I did a gig last Saturday night with a guy that uses Sonar X2 to sequence just about everything. Bass, drums, keyboards, and horns were all done using X2.
Most everything used Kontakt. He used Battery 3 for drums, various keyboards (piano and organs), and Session Horns for brass. For bass he used the Cakewalk Session Instruments Bass.
It was all controlled from a laptop running X2.
He also had a TC-Helicon unit he used for harmonies.
He used the lyric view to send the words and chords to the songs to a tablet mounted on my mic stand
He had a really good sound system and some killer monitors so it was all sounding great, like playing with an 8 or 9 piece band with a bunch of background singers.
Unfortunately I forgot to ask him what kind of interface he used to get everything from the laptop to his mixer (DOH!).
He said he would be calling me for some more gigs so I'll be sure and ask him then.
It was a very eye opening experience, I had never seen SONAR used in a live situation like that, it went without a hiccup.
I really enjoyed it.

Very cool - I used to do gigs for wedding reception pre-dinners and such, and I would do the same kind of thing - with me playing keys and also singing with all the backing sequence tracks.  It worked fabulously, and I would get $150 an hour for 2 hours, then make a bunch more playing with the rest of the band for the actual dinner/reception.  It would usually end up as a $500 night for me.
 
Ka-ching!  :)
 
Bob Bone
 

robert_e_bone
Very cool - I used to do gigs for wedding reception pre-dinners and such, and I would do the same kind of thing - with me playing keys and also singing with all the backing sequence tracks.  It worked fabulously, and I would get $150 an hour for 2 hours, then make a bunch more playing with the rest of the band for the actual dinner/reception.  It would usually end up as a $500 night for me.
 
Ka-ching!  :)
 
Bob Bone
 

Cool Bob!
I have to admit that halfway through the night I started thinking "Well, I have SONAR, I have a laptop, I have a sound system, I have Kontakt......."
 
Hmmmmmmm.
 
The drummer never gets drunk, the keyboard player always shows up, the bass player doesn't have a crazy girlfriend......
 
Hmmmmmmm.

I did some digging, and found literally hundreds and hundreds of freely downloadable midi files, for just about every kind of song you could imagine.
 
I set up a bunch of these in Sonar, and played along with them on keys, leaving the fun parts for me.  The whole thing was much fuller than playing without the backing sequences, and folks felt they got their money's worth.
 
Bob Bone
 

I have made tons of jam along tracks using downloadable midi files.  
 
Even if all you do is point the midi tracks to Sonar Studio instruments they sound really good and would work well and I assume pretty solidly without a hiccup in a live environment.  
 
JR
 

The TTS-1 excels at feeling out a midi track's potential for use.
 
Bob Bone

auto_da_fe
I have made tons of jam along tracks using downloadable midi files.  
 
Even if all you do is point the midi tracks to Sonar Studio instruments they sound really good and would work well and I assume pretty solidly without a hiccup in a live environment.  
 
JR
 

Yeah, that's one of the things that most impressed me, the whole thing worked so smoothly. I don't know why I was surprised, except I had never really thought of using SONAR in a live environment.
It kicked huge butt!

I anticipate spending a few hours searching the internet tonight!

rscain

robert_e_bone
Very cool - I used to do gigs for wedding reception pre-dinners and such, and I would do the same kind of thing - with me playing keys and also singing with all the backing sequence tracks.  It worked fabulously, and I would get $150 an hour for 2 hours, then make a bunch more playing with the rest of the band for the actual dinner/reception.  It would usually end up as a $500 night for me.
 
Ka-ching!  :)
 
Bob Bone
 

Cool Bob!
I have to admit that halfway through the night I started thinking "Well, I have SONAR, I have a laptop, I have a sound system, I have Kontakt......."
 
Hmmmmmmm.
 
The drummer never gets drunk, the keyboard player always shows up, the bass player doesn't have a crazy girlfriend......
 
Hmmmmmmm.

 
Don't forget the most important thing you have going for you aside from the equipment 
You have a great voice , I've heard it in your song postings 
 
nice story btw...
 
Kenny

Try these 2 VERY similar looking sites - I have found crazy numbers of cool tunes here:
 
http://www.free-midi.org/
 
http://freemidi.org/
 
There are LOTS of others out there too - the trick is to avoid all the ring tone sites.
 
I found the above by searching Google for: midi download artist
 
Bob Bone