1. Just curios, what MIDI software do you have that plays MIDI files?

->Well, I have been playing with most major sequencers incl. Cubase, Logic and Cakewalk, but I also have Sibelius, which is strictly a notation program. Band-in-a-box is also quite an interesting software.

2. Still not sure what you mean by "can hardly tell what's what"...

->Once you get MIDI files that have been recorded live, they will definitely not be on the beat as much as you would need for notation. What I’m looking for is sheet music that I can learn from. However, I also want to be able to listen to it. This is why I bought Musitek’s Smartscore which lets you scan sheet music you have, and then translate it into MIDI files. Unfortunately it costs an awful lot of time to get even one piece recognized without errors. Sometimes you get lucky and it actually recognizes a page correctly, but you can never be sure and you got to check every single note.

3. I agree that educational midi music is very limited…

->Yes it is. And it is particularly surprising that even Yamaha doesn’t seem to provide any serious program, although they produce so many home keyboards (AND are conducting the Yamaha Music School all over the world). My new PF1000 has a notation screen for example, and with the disk I got you can really learn to play certain pieces much easier. However, this doesn’t help you to really learn chords, harmonies or improvisation and comping. If there is ever going to be a nice MIDI-based keyboard education program, it surely would take off.

Cheers,
Studio