Patches, MIDI

There are 128 instrument sounds (patches) in the MIDI standard. General MIDI (GM) specifies how that basic repertoire of 128 sounds is assigned to the various patch numbers. These may be numbered 1-128 or 0-127. These sounds can be broken up into sixteen family groups. 

The General MIDI standard was created so that generic Standard MIDI Files created on a sequencer or notation application may be played back on another device while preserving the integrity of the original selection. Another part of this standard is a separate set of percussion instrument sonnds, usually assigned to Channel 10. This is a special instrument (patch), since each note on the keyboard may he assigned to a different instrument (for example, C= snare, D = woodblock, E = cymbal). 

This list may be subdivided into a number of banks (see Figure 10.6), each of which contains a different set of patches (programs). Anything on the list can be selected, regardless of the bank. The voices and banks that are available again depends on the Voice set and the MIDI output device selected. 

Nevertheless, Reality is easy to use and it is much quicker to learn than learning actual programming languages, such as Nyquist, or programming systems, such as Audio Architect Reality is flexible for building its patches and it can hold more than one thousand patches in its memory. Also, it offers M-voice polyphony and is multi-timbral to sixteen MIDI-channels. 

A program, which may be a patch or a patchwork, is more or less equivalent to a timbre on a standard MIDI synthesiser. Programs can be selected from any MIDI controller able to send program change messages see Rumsey (1994) for an introduction to MIDI. A patch is simply the set-up for a timbre using any of the synthesis capabilities of the system, whereas a patchwork may combine different types of timbres... 

---