How to Convert Music Files from Mp3 to MIDI, Wave to MIDI, from MIDI to Wave and Mp3

Programs and free trial downloads

Converting from MIDI to Wave and Mp3

MIDI is the modern equivalent of the old piano rolls, and then some. Piano rolls on those vintage player pianos, were long sheets of paper with holes all over the place. As the roles turned, the holes triggered the notes to be played. MIDI data is similar, in that it tells your synthesizer what notes to play, how loud to play them, how long to hold them and so forth. Additionally, MIDI can tell your synthesizer to change to a different instrument sound, to add some echoes to the sound and to pan it to one side or the other. The one thing MIDI can not do is make any sounds itself. It is simply a detailed set of instructions.

To create music you can hear on your CD player, you have to transform the MIDI into audio files such as wave files and MP3 files. It's not very hard to do, and there are two ways to do it. One way, the slower way, is to play back the MIDI through some synthesizer (even your computer's sound card has a synthesizer built in) and to record it. You would open a MIDI file, play it through your synthesizer, and at the same time run a music recording program to record the performance.

The other way is to use a program that contains its own sounds and can translate the MIDI instructions into an audio file without even getting your sound card involved. These programs are much easier and much faster to use, although they give you less control over the actual sounds you will hear. If you have a very fancy hardware sampler or synthesizer whose sounds are the ones you want, then go for the first option. If you are flexible about it, explore some of the dedicated conversion programs. The sounds that they have vary in quality. You may just find a program that has the perfect sounds, and then it's a winner all around.

Converting from Wave Audio and Mp3 to MIDI

Converting from wave to MIDI is much more complicated. Here there is really only one way, with a dedicated software. Earlier versions of these programs most commonly could only handle monophonic sounds. That means that you can't simply pop  in  your favorite CD and expect to get a MIDI file. It means that you can play a melody on the clarinet, and get a somewhat accurate midi file. Some programs now  offer polyphonic MIDI recognition. That probably means it will work well with a piano, guitar or string quartet, but not necessarily with a hard rock band. Nonetheless, these programs will improve dramatically, and some day they will be as common as OCR programs. Try some of the programs listed below and see if they perform according to your needs.

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Converts digitized mp3,WAVE,AIF,SND,AU  formats as well as audio CD tracks music into MIDI sequences (mp3 to MIDI, wav to MIDI) - and unlike other programs it CAN process polyphonic  music (that is having many tones or voices). What takes several hours of hard work even for a well-trained musician will be a matter of some few minutes for TS-AudioToMIDI. TS-AudioToMIDI can operate in two recognition modes: off-line and real-time. $34.99

Music recognition software which performs polyphonic Wave to Midi conversion. Composer recognizes polyphonic music from microphone (other Wave input or file) and converts it into Midi sequences. You can sing, whistle or play guitar, piano, flute and so on with your microphone, Composer will automatically recognize and score your music and create standard Midi sequences. Neither a Midi keyboard nor any musical experience are required to compose music. From what I've seen, the accuracy is pretty good, compared to similar products. $29.00

Recognition features: