracks.

This problem is caused by the use of a software synthesizer on your computer. Software synths have a certain amount of latency - this means that it takes them some time to produce sound after receiving MIDI data from Band-in-a-Box^®. There is more information about this in FAQ 23. It is common for the Microsoft GS Wavetable or Roland VSC soft synths to be used as the MIDI Output Driver in Band-in-a-Box^®. Here are some tips for understanding and resolving this problem.

If you are not using a DXi synth

• Make sure that the Roland VSC is not selected for audio recording/playback in the Control Panel | Sounds and Audio Devices (or Multimedia) Properties window, or (in Band-in-a-Box^® 2005 and higher) in the Opt. | Preferences | Audio | Drivers dialog. Having audio routed through the VSC causes latency problems. If you change your audio drivers in the control panel, close and re-open Band-in-a-Box^® for the change to take effect.

• Find out the latency of the synth you are using, and set the Driver Latency in the MIDI Driver Setup dialog appropriately. For the Roland VSC, check the latency ('response time') in the VSC settings window | Performance tab. For the Microsoft GS Wavetable, the latency is usually between 50 and 100 ms. Narrow this down by trying different values and watching the main screen during playback. When you see the chords being highlighting in exact time to what you hear, you have the right number. Make note of this number for future reference. If you are using a hardware synth, make sure the latency is set to about 0.

The two things above should resolve the problem, but if you are still having trouble use a hardware synth (your sound card's built-in synth or and external synth/module if you have one).

If you are using a DXi or VSTi synth (Band-in-a-Box^® 2004 and higher) and MME audio drivers

When you have a DXi synth selected for playback, and while you are recording audio, the MIDI tracks are not played through the DXi synth. Instead, MIDI is routed to your default MIDI device (MIDI Output Driver selected in the MIDI Driver Setup dialog). This applies to MME drivers, not ASIO.

By default, Band-in-a-Box^® assumes that your MIDI Output Driver is a (close to) zero latency MIDI Output driver. The recorded audio is then automatically shifted ahead by the amount of the (DXi synth) Driver Latency. So, to make sure that your recorded audio is in sync, just ensure that you do not have a soft synth selected as your MIDI Output driver. If you do not have any choice other than to select a soft synth, you can do one of the following:

• Adjust the Opt. | Preferences | Audio - 'Offset in ms' setting before you record your audio track. You need to find out what the exact latency of your MIDI Output driver is as explained previously. For example, if you record a vocal track and find that it plays behind the MIDI tracks, this means that you were hearing the MIDI music play late - so you were singing late. Set the 'Offset in ms' to a negative value corresponding to the latency of your MIDI Output driver.

• Use the Audio | Edit Audio Track | Timeshift Audio command to slide the audio track forward or back after you have recorded your audio track. You would use the same value here as you would use for the offset in ms.

If you are using a DXi or VSTi synth (Band-in-a-Box^® 2004 and higher) and ASIO audio drivers (Band-in-a-Box^® 2006 and higher)

Unlike when you are using MME drivers, the MIDI tracks are played through the DXi or VSTi synth while you are recording. This is possible because of the low latency provided by ASIO drivers. If you are finding that your MIDI and audio tracks are out of sync, either adjust the 'offset in ms' setting or Timeshift Audio, as explained above. If you are finding the tracks drift out of sync, one thing you can try is to increase the latency of your ASIO driver in the ASIO Driver Control Panel.

Note: We have an in-depth tutorial about Band-in-a-Box^® latency settings.

141. How can I insert a patch change in a specific chorus or change to a non-General MIDI patch at any bar?

The Edit Settings for Current Bar dialog allows you to change to a GM or GM2 patch at any bar in your song, however the change will apply to all of your choruses. If you want the patch change to only happen on one of your choruses, there are a couple of options. The first option is to "unfold" your song into one long chorus. The Edit | Unfold command can do this for you. The other option is to use the Event List window to specify the patch change at a particular bar. You can also use the event list to specify a patch change to a patch on a higher bank. Here are the basic steps for using the event list to insert a patch change for any track:

If the track that you want to insert the patch change on is the Melody or Soloist track:

1. Open the Notation Window, viewing the track of interest (Soloist or Melody) and position yourself where you want to make the patch change.

2. Open the Event List Editor by clicking the [#] button and fine-tune your position in the event list if necessary.

3. If your patch is a General MIDI patch, skip to step 5. If you want to choose a patch on a higher bank, click on [Insert] and select Control Change. Choose Controller 0 (MSB Bank Select) type the MSB Bank number for your patch, and press OK.

4. If your synth uses Controller 32 (Bank select LSB) click on [Insert] and select Control Change. Choose Controller 32, type the LSB Bank number, and press OK.

