My MIDI Setup:

Obsolescence is my friend!

My MIDI setup is not particularly elaborate by modern rig standards. Obsolescence is indeed my friend: the hot new toy of last year or the year before still does whatever amazing thing it was designed to do, but can be found at dramatically reduced price on the used market (as with most electronics nowadays). I have built my system a piece at a time over several years:
  • Kawai K1: 8 voice multitimbral wavetable keyboard synthesizer circa 1989
  • Kawai K1r: the same synth "engine" but rack-mount, circa 1989
  • 360 Systems MIDIBass, a dedicated bass sample-player circa 1987
  • Alesis D4 rack-mount drum sound module circa 1992
  • Borrowed Proteus I module circa 1990
  • IVL Steelrider Pitch-to-MIDI Interface for my steel guitar circa 1988
  • Compaq K6 Laptop / Win 98
  • Packard Bell P100 Tower / Win 95
  • Cakewalk Pro Audio sequencing/digital audio software
  • Band in a Box algorithmic composition software
  • Jammer algorithmic composition software
  • Peavy PLM8128 Programmable MIDI Controllable Line Mixer circa 1989(?)
  • Digitech StudioQuad v2 Multi FX unit - 4 in/out simultaneous FX!

The Rack Stack

Not necessarily the latest & greatest, but emminently functional.

I can play gigs where I am the only live musician on stage. Maybe visually unexciting, but musically as full as I can plan it to be. I joke that the only musician I have to worry about showing up to the gig sober is myself.