MIDI is thousands of times more editable than audio.

If you have a good MIDI synthesizer, it can sound 95% or more as good as the real instrument. If you have a cheesy synth, you will have cheesy sounds. If you have a great synth, you'll have great sounds.

You can export a MIDI track to a Sequencer or DAW and make the music more expressive.

The average listener listens to expression more than tone, which is why singers like Dr. John, Stevie Nicks, John Lennon, Blossom Dearie and others can sell zillions of records with voices that are not considered great sounding.

And what is great tone? Take guitar is in Hendrix? Burrell? May? Hall? Slash? Beck? Clapton? Armstrong? Satriani? And on which guitar? Jimmy Page plays better on an el-cheapo Danelectro than most others do on top-of-the-line premium guitars.

Here is a short list of what you can do with MIDI that you cannot do with audio:
http://www.nortonmusic.com/midi_vs_loops.html

And here is a link to the continuous controllers that you can use to coax more expression out of MIDI
http://www.nortonmusic.com/midi_cc.html

I make backing tracks for my duo, The Sophisticats http://www.s-cats.com, that would be impossible to make with RealTracks. I'll use BiaB MIDI tracks and add the song specific licks and other parts that a generic BiaB style can't do. And BiaB styles need to be generic. If you had a style with an obvious signature lick for one song, it would only be good for that song.

Music is a journey, life is too short to learn it all. But that makes it interesting, as you can learn new things forever to keep it from being boring.

Your first inroads into MIDI may be baby steps, but sooner or later you will be able to make better music with MIDI than you can with audio loops.

But remember, there is more than one right way to make music. The RealTracks are fantastic, and although I prefer MIDI, when a RT is just right for what I need, I'll use it. It's good to have an assortment of tools in your tool chest.

Insights and incites by Notes

Last edited by Notes Norton; 12/03/21 03:57 AM. Reason: Typo
Bob "Notes" Norton smile Norton Music
https://www.nortonmusic.com

100% MIDI Super-Styles recorded by live, pro, studio musicians for a live groove
& Fake Disks for MIDI and/or RealTracks