How Important is MIDI to Your Recordings?

[blue2blue]

Once again, I'm in the Great Unwashed Middle.

 

 

MIDI was still in the throw-the-baby-bottle-out-the-crib stage of development when I started with synths and studio recording in 1981.

 

So, back in the 80s, all my synth work was played by hand (man, I had a hellacious right hand back then... no bawdy jokes, ok?) and my drums were from a series of non-MIDI drum machines. (My first rhythm toy was a Roland battery metronome. My second was the very first Dr Rhthm, the one where the hat had three settings: off, 8, and 16. My third was an Oberheim DX... you get the idea.)

 

When I finally got up with MIDI at the flip into the 90s (I can't even remember my first sequencer's name. It was from Voyetra. The second was the old MasterTracks Pro, a refugee from the Mac.)

 

 

I actually was using loops long before I used MIDI (outside one class). One of my collaborators back around '83 or '84 (the esotericist/musicologist Loren Nerell, then fresh out of high school) had bought a used Emulator 1 (not cheap back then... my low mileage used Plymouth Valiant cost less than half what the EMU cost) and we used it for a number of projects and goofs, even building a band around it for a brief period. (Walk on Fire, we never played out.)

 

 

But, after an initial period of abject and utter confusion (we're talking near-total befuddlement, folks), I found myself taking to MIDI like the proverbial duck to water. At its worst, of course, it was more awful than the cheapest music box or tinkiest Casio demo. But at its best it could approach a vague level of musicality.

 

And, if you stopped fighting it and let it do its robotic thing, you could make some very cool and fun music that could never be played by humans. (Well, it was cool and fun for a while, anyhow...)

 

I always found wavetables to be a devil's bargain -- too useful and easy to ignore -- but always compromised on multiple levels. I still use them all the time -- but I try to use them intelligently, like, for instance, not using a sample of a Rhodes vibrato -- since the vibrato is locked to the sample and any kind of polyphony tends to produce vibrato trainwrecking, but using a straight sample set and applying vibrato (and often 'reamping' as well).

 

Anyhow, MIDI... it might turn into something some day if they work out the kinks...

[C JoGo]

Half of our studio tracks~ are always MIDI...We sync to our keyboard/sampler, for every demo.. The drums are complete Midi combop of pads/ Kurzweil ::::: .Our studios would not exist >> without MIDI

[Anderton]

 

I am going to use it. I will probably need help....

 

 

Let's do online support, okay? Because if you have questions, other people will have the same questions, guaranteed. Maybe I'll start a "MIDI Q&A Thread."

[C JoGo]

[

[C JoGo]

 

Originally posted by Bruce Swedien "Transparent to the user" What a great thought! Of course I am a MIDI ignoramus.... I understand the concept, but my biggest move towards using MIDI was to buy two MIDI cables recently. They are still unopened! Whenever I have used MIDI in the past, I just hire someone who really, really knows. The business has changed greatly in the past couple of years. I feel as though now I had better learn a little about MIDI. I have many excellent devices that use MIDI. i.e. - An AKAI MPC 3000. I love the drum 'feel' of this machine. A Big-ass Triton that sounds pretty good. Do you think an old dog like me can learn MIDI??? I am doing much of my work in own beautiful studio here at home now. I love working this way!!! What to do??? Brucie the Viking!!!!

 

 

 

 

I remember attending my first NAMM back in 'bout 85/86 ~~~ MIDI was just hitting the streets. Bought my first MIDI sequencer/program ...in those days you actually called the Developers' home phone # ...it was the keyboardist for Todd Rundgrens' UTOPIA --So, you simply called Powell and asked questions ~~ Not so these days..

 

Since our studios are quite small { in comparision to what you may be sittin' in} and we have grown lazy over the last 30 years ...we use MiDI drums for all productions. We never record the actual drums to DAW/tape but, just sync to the MIDI sequencer on playback/mastering. Samplers have 8/10 outputs --so with a MIDI sequencer ( we use 3 Kurzweils )-- you have a decent 10 seperate channels of drums ~with each sampler (sample of choice =instead of mic placement )

 

So next time you are out West-- * Carmel way:cool:..stop by,,, we'll swap MIDI stories~!~!

http://acapella.harmony-central.com/forums/attachment.php?s=&postid=12654809

[MrKnobs]

Austin has taken it's toll on me.

 

I'm strictly organic / non-MIDI these days on my own stuff and most of my customers' stuff. And I mean *everything*. I had a real string quartet in the other day.

 

Occasionally a client will come in and use my V-Drum set, but honestly it makes me cringe. It's not quite so terrible if they'll let me put up real cymbals and a real snare.

 

Terry D.

[Kendrix]

Its a mix of midi and audio for me with midi also serviing as a platform for control info such as program changes to pass around the system.

 

Basically, I consider that I have three networks goin on in my little sandbox of a studio:

 

1) Analog Audio:- line level connections between sound modules, effect units, mixer and recorder.

 

2)Digital audio: connections to every piece of gear that has digital I/O. I seek to avoid conversions if at all possible.

 

3) MIDI: patched from the PC/Cubase our a number of sound mudules and my automated mixer/recorder.

 

All three of these networks get well used for each and every tune I work on. Some using a midi click and some without.

 

Recently my investments have focused on replacing some often used midi sounds with real instruments. So, Ive bought a few saxes, a bass geetar and some perc. However, because of limitations in my home recording situation, strings, piano, full horn sections, drums and some other items will always be midi generated.

 

I have also found midi to be a useful tool in creating/arranging.

Randomly looping some bass tracks has lead me to some useful riffs. Sometimes i scroll through numerous midi sounds while playing the whole arrangement. This is a fun/interactive way to try out alternative voicings for a given midi part.

FWIW- There are times I find this really useful.

 

For what I use it for midi "as is" is just fine.

[Billster]

I started using virtual tracks of MIDI with tape sync back into the stone ages (1986)

 

Then, I started using virtual tracks of MIDI, with early digital audio from the computer, mixing to tape in the mid-1990's

 

Now, I still use MIDI, but bounce the tracks into digital audio for mixing in the box.

 

I find myself using less MIDI for drums and percussion, and using more sample assembly. I don't use loops much.

[Rabid]

I like to compose a lot with MIDI hardware, then start moving tracks to soft synths and record them to audio. I also like to play drum parts in using a Roland Handsonic or V-Drums.

 

Robert

[Etienne Rambert]

blue2blue:

 

 

"Anyhow, MIDI... it might turn into something some day if they work out the kinks...

"

 

----

That's what I think about digital audio. In many ways, MIDI is a much more powerful technology. Try slowing down a simple drum track in digital audio. In MIDI you can do it with a click of the mouse. There are all sorts of problems if you try it in digital audio. It's easier to just re-record it.

 

Try changing that guitar track to a flute...or a trombone.

 

In digital audio? No can do.

 

With MIDI, it's a cinch.

 

People don't like MIDI time? Turn off the metronome and play the beat in your own time.

 

I always feel like I'm constrained and limited working with digital audio. MIDI is liberation.

 

Digital audio is a necessity for me. I always have to get there eventually. But I'd rather get there using the most powerful & flexible technology available to me. In my experience, that's MIDI.

 

I wish human beings could sync to a MIDI clock. Maybe in our genetic future, it might be possible.