WHAT IS MIDI? WHERE CAN I FIND BASIC INFORMATION?
MIDI stands for Musical Instrument Digital Interface and is an international hardware AND software standard. MIDI specifies the hardware interface, the communication protocol, and the content of messages which allow you to connect and communicate between electronic musical instruments and computers from different manufacturers. In other words, the “wiring diagram” and the “language” are standardized. (See below for sites with info.) So we have a hardware and software standard. That should do it, right? Now let’s go make music! Wrong! Something turned out to be missing. MIDI worked well and the devices from different manufacturers could indeed communicate, but the results were sometimes unexpected. One of the main problems was in the instrument list (the manner and order in which the instruments are numbered inside the synthesizer). When a MIDI message tells a synthesizer to use instrument number 12 (and that IS how it works) then one synthesizer would generate the sound of a vibraphone
