What happened to MIDI? Where did it go?
We used to be in love with MIDI. But you hardly hear of it these days. Has it gone away, or is it just keeping quiet?
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MIDI was a revolution in music and audio. Before MIDI, which means before 1982, every musical instrument manufacturer had their own way of connecting their equipment together.
So you could connect Yamaha to Yamaha, Roland to Roland. But if you tried to connect Yamaha to Roland you would come unstuck.
Once MIDI (Musical Instrument Digital Interface) had taken off however, you could connect anything to anything.
This allowed interoperability between just about any musical equipment you could desire to own.
But something else much more important happened...
The MIDI sequencer was invented!
The concept of the MIDI sequencer is that you can record key presses from a musical keyboard into a computer. Then you can use that to build up several tracks, each controlling a MIDI sound generator that would create the audio live from the note data.
The sound generator would be a synthesizer or sampler, or perhaps a module whose sounds were based on samples although you couldn't add your own.
So in the 1980s and 1990s everything was MIDI-this, MIDI-that, MIDI-MIDI-MIDI...
You couldn't get away from it.
But we don't talk much of MIDI anymore, so what happened to it?
What happened to MIDI was first that MIDI sequencers acquired audio recording functions.
Loop-based music was already popular. Loops were recorded into samplers and triggered by notes recorded into MIDI sequencers.
But with an audio sequencer, you could create a loop directly in a track without the need for a sampler. So MIDI wasn't required.
Loop-based music became incredibly popular, and people would add drums and guitars to loops. Single-sample sounds could be positioned on a track wherever you wanted, once again without the need for a sampler.
And where you needed several sound modules, or a multi-timbral module, to create audio from a MIDI sequencer, you could just play keyboard sounds directly into your audio sequencer.
So gradually almost everything MIDI disappeared from the studio.
Except that it didn't disappear, it went underground.
So these days you probably don't connect your music keyboard to your computer through a MIDI cable and MIDI interface; you connect it with a USB cable.
It isn't actual MIDI data flowing from your music keyboard to your computer, but it is very MIDI-like in structure...
Just as MIDI had note-on and note-off messages (and no such thing as a 'note-continue'), these same types of messages are used today.
You can play software instruments directly from your USB-connected music keyboard and record their audio output. Or you can record MIDI tracks that contain note data but no audio; these MIDI tracks will drive software instrument tracks.
These MIDI tracks contain data that is exactly like MIDI - which notes you played, how hard you played them, modulation wheel and pitch-bend data etc. All corresponding directly to the MIDI of old.
It could be that we are overdue for a revolution, and something much better than MIDI could be invented now. However, the legacy of the past is deeply entrenched and it is likely that we will be using this 'under the surface' MIDI for decades to come.
Publication date Wednesday February 03, 2010
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Discussion on this article's topic...
Mike H, Atlanta, USA
Midi is alive and well in most project studios...and not much different from mine. Is the author of this article out of touch? Many of us have old synths that you just don't sell. Only newbies have been fooled into selling great midi gear to get the next big thing in soft synths, only to learn that sooner or later you wind up with plugin overload with even an 8-core computer. So I have learned to use a combination of the old and new. I use USB midi for new hardware, standard midi for older synths, internal midi and a Muse Receptor with soft synths via ethernet cabling. All use midi protocol. In fact, my DAW recognizes USB and old-fashioned 5-pin midi as if they were the same. I replaced my old hardware sequencer eighteen years ago with Performer and a MOTU eight-channel midi interface. But I still use the midi interface and all eight channels like I did back then. With the addition of a word clock, my DAW plus old and new devices are one happy family. One last thing: Almost all top music hardware today has both 5-pin midi and USB. Do the music hardware makers have this all wrong?
Wednesday May 19, 2010
Schewak, Eye-taly
No, wait.
There's some confusion, here.
MIDI is a standard defined on multiple levels, akin to physical, datalink and network layers in the ISO/OSI stack.
While USB keyboards don't have a DIN connector nor a current-loop circuit with an optoisolator, nor even those lovely 33kbaud UARTs (or whatever it was), the data they transmit from one point to another IS 100% STANDARD MIDI, with status, note on, note off and all.
Each and every byte defined by the 1983 standard is preserved, it's just the physical connection that is supplanted by a newer and more practical one.
Whether you talk into a phone or into Skype, it's still English, right?
Oh, yeah, by the way: sorry for my incomprehensible English.
There's some confusion, here.
MIDI is a standard defined on multiple levels, akin to physical, datalink and network layers in the ISO/OSI stack.
While USB keyboards don't have a DIN connector nor a current-loop circuit with an optoisolator, nor even those lovely 33kbaud UARTs (or whatever it was), the data they transmit from one point to another IS 100% STANDARD MIDI, with status, note on, note off and all.
Each and every byte defined by the 1983 standard is preserved, it's just the physical connection that is supplanted by a newer and more practical one.
Whether you talk into a phone or into Skype, it's still English, right?
Oh, yeah, by the way: sorry for my incomprehensible English.
Friday May 14, 2010
Mark, Columbus, Oh, USA
I had trouble discerning what the author is talking about here. My MIDI connections are indeed made via USB, but they are just as "MIDI" as they ever were. The connection appears as a MIDI device in Cubase, Logic, and GarageBand, exactly as it would if the 5-pin DIN connectors were used. I don't get why hooking it up via USB means it's somehow no longer MIDI - ?
