Completely New to Midi

  • Thread starter Thread starter JayDeLuca
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JayDeLuca

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hello I have been recording for a while but i have never gotten in depth with the whole midi area.

here is what i have to work with...

Korg SP-100 with a Kurzweil K2000R V.A.S.T. Player

USB Midisport 2x2 Interface

and a few demos of Cakewalk, Cubase, and N-Track (im trying before buying)

What i am looking for are some tutorials on Midi. Every aspect of it, how it works, and how to do it. I am starting off with almost zero knowledge and i am looking for a place to start.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Jay DeLuca
 
I am also completely new to MIDI

The first thing I learned was that there is a MIDI forum down below :)

https://homerecording.com/bbs/forumdisplay.php?f=22

A couple of things I've found.

1) It's amazingly hard to find tutorials on making music with MIDI, there are lots on the tech but not on the music

2) There are some decent free sound files that can be used to replace the standard MIDI.

3) IF you don't have a sound blaster card you can still use Sound Fonts (there are lots of free one's) using a program called SFZ - here's one http://www.naturalstudio.co.uk/ns_piano.html

That's it from me
 
Read, read, and then read some more, Midi, while its basis is very simple can be some of the most frustrating stuff in the world. When it works, you'll be surprised how powerful it is.
 
HomeMadeHitShow:
thank you for enlightening me with those wonderful programs you posted to replace midi sounds! I was able to use the SFZ program as a VST for an audio track cakewalk, and i routed the midi tracks in cakewalk to output to the SFZ VST on the audio track. While this is great, it would be even better if I could use the program to play any midi file thru this SFZ program. For example, when I open a *.midi file with windows media player, i want the SFZ program to use a sound font to change the sound, rather than having to import the midi file into cakewalk and setting up the VST etc. Is this possible?

I ask this because I use a program to compose songs in midi, and i want that program to output sounds using this SFZ program, rather than the default midi output sounds. I guess what i am asking is if it is possible to change one's midi sounds. PS- i don't have a soundblaster card, so i suppose i am unable to use their sound font feature (although this SFZ program seems to support it)
 
Skyflyer, I am not expert but here's what I know and I'm not completely sure what you're asking.

Every program I have used for MIDI released in the last year has the ability to use VSTi (plug in instrument) You should be able to play "live" and hear the instrument (though there can be a delay), you can record with any instrument and switch to another.

The way I use SFZ is as a VSTi plugin (perhaps the only way) then you load the sound font file and that channel will come out that way, played live or played back.

Sorry if I'm not being clear.

Tony
 
JayDeLuca said:
Kurzweil K2000R V.A.S.T. Player
Click to expand...
I know this is going to sound screwey, but I have to say this... I have an issue with the whole "Player" idea. It's not a player. You've got one of the most advanced synthesis environments in your hands, and to label it a "player" does it a grave injustice. It's like reducing Europe to one city, the marine life to just fish and the universe to one star system. Yep, I'm a great fan (and avid user) of VAST. Is it obvious? :D

Alright, alright... I have several...uh... I dunno how many actually... shots of vodka in me right now, so please don't take offence to that.

OK... MIDI. Musical Instrument Digital Interface. One of the geniuses of '80s bestowed upon us. A marvel of cooperation between competitors that has been pretty much unrivaled to this day. It opens up great creative and sound manipulation potential.

At its heart MIDI is nothing more than just commands and information about performance data. I.e. "Play this note for this duration at this velocity, move filter cutoff from this frequency to that frequency from time point A to time point B..." etc. It's very simple actually, and that's the genius! This allows great flexibility and freedom in experimentation and the ability to fine tune performance parameters. For example, let's say you played a riff on a synth and recorded the performance data in MIDI. Say you decide that it would be a great idea to douple that riff at an octave using a different sound. No problem. Copy the recorded MIDI part to a different track, transpose it by an octave and assign it to a different MIDI channel (or instrument) using a different sound, and voila! You got your double. Had you done this in audio, you'd have to actually perform it again using the different synth/sound a second time.

On the other hand, let's say you're not one of the best performers around, or like me you've damaged one of your arms, pretty much making it useless for two handed performance. No problem. Just record the part, and then you can fix the timing, or the velocity of notes if you've got some notes sticking out where they're not supposed to, or record the right hand part, and the overdub the left hand part, using the same sound, and if there are some timing differences, fix them rather easily.

Any of these operations would entail much more work in straight audio alone, specially sound/timbre replacement, fixing the timing of notes, etc.

I know all this is general... but then again, so was your question. :p
 
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