Impro-Visor is a music notation program designed to help jazz musicians compose and hear solos similar to ones that might be improvised.




Impro-Visor vs Band-in-a-Box Comments


- Impro-Visor is Free and Open Source
Band-in-a-Box is described as 'Intelligent automatic accompaniment program. You can hear and play along to many song ideas and go from "nothing" to "something" in a very short period of time with Band-in-a-Box as your "on demand" backup band' and is a music production app in the audio & music category. There are more than 50 alternatives to Band-in-a-Box for a variety of platforms, including Windows, Mac, Linux, iPhone and iPad apps. The best Band-in-a-Box alternative is Impro-Visor, which is both free and Open Source. Other great apps like Band-in-a-Box are ChordPulse, MMA, JJazzLab and Avid Sibelius.
Impro-Visor is a music notation program designed to help jazz musicians compose and hear solos similar to ones that might be improvised.






ChordPulse is a handy backing band software for music practice, inspiration, improvisation, and pure fun with music. Play and sing along with ChordPulse. Use it as a full accompaniment, a drum machine with bass, a metronome with chords, and more.

it's cheap. incredibly easy to use, it's very complete in its chord options and many styles which all sound great. Also, having a mixer built-in for the separate tracks like drums of bass helps me a lot. I also use it to create chord progressions which you can export to text and MIDI which I will then import into my recording software
Easy to use, simple interface that even beats I-Real Pro.
I have BB but this is easier for beginners.


“MMA—Musical MIDI Accompaniment” is an accompaniment generator. It creates MIDI tracks for a soloist to perform over from a user supplied file containing chords and MMA directives.

MMA is free. It runs on (among other platforms) linux. I have it running on my $35 Raspberrry Pi. The data file of chords (and, optionally, melodies, and song structure (repeats!), is text but pretty easy to follow. Type in the chords, the repeats, some melody or solo licks, choose styles (and substyles) and a quick run will generate a MIDI file. A free Biab alternative!
Produces backing tracks to play over.
After trying it out, I should be able to describe it.


JJazzLab is a free Midi-based application which automatically generates backing tracks (a musical accompaniment) for any song. It’s a jam buddy to have fun improvising, learn new stuff or just practice your instrument. It’s also a great tool for teachers.

Simple to use and with a several song packages to download
Easy to use and imports Band-in--a-Box files


Professional music notation software for Windows and macOS featuring intuitive, task-based score creation, MIDI and onscreen input, up to 16 staves, guitar tab conversion, Magnetic Layout, dynamic parts updates, text and lyric support, scanning tools, and expressive playback.




Sibelius is a notation (Score writing) application, Band-In-A-Box is not.
The two softwares have very different goals - BIAB to create backing tracks, Sibelius to compose and notate sheet music. They share very few similarities.
Sibelius is music notation software. You would have to create the accompaniment yourself in the notation. There is little similarity between this and BIAB.


Rosegarden is a well-rounded audio and MIDI sequencer, score editor, and general-purpose music composition and editing environment.



Rosegarden is a DAW, BAiB is not.
IT's a DAW and BIAB is not.


iReal Pro offers an easy-to-use tool to help musicians of all levels master their art. iReal Pro simulates a real-sounding band that can accompany you as you practice, and also lets you collect chord charts of your favorite songs for reference.



Transforms all (piano, synthesizer) keyboards into arranger keyboards with real time chords recognition! Creates complete MIDI music-arrangements with just simple drag and drop operations! Utilises, modifies and creates styles in Yamaha format!




Composing it for you... Automatic three and four-part composition (styles: J.S. Bach, Max Reger, Jazz, Pop plus creating your own styles), automatic harmonizing, automatic fugue and canon composition.




The Tonelib JAM is a software for creating, editing, printing and listening to tablature and sheet music for guitar and other fretted instruments. You can use Tonelib JAM for regular guitar practicing, for learning songs or for advancing your performance skills to the next level.


Groovyband Live! is a realtime arranger software that runs on any Windows PC (tablet, laptop, desktop), interfaces with MIDI input devices (keyboards, pedal board, control surfaces) and produces a live stream of MIDI events to drive a suitable sound generator.




better user interface. many similar facilities to BIAB.