MidNote
from PDA Musician

Are you musically inclined? Are you one of those people with tunes running through your head, but can’t remember them when you sit down to play them later? MidNote is a handy little program for your Pocket PC to help with those musical moments.

It’s not designed to be a MIDI file editor, however it’s a simple way to put your music notes into a form that can be exported into other applications. MidNote gives you the ability to create up to 10 tracks of music notation and play it directly on the Pocket PC. It works in conjunction with other MIDI Players on the Pocket PC. MidNote can play one track without a problem, however if you want to listen to all ten tracks, just install any one of three supported MIDI players and it will automatically export and play your tune. MidNote can also export the tracks so they can be played with any other MIDI player such as WinAMP or edited with programs such as Cakewalk. The free MIDI programs for the Pocket PC are GSPlayer for MIDI or Mimidi MIDI Player. MidNote will also support PocketAMP (which is still in beta testing). All three programs are available from PDAMusician.com.

Creating music with MidNote is simple, just drag and drop the music notes on the bars and you’re off. It can create chords, or just a single string of notes and rests. It’s easy to change the key or repeat sections of music if you wish. It will even support creating drum tracks as well. However MidNote can’t play back the drum sections, they must be played using one of the supported programs. Within minutes, you can be writing music like Mozart!

MidNote will import and export MIDI files (using the full version only). It has been disabled in the demo release. Once the track has been imported, you can select which track to work on and make the necessary changes. You can even add words to your track so they flow by on the bottom of the screen.

I have noticed that after importing some MIDI files, the timing may be off somewhat. However, after saving the file as a MIDI file and playing the tune back through another MIDI player program, it plays normally. MidNote is guaranteed to play its own exported files exactly as generated. This has to do with the various ways MIDI files are created and saved. As I mentioned, it’s not designed to be a MIDI file editor, it’s made to create your own tunes on the road. And it does that perfectly.

My daughter plays cello and she’s been playing with MidNote entering tunes. She finds it very easy and entertaining. It took her a while to get used to the way the tracks work, but once she figured it out, it was simple. Since the screen is limited, the high notes appear on the top row in a straight line with small arrows above them. There is an icon (at the bottom, next to the marker icons) that switches between the bass and treble range. I have to admit, this program is very simple to use, yet it’s flexible enough for the full musician in the family.

MidNote was created using C. In order to install it on the Pocket PC, you also have to download a copy of the PocketC Runtime package. It is available on their website. It’s small and can be installed in system memory or the storage card. The MidNote program is less than 1 meg as well. Due to speed issues of reading from a storage card, it’s recommended the program to be installed to system ram. Depending on the MIDI player you install, system ram may be required. Mimidi can be installed in either location. However, GSPlayer and PocketAMP need to be installed in system ram due to hardcoded information within each application. Music files can be copied anywhere.

Download a free demo of the program and get to work on your masterpiece! Even if you can’t read music, this program will help you understand the basics. The installation program can be sent via email or CD, or you can order it here. All upgrades are free and automatically sent to your email address. Their website has full documentation for using the program. In addition to MidNote, they also offer several other programs for the Pocket PC including: PocketSynth Pro, Pocket Drums and Strummer. PocketSynth Pro sounds like a cool program to check out. While checking out their website, I listened to a few of the sample tunes created. I was truly impressed.

MidNote was reviewed using the Samsung i700 Pocket PC Phone Edition with GSPlayer for MIDI.
Special thanks to Wolfgang at PDAMusician.com for sending a full version of the software to review.