MIDI files of Yes songs - amazing!

[David Polich]

Maybe I'm missing something on the site- when I click the MIDI files for The Yes Album, for example, a Quicktime mp3 plays. How do you get to the actual files?

Tobor

Control+click on the underlined name, a window opens up and you select
"Save Link As..", then just save it to your desktop with the ".mid" in
the name (as in "Roundabout.mid").

[David Polich]

Thanks for the link, David.

FYI-- have you ever seen this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TKVYEShL2fs" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Rick Wakeman doing Close To The Edge as a solo piano piece!! The video is a little oddly edited at times, but the audio is wonderful. What an incredible pianist he is. It's less of a transcription than it is a reading of essentials, but it's a nice thing to have on record.

Yep, that is cool. Thanks for the tip, Frodo!

People tended to dismiss Rick as less talented than Keith Emerson, but they're both brilliant keyboardists. If you watch the video closely it's
obvious Rick knows what he's doing, it's not just "jamming".

I'm learning a lot from these downloaded MIDI files. There's still voicings
that are wrong for certain parts, and the drum tracks are all close but not
exact. Nevertheless, it's great to review these, even if it's just to get
what the key changes and chord progressions were. For example, even though
I used to play it in my 70's cover band, I'd forgotten how "Yours Is No Disgrace" transitions from Bb to E right before the first verse.

[mhschmieder]

The ELP link does work. You simply have to context-click and do a "save as" for each of the underlined MIDI file names. The only exception is Knife-Edge which apparently was planned but not prepared.

But maybe more of those MIDI file links are broken now -- I first loaded my cached Web Archive page and verified those MIDI links. Then I traversed back to the main page (which gave permission errors) until I found the back door way to that page for the revised MIDI links. This was so I could post a URL, since a Web Archive can't be used on a different computer, I imagine (though I've never tried it).

Anyway, I clicked on several of the links and they worked, except for Knife-Edge, which was the only addition from my original Web Archive cache. I simply didn't take the time to click on all 17 MIDI links. So maybe a few didn't work and you gave up? I don't think, after loading the fresh page, there's any way my Web Archive cache could have been referenced to make the links work ONLY on my machine?

[mhschmieder]

Quicktime is used to play MIDI as well as audio files, in many cases (though I think this might be a user preference). It's easy to get fooled.

Note: on newer macs and/or Snow Leopard and/or 64-bit systems (not sure since I went from Dark Ages to Post-Modern overnight), you have to download Quicktime 7 in order to be able to play MIDI files anymore, as Apple removed that feature from the latest Quicktime.

I'm guessing Apple thinks MIDI files aren't needed anymore due to greater bandwidth. As usual, they forget that MIDI files are also used by professional musicians for various purposes. But historically they were mostly for karaoke and/or a pre-MP3 low-bandwidth way of sharing music (sans vocals of course).

[Guitar Gaz]

Thanks - I will try again.

I think Keith Emerson was by far the better keyboard player than his contempories - his solos were actually more like guitar solos in building up to climaxes and a sense of dynamics - Jon Lord and Vince Crane just did messy arpeggios and chord stabs - Rick Wakeman was slightly better but still not a patch on Emerson. Listen to the solo in Knife Edge which builds up gradually - fairly typical of his inventive soloing. Yes its Brubeck and Bach but still good.

[Guitar Gaz]

http://www.davidyounker.com/MIDI/midi1.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

the actual link that works has "MIDI" in lower case rather than MIDI in upper case but the posting seems to default to upper case MIDI - so make sure you use the lower case version. Strange but it works

[mhschmieder]

Oh, so it's one of those URL's that changes after you type it in.

Guess what -- that reinforces what I was going to write earlier but forgot to finish when I got interrupted by work.

Most of these MIDI sites do everything possible to not be found by robots or search engines, so they don't get shut down.

[AnthonyS]

I remember back about 10 years ago, there was "Gabor's MIDI Page", which had pretty much all of the Yes catalog in SMF's. He also had Genesis, Marillion, ELP, some Gentle Giant and a bunch of others.

For the record, I am probably 1 of those 3 people mentioned that still listen to the old Genesis stuff . And the Gentle Giant site is great.

Cheers!
Anthony

[funkyfreddy]

People tended to dismiss Rick as less talented than Keith Emerson, but they're both brilliant keyboardists.

IMHO Rick was way more tasteful than Keith and I don't believe Keith could have worked as well as Rick did with a guitarist like Steve Howe..... again - just my opinion I saw Yes 3 times in the late 70's, twice with Rick and once with Patrick Moraz, was also brilliant!

Thanks for the links! I wanted to ask you guys a question about early Genesis. I was told that Michael Rutherford did a lot of alternate tunings on the 12 string and that was one of the reasons Peter Gabriel told a lot of stories between songs - to give the band time to tune! Is there any truth to this rumor? if there is I'd like to know the alternate tuning they used for their early stuff...... Thanks again, Fred

[Guitar Gaz]

People tended to dismiss Rick as less talented than Keith Emerson, but they're both brilliant keyboardists.

IMHO Rick was way more tasteful than Keith and I don't believe Keith could have worked as well as Rick did with a guitarist like Steve Howe..... again - just my opinion I saw Yes 3 times in the late 70's, twice with Rick and once with Patrick Moraz, was also brilliant!

