Starise

You have that guitar sound down in spades. This is pro release material. Sounds like it could either go straight to master or be the master. Nice work!

I don't know how you can stick with a project for so long and not get frustrated with the progress causing me to think you are probably one of those methodical thorough types who checks and double checks everything twice. This is actually a great quality to have and shows here in this work. The only thing that bothered me about the mix was the violin didn't seem to be coming out enough. Congrats on this!

Excellent, especially for such a fast comp. I enjoyed listening to it. I have a weakness for the flute. One of my favorite instruments.

@Lynn WilsonThanks for those words . I wrote this song for a competition. I'm not sure how it will place. I have a lot of respect for anyone mixing pop/rock. Seems to take more effort for me than simple acoustic tunes. I made some further changes to the vox. It isn't a chart topper but yeah, I'll keep it around and thanks again. @Kevin Walsh I hear you on this. I made some timing adjustments to the vox in relation to the music. Thanks!

Sorry for the confusion. I intended to have this thread to address experiences. Q&A might not have been the best title, though it is a Q&A of sorts. The motive mainly came from the overall reluctance of some Cakewalk users, including myself to use the BL app. I finally decided to jump in and give it a shot. I wanted to know who might have more experience and possibly offer any advice on the best ways to use it. The "Q" was me asking some questions above. The "A"- I have a few answers so far. Not many yet. I had hoped there were others who might have advice. I hate to be painfully honest because I like what Meng has done with Cakewalk. Is it really worth the effort to use the BL app for you ? If so why and how have you been using it? I'm not completely sold on the concept because I'm not sure I totally understand it yet. If the idea is to upload stems for the fun of it, that might be fun occasionally. If that's the primary use or purpose of the app I'm likely not a full time user unless there's some kind of a return for my efforts.

Sale I picked up the Lakeside Pipe organ for 29.00! Check it out.

Isn't anyone here using Bandlab?🙄

Thank you C2. I seen an answer from Tracey on the VI forum. Apparently I must have done something wrong. I'm not sure what. I didn't have anything locked. Could have been the NI app acting up temporarily . It was the holidays and servers were likely overloaded with users doing one thing or another. I made second attempt on my laptop today and everything went well. Sorry for that scare, yeah go for it man. A great value IMO. No it isn't Spitfire, however this library has been used convincingly on pro projects by big names successfully.

Thanks Bob for that info on Biab. I can see the advantage in midi construction over audio work and why you choose to go that route. DAW makers have made great strides in recent years adding the ability to stretch audio without changing the pitch. Lots of cool midi tools now too.For all practical purposes any DAW that can make midi and audio loops should be able to do a similar thing to Biab. I can understand the benefit of working in a medium we are familiar with, and probably why you like Biab as your go to. Biab has advanced chord recognition/construction. A few of the old time Cakewalk users were or are making extensive use of Biab in their studios. One in particular, anyone remember Herb? Was using it big time in country music. I have been impressed with the quality achieved using Biab on some mixes I've heard. As you say, there are some limitations to the audio loops. I have been increasingly using backing tracks at my church. Mostly because we don't have enough people to do everything sometimes. I've been kinda lazy because I buy the multitracks and use them with an iPad. I keep telling myself I should simply make them on my own, because frankly much of the time the bought tracks need an edit or two. Too much time between parts occasionally, or in all the wrong keys. Usually way too high. And sometimes, just bad compositions. If it happens to be a popular cover, the studio sends the exact tracks from the master. This can sound very professional, however it can be a 5 minute track with lots of instrumental fill in. That works great when listening. Not so good when people are standing in participation waiting for the next verse. I've tried all kinds of things in the past Yamaha style files and keyboard backup. Not real enough for me. Sounded like, well...............a keyboard playing cheap sampled backing parts. I seem to have no trouble making songs in a DAW. The process is somehow different for me when attempting to make something others will participate in. in making the right mood for it and in trying to get it to sound like something that doesn't stick out in a cheesy way and is relevant for them.

Best wishes to you you Noel and the rest of the Cakewalk/Bandlab team in 2019. The future looks bright!

I have been around Cakewalk products for a long time and mostly used SoundCloud and YouTube as my main online exposure /storage mediums. I am posting this thread as a way to bring us new players in Bandlab up to speed. Also please send me links to the Cakewalk crowd on BL. I recently uploaded my first tune to Bandlab here- A Man I Cannot Be though I was involved with a stem kind of thing a few months back. Since then I've never really figured it all out completely. Almost seems too simple on the surface, but when you get into the stems it then gets a bit confusing. One thing you might want to know that I have found out is BL only allows 12 individual tracks to be uploaded. My song was 15 tracks so no go. My intention was to export the individual tracks and see where it went. A few annoyances I encountered while using BandLab, Within 5 minutes of my upload I had a post from someone who wanted to sell me loops. It was the only post I had. Secondly- When I launch the BL app it ALWAYS tells me there is an update for the app. I have clicked my win 10 setup to download. Launched again and get the same message. Same thing is happening with CbB in the BL app. I am up to date, however I get a reminder to try the latest version of CbB. Are you using BL for finished tunes or as a way to collaborate? BL seems to be both things, however my initial hunch is it's more about open uncontrolled collaboration which leads to the next question. Can I control who collaborates with me? When I was involved in the my BL experiments a few months back I didn't know what it was and I unknowingly put a tune up. That tune came back with someone's ideas ion it which frankly were horrible. I mean, I don't expect perfection from a work in progress. I get there will be rough tracks and all of that. This was really bad, like someone took a child's tape recorder and sang off key into it, then added it to my track. This didn't give me a very favorable impression of the BL experience overall. What have your experiences been? Is there anything you could share which would make the BL experience better for those who are at least intermediate at mixing and playing?

