I've played bassoon and taught for a long time, but .... I've only been in computers since December 1993. see my resumé.
I retired from Salem/Keizer Public Schools where I taught music and lent help as a technology person.
Salem/Keizer paid for my sabbatical year of technology studies at Oregon State University. Click here to review that year.
QuickTime Musical Instruments, an adjunct piece of QuickTime, was created so developers would not need to use a lot of space for music in their products. It gives voices to midi files. It is a software synthesizer.
MIDI files (which can be regarded as electronic piano rolls) are very small compared to audio files (which are digitized recorded sound). So in many instances midi is preferred over audio files.
How they Work: When an application in your computer plays a midi file it sends midi instructions to QT Musical Instruments, a different software synthesizer, or to an external synthesizer. The synthesizer (software or hardware) gives voices to the midi instructions which you then hear through your computer speakers, headphones, or external speakers.
The best possible synthesizers are fairly expensive pieces of hardware. There are desktop synthesizers (relatively small physical packages) and synthesizers with keyboards which take a larger amount of space.
There are some excellent software synthesizers available besides QT Musical Instruments, but for the most part the best ones are ram hungry and need a very fast processor. QT Musical Instruments is arguably the best onboard choice. Especially for Mac computers.
The Duet mp3 file is 187.5 times larger than the Duet .mid file. The choice multimedia developers have to make is: Do I want to use .mid which is small and quickly downloaded, but dependent on the user's synth or do I want to use mp3 which is much larger and slower to download, but has guaranteed quality?
This is just the first movement. The whole Duet midi file is available at the midi bassoon music section of this page.
Turn on, off, make louder, make softer, fast forward, back, or copy from the tool bar just above.
To go to my midi bassoon music page: Click Here
If you choose to ...... what you can hear is a midi file embeded in this page being used by your computer to play whatever synthesizer it has as a resource. The piece is the same one as above, but now it is using the synthesizer your computer has on board. The music sounds only as good as the synthesizer your computer uses. And remember ....... there are hundreds of synthesizers both software and hardware that you can use to play midi files.
I checked this file using QuickTime Musical Instruments 2.5 and 6.0 (software synthesizers) which both sounded o.k.. I worked through a KORG AG-10 desk top synthesizer during preparation. That sounded very good, but your onboard resources will deliver markedly different sounds just as mine do.
On a good hardware synthesizer you can hear better voices, pan (stereo placement), articulations, and reverb than you can with a software synthesizer. I recommend play through a good hardware synthesizer.
Go to my midi music: Click Here
QuickTime Musical Instruments is a "free" software synthesizer that is stored in your computer. You need to choose between QT 2.1, QT 2.5, QT 3.0., QT 4.0, QT 5.0, and QT 6.0. There are advantages and disadvantages to all six. QT 4.0 through 6.0 have versions that are for PCs also.
Version 6.0 has cured several problems that QT has had since 4.0. The main problem had been the "goofy" rhythms that QT has played through some older applications when playing a midi file. This probem has been fixed in QT 6.0. QT 6.0 still has a time lag between an external keyboard signal and actual sound production. This lag is also evident in applications that show a cursor passing over music. Sight and sound don't line up. But overall I am very happy with QT 6.0 and I recommend the "Pro" version if you like to play with midi files and other media.
To experiment with different versions of QT:
If you don't have a removable drive:
Once again ....... Do not try to boot with more than one version of QT in the same extension folder at the same time.
QT 2.1 is easiest to use when experimenting with QT Musical Instrument voicings, but its General Midi list is incomplete with many defaults to other voices . The QT 2.1 numbering is not consistent with the GM numbering system. You can experiment with different voicings though, using 2.1 alone. QT 2.1 is for Macintosh only.
QT 2.5 is more complete than 2.1 and has karaoke, but you cannot experiment with voicing from within the application and the voices are a little "cheesy".
Isn't it amazing that you now have to pay for these features in 3.0 through 6.0?
QT 2.5 Movie Player is my favorite player for versions before QT 6.0!
QT 3.0 has fairly good sounding voices and a whole complement of sound effects and "synth" voices but, once again, there is no access to the voicing from within the application. Additionally ........... if you install 3.0 in an older slower Macintosh many pieces will play in a jerky fashion since the computer can't get everything together in time. So, it leaves some things out. There are versions of 3.0 for both Macs and PCs.
QT 4.0 has even better sounding voices than 3.0. I would call them good. (Excellent is the term I still reserve for the best sounding external synths.) It plays more smoothly, but it also presents problems to older slower Macs. It also has some very good streaming abilities, which are new to QT, as well as choices of versions that will be determined by your intended use. There are versions of 4.0 for both Macs and PCs.
QT 5.0 has the best sounding voices yet, but still not in the same league with a good hardware synth. I guess I like some of the effects that accompany their synth ...... some nice reverb and pretty good stereo separation, for instance. There are versions of 5.0 for both Macs and PCs.
QT 6.0 is the best version yet. I'm still amazed at the quality of sound from such a small software package. It is still not on the same level as a good hardware synth, but they are getting close.
If your system and computer can handle it this is the version I now recommend.
Macintosh and Windows requirements for and downloads of QT 6.0 To see the requirements click here.
To Download QuickTime:
Some "e-mail" pointed this one out to me : http://harmony-central.com/
A very large resource: http://www.aitech.ac.jp/~ckelly/mmuig.html
A good collection of Classical although some files are so large they do not translate well to QT Midi: Classical Midi Archives http://www.prs.net/midi.html
A collection of midi file resources and sources. Many midi files will translate well: http://www.aitech.ac.jp/~ckelly/SMF.html
There is a very fine collection of midi bassoon at this location: BRAM-MIDI FILES
I would like to hear from you. Most recent touch up on this page: December, 2006
