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When I first wrote this article almost five years ago (in Nov., 1996) there
were a great number of things I wanted to see improved. Since then most of those
improvements have happened in one way or another. However, there are now so many
new features and tools and new ways to do things that today it can be more
overwhelming than ever. Because of this I will try to resist the urge to tell
you about all of the new goodies out there and, instead, keep this article as
simple as possible, changing things only where the old information is no longer
valid. I am considering a new article that will attempt to organize all of the
innovation in computer music software and hardware over the past few years.
The software and hardware necessary to compose music using MIDI can be best understood
in terms of the path that the MIDI data follows. This is the MIDI signal path. In an
intermediate or advanced MIDI studio there can be several different types of paths to
follow that all involve some form of electricity like MIDI data, analog audio signals,
digital audio signals, amplified speaker connections and even power connections and all of
these can have increasingly complicated paths through your studio as you add more
equipment and hook it up in more complex ways. Because of this phenomenon I find it easier
to make sense of what I am doing by remembering what type of signal I am tracing and only
following one type at a time. This article will focus almost entirely on the MIDI signal
path. Trains are often used in making analogies about MIDI because they share some of the
same characteristics. Like MIDI data a train follows a single track and can only go where
the track leads and generally only in one direction. That means to send the train back in
the opposite direction requires routing it to a different track to travel in the opposite
direction. MIDI is a serial communications protocol so it consists of small packets of
data that are labeled for their destination then sent down the track like a car on a
train. Unlike cars on a train, MIDI data does not have to be linked together and there
isn't really anything analogous to the engine. Many people find MIDI data hard to use
because they think only in terms of what cable plugs into what socket. That is like
thinking of a railroad as only a bunch of stations with some connected track. The train's
whole purpose is to carry cars (MIDI data) from one station (MIDI device) to another so it
makes more sense to think in terms of following the car (MIDI data) along the path it
takes to get from its starting point to its ending point in a particular trip.
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