Advice on accompaniment and background tracks

[joez]

I am looking for background tracks to solo /live performance. I would provide lead vocals, and either guitar or piano parts and the background tracks would provide the other instruments as well as the harmonies and vocal backups in the particular song. Looking for older rock (60s and 70s) as well as pop.

 

I have seen solo performers using these. Are they tapes? CDs? computer files? Are some better than others? Can you select/change which parts to mute for a particular song (i.e. can I choose to play the piano parts instead of the guitar parts and vice versa)? Can anyone tell me more about these and where I can get them? Thanks.

[DC]

When I've been in that situation I've always made my own. Much more control that way.

 

You can always download midi files (much harder now than it used to be) but you'll almost always have to edit them to the point where you might as well do it youself from scratch. If you do it for awhile it gets easy and quick and it's you, not some canned crap.

 

My 2 cents.

[blackpig]

Karaoke users have c.d.s with everything except the vocals on them. Well, actually, they're d.v.ds - they contain information that allows a video of the lyrics to appear on a screen while the song is being played. You can also get devices that purportedy "strip" the lead vocals from commercial c.d.s by filtering out certain frequencies or whatever. It would be much easier and much more fun to hire some extra musicians!

[joez]

Thanks for the advice. I've actually been working on my own. I can see how it will take awhile but in the long run be more rewarding. However, in the interest of time, sometimes I may have to cut corners and buy backups.

 

Thanks again,

Joe