what is (MIDI /Musical Instrument Digital Interface)????

[bluesfloyd]

hi,guys
I hear the term (MIDI /Musical Instrument Digital Interface)
I am not sure what this is, and what I do with it,
e.g. my (eventide time factor) as got a MIDI function, so could you guys kindly explain this to me,
much thanks for your time guys,

bluesfloyd,

[Obsessive Compulsive]

Re: what is (MIDI /Musical Instrument Digital Interface)????

Ever heard of Google? Wikipedia?

[Johnny the Kid]

Re: what is (MIDI /Musical Instrument Digital Interface)????

MIDI was invented in the 80's as a way for musical instruments by different manufacturers to communicate together. You could have one master keyboard and a bunch of racks synths all connected via MIDI and be able to play whatever you wanted. Some people even used MIDI to set up light shows. As digital technology, particularly modeling technology, became more and more popular with guitar players they adopted MIDI in order for these large guitar rigs to be able to function with only one switcher. The MIDI function on your Eventide can be used for a ton of different stuff, such as setting temp and patch changing.

[beaubrummels]

Re: what is (MIDI /Musical Instrument Digital Interface)????

hi,guys
I hear the term (MIDI /Musical Instrument Digital Interface)
I am not sure what this is, and what I do with it,

WHAT'S MIDI?

MIDI is an industry standard music technology protocol that connects products from many different companies including digital musical instruments, computers, tablets and smartphones. MIDI is used everyday around the world by musicians, DJs, producers, educators, artists and hobbyists to create, perform, learn and share music and artistic works. Nearly every hit album, film score, TV show and theatrical production uses MIDI to connect and create.

https://www.midi.org/

GETTING STARTED

https://www.midi.org/articles/tutorials

https://www.midi.org/index.php/articles/categories/getting-started-with-midi

e.g. my (eventide time factor) as got a MIDI function, so could you guys kindly explain this to me,
much thanks for your time guys,

bluesfloyd,

Starting from page 43 of your manual, is describes what you can do with it.

https://s3.amazonaws.com/com.eventide.downloads/Product+Manuals/TimeFactorManual.pdf

MIDI can be used to:
1) Load and bypass Presets
2) Select Banks
3) Toggle infinite Repeat On and Off
4) Change parameter values
5) Set tempo from MIDI clock
6) Enable TimeFactor’s knobs and switches to control other MIDI devices
7) Dump (backup) Presets and/or system settings to a computer

Starting from the middle of page 50 describes how to set it up. If it seems too much to understand, you probably don't need it.

[TwilightOdyssey]

Re: what is (MIDI /Musical Instrument Digital Interface)????

^ What they said.

MIDI is a simple machine language that allows for all sorts of useful communication between musical instruments, including transferring of musical data (note pitch, velocity, etc) and settings data.

[bluesfloyd]

Re: what is (MIDI /Musical Instrument Digital Interface)????

hi,
thanks guys for your help above,starting to understand the midi thing,

bluesfloyd.

[Mincer]

Re: what is (MIDI /Musical Instrument Digital Interface)????

Put simply, it allows one piece of gear to talk to another. It will allow you to change presets on your pedal remotely, and possibly change parameters with a remote footcontroller. It is very useful with complex gear setups.

[bluesfloyd]

Re: what is (MIDI /Musical Instrument Digital Interface)????

Put simply, it allows one piece of gear to talk to another. It will allow you to change presets on your pedal remotely, and possibly change parameters with a remote footcontroller. It is very useful with complex gear setups.

hi, mincer
i like when things are explained simply, some guys like me are still new to this guitar world, nice when you guys just want to help,

all the best,
bluesfloyd.

[Securb]

Re: what is (MIDI /Musical Instrument Digital Interface)????

The most common misconception of midi is that it transfers audio. Nothing is further from the truth. Midi sends performance information and other data. An example would be the one device telling another to play a particular note at a determined volume at a fixed amount of time. One description of midi I always have liked is midi is a lot like the rolls on a player piano that tell the piano which notes to play and how long. Or as Mincer said to change a certian preset or patch. Lots can be done with midi or very simple operations.

[DrNewcenstein]

Re: what is (MIDI /Musical Instrument Digital Interface)????

MIDI also allows multiple MIDI-capable devices (which are easily identified by having a MIDI port) to control or be controlled by a single MIDI-capable device.

For example, the ART X-15 Ultrafoot pedalboard from way back in the late 80s was this huge foot controller that had two treadles and 12 buttons. While Digitech's foot controllers for their rack units would only work with their own gear, and usually only the item it was built for, like the GSP 21, the ART X-15 worked with anything made by anyone, as long as it had a MIDI port and could receive the standardized commands of the General MIDI specification, such as Program Change (i.e. switching Presets), Note Number (where a MIDI Note is directly linked to a Keyboard note, meaning MIDI Note C# played a C# on your digital piano or synth unit), Tempo Up/Down (usually for drum machines, but later included Digital Delay units), Start/Stop commands for sequencers, and Continuous Controller commands for things like Volume and Pitch controls found on most synths, and later in Rack units which had either a Volume control or a Volume Pedal or Wah pedal.

If you had multiple rack units with MIDI capability - Compressor, Drive, Delay, Reverb, Chorus, etc etc - you could connect them all to each other with MIDI cables and control patch changes on all of them at once using just one controller. Some amps even feature MIDI-controlled channel switching, so if you had effects that were only used when you switched to the Crunch channel, turning that effect on would automatically switch to that amp channel, and turning it off would switch back. Alternatively, changing the amp channel would turn said effect on, while switching back would turn it off.

A lot depends on which unit you set as the controller and which one is to be controlled. You may, for example, want to use the Crunch channel without that one effect, or use that effect with the Clean channel. In that event, you want it set so changing amp channels turns the effect on/off, rather than turning the effect on/off changes amp channels.


As well, a MIDI-based desktop mixer can control your Digital Audio Workstation on your PC, which makes adjustments faster and easier than chasing things down with a mouse individually. You turn a knob or slide a fader on the mixer and that data is passed to the DAW, though I'm sure more recent mixers do all that through USB directly.