5. Click on [Insert] and select Patch Change. Choose the patch or Program # you want and press OK.

If the track that you want to insert the patch change on is not the Melody or Soloist track:

You also use the Melody or Soloist track event list to insert the patch changes as described above, but note the following:

• You need to change that track to a multi-channel type track to prevent all events from being re-channeled to the Melody or Soloist channel. To do this, go to Melody or Soloist | Track type, and select multi-channel.

• When you insert the Control and Program (patch) Changes, you need to specify the correct channel for each event you insert. You can find out what channel each of the Band-in-a-Box^® tracks use by going to Opt. | Preferences | Channels.

142. Is there a way to display my chords in root position in the notation window?

You can use the 'Output Chords to External Device' feature to accomplish this. Normally, this feature is used to output chords to a vocal harmonizer, however you can use it to save the chords in your song in their root positions to a MIDI file, then import the MIDI file into the Melody or Soloist track.

1. Go to Opt | Preferences | OutputCh. Put a checkmark beside "Output Chords". The channel number should be set to 9 by default. You will probably find it best to change some of the settings in the Output Chords dialog (You may need to experiment with this a bit):

   • Note Range: 60 to 84.

   • # ticks before chord change: 0

   • Output chords during lead-in: NO

   • Write Track to MIDI file: YES

2. Click the .MID button to save your song as a MIDI file. It is easiest if you save it to the [Clipboard].

3. Go to Melody | Edit Melody Track | Import Melody from Clipboard. Import only channel 9. Make sure that the '# blank bars to insert a beginning' is set to 0. Press OK.

You should now see the chords in the Melody track.

143. My toolbars are not displaying properly. How can I correct this or return the toolbars to their default configuration?

You can customize the buttons that appear in the toolbars by clicking on the arrow on the right side of the toolbar and selecting 'Add or Remove buttons'. There are three customizable toolbars: The main toolbar that contains the Play and Stop buttons, and the two toolbars to the right of the song title window. You can undock any of the three toolbars and turn them into 'floating toolbars' so they can be repositioned anywhere on your screen. To do this, you click near the right or left side of the toolbar (you will see the mouse pointer turn into a double arrow) and drag. To dock the toolbar, drag it back to its original position and it will 'snap into place'. There are additional toolbar settings in the Opt. | Preferences | Display dialog.

If you just want to return the toolbars to their factory settings, close Band-in-a-Box^®, and open the Band-in-a-Box^® folder on your hard drive (usually C:\bb). Look for and delete the file "BBToolBar6.INI". The next time you open Band-in-a-Box^®, the toolbars will be back to their factory configuration.

144. I get an Access Violation or General Protection Fault when I try to open Band-in-a-Box^®.

This could indicate a problem with your Band-in-a-Box^® installation, a problem with windows, or a problem with a driver installed on your computer. If you get the error every time you try to open Band-in-a-Box^®, you can normally resolve the problem by deleting a file called intrface.bbw from your Band-in-a-Box^® folder (usually C:\bb). This will return many global Band-in-a-Box^® settings to their factory defaults. If that doesn't help, perform the following steps until the problem is resolved:

1. Return all Band-in-a-Box^® settings to their factory defaults by following the instructions in FAQ 116.

2. If you are running Band-in-a-Box^® on Windows 98 or ME, ensure that the name of your Band-in-a-Box^® folder doesn't have a '+' or '=' sign in it, as this can cause an access violation on some systems.

3. Reinstall Band-in-a-Box^® to a new folder that doesn't contain your existing Band-in-a-Box^® files. One way of doing this is to rename your existing Band-in-a-Box^® folder (bb) to "bb_old" - then simply reinstall Band-in-a-Box^® using the original CD(s) or installer that you downloaded and choose bb as the destination directory. This way you end up with a "fresh" install, and you also keep all of your old files for backup purposes. Don't delete the bb_old folder until you are sure that you have saved all of your personal work etc. elsewhere. It is ok to have Band-in-a-Box^® installed in more than one location on your computer, but keep track of where your Band-in-a-Box^® shortcut is pointing by right-clicking on the shortcut and selecting properties.

4. If you are still getting the error when opening Band-in-a-Box^®, this may indicate that there is a problem with a sound card driver installed on your computer, and Band-in-a-Box^® is having trouble making a connection to it. Reinstall the drivers for your sound card (and MIDI/Audio interface if you have one), using the latest updates available from the manufacturer.

145. After installing an upgrade and rebuilding the StylePicker window, some of the Styles Set categories are missing.

We periodically re-organize the category list so that only the very latest styles sets we have released show up as separate categories; styles from earlier sets are placed in the appropriate genre - Jazz, Latin, etc. You can still view all styles from any particular set by selecting the ALL category, and choosing the Styles Set # of interest from the "Only show Styles #' pull-down menu.

