MIDI Creators and Innovators Panel
Featuring: Dave Smith, George Duke, Tom Oberheim, Alan Parsons, Jordan Rudess, Craig Anderton. For 30 years, MIDI has been at the forefront of music technology even as musical trends change. Watch a star-studded panel of MIDI instrument designers and musicians talk about the past, present, and future of MIDI with MMA CEO/President Tom White.
MIDI 30th Anniversary Exhibit
Here’s how we celebrated the incredible history of MIDI at 2013 NAMM:
- We recreated the 1983 MIDI launch with the first two MIDI keyboards, the Roland Jupiter-6 and Sequential Prophet 600, connected via MIDI.
- We displayed historical documents about the development of MIDI and the MMA, and some well-known MIDI products from the past.
- We displayed some of the latest products using MIDI technology, and gave attendees the opportunity to jam with each other.
- We used a 30 year-old Commodore 64 as a MIDI sequencer for an iPad (running AniMoog)
- We handed out nearly 5000 “MIDI 30 Years” commemorative pins, and five lucky people people seen wearing the pins received prizes, including one Gibson Les Paul Standard Grand Prize.
MMA Annual General Meeting 2013
The Annual General Meeting of MMA Members began with a General Session at 9:00 am for members and invited guests, followed by a closed (members-only) Technical Session at 10:00 am.
MMA Status Report
MMA President Tom White explained how MMA’s mission is providing for interoperability of MIDI products, and explained the various technical proposals and business development projects being managed by MMA on behalf of the industry.
- HD Protocol
- MMA AVBTP Payload Types – The new IEEE AVB Transport Protocol specification (IEEE-1722) includes a reference to MMA for specifications now under development that define the transport of MIDI and HD Protocol.
- Updated MIDI Electrical spec – A proposal for MMA to publish a new circuit diagram using current components and practices and allowing for 3.3V power supplies.
- IEC MIDI Specification – A proposal is under consideration to submit some portion of the MIDI Specification to IEC for standardization, to improve recognition as a standard by emerging countries.
- Universal SysEX ID for iOS OMAC – A proposal to improve communication among iOS music apps.
- MIDI Home Control Specification – A proposal to provide interoperability among home A/V devices.
- Web MIDI API – The web standards organization (W3C) has developed technology to enable browser-based audio apps, including support for MIDI input/output. Florian Bomers (Bome Software) presented an overview of the Web MIDI API, and encouraged MMA members to advocate for browser support.
- Bluetooth LE – Tom mentioned a few companies interested in using this technology for MIDI.
- Logo and Trademark Protection – MMA is working with AMEI in Japan and CMIA in China to prevent dilution of the meaning of “MIDI” in China caused by registered marks being used on non-MIDI products.
Tom also reported on MMA’s “MIDI Makes Music” promotional campaign for 2013, and the Technical Grammy to be awarded February 9th to Dave Smith and Ikutaro Kakehashi for the invention of MIDI.
Following the General Session the MMA members discussed each active technical proposal in more detail.