Members KaraUkey Posted January 20, 2020 Members Share Posted January 20, 2020 I use backing tracks with up to 15 channels that you can mute. I use the free vanBasco midi player with windows 10 on my tablet. I have been developing the backing tracks with chords and lyrics for several years and now have around 1000 tracks in total. The format of the backing tracks can also be used with SongBook where you can set the pace that the music scrolls at for those times when you don't want to use backing tracks. Henk Brent http://www.karaukey.com Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Bob Dey Posted January 27, 2020 Members Share Posted January 27, 2020 On 1/13/2020 at 6:24 PM, PaulSmith01 said: Are Karaoke version files any good for playing along an acoustic and singing. Thinking of buying and using but not sure of the quality through a pa? During the last 1 1/2 years I've purchased about 20 custom tracks from Karaoke Version. The chick singer I've been working with wants background vocals on the tracks we use. My preference is tracks that don't have lead guitar (guitar is my job!). With the custom track option ($3 per song) you can download as many times as you want and make each download a different mix. Sometimes I download each track individually and load them all into my DAW (DP) so I can create a mix that's exactly what I want! Their tracks certainly aren't perfect and some are done much better than others. I had to eliminate weird sound effects in one song. The bass tone sucked in another song I downloaded. I did what I could in DP (EQing mostly) to get it to sound better. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members ggm1960 Posted March 19, 2020 Members Share Posted March 19, 2020 On 11/23/2019 at 5:55 PM, Notes_Norton said: What I like about MIDI over audio is that they are thousands of times more flexible via editing. There is just so much you can do with MIDI Notes This indeed! So easy to edit and tweak. Controllers are awesome, fade in/out with 11, volume with 7, pan, change/scale velocity, quantize, "humanize", cannibalize, patch changes if necessary, sysex for changing modes on gear. Run tracks to your old keyboard/rack synth, your new sound generator, or both. Run tracks to computer plug-ins like Superior Drummer. You can control external effects, guitar processors, lighting, etc.. It's an OCD rabbit hole for musicians! Just be sure to have a start/stop foot switch in case the human screws up hahha! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Notes_Norton Posted March 20, 2020 Members Share Posted March 20, 2020 Yes, a good MIDI module will have tone about 95-99% as good as the "real" instrument and being thousands of times more editable it can in the long run produce much more expressive and individualized music. I can put the background vocals on a synth patch and don't sound like I'm a Karaoke band. I can extend solos, put songs in the best key for the vocalist exaggerate the groove, and do a mix for live performance instead of that karoke mix that is more for recorded performance. I can extend the length of songs that I know the dancers will want to dance to, I can change the sound of the instruments used for more punch in a live situation, and do a thousand other things that can't be done with pre-recorded tracks. But that's my way. There is more than one right way to make music. Notes Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members rockkdog13 Posted March 29, 2020 Members Share Posted March 29, 2020 Have any of you used/performed with the Digitech "Trio" pedal live? Did it work for you? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderators daddymack Posted March 31, 2020 Moderators Share Posted March 31, 2020 A friend bought the Trio +, thinking it would be a nice addition to his solo act, but the drums are not easily 'controllable', and the bass lines can be, in a word bizarre...or annoying. He uses it at home for practice, though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Perceval Burkett Posted April 28, 2020 Members Share Posted April 28, 2020 What about loopers? If I already have an appropriate drum pattern programed, I can do a lot with a guitar and a simple looper pedal. Has anybody tried to Boss 505 or 300? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members ggm1960 Posted April 29, 2020 Members Share Posted April 29, 2020 14 hours ago, Perceval Burkett said: What about loopers? If I already have an appropriate drum pattern programed, I can do a lot with a guitar and a simple looper pedal. Has anybody tried to Boss 505 or 300? My wife has a Boss VE-500 vocal unit but I doubt we'll ever use any of the looping options on it. There are some people out there doing amazing things with loopers, I'm never going to be one of them. It actually looks like a lot of work with some serious tap dancing and I'm certain the top guys know those user manuals backwards and forwards. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderators daddymack Posted April 30, 2020 Moderators Share Posted April 30, 2020 I did a mass research on loopers a few years ago*, and based on that, I have a Boss 300...great looper, but way overkill for what I was doing at the time....I'm using a TC 'Ditto' now live...simple...clean. There are so many on the market now, I would be spending months trying to get through all of them. * it should be in our archives here Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members ChrisBell Posted September 28, 2020 Members Share Posted September 28, 2020 I play solo guitar and use custom midi tracks, played through a midi player app via my ipad on stage into an analog mixer, (with guitars, vocals and a harp mic), then out to twin Bose L1B2 towers. I've tried the Karaoke Version product. Their tracks all sound bland and muddy through my system. I can identify Karaoke Version tracks a mile away by that alone. Listening to mediocre solo "guitar" acts using those tracks with prerecorded guitars in their mix, not to mention the background vocals exasperates me. At that point, it's getting into karaoke territory, imo. Midi does a lot of things very well, but not guitars and vocal sounds. They are completely eliminated via hard coding on my midi tracks that are commercially acquired. Numerous other hard coding changes have to be made for them to be useful to me in live performance. Karaoke Version's "customization" options are very simplistic and not precise. They don't allow for the manipulation of sounds within the percussion track, custom count-ins, the creation of alternate endings, shortening or lengthening songs, other timing tricks, linking 2-3 songs together to eliminate awkward time between songs when on stage, and in a duo scenario with a good lead guitar player, extending solos from, for example, 12 to 24 or more bars, (but not on the fly). I have 3 or more versions of some songs, including 3, 4 or 5 minute versions of Mustang Sally that depend on whether I'm playing with a lead guitar player and how much "love" was placed in the tip jar for the request. It's a learning curve to figure out how to program quality midi tracks, but its been worth the effort. The best I can say for Karaoke Version MP3 tracks is that they are cheap, great for people starting out and better than actual Karaoke tracks recorded from Youtube that I've seen some acts attempt to use in a live show. Cringeworthy! Though based in Canada, I played about 130 shows in 5 countries in 2019, and 3 countries in 2020 before March rolled around.... It's taken quite some time to perfect the combination of software, processing systems, stage hardware, pedals and other bits and pieces to get a system that is bulletproof and portable for international travels. That being said, I'm always experimenting with upgrades, but increasingly, I've found that what I have simply works and delivers very impressive sound quality. I draw from a rotation of about 400 tracks, with roughly 36 per three set show. When it comes to using tracks, there's really no substitute for long hours of programming and practice. It's not as easy as it looks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Notes_Norton Posted September 28, 2020 Members Share Posted September 28, 2020 13 hours ago, ChrisBell said: <...snip...> When it comes to using tracks, there's really no substitute for long hours of programming and practice. It's not as easy as it looks. +1 MIDI sequencing is like learning another musical instrument. And often another musical instrument for each patch. What will this patch do? What won't this patch do? Playing the parts into the sequencer takes time too. Like learning any instrument, the more you do it, the better you get at it. I've never found any that I've purchased to be good enough for me. The few MIDI files I've bought took so much work to get them the way I want them, it saved no time at all from starting from scratch. That's why I make my own backing tracks. Insights and incites by Notes Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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