146. What is the easiest way to render a Band-in-a-Box^® song to wave?

The process of converting a MIDI file or Band-in-a-Box^® song to an audio (.WAV) file is referred to as "Rendering". We recommend that you read our complete tutorial on rendering to wave for more information, or if you have any trouble. The quickest way to render songs to way is probably to use the VSC-DXi to Direct Render. Here is how you do it:

1. Make sure you have the VSC-DXi (included with Band-in-a-Box^®) installed, and the latest update patch for Band-in-a-Box^®.

2. Load the song you want to render and click on the DXi Synth button in the Band-in-a-Box^® toolbar. In the DirectX window, select the VSC-DXi in the top pull-down.

3. Press the .WAV button to open the Render to Audio File dialog.

4. Press the [DXi-Direct Render] button.

147. How do the Band-in-a-Box^® latency settings work?

We have an in-depth tutorial about this: Understanding Band-in-a-Box^® latency settings.

148. When using a DXi or VSTi plugin with ASIO drivers, why does realtime play-thru not work while the song is stopped?

For real-time MIDI thru to a DXi/VSTi synth using ASIO, look in the Audio Settings dialog (Opt. | Preferences | Audio), click the [Audio Drivers] button, and in the "ASIO Audio Drivers" dialog make sure that the "ASIO Always On" checkbox is ON.

The choice whether to run ASIO all the time, or just when BIAB is playing/recording, is offered in case anyone has problems running ASIO constantly. If ASIO is not always on, BIAB will route MIDI thru to your default MIDI destination (such as the MS GS Wavetable, Creative Soundcard synth, hardware MIDI synth, etc). This is to minimize playthru latency when ASIO is not always on, and it is the way MIDI Thru behaves with MME high-latency drivers as well.

149. When I try to install some programs, the CD just spins in the drive, or nothing happens when I try to run the installer.

Applies to: GuitarStar, CopyMe, and the Video Guitar Lessons (Essential Rock Guitar Volumes 1 & 2, Essential Blues Guitar Volumes 1 & 2, and Essential Jazz Guitar Volumes 1, 2, & 3).

ZoneAlarm and some other system security (anti-virus/firewall) software can cause this to happen. The solution is to either "be patient" (sometimes it just takes a few minutes for it to start), or:

1. Remove the CD from your CD drive.

2. Restart your computer.

3. When Windows has restarted, disable your system security software. If you aren't sure how to do this, look at the icons in your computer's taskbar at the bottom right-hand side of your screen. One of them will likely be for your virus checker. If you click on the icon, you should be able to find an option to disable it.

4. Put the CD back in your CD drive and run the installer.

If that didn't help, use the system configuration utility to perform a selective startup, like this:

1. Go to the Start menu and click on Run.

2. Type msconfig and press OK.

3. Choose 'Selective Startup', and uncheck 'Load Startup Items'.

4. Press Apply, then press Close, and reboot the computer.

5. Once the computer has restarted, cancel the System configuration Utility (if it comes up automatically), and install the software.

6. After you have installed the software, you can set Windows back to 'Normal Startup'

150. When I type a chord into the chord sheet, it automatically transposes my chord and displays a different chord than what I typed.

If, for example, you type Cmaj7 and Band-in-a-Box^® inserts an Emaj7 chord instead, this means you have the 'visual transpose' set to something other than 0. This setting is usually used for non-concert instruments. You can correct the problem by going to the Notation Window Options dialog and setting 'transpose' to 0.

151. I hear handclaps and other strange sounds when I play styles that use the drum brush kit. How do I get brushes to play properly?

Many Band-in-a-Box^® styles use the Brush Kit. There are a few ways you can tell if a particular style uses the brush kit, aside from just listening to it.

• The Memo field in the StylePicker window will indicate if drum brushes are used in the style.
• Many styles that use the brush kit have a ~ symbol in front of the style name, although this only applies to older styles - most newer styles don't use this naming convention.
• If you have the style open, press Play, then click on the Drum radio button in the instrument panel. If the style uses brushes, it will say "41 Brushes Kit" in the instrument pull-down menu.

MIDI channel 10 is the drum channel on most MIDI synthesizers. On the drum channel, different notes are interpreted as different drum sounds, instead of being different pitches of a particular instrument. Instead of using Program Change messages to switch between different instruments, on the drum channel they are used to choose a drum kit. Patch #1 is the Standard Drum Kit. Click here a list of the drum sounds that correspond to each MIDI note in the Standard Drum Kit. The Brush Kit is usually the same as the Standard Drum Kit with the following three exceptions:

• Note #38 is a Brush Tap instead of a Snare Drum.
• Note #39 is a Brush Slap instead of a Hand Clap.
• Note #40 is a Brush Swirl instead of a Snare Drum.

Some Yamaha synths use a somewhat different map for the brush sounds. On these synths:

• Note #25 is a Brush tap.
• Note #27 is a Brush Slap.
• Note #26 is a Brush swirl.

