Posters occasionally ask about materials introducing MIDI, and IMHO a lack of familiarity with MIDI accounts for many of the questions that are posted on forums like this one and also for much of the frustration.

"Rick" posted the following to the JV1080 list today:

>>Before spending your money and time attending classes: Have you looked
anywhere for info? There's a lot online. One of the frequently "basic" texts
online is Bob McQueer's MIDI primer, which you can find at several different
sites in different formats: www.harmony-central.com/MIDI/Doc/primer.txt (ascii) http://www.sfu.ca/sca/Manuals/247/midi/UseNet-MidiPrimer.html http://www.tcmidi.com/midiprimer.htm

There's another "primer" type site at www.knowledgehound.com/topics/midi.htm

Also check out the IAEKM (Int'l Assoc. of Electronic Keyboard Manufacturers)
site at http://www.iaekm.org. There are a lot of different articles there,
including "MIDI In a Nutshell" (http://www.iaekm.org/nutshell.html) and
"Taking the Mystery Out of MIDI" (http://www.iaekm.org/ttmom.pdf). This may
be the best place to start, as these and some other articles are good for the
complete novice.<<