---
title: Music Production with MIDI
description: MIDI (Musical Instrument Digital Interface) allows computers and electronic instruments to communicate. You will understand how to sequence notes, program virtual instruments, and edit MIDI data within a digital audio workstation.
category: music-audio
subcategory: instrument-training
difficulty: beginner, intermediate, advanced
url: /subject/music-production-with-midi
---

# Music Production with MIDI

MIDI (Musical Instrument Digital Interface) allows computers and electronic instruments to communicate. You will understand how to sequence notes, program virtual instruments, and edit MIDI data within a digital audio workstation.

## Available Resources

3 Books • 3 Websites

## Websites

### 1. Learning Synths

**Author:** Ableton

Interactive browser lessons on the synthesis engine that MIDI notes drive: oscillators, filters, envelopes, LFOs and modulation, each adjustable in a live playground. Explains why velocity and modulation data change a sound rather than just triggering it.

**Difficulty:** Beginner | **Language:** English | **Price:** Free

**Link:** https://learningsynths.ableton.com/

**Tags:** synthesis, subtractive-synthesis, oscillators, filters, envelopes, modulation

### 2. MIDI Basics (5-part series)

**Author:** Paul White

Paul White's five-part primer explaining MIDI as a communications protocol: channels, note on/off, multitimbral modules, program change, continuous controllers, sequencer recording and clock synchronisation. Written for readers who confuse MIDI data with audio.

**Difficulty:** Beginner | **Language:** English | **Price:** Free

**Link:** https://www.soundonsound.com/techniques/midi-basics-part-1

**Tags:** midi, midi-protocol, midi-channels, midi-cc, sequencing

### 3. MIDI Association - Specifications & Technical Documentation

**Author:** The MIDI Association

Official hub from the standards body that defines MIDI. Free reference tables list every MIDI 1.0 status byte, control change number and universal SysEx message, alongside MIDI 2.0, transport and Standard MIDI File documentation.
The free spec-detail tables are the authoritative answer to 'what does CC11 actually mean' - the exact question producers hit when editing MIDI data.

**Difficulty:** Advanced | **Language:** English | **Price:** Free

**Link:** https://midi.org/specs

**Tags:** midi, midi-specification, midi-2.0, midi-cc, sysex, standard-midi-file

## Youtubes

### 1. Guy Michelmore (ThinkSpace Education)

**Author:** Guy Michelmore

A working screen composer demonstrates MIDI mockup technique in real sessions: controller riding for dynamics, articulation choice, note timing and length, and template building so sampled instruments phrase like performers rather than triggered samples.

**Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Language:** English | **Price:** Free

**Link:** https://www.youtube.com/@ThinkSpaceEducation

**Tags:** orchestral-mockups, midi-orchestration, film-scoring, sample-libraries, midi-cc

## Books

### 1. Acoustic and MIDI Orchestration for the Contemporary Composer (2nd Edition)

**Author:** Andrea Pejrolo, Richard DeRosa

Pairs traditional orchestration with sequencing practice, showing how instrument ranges and articulations map onto sampled libraries, keyswitches, velocity layers and controller curves. Chapters cover rhythm, string, wind, brass and vocal writing plus mixed contemporary ensembles.

**Difficulty:** Advanced | **Language:** English | **Price:** Paid

**Link:** https://www.amazon.com/dp/113880150X?tag=edmonddante07-20

**Tags:** orchestration, midi-orchestration, sample-libraries, keyswitches, sequencing

### 2. The MIDI Manual: A Practical Guide to MIDI within Modern Music Production (4th Edition)

**Author:** David Miles Huber

The standard single-volume reference on MIDI, covering system interconnection, controllers, sequencing and editing inside the DAW, groove tools, synchronisation and mixing. The fourth edition adds the MIDI 2.0 specification alongside MIDI 1.0 implementation charts.

**Difficulty:** Intermediate | **Language:** English | **Price:** Paid

**Link:** https://www.amazon.com/dp/0367549980?tag=edmonddante07-20

**Tags:** midi, midi-2.0, sequencing, daw, synchronization

### 3. MIDI for the Technophobe

**Author:** Paul White

A plain-language Sound On Sound guide by Paul White explaining how MIDI works in a home studio. Readers learn MIDI channels, messages, sequencing, software instruments and automation well enough to connect gear and record and edit MIDI parts confidently.

**Difficulty:** Beginner | **Language:** English | **Price:** Paid

**Link:** https://www.amazon.com/dp/1860744443?tag=edmonddante07-20

**Tags:** midi, music-production, sequencing, home-recording, software-instruments

---

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