If you are not hearing brushes when playing a style with a brush kit, this most likely means that the MIDI device you have selected doesn't have a brush kit. You have two options:

• Choose a different MIDI output driver in Opt. | MIDI Driver Setup so that you are playing through a MIDI synth that has a brush kit. Synths that support brushes include the Roland VSC3, VSC-DXi, ForteDXi, and Microsoft GS Wavetable. If you have a Sound Blaster sound card, you may have the soundfont synth selected as your output driver - this may appear as "SB...Synth A", "SB...Synth B", "Creative Soundfont synth", or something similar. Often the default soundfont bank included with Creative cards does not have a brush kit.

• The second option is to get Band-in-a-Box^® to re-map the brushes so that the drums sound ok using the Standard Drum Kit. This is done by going to Opt. | Preferences | Arrange and selecting "none - remap them" in the Drum Brush pull-down.

Another possibility is that you are playing through a synth (usually an external synth/sound module) that does support brushes but uses a different MIDI note map for brushes. This is common with Yamaha synths. If you have a Yamaha synth, select 'XG format #s' in the Drum Brush pull-down.

One last possibility is that you are playing through a synth (usually an external synth/sound module) that has a brush kit, but it is not located at program # 41 on Bank 0. In this case, you will need find an instrument list in the documentation for your synth and find out how to access the Brush Kit. You need to know the PC#, Bank0(MSB) and Bank32(LSB). once you know these numbers, you can use the instrument pull-down menu, Bank0 box, and LSB box to select the patch for the drum track. You will need to use File | Save Song with Patches and Harmony after you do this (and before you play your song again) so that your drum track doesn't revert back to the default drum patch. One other thing you will want to check is that 'Drum Bank changes' is enabled in Opt. | Preferences | MIDI Options.

152. When using ASIO4ALL, the ports in the ASIO Audio Driver dialog are listed as "Not Connected".

You may need to enable the appropriate device in the ASIO4ALL control panel. In the ASIO Audio Drivers dialog, click the [ASIO Driver Control Panel] button. On the upper left side of the ASIO4ALL control panel, it will list your audio devices and give the status of each. If the device is available (there isn't a red cross through it), but not enabled (not highlighted in green), select it and click the Enable button. For this to take affect, you will need to exit the control panel, exit the ASIO Audio Drivers dialog, and possibly close and restart Band-in-a-Box^®.

If the device is showing as unavailable, you may be able to resolve the problem by making sure the Microsoft GS Wavetable is not enabled anywhere in your setup. In Band-in-a-Box^®, go to Opt. | MID Driver Setup, and make sure the GS Wavetable is NOT selected as your output driver. If this doesn't help, close Band-in-a-Box^®, go to Start | Control Panel | Sounds and Audio Devices | Audio, and make sure that the GS Wavetable is not selected for MIDI playback there. Also, make sure that there aren't any other programs running on your computer that might be using the GS Wavetable. The problem should be resolved next time you open Band-in-a-Box^®. If not, try a reboot. Note that there is a way to disable the GS Wavetable completely using the registry editor, however this is beyond the scope of this article.

153. After importing a MIDI file with drums into Band-in-a-Box^®, I can see the drum notes in the Notation Window but they do not play.

You might also encounter this problem when recording drums directly into Band-in-a-Box^® from some external synths. Right-click on one of the drum notes, select 'Edit Note', and check to see if the note has 'zero' duration. If it does, the problem is that Band-in-a-Box^® doesn't play zero duration drum notes. One solution would be to go through each of the notes and edit them so that they have a non zero duration. An easier solution is to use a MIDI sequencer such as PowerTracks Pro Audio to quantize the drum track notes. For example, in PowerTracks you could:

1. Go to Edit | Quantize.
2. Put a checkmark beside 'durations'.
3. uncheck 'start times'.
4. set the Resolution to 'sixteenth', and press OK.

154. Can I record and edit multi-channel MIDI files in Band-in-a-Box^®?

Band-in-a-Box^® isn't a dedicated multi-track sequencer, so it isn't as easy to edit multi-channel MIDI files as it is with our program PowerTracks Pro Audio. In Band-in-a-Box^®, you only have two tracks to work with - Melody and Soloist. The other tracks - Bass, Drums, Piano, Guitar, and Strings - are used by Band-in-a-Box^® to generate its arrangements. However, the Melody and Soloist tracks don't have to be used for ONLY a melody and solo - you can have whatever you want on those tracks, including multi-channel MIDI data. Here are some tips:

• The Melody and Soloist track type need to be set to 'multi-channel' when you are working with MIDI data on more than one channel (more than one instrument). The default track type is 'single-channel'. When the track is single-channel, all MIDI data is re-channeled to the default channel for that track (channel 4 for Melody and channel 8 for Soloist). The track type can be set by selecting the appropriate option under the Melody or Soloist menu.

