origin of general midi patches

[object.session]

dunno why it never crossed my mind before, but how did the general midi designers decide on the patches to use in the sound effects family of the GM standard? for people that don't get what i'm talking about, look here:

 

http://www.borg.com/~jglatt/tutr/gm.htm#Patch

 

gunshot, seashore, etc. . . did they determine they were the most useful or common sound effects to have? were there specific songs that used these sorts of sound?

 

just wondering if anyone has any idea . .

[elsongs]

Originally posted by m15a dunno why it never crossed my mind before, but how did the general midi designers decide on the patches to use in the sound effects family of the GM standard? for people that don't get what i'm talking about, look here: http://www.borg.com/~jglatt/tutr/gm.htm#Patch gunshot, seashore, etc. . . did they determine they were the most useful or common sound effects to have? were there specific songs that used these sorts of sound? just wondering if anyone has any idea . .

 

I believe the first commercially-available GM synth was the Roland MT-32 which came out in the late '80s. Its presets include the same types of sounds that are still used today in GM soundsets.

 

[sevensinner]

I think the MT-32 and GM were almost identical except that the MT-32 patches went from 0 - 127 whereas GM were assigned 1 - 128, so the presets were effectively offset by 1.

 

I believe General MIDI was also part of the original Multimedia PC specification (if anyone remembers that, circa 1992 ~ Windows 3.1) along with a 16-bit stereo sound card and a double speed CD-ROM drive (300KB/sec yeah really kiddies)

[Etienne Rambert]

Great question.

 

I don't know the answer.

 

But you're at the right website for studying the language of the Gods.