by Ryan Alexander Diduck (Music 786.7 Did)
The MIDI (Musical Instrument Digital Interface) specification, which allows multiple digital instruments to communicate with each other, was recently approved for update to a new MIDI 2.0 standard, the first major update to its functionality since the 1.0 standard was adopted in 1985. Think of how often your computers or phones or tablets need software updates, and consider how well-designed a software standard must have been to survive without significant changes for 35 years!
On the surface, software standards might not be the most exciting aspect of music-making, but the truth is that MIDI allowed unparalleled possibilities with digital music that have changed our musical landscape. Before MIDI, synthesizers and other digital electronic musical instruments could only interface through proprietary systems made by their own manufacturers, if at all. Once MIDI was in place, a musician could use products made by any company, and all of them could be used together in large, complex systems. Computer systems could also implement MIDI, making it a great way to combine hardware and software setups. A lot of the most cutting-edge music being made today still relies on MIDI.
In Mad Skills: Midi and Music Tech in the 20th Century by Ryan Alexander Diduck, we leave the more contemporary deployments of MIDI technology behind, and look at the development of the specification and its uses through the late 1990s. Diduck heads even further back in history to find music-tech antecedents that required standardization, like piano rolls for player pianos, and then he looks at the complex circumstances that led to MIDI. Music industry advocacy organizations and trade unions played roles just as important at times as hardware and software engineers, creative visionaries, and startup computer companies. After laying out the history of MIDI, he goes on to compare its functionality to some of the proprietary systems it replaced, and outlines how the General MIDI specification that arrived in 1992 served as a kind of simplified deployment of the specification to streamline its use in non-professional environments. Finally, he explores the initial proposals and failure to introduce a MIDI 2.0 spec in the late 1990s, a task just now being realized 20 years later.
The topic turns out to be much more interesting to read about than I would have guessed initially. To some degree, the story of MIDI reminded me of the early days of the electric guitar, when market forces and maverick designers met in unexpected ways. I’d particularly recommend this book for electronic music producers, but even folks who are just interested in the history of evolving technology will find something to love here.
[If you enjoy this, you may also wish to try How to Wreck a Nice Beach: The Vocoder from World War II to Hip-Hop by Dave Tompkins, or How Music Works by David Byrne.]
[ publisher’s official Mad Skills web page ] | [ official Ryan Diduck blog ]
Recommended
by Scott S.
Polley Music Library
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