  Note 1: When you import a MIDI file using File | Open MIDI File, Band-in-a-Box^® will automatically set the track type to multi-channel.

  Note 2: When you save a Band-in-a-Box^® song with a multi-channel Melody or Solo track, the song is saved as an .MGX file so that you can identify it easily.

• You can record directly to the Soloist track in the same way that you record to the Melody track. To do this, go to the Soloist menu | Edit Soloist Track | Record to Soloist Part. Band-in-a-Box^® will record to the Soloist part by default for the remainder of your Band-in-a-Box^® session. To switch back to recording to the Melody part, go to the Melody menu | Edit Melody Track | Record Melody.

• With Band-in-a-Box^® 2006 and higher, you can record more than one part/channel to the Soloist or Melody tracks. To do this, first make sure your Melody or Soloist track type is set to multi-channel, then record your part. When you have finished recording, you will get a dialog with a pull-down menu that will allow you to select which channel you want to place the recorded MIDI data on. Note that since Band-in-a-Box^®'s accompaniment tracks use channels 2-10, it is best to use channels 11-16 to avoid conflict, although if you will not be using the Band-in-Box arrangement this isn't an issue.

• If you don't want to hear the Band-in-a-Box^® generated style parts - ie, if you are only interested in hearing what you have on the Melody and Soloist tracks - you can do any one of the following:

  • Choose one of the blank styles from the StylePicker dialog (BLANK.STY (even 4/4), BLANK34.STY (even 3/4), BLANKSW.STY (swing 4/4), or BLANK3SW.STY (swing 3/4).

  • Disable the style by going to the Style menu and clicking on Style is enabled (this will de-selects it).

  • Rest the first chord in the chordsheet by entering the chord symbol followed by a period. For example, you could type "C." at bar 1. If there is more than one chord (if Band-in-a-Box^® interpreted the chords in your MIDI file), then you will need to copy the rest to the entire song using the Edit | Copy Rests menu command.

• When you import a MIDI file into Band-in-a-Box^® using File | Open MIDI file, the entire MIDI file is imported to the Melody track. If you would like, you can separate one or more channels to the Soloist track by using the Edit | Copy/Move Tracks menu item (this is also possible to do from the Sequencer Window in Band-in-a-Box^® 2006). Copying an individual channel to the Soloist track allows you to use the Notation Window to easily edit the notes on an individual channel.

• The Sequencer Window in Band-in-a-Box^® 2006 (and higher) is an easy way to change the patch and volume for any channel in an imported MIDI file. To open the Sequencer window, click the green [SEQ] button in the bottom Band-in-a-Box^® toolbar and select 'Sequencer on Melody track'. You can choose a new patch using each of the patch pull-down menus, and you can use the Edit [...] buttons to change the volume, re-channel, or move a channel to the Soloist track so that you can edit it separately.

• The Event List editor can be used to insert other controllers such as pan, reverb, and chorus. To open the event list window, click the [#] button in the Notation Window toolbar. Use 'Insert ... Control Change' to insert a reverb (# 91), chorus (#93), or pan (#10) controller. Make sure that you insert it on the correct channel. You can find out what channel each instrument is on in the Sequencer Window.

• The Piano Roll window in Band-in-a-Box^® 2005 and higher allows graphical editing of note timing, duration, and velocity, as well as precise and easy editing of controllers, Program Changes, Channel Aftertouch, Pitch Bends etc. It is similar to the type of MIDI editors found in many sequencer programs. You can edit/view each channel individually. Click on the Piano Roll button in the bottom toolbar or go to the Window menu | Piano Roll window. You can also graphically edit Note Velocity, Controllers, Program Changes, Channel Aftertouch, or Pitch Bends, and you can select specific channels to work on.

• To save your song as a MIDI (MID) file rather than a Band-in-a-Box^® song (MGU/SGU/MGX) file, click the [.MID] button on the main Band-in-a-Box^® toolbar.

• You may wish to investigate other ways to use MIDI files in Band-in-a-Box^®. Since Band-in-a-Box^®'s primary purpose is to be an intelligent accompaniment program, try using the Interpret Chords from MIDI File feature (File | Import Chords from MIDI File) to have Band-in-a-Box^® figure out the chords and melody in your MIDI file - then you can generate the accompaniment tracks using a Band-in-a-Box^® style. You can also use the Style Wizard (Style | Style Wizard) in Band-in-a-Box^® 12 and higher to have Band-in-a-Box^® generate a style based on your MIDI file. The Melody | Edit Melody Track | Import Melody from MIDI file option allows you to import part of a MIDI file (usually the melody) into your current Band-in-a-Box^® song.

