Since the 80’s we’ve had MIDI 1.0, and it was great for the time… but it also has its issues, doesn’t it? To me, the two biggest issues were only having 128 different levels of velocity on a keyboard, and the fact that long MIDI cable runs usually screw with your data, dropping or holding notes at random. There are other things, but to me, those were the big issues.
And honestly, I never thought 128 different velocity values was the end of the world. Can you hear the difference between 82 and 83? I feel like I mostly can’t. And yet, every MIDI recording of piano that I do, there always seems to be an artificial quality to it that I was never able to put my finger on.
I now believe that while I might not hear the difference between 82 and 83, when every single note is rounded to the nearest value of between 1 and 128, the overall effect is that something is missing. If I’m doing organs or synth pads, it never seems to matter. But on piano sounds, it matters.
When MIDI 2.0 becomes the universal standard, it won’t matter any more. We’re going to go from 128 different possible velocities to… wait for it… over 4 BILLION different possible velocities. That will solve the issue, forever. And that reason alone is enough to want never, better gear with MIDI 2.0.
Also, think about virtual synths controlled by MIDI 1.0. When you turn a filter knob on your MIDI keyboard, there are only 128 levels. Now there will be over 4 billion. No more “stepping” sounds, as long as the hardware and software are both capable. That’s huge.
There are also timing benefits, moving from 16 channels to 256 channels, and some other cool stuff that we’ll gain. But the coolest will be auto-configuration. If you have an organ plugin and a MIDI 2.0 keyboard, it’ll be possible that they’ll automatically talk to each other and the keyboard will automatically map for you. Same with MIDI Mixers. And that will be badass. Yeah, we can do it now manually, but this will be a massive time saver.
Should you be excited about MIDI 2.0? Hell yes.