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MMD > Archives > December 1999 > 1999.12.22 > 11Prev  Next


MIDI Note Numbers and Octave Numbers
By Mike Knudsen

Robbie, you have the MIDI numbering right.  But for octave numbering,
I've seen a "standard" in several places (please don't ask me to
remember where :-) that Middle C is the bottom of octave 4, so it is
C4.  I think some MIDI software, besides my own, uses that convention.

That means that the low Boesendorfer C is C0, and A0 is the bottom of
an 88-note piano.  To get the bottom MIDI octave (down to 64' C, MIDI
0) you'd have to go to negative numbers, or C-1.  Not nice, but few
musicians ever go there!

There's an old British notation where bass notes like "C are written
CCC, etc.  But I think there was disagreement on that too; besides,
I think an octave's C was at its top, not bottom.  Worse than a
bass-ackwards carousel, for certain!  :-)

Mike Knudsen

 [ A publishers convention isn't necessarily a standard recognized
 [ world-wide.  Cakewalk says Middle C is C5, but my preferred editor,
 [ Master Tracks, calls it C3.  The MIDI note number _is_ a standard,
 [ and that's why I add it as a prefix; thus 60C3 and 60C5 are both
 [ Middle C (ignoring the non-standard octave suffix).
 [
 [ When the 100-note Ampico tracker bar image is displayed in a MIDI
 [ editor there are "notes" down to sub-bass D#, or MIDI note 15.
 [ The image of 125-key book music uses almost all available MIDI
 [ notes.  Who says we're musicians?!  ;)  -- Robbie


(Message sent Wed 22 Dec 1999, 04:38:43 GMT, from time zone GMT-0500.)

Key Words in Subject:  MIDI, Note, Numbers, Octave

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