Thanks for the links! I wanted to ask you guys a question about early Genesis. I was told that Michael Rutherford did a lot of alternate tunings on the 12 string and that was one of the reasons Peter Gabriel told a lot of stories between songs - to give the band time to tune! Is there any truth to this rumor? if there is I'd like to know the alternate tuning they used for their early stuff...... Thanks again, Fred

I know Keith Emerson was less likely to work with a guitarist (although the early Nice had Davy O'List on guitar and Hendrix was due to join ELP originally - wonder what they would have called themselves?) - he was a lead player rather than more textural like Rick Wakeman had to be in a group like Yes. Emerson would not have wanted to be in a band like that so Wakeman was definitely more suited to Yes. But Emerson's solos were just better and went somewhere - but then he had a vehicle like the Nice and ELP where he could do that. Wakeman's own stuff is still not so solo oriented as Emerson's - which is what I was basing it on. Emerson is more Jazz/Classical whereas Wakeman is more Rock/Classical. So there is a difference in style.

Having seen Genesis many times in their "proper" lineup I don't remember a lot of re-tuning going on - Gabriel's stories seemed to be part of the set rather than an interval for re-tuning. It may have happened in the early days but by the time of Trespass and Nursery Cryme it was part of the act - any tunings would involve a switch of guitars.

[mhschmieder]

The Hendrix story has been confirmed multiple times by now, and the band was to be called HELP. It may be in honour of that, that the UK issues of ELP's catalogue were numbered HELP 1 through n.

Guitar Gaz has done a good job of summarizing Emerson vs. Wakeman. I like them both, but given my love for jazz, would pick Emerson every time if forced to choose. The dual interviews in the past two issues of Keyboard Magazine are enlightening. I lost some respect for Wakeman when he dismissed the entire 80's decade as based on gimmickry instead of musicality; whereas I consider that the best decade for songwriting next to the 60's.

As for Gabor's MIDI Page, that WAS my original source for a lot of prog-rock MIDI and I'm glad I downloaded a lot (but not all) of them at the time. Little did I know at the time that the publishers would start going after MIDI sites as a copyright infringement.

It sort of reminds me of how the guy who did The Real Book (jazz fake books that were direct transcriptions of musician interpretations rather than original Tin Pan Alley scores) sat in jail for many years but had tried very hard to get the publishers to agree to do something and set up a proper royalty system.

So, it's just another case of the publishers and labels being ignorant of the needs of working musicians (vs. consumers).

[twistedtom]

One of my fondest concert memories was sitting on some road cases at the side of the stage watching Yes perform. The lead guitar player turned to me and my wife and played lead almost with in arms reach like we had our own show.

[David Polich]

The argument of who was better, Emerson or Wakeman, reminds me of the
same argument about Hendrix vs. Clapton, or Gabriel vs. Collins.
Now that I'm much older, I don't think there ever was a "better" anyone.
Each artist had his or her context within which they wrote and played.

Wakeman was essential to Yes. And his parts are a lot more difficult to
play than you'd think. Try copping "Long Distance Runaround" note for note,
or the rapid arpeggios in the first section of "Close to the Edge" - this
was not sequencing, he was playing it all live. In contrast, his "Six Wives"
stuff is a study in simplicity and economics of notes.

As young musicians we're naturally drawn more to the "fastest gun in the
West" and assume that the flashier player is the better player. That's
like saying Yngvie Malmsteen was better than Joe Walsh. No doubt Emerson
was great, we all love Keith and he definitely had the theory and
compositional ability to back up his playing, which was so often astounding.
I prefer to say now that he and Rick are simply two different musicians
with their own styles and approaches.

Btw, both Keith and Rick have been featured in the latest issues of Keyboard
Magazine and both have very complimentary things to say about each other.
Whatever rivalry may have existed between them decades ago is long gone
and they're friends now. Both have said they'd like to collaborate on something in the near future.

[mhschmieder]

Oops, I forgot to mention the Keyboard magazine interviews and articles here, as I had already done so on the Keyboard forum.

It may be hard to find the DEC issue now, but the JAN issue will probably be on the shelves for another week or two.

The previous issue was Emerson and this issue is Wakeman. The interviews are quite enjoyable, and it's also heartening to know that Emerson is regaining more control after his surgery.

They do talk about collaborating, and I can see how it might be a case of Emerson more on organ and Wakeman more on piano and synths, but they could surprise us too. I think it would be a musically exciting venture.

It reminds me a bit of when Steve Hackett and Steve Howe formed GTR together. I loved that band (many hated them because they had different expectations) and felt the two guitarists had really found a great way to strut their stuff without stepping on each other.

Back to the Keyboard articles that Dave brings up, they also have some transcriptions of both Wakeman and Emerson, and some tutorials on how to play like both keyboardists (giving some lead, rhythm, comping, and other hints).

[ As a side note, my love for the GTR experiment went from lukewarm to hot after coming upon the King Biscuit Flour Power Hour live set, which may now be hard to find, and which includes Matt Clifford on keys and covers a lot of songs from Genesis/Asia/Yes/Tomorrow ]

[Jim]

Crikey. I just found this thread 13 years after the fact after doing a web search for "Yes MIDI."

I appreciate having the link, although I probably already had every MIDI file already as I've been collecting them since the beginning of time, and also files from practically every other Prog band with the exception of Prog Metal, of which I'm not a fan.

The harder or impossible stuff to find are the less well known bands like National Health, Eloy, Gong, etc.

I like to drum along to Prog and Jazz Fusion as learning exercises and challenges. Importing the files into DP and muting the drum tracks to play alongside has been a hobby for a while. You can hear on jpcurtis.com/covers This is primarily how I use DP.

I may be looking into an app that converts audio to MIDI in my retirement, as I've exhausted most of my collection so far. I think that can be done with Melodyne (which is still expensive, last time I looked).

If anybody is interested, I paid a British company $65 to make a MIDI of Yes's arrangement of Simon and Garfunkel's "America." I don't recall my license saying I can't share it. PM me and I'll send it to you. I don't see it on the page with all the other Yes songs.