155. Is there a way to get my songs to play in the order I want using the Jukebox?

There are a couple of ways you can do this. One way is to use the Favourite Songs dialog. To open this dialog, click the F button beside the Song button on the left-hand side of the main screen. Using this dialog, you can save and load sets of songs. When you press the JUKE button within the dialog, the jukebox will play all of the songs in the currently loaded set in the order that you added them.

Another way of doing this is to number your song filenames. If you play the Jukebox by pressing the Juke button on the main screen, it will play all of the songs in the folder you have selected in alphabetical order, provided you have the 'random order playback' setting unchecked. So, if your file names are mysong.mgu, anothersong.mgu, and firstsong.mgu, Band-in-a-Box^® would normally play anothersong.mgu first, followed by firstsong.mgu, and then mysong.mgu. You could change your filenames to 1-mysong.mgu, 2-firstsong.mgu, and 3-anothersong.mgu and Band-in-a-Box^® will then play them in that order. Note that you need to be careful once you get to 10, because 10 would actually come after 1 (not 9). There are many ways around this, for example you may wish to use letters instead of numbers.

156. What is the difference between line-based and note-based lyrics?

Band-in-a-Box^® allows you to use two different methods for lyric entry: Line-based and Note-based. Note-based lyric entry is a newer addition to the Band-in-a-Box^® feature set, and in most cases it is the best method to use. With note-based lyrics you can associate specific words or syllables with specific notes in the music, so your lyrics print out at the right spot. You can also adjust the font and size of the lyrics. These options aren't available with Line-based lyrics. You might want to use line-based lyrics if you do not have a Melody line (so there are no notes to associate the lyrics with) or if you aren't worried about how the lyrics look, and just want to use the fastest lyric entry method.

Line-based lyrics

In the Notation Window, find the space directly above where the chord symbols appear. To enter line-based lyrics, you simply click in this space, then type in the lyrics. Use the cursor down/up keys (or Enter key ) to advance to the next/previous line of lyrics. To print out the lyrics with your song, press the Print button to open the Print Options dialog and make sure that 'Lyrics above', 'Lyrics below', or 'Lyrics Separate' is selected in the pull-down box on the left side. This will print out the lyrics above or below the staff or on a separate page. The vertical position of the lyrics can be specified with the 'Lyrics Below by' setting.

Note-based lyrics

In the Notation Window, press Ctrl-L on your keyboard, or press the [L] (Lyrics) button in the toolbar. When you press the Lyrics Button, the Lyric Edit window opens up and the current note (or group of notes at the same time) are highlighted. Whatever you type into the Lyric Edit window will be placed under the currently highlighted note. To move to the next note, you can press enter or tab on your keyboard. To move to the previous note, you can use shift-tab. Note that a hyphen can be added at the end of syllables, and a backslash can be placed at the end of a phrase to indicate a line break. Note-based lyrics will print out as long as you have the 'Print Note-based Lyrics' setting in the Print Options dialog selected. You can customize the font and size of the lyrics by using the Font settings in the Notation Window Options dialog (OPT button). You can also control the vertical position of the lyrics by using the 'Lyric Position' setting in the Notation Window Options dialog.

157. I am unable to transpose my Melody track, even if I use the Transpose Melody Only menu option.

If your Melody is not transposing, whether you change the key of your song, or go to Melody | Edit Melody Track | Transpose Melody Only.., it could be because your melody notes are on channel 10 for some reason. Channel 10 is set to not transpose because this is the drum channel, and when drums are transposed they become entirely different drum sounds. Even if your melody doesn't sound like drums, the notes may still be on channel 10. This is because unless your Melody track type is set to 'multi-channel', Band-in-a-Box^® re-channels all Melody track data to the default Melody channel (usually channel 4) during playback. To check what channels your Melody notes are on, you can right-click on one of the notes in editable notation mode and select Edit Note, or look at the Event List.

One way of correcting the problem for your current song is to use a feature in the Piano Roll window (Band-in-a-Box^® 2005 and higher). Open the Piano Roll window, right-click anywhere, and select 're-channel all events to the track channel'. To avoid the problem in the future, open the Notation Window Options dialog, press the More button, and make sure that the 'inserted note default' is not set to channel 10. If you are recording from an external controller, check that it isn't set to send all MIDI data on channel 10 for some reason.

158. How do I use Native Instruments Bandstand with Band-in-a-Box^®?

Please click here to read our Bandstand tutorial, which explains how to use Bandstand with Band-in-a-Box^® and PowerTracks Pro Audio, and provides some troubleshooting tips.

159. Is there a way to have the tempo of a song increase automatically each time it repeats, or to have the tempo increase every few bars?