Monday March 22, 2010
Orin, Inverness, U. S. A.
Except for one rack-mount item everything we use has MIDI support... and a lot of it is relatively new equipment (2 years). Without MIDI, sync would be a truly large headache. Plus, using Logic Pro 7-9 Apple has made MIDI an important part of every formulated and finished Track and Production.
Sunday February 14, 2010
Karel Post, Grou, Netherlands
MIDI in my studio is STILL the main means of production.
Approx. 500 metres of MIDI cables, splitters and expanders here...
DAW (REAPER) is synced to MTC out of pure necessity rather then lust for it.
24 Track HDrec on RADAR24 just for the sound and feel of working with real audio instead of an approximation of sound like most DAW's do in my view.
Atari TT030 Cubase 3.01 master MTC with all serious expanders like SMP24 and good old MIDEX ATARI... No need to update that lot! And it NEVER crashes or fails.
S1100's, 2 Prophet 5's, Memorymoog, Trident, Synthex, Minimidi, Jupiter 8, a shackload of Juno 60's and 106's, Analog Vocoder SVC350, 808, DMX, Linn, Simmons etc..etc..... All on a Soundtracs IL 3632 Desk.
Sounds superior to any DAW i've heard.
Be honest, does your Pro53 plugsynth deliver the meat and grudge of a real P5?... Be honest i said! :-)
Approx. 500 metres of MIDI cables, splitters and expanders here...
DAW (REAPER) is synced to MTC out of pure necessity rather then lust for it.
24 Track HDrec on RADAR24 just for the sound and feel of working with real audio instead of an approximation of sound like most DAW's do in my view.
Atari TT030 Cubase 3.01 master MTC with all serious expanders like SMP24 and good old MIDEX ATARI... No need to update that lot! And it NEVER crashes or fails.
S1100's, 2 Prophet 5's, Memorymoog, Trident, Synthex, Minimidi, Jupiter 8, a shackload of Juno 60's and 106's, Analog Vocoder SVC350, 808, DMX, Linn, Simmons etc..etc..... All on a Soundtracs IL 3632 Desk.
Sounds superior to any DAW i've heard.
Be honest, does your Pro53 plugsynth deliver the meat and grudge of a real P5?... Be honest i said! :-)
Monday February 08, 2010
Tom Goldschmidt, Brussels, Belgium
I am glad to notice many readers underline the importance that MIDI still has today. I'll simply add that some forms of contemporary music make heavy use of patterns and arpeggios, and MIDI plug-ins (MFX, VST...) like sophisticated arpeggiators or pattern sequencers can play a very important role there.
Tuesday February 02, 2010
Ventedge Music, Nagoya Aichi, Japan
In other words...USB D.A.W.or(Video) KILLED THE Midi Sequencer (Radio Star) lol
Monday February 01, 2010
Red, Peterborough, Ca
Midi is indeed alive and well in my humble studio. Drum triggers are used when recording our band live and the midi data is recorded. It's great to get the feel of a live songs performance and not have to try to hear over a loud kit. The new vst instruments like addictive drums are incredible and my triggers can run right from the vst via the module.
Monday February 01, 2010
Euan, Perth, Australia
While the MIDI 5-pin interface is not used much now, MIDI is still alive and well, and is most notable as a control protocol for managing the interaction between DAW software and control surfaces. Virtually all DAW software and all major control surfaces support MIDI - mostly over a USB connection, but MIDI nonetheless.
Monday February 01, 2010
Anthony Linden Jones, Kurrajong, Nsw, Australia
Internalising MIDI into a computer, where the sequencer and sound sources live together, allows for a whole lot of benefits. Losing the external equipment (taking up space) and not needing a complex cabling system, are just the start.
Being a 7-bit system, MIDI is limited to numbers between 0 and 127. There are many workarounds incorporated into the system, but one big problem used to be 'zipper noise' - the fact that the difference in sound level was very apparent between subsequent numbers of MIDI Velocity or MIDI Volume. So, if the MIDI Volume was swept up and done, you might hear the sound level going up in discrete steps - not smoothly. Internal systems used within a DAW, being not confined to the MIDI protocol, are free to use more bits to achieve smooth transitions.
Being a 7-bit system, MIDI is limited to numbers between 0 and 127. There are many workarounds incorporated into the system, but one big problem used to be 'zipper noise' - the fact that the difference in sound level was very apparent between subsequent numbers of MIDI Velocity or MIDI Volume. So, if the MIDI Volume was swept up and done, you might hear the sound level going up in discrete steps - not smoothly. Internal systems used within a DAW, being not confined to the MIDI protocol, are free to use more bits to achieve smooth transitions.
Monday February 01, 2010
Keith, Mobile, USA
MIDI data is alive and well. The only change is that the original MIDI data is now encapsulated and transmitted over USB or ethernet cables instead of the old 5 pin MIDI cables.
Monday February 01, 2010
Daniel
Well, IMHO author has forgotten most important MIDI feature. It's MIDI clock. Even without sequencers and keyboards samplers, loopers, effect units, and laptops are got to be connected with some kind of synchronization things and the MIDI clock is sometimes the only choice by now.
Monday February 01, 2010
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