Owners should be able to program arrangers to do the same (You will need to put some work in) providing the style engine does not limit the number of bars.

Enjoy

Bill

Hi Bill,
brilliant demo. Only had a chance to watch the first 10 min so far.

Definitely yes, from what I’ve seen to date, would have been doable in a Korg
( not sure about my psr , haven’t checked max no of bars allowable per variation).

Korg, 32 bars allowable per variation ( as well as fill /intro/ending).
I tried it with a couple Band in a Box styles. The style morphs throughout a song, so I thought I’d give it a try.
Basically the idea worked, but biab styles use phrases that don’t really lend themselves that well to an arranger style, so by the time I eliminated the ones that wouldn’t work, it left a fairly bland style.

Thinking though, if someone started with a fairly basic style the core bits, drums bass, piano or guitar rhythm, lengthened it to 16 or 32 bars, the addition of the twiddly bits like the brass , horns etc could make a style more realistic instead of being so repetitive. ( approx 6 min into video).

I’m going to try and watch the rest shortly.

Great find , thank you Bill.

Hi,
did some further checking, my sx can do 32 bar variations, also 32 bar Intro/ Ending, but only 1 bar fills.

Best part, in style creator, one can actually lengthen an existing style variation ( intro/ending) from there, style can be exported to Jørgen’s style split software, the the midifile part can be loaded into a pc sequencer, edited, saved, and one has a new style.

Haven’t tried it yet with 32 bar style, but I have edited a couple of other styles usin* Jørgens software and xg works sequencer.

So thanks Bill.
Haven’t watched video 2 yet.

Less repetitive styles have always been a Lowrey feature starting in the early 80s with the MX1 that chose (I think randomly) from several different patterns that also differed for the dominant, subdominant, 7th. This is explained in the MX1 patent. My old Lowrey Genius G300 also chose randomly from several different patterns. I think that for patterns to be generic, that they cannot be too long; but one can program several similar (but not identical) shorter patterns and choose randomly from them. I cannot imagine that introducing this requires great changes to the style engine. The hard part is writing 3-4 patterns for each variation A-D for Yamaha and Korg arrangers. But in the end having - for example - one generic Miller Big Band - with several randomly chosen, similar patterns for each variation, is better than having several separate styles of one type. Thus, the many-pattern per variation style can be put together (by the style programmers) from various styles that already exist. The only novel aspect is allowing each variation to have a several possible patterns and choosing them randomly. The is, I think, what Lowrey does with the styles (but not the FX or fill bar); but note that they do not have 4 variations per style, only 2.

Keep safe.

Sam

Band-In-A-Box (BIAB) is the ideal example of less repetitive Styles.

Bill, thank you, the video brought out things that I have been trying to say, but a more elegant way.

In my explanations I have left out one important thought, people who have played in a band with other musicians are more likely to do what the video pointed. Start playing at the right time, people like Don, Tony and Donny do that without thinking. They are also more aware of what the style is doing.

Controlling the style:
Helpers in order of importance. Registrations, mixer, and the pads.

I picture Tony with his band; he listened for a lead-in for him to sing, or solo. (like listening to the style) He did not want all the same instruments to keep playing, they would have been in his way.

There is more, much more, so thanks to Bill we may listen to styles differently now.
John C.

PS, one of the reasons organs have lost their popularity was demonstrated in the video; playing big band music with organ sounds. Wersi demo people never did that

So, what if we take a MIDI file of a song, and make a style out of it....that is more what I heard on the Lowrey demo?

That's waht I have wanted all along as I don't sing...I think if you sing (well) it is fine the way it is as the variance is the singer, and that's what people hear mostly...However if it is a n instrumental performance a style most of the time falls short.

I'm not sure I described that very well??

The problem in converting a Midi file is that it is fixed, whereas a style can change depending on the chord played. I.E: The backing will be different due to more loops are available for the style to choose from, (A midi file is just one big loop with no variations even if converted to a style) as an example: the intro of a style will be different depending on the chord played, whereas if it is a converted midi file it will be the same no matter what chord you play.

Bill

Korg solves this really well, converting midi files to styles,...

That’s not new, but when you play a 7th chord instead of a major chord does the pattern change, or if you play the intro is it a different pattern depending on whether you play a major or minor chord, as this is how a dedicated programmed style works.

Bill

Hi Bachus
I didn’t find the korg convertor particularly good.
Really depends on the midi file that one wanted to convert.
Didn’t do a great job on the ones I tried, yet other people did have success.

A song style I don’t think will ever sound as good as an original midi file.

That's OK, I want it for just the ONE song, I'll use another one for the next song.

Hi John,
with the way some of the demonstrated styles have been programmed, you have no choice but to start at the right time, or your whole song will be out of whack.

They appear to be song specific? or , all but.

Think most arranger players want styles that are more generic, heard some people complaining that the sx styles were geared too much towards particular songs.

Maybe longer patterns only work for specific song styles.

Anyway Bill,
been a very interesting watch.

May give my Band in a Box another try, though must admit I’d sooner be experimenting for a Korg rather than my Yammie.

Think I know where I went wrong with my 32 bar patterns, when I tried them for the korg a couple of years back,
Should have had a core set rhythm , bass, drums, piano or guitar and used the fancy short fill ins at set intervals ie every 2 bars or 4 bars or 8 bars whatever happens to work for some specific songs.
I shouldn’t have let biab come up with its own random patterns, which probly works fine when there are chord changes involved for a biab song, but doesn’t work all that well with the single chord an arranger requires for a style.

Anyway something to think about.

Rikki and friends, we can go the tech. route, or we search and search for the right style – and they are good things. People who are having difficulties in life normally look outside themselves for an answer. It is the same for this topic.

Tech and style search, although they are good things, account for 35% of sounding good. Imagination (self) is what is needed to complete your work/sound; and it is normally the last place we look.

What can I do with the style I am using? With my registrations, with my mixer. Leaving a style, then coming back to it? Can I select the ending, and then come back to the style? Am I listening to the original song and using the above to create what I want? The best part of this method is, when I learn it, and I can apply the same thinking to the next song -- I the next 100 songs will sound much better – it will sound like me.

Use all you have in you, John C.

PS, Dave is a perfect example of things out of the box. His set up is him, and his performance is him. Do I like how he sounds, well, I thought I would send him a PM message about that.
(he he he he ha ha ha oooops!)

That depends on the conversion... if the orriginal song has 7th chords orwhatever in it.. chances are the style will support it..

The results are very dependant on themidi file...

I been browsing my Genos today for advanced styles as described in the firstvideo..

I found all on board styles are so generic in nature that it doesn’t matter much when you start playing..

However user created songstyles is a different story..

I had a lot of fun experimenting with them..

Hi John,
For me it’s more of a case of fascination with the instrument ie how far one can go with the styles.
The onboard styles , quite frankly ,are never programmed to their full potential.
Most of the psr onboard styles I’ve used are only 2 to 4 bar loops.
Supposedly they can be up to 32 bars.
Maybe there is some sort of memory constraint that doesn’t actually allow larger files with 32 bars, that I don’t know, haven’t tried experimenting, yet.

Band in a Box and I , go way back to when it was first released, back in the 90’s.
I’ve mainly used it as a source for potential styles for an arranger keyboard, be it my Technics, Roland , Yamaha, Ketron and Korgs. Been thru the lot over the years.
I’ve always found ways of converting styles from one brand keyboard to another, (and I don’t mean using EMC style works) but getting a good style from BIAB has been elusive, so every now and again I drag it out and try some new ideas.
Time wasting exercise, for sure, but I’ve always had plenty of it . Haha