puny sounding midi's

Lonnie Terry · Post by **Lonnie Terry** » 3 Dec 2004 12:52 pm

After down loading or BIAB midi's I save them to floppy disc, I then load them to my Korg i30 keyboard ( a great workstation )but the sound is crappo.
From my Korg I also send channel #1 to a Digitec Pro Vocalist harmonizer using vocoder mode.

Any suggestions to improve the midi sound from my workstation most welcome,

Lonnie Mullen Royal Precision S10

Larry Bell · Post by **Larry Bell** » 4 Dec 2004 2:52 am

Lonnie,
midi is midi. Doesn't matter whether you are exporting from BiaB, recording from a midi instrument, or drawing the notes on the staff one by one. It's possible that the patches selected by BiaB may not be the best choices. General Midi is arranged in banks: keyboards are together, as are guitars, basses, etc. I'd suggest changing the patches for each instrument until you find what you're after. All midi does is give info on when the note starts, how loud it is, what instrument plays it, and how long it lasts (among other parameters). The names of instruments are not precise and vary by tone generator. A sound card on a pc, for example, may have pretty good sounds but SOME DON'T. In general a dedicated midi tone module will produce pretty good results.

I always export BiaB tunes to midi, then tweak them in a sequencer program like Sonar. Your workstation may do the same. I can add live audio tracks, change the patches, edit individual notes, etc.

Hope this helps. EMail if it doesn't.

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Larry Bell - email: larry@larrybell.org - gigs - Home Page
2003 Fessenden S/D-12 8x8, 1969 Emmons S-12 6x6, 1971 Dobro, Standel and Peavey Amps

[This message was edited by Larry Bell on 04 December 2004 at 02:54 AM.]

David L. Donald · Post by **David L. Donald** » 4 Dec 2004 11:56 pm

As stated above the Korg is the problem.

There are great Korgs,I have an X-5 with AI synthesis,
not the newest Korg, but it sounds darned good even 5 years old.

There are some very good virtual synths by most major companies, like Roland or Steinberg etc.
If you have a good soundcard, and lots of ram and processing.

If not get a good synth with multi channel output,
32 or 64 audio voices,
32 midi channel I/O
general midi mapping ; that you can find a refrence for in BiaB's list of general midi patches,
and you are off and running.

Midi is note on note offf, and some control functions so synths and computers can talk.
Sound apps and moduals actuall create the sounds.[This message was edited by David L. Donald on 04 December 2004 at 11:59 PM.]

Paul Matthews · Post by **Paul Matthews** » 5 Dec 2004 5:22 am

What exactly do you mean by puny?

How do they sound played on the PC?

The reason for this question is there are two ways it can be puny - it can be the sounds generated by the midi box itself sounding thin, or it can be the actual way the tune is "played" - the timing of the notes, what notes, what the drums are doing...

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Absolute beginner!
Bennet Freshman E9 3+3

Lonnie Terry · Post by **Lonnie Terry** » 9 Dec 2004 8:04 am

After talking with several people regarding the poor quality of midi sounds it seems great results are obtained using p.c. plus sound canvas and a midiman interface. This is probably the way I will go.

Lonnie Thanks everyone for reply's