BackingTracks System

  Introduction  
Backing-Tracks staff consists in professional musicians who have been treading the stage live for more than 20 years. The know-how they have been storing also in studio musical production has ended up in conceiving and creating a system based upon modern software technology. The aim in doing so was solving the most serious problem which commercial bands have to face nowadays: the quality standard of bands’ live exhibitions in clubs, parties and so on is no longer proportionate to record production standards.
Steady development of music production thanks to a massive use of digital technology has enormously widened the gap between what can be heard in a record and what can be reproduced live by means of traditional instruments. Artists themselves have been the first to counterbalance this gap by making use of accompaniment tracks and by availing themselves of very complex and expensive instrumentations which require high budgets.
Bands reproducing the covers of such artists are unable to use all that technology for obvious reasons. As a consequence sound is poor and oversimplified: it is not satisfactory either for the public or for the musician.
Technology, experience, creativity and know-how are the strength of Backing-Tracks which ended up in the conceiving and the realization of Backing-Tracks System.
  The BackingTracks System (BTS)  
This system is aimed at solving the above mentioned problem completely.
BTS allows the band not to bind their repertoire to the kind of instrumental training possessed by the team. All the pieces in the site catalogue of www.backing-tracks.com can be played by any band.

Backing-tracks provides musicians with a piece which is unabridged but on different tracks. Every track is a different instrument. No matter how many instruments the track contains: in the Btp version they are all present. This is due to the fact that BT reproduces the piece starting from the beginning in each slight shade and it strives to resemble the original as much as possible. There are no MIDIFILES: every instrument is played by a real musician! The pieces are mixed in a professional studio and they undergo a particular Mastering process which was conceived on purpose by and for Backing-Tracks.
A pdf-file embedded in the piece directory contains the song score. Score means a harmonic guide (chords present in the piece are expressed in abbreviations which are coded in English). The song structure is divided into Markers: Intro, Chorus, A, B Special, Coda and so on.
This guide conteains the numbering of the measures too. For the time being this is the only way to identify a part of the piece in the Assembler which does not display the structure marker.

  The BT Suite  
In order to use this system to the utmost Backing-Tracks conceived and realized the Bt-Suite. BT-Suite is made of two unique softwares: Assembler and Player.
These programmes allow to:
A) personalize the piece as much as one likes
B) create a live show that is always under the band leader’s direct control.
Softwares can be used both on Mac and Pc Windows operating-systems. (See system requirements).

  1) TheAssembler  
Assembler is the first software to be used and it allows to edit the purchased song completely.      

Editing means:
A) Modifying the structure by cutting off some measures, copying and pasting entire sections of the piece, modifying intro and finals, creating medley and much more.
B) Arranging the piece tuning in real time by providing higher or lower-shiftings in semitune steps. The great innovation introduced by Backing-Tracks is that the pitch-shifting process does not affect the tracks of the drums.
C) Arranging the piece speed by acting on the bpm or even by drawing flights for the “accelerando” or “rallentando”.
The software has been conceived so that it can be used in performing rooms where these arrangements may be carried out. It has also the necessary hints, such as the “2 BAR COUNT OFF”, so that play-sessions can take place correctly. This function allows to play the piece starting from a particular structure section (for example the chorus). If the 2 Bar CO is enabled Assembler supplies the drummer with 2 click measures which help giving the band the count off so that one can start playing the Chorus afterwards!!!
Once the piece has been edited you can go on with the second software called PLAYER.
  2) The Player  
Player is the real innovation and it permits handling one’s set lists as the play lists of a player software. If you drag the songs into the window you can create the treatment and modify the pieces performing order at once. Say goodbye to the old mini disks or cd-players capacity limits. Now everything depends only on the capacity of the hard disk the songs are recorded on. The convenience of creating different play-lists consists in having old treatments (parcelled out for club or evening) at hand. Player has the unique feature that it may be handled remotely. You are not obliged to have your hands free to direct the evening. As a matter of fact one can control everything thanks to a MIDI file by using a pedal device (in case of singers, guitarists or keyboardists) or a multi pad in case of drummers. Player has all the functions needed by the band for a correct execution of the show. For example you can decide how much time must elapse between a song and the following one, fix a precise number of pieces in order without a break, stop to make an introduction and then just start again by activating a signal or interrupt the treatment at the end of a piece by setting in the auto-pause. You can modify the order of the pieces sequence during the evening execution by winding forward the selector “next song to play”. This always activating a command remotely. Once it has ultimated the song being executed Player will spring directly to the selected song. In case one gets back through the treatment, the programme will not play again the songs which have already been played.
The night is always under control. You know for sure what song is being played and which will be the next one, how many measures and how much time have elapsed from the beginning, how many measures are still to be played and how much is still left.
The whole playlist may be controlled in the same way. Eventually there is a timekeeper section which is very useful for those who must execute a show with a fixed running time. This backwards running timekeeper allows to reckon the time left to execute the playlist and to decide if some pieces must be stricken off. Well, this simple programme is the real solution to all old problems in handling a Live show!
     
