Play Along Suggestions - what do you prefer?

[Geordie]

Looking for some suggestions on pieces I can work on to help develop - ideally with play along tracks.
I've done the Rimsky Korsakov, Berlioz, real books/ireal-pro etc . Was not so impressed by Music minus one - found the one I bought hard to navigate.
Looking for items that are preferably light jazz/swing/blues based or 'classical', but have a chart and play along track. I'm based in UK. All suggestions/links about items you've used and enjoyed gratefully received.
Many thanks.

[Matt K]

I love ireal-pro. Use it basically every day but I almost exclusively practice standards. For those reading who might not know, they can't ship it with any songs but their forums have dozens of thousands of songs uploaded from a variety of genres, including classical.

[Grah]

Over the years, I have invested a lot of money into play-alongs but I never use them these days, much preferring to create my own backing tracks with Band-in-a-Box. Really, the easiest of any music software to do the notation. As they say:

"Band-in-a-Box® is so easy to use! Just type in the chords for any song using standard chord symbols (like C, Fm7, or C13b9), choose the style you'd like, and Band-in-a-Box® does the rest... Band-in-a-Box® automatically generates a complete professional-quality arrangement of piano, bass, drums, guitar, and strings or horns.
RealTracks add the human element of great session musicians to your songs and with 202 more RealTracks available in version 2018 there is over 2,700 hours of studio musicians' recordings that you can use in your songs! "

http://www.pgmusic.com/

And I also use it to do my arrangements for small bands.

[Geordie]

Thanks for the ideas. I’m keen to get new charts so as to development/maintain sight reading in different clefs.

[Savio]

I also use band in a box a lot. I find it difficult to use play a long in classical music, difficult to listen tempo. Jazz and pop is easier, but I think it's important to have good earphones or speakers. Still it will never be like a real situation with real musicians. Good earphones makes it better but still, can be a challenge. I use it both for my students and my self sometimes, can be fun for practicing.

Leif

[Grah]

Whilst I prefer my Band-in-a-box, there is a great play-along available on sale from Jamie Aebersold Jazz Books, right now:

http://www.jazzbooks.com/jazz/product/V ... cef4191dfa

I don't need to tell you what is my favourite style of jazz! But there are plenty of Dixieland Styles in BiaB.

[Geordie]

Ha ha! Yep, no secrets here. Thanks Gra, I’ll check them out.

[VJOFan]

I enjoyed using Smart Music when I was a teacher. There was a lot of variety of music with jazz, classical, solos and ensembles of all kinds.

I liked being able to change the tempo of songs too.

You have to pay for it but it really is a quality service.

[norbie2018]

On the classical side, Rochut Book 1 as edited by Alan Raph has a piano accompaniment cd that I like to use.

[bobroden]

I second Band-in-a-Box for practicing jazz. It's easy to use, sounds remarkably good, and gives you complete flexibility as to tempo and key. I've used it daily for the last 7 years.

[baileyman]

Make a playlist of everything your favorite trombone jazz soloist has done.

Start it up, and play along with the pros until your guy plays, then rest and listen.

When he's done, play along with the pros some more.