Are you ready for MIDI 2.0?

[Phil O'Keefe]

It's here... but don't expect new hardware for the actual MIDI interface or anything - this is really more about evolution of the spec, not a complete redo of everything, and best of all, it's all designed to remain compatible with previous MIDI devices, although of course they might not be able to do everything that more modern MIDI 2.0 compliant products can do. 

What kinds of things CAN you do with MIDI 2.0? Take a look at this page for some ideas... 

https://www.midi.org/articles-old/details-about-midi-2-0-midi-ci-profiles-and-property-exchange

 

[nice keetee]

So it will run under the hood, so to speak,  no need to get a new midi interface etc?

[thelurker]

I'm finally getting around to using more of MIDI 1.0, this will add to the learning curve.  XD

[Phil O'Keefe]

16 hours ago, nice keetee said:

So it will run under the hood, so to speak,  no need to get a new midi interface etc?

As I understand it, that’s correct. 

[1001gear]

Still on three pins or is it all USB now? I like the higher resolution but now that you finally got that, synths need to evolve. Typical fish ladder marketing.

[Consume]

I have a question, and I didn't want to unearth up a Zombie thread to ask in.

How do I go about learning MIDI? I mean, literally for somebody who doesn't know anything at all about MIDI.

I am a drummer. I've had, and toyed with electric drums going back to the mid-80's, but I  always used the internal sounds in the modules. I have all sorts of MIDI gear now (3 ddrum4 modules, a brand new MOTU 8x8 MIDI Interface, about 4 "midiK.I.T.I." Trigger to MIDI interfaces, and a brand new PC with Mixcraft Pro Studio 7 software which has lots of sounds.) 
as well as  about 20 HART Mesh head electric drum pads, and a ddrum 4 drumkit.

I kept buying all this gear and it is so new to me (I'm 51) and I know nothing about MIDI and it is like I am terrifiedto hook it up and dive into it because I don't have a clue what I am doing or where to begin. I bought The MIDI Manual : A Practical Guide to MIDI in the Project Studio (Audio Engineering Society Presents) 3rd Edition by David Miles Huber.

I read it, it made me feel like a complete idiot. (Remember, you are dealing with a drummer, use small words. LOL) I need this stuff really dumbed-down so that I can get a grasp on what I am doing. I have a friend who is considered by almost everyone locally to be "THE" local Keyboard master - we're talking the guy everyone calls first when they need a keys player for a gig or recording. Guess what? He doesn't know anything about MIDI. He said he looked into it about 25 or 30 years ago, but decided it is of very little use to him, because he does everything live. No sequencing at all. He said he is like John Lord from Deep Purple, David Stone from Rainbow, and Don Airey from Rainbow, Purple, and Ozzy Osbourne era.  not Trent Reznor.... he said he is really more like an old school "Rock Organ" player than a keyboard player, although he is a classically trained pianist.

For me, as a drummer. That is essentially how I use the drum modules, BUT I want to be able to use MIDI for recording drums - I mean, everyone does track/sound replacement on the drums, so I thought - why even bother recording actual drums, when I can just record the MIDI sequence, and stack as many sounds as I want on there without wasting processor speed, RAM, etc on actual audio tracks for the drums. 


Thanks!

[Phil O'Keefe]

The book I recommend (strongly!) is MIDI For Musicians by Craig Anderton. It's presented in a easy to read and logical manner that makes understanding MIDI as easy as possible. It's an older book (written in 1986) but don't let that put you off - until very recently, the basic MIDI spec has changed little between then and now, and the information in MIDI For Musicians is still totally relevant. Once you learn the information it contains, you'll have the basic foundation, and you can build on that by learning about more modern aspects such as MIDI over USB and the recently introduced MIDI 2.0 specification. 

While I'm not a Mixcraft user, I'm pretty knowledgable when it comes to MIDI and sequencing in general, and so are many other people on HC, so if you have any specific questions about some aspect of that, don't hesitate to ask...  

[Phil O'Keefe]

On 1/11/2020 at 4:40 PM, 1001gear said:

Still on three pins or is it all USB now?

Both 5-pin DIN connectors and USB are used on modern MIDI devices, although not all will feature both types of connections. USB is obviously great if you need to connect an instrument or controller directly to a computer, but they're less useful in a live performance situation - especially if you don't want to haul a computer to the gig or use one as part of your live performance rig, so controllers that don't have the 5-pin DIN jacks are generally more useful for studio, as opposed to live use. 

 

 

[kbeaumont]

I don't know about MIDI 2.0 but I have been seriously lusting for a ROLI Seaborg Rise!

[ggm1960]

I don't expect much impact from MIDI 2.0 for quite a while. I "evolved" in my own way a while back by eliminating the MOTU timepiece(s) and just connecting my newer keyboards (FA08, Krome) via drivers with USB to my MBP for live gigs. I'd have to "de-evolve" however if I wanted to go back to controlling other processors (guitar, vocal/autotune, lighting, etc.) with MIDI.