jbjones@marlin.NOSC.MIL (John B. Jones) (10/13/90)
I hope someone knows about this; I'm looking for some type of system to compose, edit, and play music on my PC. I want to be able to print the music on a dot matrix printer, and save it for later use or editing, in standard notation. There are sparse advertisements, vague boasts, and blunt demands for cash. I know I need "a midi system". Beyond that, I know nothing. Can anyone help me? jbjones!marlin.nosc.mil
6600bori@ucsbuxa.ucsb.edu (Boris Burtin) (10/13/90)
In article <1634@marlin.NOSC.MIL> jbjones@marlin.NOSC.MIL (John B. Jones) writes: >I hope someone knows about this; I'm looking for some type of system to >compose, edit, and play music on my PC. I want to be able to print the >music on a dot matrix printer, and save it for later use or editing, in >standard notation. There are sparse advertisements, vague boasts, and >blunt demands for cash. I know I need "a midi system". Beyond that, I >know nothing. >Can anyone help me? MIDI stands for Musical Instrument Digital Interface. Its purpose is, as the acronym states, to allow various musical equipment - keyboards, samplers, drum machines, effects processors, and more - to communicate with your computer. MIDI allows you to use your computer as a home recording studio, and record and play back notes that come from all the instruments you own. You can also use it as a librarian and store your synth patches on disk. And that is just the beginning! - Boris Burtin
davet@cbnewsj.att.com (Dave Tutelman) (10/14/90)
> In article <1634@marlin.NOSC.MIL> jbjones@marlin.NOSC.MIL (John B. Jones) writes: > >I hope someone knows about this; I'm looking for some type of system to > >compose, edit, and play music on my PC. OK, that's the requirements: compose, edit, and play. Play on what? That's important, as we'll see. > >I want to be able to print the > >music on a dot matrix printer, and save it for later use or editing, in > >standard notation. Another requirement: print the music in standard notation on a dot matrix printer. (It may matter which printer.) > >There are sparse advertisements, vague boasts, and > >blunt demands for cash. I know I need "a midi system". Beyond that, I > >know nothing. In article <6580@hub.ucsb.edu>, 6600bori@ucsbuxa.ucsb.edu (Boris Burtin) writes a glowingly colorful hymn to the wonderfulness of MIDI, which frankly seemed like more sparse advertisements and vague boasts! It's a real piece of overstatement, especially against John's requirements. By the way, I'm a MIDI enthusiast myself, but it's doing John a real disservice by that oversell. Let's examine this, one step at a time, against what John needs done. > MIDI stands for Musical Instrument Digital Interface. Its purpose is, as the > acronym states, to allow various musical equipment - keyboards, samplers, > drum machines, effects processors, and more - to communicate with your > computer. That's absolutely true. It's also totally irrelevant to three out of four of John's requirements (compose, edit, play, and print). This only addresses "play", unless John intends to compose and edit at his instrument rather than his computer. He really didn't make this very clear. > MIDI allows you to use your computer as a home recording studio, > and record and play back notes that come from all the instruments you own. Boris, we both know what this means, but the MIDI novice won't. Your computer DOES NOT become an audio recorder. It records which notes you played. You can play them back only through another MIDI instrument, not through a stereo system. Moreover, it doesn't do a thing for "all the instruments you own", just the MIDI-equipped electronic instruments. Among the instruments in my house that it WON'T talk to are: - My Baldwin piano. (Conventional pianos are not MIDI) - My sons' clarinets and saxophone - My banjo Granted, I also have about a dozen MIDI-equipped keyboards, drum machines and synths, but conventional acoustic instruments have nothing to do with MIDI. > You > can also use it as a librarian and store your synth patches on disk. True, but that has nothing to do with John's requirements. > And that is just the beginning! True, but getting back to the point at hand: John, Why do you feel you need a MIDI system? It sounds like you need a musical notation program. You may want an all-in-one "music card" for your PC, to play back the music. But MIDI, which will (for your application) just act as a device to log and play back keystrokes on your Electronic Musical Keyboard, will only help if: - You have a MIDI-equipped electronic keyboard. - You want to input your music or play it back via that keyboard. Let me recommend that you find a piece of SOFTWARE that does what you want (musical notation composition, printing, and editing) in a way that pleases you. THEN find out what hardware you'll need to use it for playback (and keyboard input, if that's what you want). Dave +---------------------------------------------------------------+ | Dave Tutelman | | Physical - AT&T Bell Labs - Lincroft, NJ | | Logical - ...att!pegasus!dmt == dmt@pegasus.att.com | | Audible - (201) 576 2194 | +---------------------------------------------------------------+