(Musical Instrument Digital Interface) A standard protocol for the interchange of musical information between musical instruments, synthesizers and computers. MIDI was developed to allow the keyboard of one synthesizer to play notes generated by another. It defines codes for musical notes as well as button, dial and pedal adjustments, and MIDI control messages can orchestrate a series of synthesizers, each playing a part of the musical score. MIDI Version 1.0 was introduced in 1983.
Not Sound, The Notes
MIDI does not record analog sound waves like a tape recorder. MIDI encodes keyboard functions, which includes the start of a note, its pitch, length, volume and musical attributes, such as vibrato. As a result, MIDI files take up considerably less space than digitized sound files. Since the advent of the General MIDI standard for musical instruments, MIDI has been widely used for music backgrounds in multimedia applications due to its space-saving feature. It is MIDI technology you might be hearing as the latest mobile ring tone or on a thrill ride or attraction at a theme park. However, MIDI is only for music, not voice. See General MIDI.
Editing Is Different
MIDI recordings are edited in an entirely different manner than conventional recording; for example, the rhythm can be changed by editing the timing codes in the MIDI messages. In addition, the computer can easily transpose a performance from B major into D major. Such editing would be virtually impossible with recorded sound waves. For more information, visit www.midi.org. See MIDI sequencer, MIDI patch, MIDI voices, MPU-401, wavetable synthesis, FM synthesis and sound card.
MIDI Vs. Digitized Sound
This shows musical notes stored in MIDI compared to digital audio. MIDI is musical notation, whereas digital audio is a sample of the actual waveforms. This is a conceptual example. The binary coding is not accurate.
The Power of MIDI
This drummer is playing with two musicians in different parts of the country. They all hear the combined sound and see each other on screen (upper right). Starting in 2005, eJamming (www.ejamming.com) opened a new world of possibilities for musicians with MIDI instruments. Just like online gamers, who match their wits with players around the world via the Internet, musicians can jam with fellow artists in different venues. Due to MIDI's concise format, the "virtual band" has emerged.
Not Sound, The Notes
MIDI does not record analog sound waves like a tape recorder. MIDI encodes keyboard functions, which includes the start of a note, its pitch, length, volume and musical attributes, such as vibrato. As a result, MIDI files take up considerably less space than digitized sound files. Since the advent of the General MIDI standard for musical instruments, MIDI has been widely used for music backgrounds in multimedia applications due to its space-saving feature. It is MIDI technology you might be hearing as the latest mobile ring tone or on a thrill ride or attraction at a theme park. However, MIDI is only for music, not voice. See General MIDI.
Editing Is Different
MIDI recordings are edited in an entirely different manner than conventional recording; for example, the rhythm can be changed by editing the timing codes in the MIDI messages. In addition, the computer can easily transpose a performance from B major into D major. Such editing would be virtually impossible with recorded sound waves. For more information, visit www.midi.org. See MIDI sequencer, MIDI patch, MIDI voices, MPU-401, wavetable synthesis, FM synthesis and sound card.
MIDI Vs. Digitized Sound
This shows musical notes stored in MIDI compared to digital audio. MIDI is musical notation, whereas digital audio is a sample of the actual waveforms. This is a conceptual example. The binary coding is not accurate.
The Power of MIDI
This drummer is playing with two musicians in different parts of the country. They all hear the combined sound and see each other on screen (upper right). Starting in 2005, eJamming (www.ejamming.com) opened a new world of possibilities for musicians with MIDI instruments. Just like online gamers, who match their wits with players around the world via the Internet, musicians can jam with fellow artists in different venues. Due to MIDI's concise format, the "virtual band" has emerged.
 | Reproduced with permission from Computer Desktop Encyclopedia. Copyright (c) 1981-2010 The Computer Language Company Inc. All rights reserved. |
Additional Resources
- Motorola Quantico
- Motorola is no stranger to the rugged clamshell, with recent handsets like the Motorola Brute i680 for Nextel and the Motorola Tundra for AT&T. So it's no surprise that even regional carrier U.S. Cellular has one of its very own--the Motorola Quantico. Like the others, the Quantico is military-specified to...
- Product reviews 2010-02-06
- DJ Mixer Pro 2.0.0 (Mac)
- DJ Mixer Professional for Mac is a powerful, full-featured, live DJ mixing software for amateur and professional DJs alike, providing everything you need to create live mixes. remixing, vinyl simulation, video mixing, and live performance. This powerful DJ software combines an easy-to-use interface makes mixing your favorite music easy. You...
- Software downloads 2010-02-04
- Acid Pro 7.0d (Windows)
- ACID Pro 7 software is a professional music workstation for composing, recording, mixing, and arranging audio and MIDI tracks. New multi-track technologies and full MIDI sequencing join legendary ACID looping functionality to form an incomparable environment for music creation and production. ACID Pro includes a custom edition of Native Instruments...
- Software downloads 2010-02-02
- ACID Music Studio 7.0a (Windows)
- It s easy to create and share your own music with ACID Music Studio software. Build original songs, remixes, and soundtracks. Record, edit, and mix unlimited tracks of audio and MIDI. Enhance songs with professional audio effects such as EQ, reverb, delay, distortion, and echo. Add pan and volume envelopes,...
- Software downloads 2010-02-02
- TabView 1.32 (Mac)
- TabView makes it possible to view and print PowerTab tablatures with your Mac. PowerTab is a well-known and widely adopted tablature editor for Windows systems. You can easily find thousands of song transcriptions in this format on the net. With TabView you can also export your tabs in MIDI format,...
