MIDI - What does it mean to you?

Hi.

for my first post as a moderator (Hi! BOA :) ) I would like to get back to the old skool.. specifically lets open a discussion about MIDI.

It seems to me that MIDI has become more integrated and less transparent into digital systems these days. However it remains a VERY important protocol, whether being delivered over cables or virtual routing inside your sequencer of choice.

So...

What is your opinion of MIDI? Tell us a few personal MIDI stories, horror and joy please!

Lets get this going, so we can focus on the basics and look towards the future.

/Chris

Its perfect for vst's, and its tried and tested. ide be lost without it to be honest....when Live 4 introduced MIDI it instantly gained recognition for being a powerful sequencer. nuff said :cheese:

As for horror stories, the problems for me occur when using hardware or to be more exact the aincient proteus modules we have at college.

Hey I don't mean to hi-jack your thread about midi, but in the spirit of getting back to basics how about a related discussion about cv / gate?

Midi is cool, I love it and pretty much nothing in my set-up would happen without it - but running say an arpeggiator over analog gate signal as opposed to midi...gate is much more fluid, no stepping

There are so many pedals and little bits of kit you can get nowadays that have cv / gate inputs...if you have a 303, use the outputs and you can create all sorts of madness. love it

midi is still indespensible, though

MIDI is a pretty impressive protocol, given that it was invented 24 years ago and hasn't changed much since. It "just works", and every man and his dog in the digital audio business builds it into their devices.

A true victory for open standards.

However, having got quite into the nuts and bolts of it (I wrote a software synth for my dissertation) it's a bit of a headfuck and has some rather severe limitations. I mean, the fact that you can only get 16 channels down a cable is pretty crap in this day and age!

Unfortunately part of it's strength is that it works on everything, and if you start trying to add extra functionality you'll break everyone's existing setups.

What would be interesting would be great would be if all the manufacturers could get together and agree on a new standard which was backwards compatible with MIDI but added the kind of functionality you might expect in an audio networking technology in 2007... that would be amazing.

There have been some efforts to do this kind of thing using TCP/IP as the protocol, which would be sick. Sadly it's nowhere near as ubiquitous as MIDI.

It's a double edged sword. It's great! Everyone uses it so it's everywhere and it works. But it's crap! You can't improve it because then it wouldn't work everywhere.

Good topic Chris ;)

great topic !!

well midi is something that is overlooked totally in alot of software setups. of course a midi track is using midi, but only really a fraction. now with a semi hardware setup, ive been reading up and im amazed about how much depth the protocol has. channels, message types etc... ive since totally maximised the way my UC33 works by re configuring hte midi messages.

heres to more learning ....:cool:

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Originally Posted by stjohn

great topic !!

well midi is something that is overlooked totally in alot of software setups. of course a midi track is using midi, but only really a fraction. now with a semi hardware setup, ive been reading up and im amazed about how much depth the protocol has. channels, message types etc... ive since totally maximised the way my UC33 works by re configuring hte midi messages.

heres to more learning ....:cool:

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Hate midi, but spent my life using it.
I heard there would be a new protocal, years ago.
It never happened, mores the pity.

Only just getting into MIDI, and only because I've got hardware which needs it.

must admit i've never really understood Midi to a depth to be able to use it contructively, its just kind of 'been there'.

Efforts i have seen to try to explain it in laymans terms fall very short in my expectations.

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Originally Posted by TechMouse

What would be interesting would be great would be if all the manufacturers could get together and agree on a new standard which was backwards compatible with MIDI but added the kind of functionality you might expect in an audio networking technology in 2007... that would be amazing.

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Well OSC is next generation MIDI imho. Its built for networking.

And you can wrap up MIDI within osc.

http://www.cnmat.berkeley.edu/ICMC97...ndControl.html
Its gonna open up a whole new world of sensor based instruments to boot.

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Originally Posted by Farnesol

Well OSC is next generation MIDI imho. Its built for networking.

And you can wrap up MIDI within osc.

http://www.cnmat.berkeley.edu/ICMC97...ndControl.html
Its gonna open up a whole new world of sensor based instruments to boot.

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Yeah, I know.

There's Yamaha mLAN as well.

The problem is that everyone will probably just create their own little protocols and there will be no ubiquity.

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Originally Posted by TechMouse

Yeah, I know.

There's Yamaha mLAN as well.