I bought this. I think it will fill the void in my sound libraries. I played with it for maybe an hour and so far I am impressed at the realistic articulations. I wasn't ready to invest heavily in expensive sound libraries since I don't compose a lot of those larger productions. Having said that, this library combined with the libraries I already won covers many of those bases. I have a question though. Maybe I falsely assumed you could load Armadeus on two computers using one license. Unfortunately I found out the hard way it won't register through NI on my laptop. Ironic that NI Kontakt CAN be used on two computers under one license but some 3rd party libraries can't. I'm not buying another copy of Armadeus and I hope they will reconsider letting the user have it on two machines. Did I miss something? Can I somehow use it on two computers. This would make a killer lightweight thing to take out in the laptop.

Thanks for this info. I see the sale is still on.

@Todskins, @Starship Krupa Thanks for your thoughts on Sibleus. I will be sure to stay away from that one. Lots of composers are using it so I figured it might be ok. When making notation I use midi played in with few corrections. No piano roll input. This is easiest for the way I like to work. I still find myself going back to CbB in almost every project I make. I had time off over the holiday so I decided to familiarize myself better with Ableton. I am impressed with the way you can put things together in it so fast and they all lock together in perfect time. It's more like two DAWs really. Arranger view makes it easy to navigate to the sounds you need or make loops with a midi keyboard on the fly. Arrangement is drag and drop. One you have an arrangement arm all tracks and hit record. This is where the magic happens. You then record everything to the tracks view all ready to be mixed like a more standard DAW. This part of it really impressed me. What didn't impress me was the work it takes to try and round up all of my plugins. Ableton defaults to one folder for plugins. You may select another folder. This is very limiting. This all resulted in me only getting maybe 25% of my plugins and instruments scanned including a big one for me ...Kontakt. That's really the only thing about the program that bothered me. I comped a mix in it with no problem and sent the individual tracks to CbB so I could use all my plugins and mix it a little better. If I'm building tracks I won't hesitate to use Ableton again for that. Studio One 4 has nothing over Ableton concerning arranging IMO. On the notation front, if I can get deeper into the connections in Rewire I should be able to hook Notion to any rewire equipped DAW. Many possible ideas for this including Mixing midi in CbB, exporting to SO4 and making my notation. My preference would be SO for that since it is so much easier to do. I have Mixcraft 8. Didn't realize it also supports some form of notation. I plan to check that out.

Understood. I didn't like it either. I made a bunch of changes to it. I made some major changes to it. In hindsight I released it much too early. I thought I was finished but wasn't. Nowhere near.

I had an old version of Biab. Maybe I should have played with it a bit more. TBH having Ableton probably already made my choice for me. Not that CbB wouldn't do it. I kind of had this notion about Biab that was likely all wrong as a program for someone who doesn't play instruments and needs backing tracks. I know that probably isn't completely true. You use it @Notes_Norton and you are quite the musician. It can be difficult trying to play some music with only two people, or to try and round up band members who will commit.

Well I can see you don't need any *ahem* coaching on this one 😁 I would love to know what you do to get such a clean sounding recording. Are you running through some kind of high end gear? I guess I just need to learn how to mix. The mix on my end is pristine. No mud to be found anywhere.

Nothing like a recorded live performance recorded well and made by a good player such as yourself!

Very nice clear mix. Makes me want to begin playing with video too.

Good to see you back in the studio Lynn. This is a very catchy and nostalgic sounding track. Takes me back to the 80's with the lead singer of Van Halen at the helm! You really sound like him a lot to me.

Holy cow. He must be on Red Bull like 24/7.

Thanks Wookie. I plan to go over it again. My voice isn't that good on this. The reverb is covering some of that up. I'm sick of it right now. Hopefully I'll mix it some more when I can stand to listen to it again lol. I've heard it like 500 times. I tried just about every trick I know on the vox and I just couldn't get it to pop the way I wanted.

Thank you Peter. I listened to Jordan back when he first started demoing Korg keyboards. He could probably play a killer bassoon on keys. Faster than a real one. :)..or anything else for that matter.

This is a pop song about a man who can't show his true feelings for a woman he likes. A Man I Cannot Be words- I acted the fool, really wasn't me I really love you, didn't want you to see I pretended to be a man who wasn't me. I pretended to be difficult I needed to believe I didn't love you I need you to see a man that isn't me. I pretended I don't care, you are unaware My lying eyes can't hide what I feel inside. A man you cannot see Can't hide those lying eyes x4 I pretended I don't care, you are unaware My lying eyes can't hide what I feel inside. A man I cannot be. Can't hide those lying eyes x 4

If it sounds anything like the hardware version it's killer. Maybe in more ways than one.