If you right-click on bar 1 of your song (or any bar that will be repeated) and select 'Bar Settings', you can enter a value in the '% change in tempo' field. Then, every time Band-in-a-Box^® plays that bar, the tempo will increase by that percentage. So, for example, if you have a 4 bar song that repeats 40 times, and you've got a 5% tempo increase at bar 1, then there will be a 5% tempo increase every 4 bars for 40 repeats. You can insert tempo changes at any bar you want by right-clicking on the bar and selecting Bar Settings, or by using the keyboard shortcut F5 at that bar.

Our program Metronome Pro has a feature that you might also find useful. In this program, you can have the tempo increase by a certain amount after a specified number of bars. The program can use MIDI files in place of the metronome click. To set this up:

1. Save your song as a MIDI file to disk by pressing the .MID button. Save the file in the C:\Program Files\Metronome Pro\MIDI folder.

2. In Metronome Pro, place a checkmark in the "Tempo Increases by..." setting, and the 'Use MIDI file' setting.

3. In the 'Use MIDI File' pull-down menu, choose the 'Browse and Add' option and open the MIDI file that you saved from Band-in-a-Box^®.

160. When recording from an external keyboard, some notes are not being recorded, are dropping out, or are being sustained when they shouldn't be.

This might occur if the connection between Band-in-a-Box^® and your external keyboard is being lost, such that note-on or note-off messages are occasionally not being received.

Here are some things to try:

• Close Band-in-a-Box^® and delete the configuration settings file "intrface.bbw" from the C:\bb folder. You may want to make a backup of this file first, as this will return many global Band-in-a-Box^® setting to their factory defaults. Deleting the file will cause Band-in-a-Box^® to re-connect to your MIDI drivers, and eliminate the possibility that this file was corrupt.

• Make sure that your MIDI cables and USB cable (if applicable) are firmly connected. If you are using a USB hub, try connecting the USB cable directly to a USB port on your computer.

• Reinstall the drivers for your MIDI interface, using the latest drivers available from the interface manufacturer's website.

• Close other programs while using Band-in-a-Box^®. There may be a conflict with another program running on your computer.

• If the problem persists, try a different MIDI interface if possible.

161. When I try to install the program I get a message that the "setup files are corrupted".

This normally occurs with downloaded programs. This error may occur when double-clicking on an installer that was downloaded from our site. It means that the setup file is the wrong size or the file failed a CRC (cyclic redundancy check). Most likely something went wrong when you were downloading the file, for example your internet connection may have been lost. Delete the file that you downloaded and try the download again. If you are still having the problem, or if this is occurring with a program that you have on CD, reboot your computer. Also, see our Sales FAQ topic 34 for help troubleshooting download problems.

162. The tempo changes in my MIDI file disappear when I import it into Band-in-a-Box^®.

This is intentional, because Band-in-a-Box^® songs and styles all play at a constant tempo. There are a few ways that MIDI files can be used with Band-in-a-Box^®, and most require that there not be any tempo changes, such as when you import the melody from a MIDI file to the Melody track, or interpret the chords from a MIDI file using File | Import chords from MIDI file. While Band-in-a-Box^® can be used as a MIDI sequencer to some extent, if you are working with files that require tempo changes, we recommend using our dedicated MIDI sequencer PowerTracks Pro Audio. Note that in Band-in-a-Box^® you can insert tempo changes at any bar by using the 'Edit Settings for Current Bar' dialog, however you can't have a gradual tempo change over a range of bars unless you reduce/increase the tempo bar-by-bar.

163. Why do some of my rests disappear from the notation window when I exit editable notation mode?

Band-in-a-Box^® is configured by default to avoid displaying unusual or complex notation in regular (non-editable) notation mode. The main setting for this can be toggled off by unchecking the 'clean' checkbox in the Notation Window toolbar. Two other settings in the Notation Window Options dialog also affect whether a rest will be displayed at a particular location. Miminize Rests: If eighth notes are displayed as sixteenth notes separated by sixteenth rests in editable mode (because you recorded them staccato), this feature will remove the rests and display the notes as eighth notes (without rests) in regular notation mode. Tick offset: This setting allows you to display the notes ahead or behind of the actual location of the notes. For example, the notation of Jazz swing music will often be improved by a tick offset setting of about -5 ticks (120 ticks = 1 quarter note), because jazz music is typically played a little after the beat. If you are inserting notes manually rather than recording them, you might want to set this to 0.

The settings mentioned above do not affect how the music sounds, only how it is displayed.

164. There is no sound when I try to preview my audio harmonies in the TC-Helicon window.

The preview feature in the TC-Helicon audio harmony plugin uses the sound device selected in your Windows operating system settings. Go to the Control Panel | Sounds and Audio Devices | Audio tab, and make sure the appropriate audio driver is selected for sound playback. For example, it's possible that you had selected a different sound card there than you had selected in the Band-in-a-Box^® program in Opt. | Preferences | Audio | Drivers, and you only have speakers connected to the one sound card. That explains why you might hear audio in Band-in-a-Box^®, but not in the TC-Helicon plugin.

