Chapter 2: Summary of New Features

We’ve added over 50 new features to Band-in-a-Box 2022, including...

All Tracks are equal
Now all the 24 tracks (8 main tracks and 16 Utility tracks) have the same capabilities. You can generate RealTracks, RealDrums, Loops, etc. on any track. Styles can be made using up to 24 tracks. You can edit audio on any track, not just the Audio and Utility tracks.

Playable RealTracks
This cool feature allows you to add MIDI notes (via the Piano Roll window) to the same RealTrack that is playing. And you will then hear that MIDI track playing, in most cases using a MIDI sound created from the RealTracks recording session. This means you can get the RealTracks to play the notes you want at key parts of the performance, either augmenting or replacing what the RealTracks is playing, for the section you want to change.

MultiRiff
Major New Feature! This is a custom, interactive regeneration of section of RealTracks on any tracks, allowing a “multi-riff” like selection from up to 20 candidates that you could choose from. Audition RealTracks riffs for a section of a track, and select the one you want, either replacing or merging with existing RealTracks audio. And the saved files are tiny (no WAV files involved). Now you can have fun choosing what gets played for the RealTracks, and merge, replace or add your selected riffs to your tracks. This can add life to old tracks, by improving sections that had problems to a better riff.

MicroChords (Multiple Chords per Beat)
The MicroChords feature allows you to enter up to 4 chords per beat. Previously, Band-in-a-Box was limited to one chord per beat, but now you can have chords on 8th notes, triplets, or 16ths notes. This is especially useful on slow songs. You can select which tracks will play the MicroChords, allowing some tracks to play fast moving chord progressions and others to play the main chords.

Motifs
The Motifs feature allows selected tracks to play specific rhythms without changing the chords. For example, you might want the guitar and bass to play a specific 16th rhythm in a funk song, while the piano and sax stick with the normal feel.

Volume Automation
This feature allows you to have volume automation on any track to achieve volume changes like fades, crescendos or other node-based volume automation

Drum Stems
This has been a popular request from users for many years. Now, over 50 of the RealDrums have drum stems, which are recordings of all the microphones used (typically 7-15 microphones). This allows producers to mix the drums as they like..

Track Settings and Actions
There is a convenient “one-stop-shopping” dialog where you can select RealTracks, Loops, MIDI SuperTracks, etc., set volume/ reverb/panning/tone, mute, solo, freeze, save as Performance Tracks, and do many other things for all 24 tracks.

Remix Full Vocal Songs
We’ve made over 50 original songs (Pop, R&B, and Modern Country) with high-quality, great sounding vocals, harmonies and Band-in-a-Box arrangements. Use these to remix new arrangements, starting from these high-quality, great sounding tracks.

Install Manager - One-Click to Download and Install
You can download and install the entire package of your order with the new one-click Install Manager. This is a much simpler alternative to manually downloading and installing all the files individually that are listed on the “My Products” page in your account. This is particularly useful for “download-only” (e-delivery) versions of the Band-in-a-Box Pro, Mega, and UltraPAK, since there can be 100 GB of files to download and install.

New Songs Default to 1 Chorus
Previously, new songs defaulted to 3 choruses, but now, they default to 1 chorus.

Settable Default Length and Choruses for New Song
You can now change the default length and choruses. For example, you can have new songs default to 64 bars with 1 chorus, 24 bars with 3 choruses, etc.

New Column and Option in RealDrums Picker
The list now has the Stems columns, which tells you the number of microphones used for recording.
The Stems option allows you to load drum stems to separate tracks or load them all to the same track.

StylePicker Picker Enhanced
Additional row has been added to the mixer for Utility tracks, so you can see which instruments are included in the style and control settings for those tracks within the window.
The Other filter button has more menu items.
The Set # column shows HalfDouble for Half-time/Double-time variation styles.
We've added more user categories (e.g., Xtra12 All Styles, XPro Styles, Style Demoss with Vocals, etc.).

Audio Edit Window Enhanced
The volume automation mode has been added. This allows you to achieve volume changes like fades, crescendos or other node-based volume automation
The marker mode selector has been replaced by three intuitive buttons.

RealTracks Medley Dialog Improved
The dialog now opens instantly.
The arrow buttons have been removed. You can now just click on the list to select RealTracks.

Notation Enhancements
You can now insert/remove a trill (tr symbol) for a note with the Notation window right-click menu.
Band-in-a-Box can read trills from XML files.
When loading an XML file from Guitar Pro that has two clefs of guitar notation on 1 part, Band-in-a-Box will correctly load the tab clef and ignore the redundant other clef.
You can now import an XML file to the current song. Previously, you could open it as a new song but not import it.

New Hotkeys
m <Enter> opens the Set MicroChords dialog.
t <Enter> opens the Track Settings and Actions dialog.
F6 now opens the Set MicroChords dialog. Previously, this key opened the Save MIDI File dialog.
F7 now opens the Track Settings dialog. Previously, this key let you open a MIDI file.
F8 now opens the MultiRiff RealTracks dialog. Previously, this key opened the Jukebox Options dialog.

Other Features including Features added since 2021 Release
RealDrums supports tuning certain RealDrums like TablaCoolSw16_75 so that they are playing their drone notes on a good note (root or 5th of the key).
Loops are enhanced for slash notes and chords following.
The Mixer window shows a waveform button for an audio track and a stems button for a drum stem track.
The Piano Roll window now has an option to draw notes with a faded color based on their velocity.
In the Bar Settings dialog, the bar number drop-down now shows all 255 bars and shows letters for part markers. There are also forward and back buttons to scroll through bars so you don’t need to use the drop-down menu.
A new setting is added to the Audio Settings dialog for choosing input channel(s)
The About dialog shows the file path of the currently running application.
The Song Form Maker is now accessible from the Edit menu.
The Feature Browser is updated with the new features.
The Feature Browser menu item is added to the Help menu.
The “Save in current song directory” option is added to the Render to Audio File dialog.
The “Include Mix” option is added to the Render to Audio File dialog.
The Choose a Plugin dialog shows info (the file path and unique identifier) for listed plugins. This is useful for troubleshooting plugin installation problems, duplicates, etc.
The [Add Plugins] button is added to the The Choose a Plugin dialog.
The Set Time Signature dialog has a button to set the range to the whole song.
Notation color settings are added to the Display Options dialog.
The Note Colors option in the Notation Window Options dialog now show Scriabin colors for all tracks (except drums)
The StylePicker shows better set names for disks like XPro 1, Loops-with-Styles (LoopsPAK1, LoopsPAK2), and MultiStyles PAK 1.
In StylePicker, searching with the text filter now finds style set names (e.g., Xpro, Xtra, LoopsPAK, RT 373, etc.)
The “Set all tracks to this” option is added to the MIDI Import File dialog.
The AboutSongsFolder.txt is added to the C:\bb\Songs folder. This briefly describes the purpose of the songs folder.
The confirmation message that shows after batch-saving the .txt files is improved.

… and more!