2. Easy Sharing of creative work over several platforms.
Well, the application of MIDI is Immense. Now a days every professional Audio device is MIDI compatible.

3. As MIDI is just a set of written instructions, which controls the remote device, the output file is very very small, few bytes. So sharing these files becomes just a snap.

4. Nowadays, professional sound is already loaded on the soundcards. So a simple MIDI keyboard can trigger these wonderful sounds, which can be played back the same way, with the small midi file on the same or similar soundcard later.

5. It used to be a headache playing combination sounds by playing different keyboards simultaneously. But now only one keyboard can suffice the requirement, as it can be sequenced to play the sounds on other keyboards through a MIDI link. It was a headache mixing sound on analog mixer in studio.
What ever was to be mixed was to be precisely mixed as no recollection later was possible. Imagine all EQ, balances, levels of maybe 20 odd audio tracks to be remembered!! Well all this was solved by introduction of MIDI compatible Automation Mixers, where all faders, EQ, panning effects were motorised and recallable.

6. Stage Lighting for repeated plays in professional setups is MIDI automated. As this stored info can be used everywhere the plays go.

7. With affordability of computers, this MIDI automation and sequencing on the keyboard has become a childs play. Now no more it is necessary to fiddle withose tiny buttons on the keyboard to get the right sound. Just a click of the mouse is enough.

8. The most popular aspect of MIDI, MTC or Midi Time Code, is used to sync synthesizers with analog devices such as old spool recorders, HI8's, and computers. For e.g. the music part can be arranged on a synthesizer, and the vocal part can be recorded on a hard disk or spool, in sync with the synth. When you press rewind on master device the other devices will sync back. This allows efficient utilisation of hard disk space as all the tracks needn't be recorded on the hard-disk.

9. As General MIDI Standard and affordability of professional synthesizers and PC Sound Cards increasing, it is a haven for
people, to play around with sounds, make karaoke tracks, drum loops, etc and share them on the net across the globe. The files are so small that you wouldn't know when it got
downloaded.

A Boon for Budding Musicians with a tight Buget
And the price of going into - The Professional recording studio? We're talking hundreds of dollars an hour. You could go broke before the microphones were even setup in front of all of the instruments.

MIDI / computers allow for professional recordings to be made on a budget, in small, "home" environments that don't require things like special sound-proofing. Furthermore, the technology in computer audio often eliminates expensive, time-consuming tasks, such as tuning drumkits and placing microphones/cables.

The storage capacity of computers also makes recalling a given setup very efficient and inexpensive, which is important since often a setup needs to be recalled during multiple sessions.

An example
With MIDI, I can play all of the musical parts myself. (Well, really the MIDI sequencer is my "band". It obeys all of my instructions, whenever I want, even when I get a great musical idea at 3AM. Try assembling a band at 3AM in order to check out a musical idea. Good luck.

With MIDI, I plug in my headphones, and start arranging my great idea immediately, and my sleeping neighbors don't even know that I am arranging and listening to the playback of my musical piece written for a 40 piece orchestra). If you cant afford a professional keyboard like a Roland or Korg, no sweat. You have a old computer. Just fit in a decent sound card (as per my advise, sound blaster live wich has digital I/Os and economical too) and a basic keyboard with MIDI I/Os even a second hand one would do. And you can start playing the great sounds of the computer.

With a MIDI sequencer, you press the rewind button and it s instantaneously ready for playback. No waiting for rewinding tape. You can have the sequencer automatically punch-in for you. (ie, you don't need another guy to punch the record button while you're busy playing your overdub). You can fix your mistakes just by quickly editing the individual "musical events". Most sequencers can display the data in the representation of a musical manuscript upon the computer's display. You just click on the graphical notes with the computer "mouse" to edit them. There is no equivalent to that in the old analog days.
And you can slow down the tempo to record your part. Speed it up for playback, and no Mickey Mouse effect.

And transposing? The computer does it for me. I just tell it how many half steps up or down, or tell it what new key signature to use. And it is helped improve my arranging immensely. For one thing, I get instantaneous feedback on my arrangements while I am arranging, just by pressing the play button on the sequencer. I don't have to wait for musicians to play my parts. (And I don't have to pay them either because "them" is my multi-timbral MIDI module playing all of their parts on all of their instruments. For the price of hiring musicians for one recording session, I've purchased equipment that I can use for hundreds of sessions). And I can play instruments myself that I never could play before. I can play the violin. I can play the flute. I can play the trumpet. And some Tabla too.

How? Because I've got a keyboard or that lovely soundcard that has realistic-sounding renditions of all of those instruments.

It really helps to get a feel for how to use an instrument in an arrangement when you actually get to "play" it yourself, listening to how it sounds in various ranges and hearing how it blends in with other instruments in an arrangement.

And my MIDI module never complains about what I m forcing it to play. It never says "Hey, I don t like this unconventional, weird-sounding music you write, and I don t want to play it".
With MIDI, one can make recordings that sound like they were done in an expensive professional recording studio, and I do it in my home at a fraction of the cost and time and physical space. I wish I had it all years ago.

But But But. One should always remember. One can not achieve the briliance of a genius drumer, guitarist etc except if himself is one. So in the end even if the sounds from your midi machine sounded unrealistc, you can play those arrangements to professional drummers etc, make them rehearse the pieces and thus go prepared in the recording studio, thus saving time and a LOT of money.

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This column has been setup to help you learn more about sound technologies. Dr. Rajpal, an expert in the field, looks after this new section.

Pls send in your questions to :
akash@sudeepaudio.com