The problem is that everyone will probably just create their own little protocols and there will be no ubiquity.

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As an Ex-User of mLAN i can't see it going anywhere... yamaha bought steinberg and initiated their studio management shizzle and it went no-where.. the driver releases for mlan stuff has been ridiculous and there have been terrible offset problems.

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Originally Posted by dirty_bass

Hate midi, but spent my life using it.
I heard there would be a new protocal, years ago.
It never happened, mores the pity.

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Ye old miser! :D

I've been using midi for years, and i understand why people hate it or have problems with it - BUT i think the key is to not think about it too much... i have horribly complex midi routings - 12x12 with merging and crap happening everywhere, but have never had any problems...

just logically plug things in and midi is great - as soon as you think about what is actually happening - disaster nearly always ensues

machina

Nevermind Mlan!!

Osc is already supported by Reaktor, PD, Supercollider ,jazz Lemur etc.

Nevermind the hardware. Osc is Midi for todays software computing environment.

Sensor based instruments. Trust me :)

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Originally Posted by Farnesol

Nevermind Mlan!!

Osc is already supported by Reaktor, PD, Supercollider ,jazz Lemur etc.

Nevermind the hardware. Osc is Midi for todays software computing environment.

Sensor based instruments. Trust me :)

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Can we have some links to this please?

Thanks.

http://www.cnmat.berkeley.edu/OpenSoundControl/

http://www.cnmat.berkeley.edu/OpenSo...ion-areas.html

http://alumni.media.mit.edu/%7Edano/matrix/MATRIX.jpghttp://www.audite.at/pics/audiocube03.jpg

http://www.iua.upf.es/mtg/reacTable/?related

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Farnesol

Osc is already supported by Reaktor, PD, Supercollider ,jazz Lemur etc.

Nevermind the hardware. Osc is Midi for todays software computing environment.

Sensor based instruments. Trust me :)

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I agree, it's very interesting.

The problem with OSC is that it's not supported everywhere, like MIDI.

It's a bit defeatist to say "nevermind the hardware"...

I'm not saying you can't make good music with software, I'm just saying it would be nice to have the choice if you want it.

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Originally Posted by TechMouse

I agree, it's very interesting.

The problem with OSC is that it's not supported everywhere, like MIDI.

It's a bit defeatist to say "nevermind the hardware"...

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Well the only solution to the problem of OSC not being supported everywhere is by pushing it and promoting it on forums like this. Its the only standard that has the potential to superceed midi. Especially when you consider that you can wrap midi (and other protocols mlan etc i guess) within it.

I suppose i was jumping the gun when i said 'never mind the hardware'.. what i meant to say is never mind the hardware manufacturers who cant see past MIDI. Music production has been gravitating towards a 'total' software environment and 'hardware' nowadays for most people just means 'input devices'. Anyway using OSC for some aspects of making music doesnt mean that you have to suddenly stop using your Juno!! What made you think that you had to 'choose' between one or the other? You build on it.

Lemur & Monome are two pieces of hardware (the dont make any noise though!) that support osc and there are many others (prototypes) in the pipeline.

The implementation of a new generation sensor based hardware\instruments that will catch the publics attention, will be integral to OSC's success IMHO.

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Originally Posted by Farnesol

Music production has been gravitating towards a 'total' software environment and 'hardware' nowadays for most people just means 'input devices'.

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Possibly.

Certainly in my case, but I know a lot of people who use almost exclusively hardware devices.

What they could do with is for someone to bring out a new version of the MPC (or whatever) which supports it.

Does OSC run over USB?

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Originally Posted by Farnesol

Lemur & Monome are two pieces of hardware (the dont make any noise though!) that support osc and there are many others (prototypes) in the pipeline.

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Yeah, one of my mates sold his mother to buy a Lemur.

Lovely bit of hardware.

Takes a while to get the most out of it though.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Farnesol

The implementation of a new generation sensor based hardware\instruments that will catch the publics attention, will be integral to OSC's success IMHO.

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Funnily enough, I nearly did a Ph. D on this kind of thing.

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Originally Posted by TechMouse

Does OSC run over USB?

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I havent a clue! Its specs are built around standard network technologies. I assume ethernet can carry more info than usb?

I think the best thing about it is the fact that you could use existing wireless technology to connect devices & instruments. Why bother with USB?

ps: what were you going to do you phd on?