Playing live with BeatBuddy

BeatBuddy General
1

I became intrigued with the BeatBuddy after playing with a drummer, but not finding anyone else to regularly play with. I found a drummer and guitarist/vocalist could do some stuff, but I wasn’t satisfied because as a musician I want to play SONGS. I don’t want to jam partial songs, or blues beats, or anything like that. After splurging and getting the BeatBuddy, it was a novelty in my guitar rig, basically being the same thing I had before: guitar and drums. So the shows I played were me with vocals and a dual guitar which could do acoustic and electric at the same time. I added a TC Helicon H1 Harmony pedal to give me some extra voices occasionally. After much research, and time spent, and Guitar Stu’s brainstorm to make drums+bass midi beats, I’m now obsessed with using the BeatBuddy as a backup band.

We’ve all heard the acoustic patio guy who plays songs on an acoustic and sings… I wanted to be more. Now with this I can play electric and acoustic guitar, sing, with harmony, and have bass and drum loops from the BeatBuddy to play a whole band experience.

Largely, the reviews have been very positive. Where I play they love having complete rock songs, or complete country songs, etc.

Being able to have basslines made a total difference. Thanks @Guitar Stu !!

2

i’m sure playing along with tracks isn’t a new thing. I hear words like “Ableton” but not sure what that means just yet :slight_smile:

I realize people don’t really enjoy someone singing along with a karaoke track as much as a live performance, but i’m hoping with one or two tweaks to the BeatBuddy, it will totally transcend the difference between those two worlds: a default “order”, and the ability to change that order on the fly.

3

In creating the BB song for Rocky Mountain Way, there is that issue where we have a verse/chorus/ending part that never changes… so from the beatbuddy standpoint, we don’t need to interact to go from part to part. however, those 32 measures contain almost 1200 Note On events. The main issues i’ve had are trying to get around the 500 note limit. You have to get creative to split them up, but that means you have to interact extra times at specific times, in order to play a certain song in order.