165. When I open the program, I get a message that the Microsoft GS Wavetable is "...installed properly but currently in use by another program".

This is most likely another symptom of the problem discussed here.

166. "Version mismatch" error when opening the program.

You can resolve this problem by reinstalling the DirectX Plugins included with your latest version of Band-in-a-Box^®. For example, if you have Band-in-a-Box^® 2006, look in the bb folder and locate the file "bb2006_dx_plug_1_3_4.exe". Double-click on this file and follow the on-screen prompts to reinstall the plugins. Alternatively, you could reinstall the Band-in-a-Box^® program and this will run the DirectX plugin installer automatically.

167. When I use the VSC-DXi in Band-in-a-Box^® or PowerTracks Pro Audio, I sometimes get an error message after I close the program.

One of the following error messages may appear after you exit Band-in-a-Box^® or PowerTracks:

• Windows XP: This program has encountered a problem and needs to close.

• Windows Vista: Band-in-a-Box^® (or PowerTracks) application has stopped working.

This error is most likely to occur if you are using the VSC-DXi, and you view the VSC-DXi control panel at some point during your Band-in-a-Box^® or PowerTracks session. It is a very sporadic error that only occurs on some computers. There isn't a known solution, however you can safely ignore the error message.

168. When using the VSC-DXi, the Audio track works, but there is no sound from the MIDI tracks.

First, check that your MIDI track volumes (Bass, Piano, etc.) are not set to 0. If you find that the track volumes are inexplicably set to 0, you should:

1. Close Band-in-a-Box^® and delete the file 'MySetup.dk' from your bb folder.
2. Download and install the latest update patch for Band-in-a-Box^®.

If your tracks are not muted and the volumes are turned up, open the VSC-DXi panel by clicking on the DXi Synth button in the main Band-in-a-Box^® toolbar. Try resetting the VSC-DXi by doing the following:

1. Click the [Reset] button in the VSC-DXi control panel.
2. Click the [Setup] button.
3. Select the Performance tab and make sure that the Volume is turned up and the effects boxes are checked.
4. In the Receive Events tab, click the [Receive All] button.
5. Press OK, close the DirectX Plugins window and try playing a song.

If that doesn't help, and you think the problem is specific to the VSC-DXi, uninstall and reinstall the VSC-DXi. Make sure that you have Band-in-a-Box^® closed when you do this.

If you get the error message "failed create property pages" when you click on the [Setup] button in the VSC-DXi control panel, the VSC-DXi is not installed properly. You will need to uninstall and reinstall the VSC-DXi. Make sure that Band-in-a-Box^® is closed when you do this.

If you are still having trouble, or the problem doesn't seem to be specific to the VSC-Dxi, you may want to check our complete "No Sound" tutorial.

169. When using the ForteDXi, the sound cuts out every few seconds.

This means that you have had the trial version of the ForteDXi installed on your computer for over 30 days. If you want to continue to use the ForteDXi without this restriction, you will need to purchase the full version. After you have placed your order, you will receive a registration code via email. To convert the ForteDXi into the unlimited version, right-click in the ForteDxi control panel and select 'Enter Registration Code'.

170. The help file doesn't work on Windows Vista.

Symptoms: When you try to open the help file, you might get a message similar to this: "The Help for this program was created in Windows Help format, which was used in previous versions of Windows and it is not supported in Windows Vista."

Cause: In Windows Vista, Microsoft has dropped support for .HLP help files, which use the program WINHLP32.EXE. This problem is not specific to PG Music software.

Solution: Band-in-a-Box^® 2007 (and higher), PowerTracks Pro Audio 12 (and higher), and the latest builds of other PG Music products have help files that are supported under Windows Vista. Also, if you have Band-in-a-Box^® 2006, you can download a free update patch to resolve the problem. If you have an earlier version of Band-in-a-Box^® or PowerTracks, you could purchase an upgrade. If you have another PG Music product, install the most recent update patch available for that product.

There is also a Microsoft update that will allow you to view most .hlp files on Windows Vista. Click here for more information about this.

171. How do I install update patches for Band-in-a-Box^®?

Update patches for Band-in-a-Box^® can be downloaded from https://www.pgmusic.com/support_windowsupdates.htm.

1. Download the file and 'Save to disk'. You can save the file to your desktop or to your preferred folder for saving downloads.

2. Make sure Band-in-a-Box^® is closed, otherwise the update will not work.

3. Double-click on the downloaded file and follow the prompts. When you get to the screen asking you to select the destination directory, make sure that your Band-in-a-Box^® folder is selected. This is usually C:\BB, although it's possible that you have Band-in-a-Box^® installed somewhere else. Continue to follow the prompts.

After installing the update patch, launch Band-in-a-Box^® and go to Help | About Band-in-a-Box^® to make sure that it installed properly.