- Software downloads 2010-01-31
- QMidi 1.8.5 (Mac)
- QMidi is the ultimate MIDI/Karaoke player for the Macintosh. It can organize and play many types of media files, including movies and CD+G, and allows easy text synchronization. It features real time pitch shifting, time stretching and the ability to display karaoke and movie content in full screen mode, even...
- Software downloads 2010-01-30
- SynthFont 1.344 (Windows)
- SynthFont is a tool for playing MIDI files making use of SoundFonts, VST Effects and Instruments. With SynthFont you can also create audio files (WAV, MP3, OGG, APE, FLAC) from your MIDI files. SynthFont makes it easy to assign different SoundFonts or VST Instruments to difference MIDI channels. There is...
- Software downloads 2010-01-30
- MidiKit 3.1.1 (Mac)
- MidiKit is a MIDI file browser/editor and batch processor. The browser quickly displays the most significant information about MIDI files. The editor allows native SMF editing with unlimited undo/redo capacity. Finally, MidiKit allows you to apply several operations on your MIDI files by batch processing entire disks at a time!
- Software downloads 2010-01-30
- WikAlarm 1.18 (Windows)
- WikAlarm is a compact, easy-to-use reminder service. Employing Text-to-Speech technology, WikAlarm will alert you vocally of your appointments, via Microsoft Agent animated characters. Using minimal resources, it will let you schedule all your tasks, and is also able to notify you via either message box, or the playing of...
- Software downloads 2010-01-30
- NoteAbilityPro 2.408 (Mac)
- NoteAbility Pro is a professional music notation package for the Openstep and Macintosh OS-X operating systems. Developed by Dr. Keith Hamel at the University of British Columbia, it is easily the most...
- Software downloads 2010-01-29
- Fresh View 7.88 (Windows)
- This free software helps you organize and view multimedia files (images, audio, and video). It gives you the ability to watch movies, listen to music, and view graphics in a slide show. Image files in a folder can be displayed using a number of views, including a thumbnail view that...
- Software downloads 2010-01-27
- JetAudio Basic 8.0.4 (Windows)
- JetAudio plays various music and video files. Features included are: CD Burning, Recording, and File Conversion. You can create Internet Broadcasts with JetCast. JetAudio plays most major file formats and various video or audio tracks. You can even convert audio files to various formats. A special feature is Video conversion...
- Software downloads 2010-01-27
- Karaoke 5 37.9 (Windows)
- Player and manager of file midi Karaoke MID, KAR, KFN, WMA, MP3, CDG, WMA, AVI, MPG and WMV for executions live without loss of time. It allows to create or to modify basic Karaoke mp3 or midi with an evolved system of synchronization that allows to syncronize the text with...
- Software downloads 2010-01-25
- OSCulator 2.9.1 (Mac)
- Virtual-hub for devices and softwares OSCulator is a software that can be used with many different hardware devices and software. For example, with OSCulator, your Nintendo Wiimote can talk to major MIDI sequencers or your favorite console emulator or even the Kyma sound design workstation. And your iPhone or Lemur...
- Software downloads 2010-01-25
- Fantasize Soundfont Player VSTi 2.51 (Windows)
- Fantasize SF2 player is a sample generator that works with the SoundFont2 collection (SF2), designed for creating music on your VST Host.Parameters:----------------# Load SoundFont - This button is located in the middle of the interface. Click it and select a SoundFont2 instruments/drumkits bank file to load (*.SF2).# Bank - Here...
- Software downloads 2010-01-24
- FutureDecks Pro 2.0.2 (Windows)
- Looking for a smart and very powerful DJ software? Meet FutureDecks Pro--the professional DJ mixing software. With FutureDecks Pro you can mix songs and videos like a pro DJ. Beat-matching, seamless beat-aware loops, external controllers and MIDI support, VST effects, precise automatic BPM counter, and sampler. You have a classic...
- Software downloads 2010-01-24
- FutureDecks Pro 2.0.2 (Mac)
- With FutureDecks PRO you can mix songs and videos like a pro DJ. Beat-matching, seamless beat-aware loops, external controllers and MIDI support, VST effects, precise automatic BPM counter, sampler and many other things. You have a classic DJ setup with 2 decks, pro mixer and playlist. Some of...
- Software downloads 2010-01-23
- Disk Doctors Photo Recovery (Mac)
- Disk Doctors Photo Recovery software recovers lost and deleted digital photos, music, and video files on Mac OS X 10.4.11 and above. The software supports both Intel and PowerPC based Macintosh and is an Apple Universal application supporting recovery from IDE / ATA / SATA / SCSI hard disk drives,...
- Software downloads 2010-01-22
- MIDI Tracker 1.2.8 (Windows)
- MIDI Tracker is music editor with ability to import and export songs to MIDI format, support of 128 instruments, assigning volume and tracks count, playing and editing notes by PC keyboard. It is easy to create a song from a several patterns without any copy/paste operations. MIDI Tracker uses own...
- Software downloads 2010-01-21
- MagicScore Maestro 7 7.022 (Windows)
- MagicScore Maestro--the professional music notation software, offering the most advanced capabilities for working with music. It lets you precisely tune up the notes' sounds and their timing features, process the effects and the dynamics. In this program, you may use both general and extended sets of musical symbols and as...
- Software downloads 2010-01-20
Neighboring Terms
Premier Vendor Content Whitepapers, webcasts & resources from our Power Center Sponsors
SmartPlanet
- Thought-provoking progressive ideas on diverse topics that intersect with technology, business, and life, and matter to the world at large. Visit SmartPlanet
- More from IBM
-
- How to Drive Better Business Outcomes with Exceptional Web Experiences Download the eBook
- Driving Business Agility through SOA Connectivity & Integration Read the White Paper from IBM
- Linking Decisions and Information for Organizational Performance Read the Tom Davenport study