  The sound  
BT tracks sound quality is undeniably high. Such are manic concern in recording details and the pieces mixing too. The tracks which may be downloaded from te site ARE NOT COMPRESSED. They are in 16 bit 44100 Khz format!
Songs reproducing by means of Assembler or Player is rigorously stereo because the click track is handled separately by both softwares.
Backing-Tracks does not recommend the use of audio cards installed on laptops which almost never separate the two stereo channels and very often generate nasty background noises. The use of external cards (if possible of good or utmost quality) is higly recommended therefore. If the card you dispose of possesses more than 2 exits you can decide to send the click to one of these exits. We think this is the safest way to avoid nasty delays between click and base. Otherwise you may choose the exit of a MIDI card that can be used to send the midi signal to a sound generator (electronic drum) which makes use of the general Midi format in order to listen to the click.
  The Click Track  
The click is a basic device for the band drummer and one should be able to personalize it. BT thinks that the drummer should be able to choose which kind of layout must be given to the click song for song. For example: if the song is a very slow one people had rather disposing of a click that also plays the raising octaves, in case of simple measures, or the two raising octaves of the triplet in case of composed measures. You choose this in the Assembler and this choice is stored up inside the file of the piece itself. Consequently he Player will have different clicks depending on what has been worked out in the Assembler!!!!! All this is possible both if you use the MIDI click and if you use the audio one.
  The Mastering  
Backing-Tracks conceived a particular mastering process particularly set so that every piece must possess the same sound stress.
  The Catalogue  
Backing-Tracks System also provides bands with a service on-demand.
On the site thee is a section where you can request the pieces you would like to purchase from Backing-Tracks so that the band can suggest the production of some pieces. On the electronic bulletin board you may find all the requests the bands have made and these can be voted for a month. During this period the song which receives a sufficient number of votes is put into production. Within 10 working days it will be inserted in the catalogue (see regulations).
  The BTM2 (alias Backing-Tracks Minus 2 Musicians)  
Backing-Tracks has developed an innovative and extremely flexible concept of the MMO (Music Minus One):
The BTM2 song version contains a stereo track with the complete instrumental version of the song separated from the instrument you would like to play live and from the lead vocal. Everything is settled in single separated tracks
For example, the keyboards version contains: the instrumental backing track separated from each individual keyboard parts contained in the full song. Each keyboard part is on a separate track and the lead vox is on another track too.
In the guitars version you can find the same procedure but, in this case, they are the individual guitar parts to be on separated tracks from the entire instrumental backing tracks. The lead vocal is again on another individual track.
The aim is to give the opportunity to the “One Man Band” to play and sing live the song choosing the version according to the instrument that he or she plays live on stage.
So the keyboardist/singer will use the keyboards version simply turning off the track of the keyboard/s part he/she plays live. The same is for the lead vox track so that he/she can play and sing the song live at the same time.
The same happens for guitarist/singer, the bassist/singer or even the drummer/singer who will be able to sing and play the song. Muting only the lead vox track, also the soloist singer will have the opportunity to use this song version.
This system perfectly works for duos formed by instrumentalist and singer. Using all the Assembler functions everyone can customize the tonality, the speed and the structure of the song exactly as in the band version.
Backing-Tracks believes that this system is a perfect tool even for students of each instrument contained in the song including the lead vocalist as, with the same version previously described, he/she can practice each different part of his instrument played in the song.
Obviously he can also slow down the tune without modifying the pitch of the song, practice it in a different tonality which is very useful especially for singers and customize the structure of it.
Backing tracks provides also the lead vocal part for the instrument student. The singer can choose any version as the lead vox is always on a separate track.
Also percussions and horns studente will find theyr own versione. With the Backing-Tracks system, the horn students, have the opportunity to practice each different part for their instrument. In fact when there are two different trumpet parts in the song (first and second), the student can practice each of them separately and maintain the other one active.
So far, without the BTM2 system, all this was impossible.