AES Convention: 70 (October 1981)
Paper Number: 1845
Authors: Smith, Dave; Wood, Chet
Affiliation: Sequential Circuits, Inc., San Jose, CA
THE UNIVERSAL SYNTHESIZER INTERFACE
The Universal Synthesizer Interface is a specification designed to enable interconnecting synthesizers, sequencers and home computers with an industry-wide standard interface. This is a preliminary specification; comments, criticism, and alternative proposals are welcome. This interface specification has not been tested and would need to be retrofitted to any equipment presently in the field. The interface is basically specified as one-to-one between two units; ie, a synthesizer and a sequencer. Under certain circumstances, however, more units may be placed on a single line.
HISTORY
Like with the formation of the BBC, MIDI is a rare occasion where technologists come together to better legitimise their operations, increase the success of their businesses. But by burying rivalries, or their desire to jump on competitive advantages create an opportunity for global culture to experience a paradigm shift. No invention since music notation has had a greater impact on the history of music. Something that each and every one of us has experienced without thinking about on a day to day basis as it churns out 31,250 1s or 0s per second.
The paper above is a response to Roland founder Ikutaro Kakehashi’s belief shared with fellow manufacturers Oberheim, Sequential Circuits, Yamaha, Korg and Kawai. That an inability to synchronise electronic musical devices made by different manufacturers was hindering the growth of music-tech industry. The paper outline a protocol defined by Dave Smith and Chet Wood based on different approaches taken to get kit to speak to each other. From the days of CV-gate, through a complex system of Smith’s devising settling on Roland’s own DCB protocol as a basis.
The agreed protocol was dubbed Universal Musical Interface, or UMI (pronounced you-me) until Dave Smith aired his disapproval that it seemed “corny”. Whereby MIDI, musical instrument, digital interface was settled upon. Smith demonstrated MIDI for the first time at the 1983 NAMM conference. This ushered in the formation of the MMA (Midi, Manufacturers Association) at which point the protocol was agreed upon and MIDI 1.0 was born.
WHAT IS IT?
MIDI is a digital protocol that allows two or more devices to communicate between each other using a very basic 8bit binary code. Whilst the transmitter and receiver inevitably are devices used for the creation of sound and music, it is truly a protocol for a microprocessor to encode and another to decode. It contains no sonic information and has often been compared to a smiliar proincipal to a “piano roll” found in pianola automatic pianos. Some greats of the art of piano performances and compositions have created piano rolls so their performances can be recreated. Not through some form of audio recording, or notation but a set of instructions that a pianola responds to mechanically. Whilst this explains the principal well, it doesn’t truly respect the thinking behind the protocol which relates more to Morse than it does to the transferral of kinetic energy.
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