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                         COMMODORES BIG MUSIC COCK-UP      
                                                         


Having  been  a  professional  musician and eager Amiga user for about 6 years
now,  I  can't  help  feeling  frustrated  about  how the Amiga is ignored and
ridiculed in the serious music society.

Ok,  so  the  Amiga  "MOD" format has become a standard even on PC's and Atari
computers,  as  a  lot  of  superb  music  has  emerged  from the thousands of
underground  hobby musicians who use the Amigas four channels of 8-bit digital
sound   to  create  some  really  stunning  music,  considering  the  hardware
limitations.

But  in  the  "real  life" of the serious music industry, where musicians work
with  CD  quality  sound,  MIDI  and  synth  equipment, composing film scores,
jingles  and  other professional quality sound and music, the Amiga is as good
as  dead.  If you tell someone in the industry that you are using an Amiga for
music  production,  chances  are  they  will  literally  laugh  at you!  In my
opinion,  there  is one company who is responsible for this:  Commodore.  They
are  the  sole  reason  for  the  disastrous status the Amiga has in the music
industry.

I recently received a new issue of a magazine called Roland Inside, which is a
magazine  for  Roland  users.  On the "letters" pages, a reader had written in
and  asked  if  the  Amiga  was  ok  for  music and midi use; and the magazine
editor's answer to this potential new Amiga user was that the Amiga was just a
games  machine  and  couldn't  be used to produce music.  Upon reading this, I
nearly  choked!  Not only because it was written in this magazine, but because
obviously, this is the general impression throughout the industry!

Why??


1985/1986

It  was  a  major  mistake of Commodore not to include a MIDI port on the very
first  Amiga  model,  the A1000.  This interface would only costs a few measly
pounds to install, and it would have led to at least 50% of the ones who chose
the  Atari ST to chose an Amiga instead, back then.  The most attractive field
of  use  for  the  ST  was  it's  MIDI  capabilities.   It had a built-in MIDI
interface, and it was immediately seen as a "computer with musical abilities".
The Amiga wasn't.

Some pretty decent MIDI software has actually been made for the Amiga over the
years;  KCS,  Music-X, Bars & Pipes; but this just doesn't help as long as the
music industry doesn't look to the Amiga as a potential music computer!


1991

One  should  think that Commodore would have learned from this cock-up, and at
least  installed  a MIDI port on the A3000.  To our great disappointment, they
had  obviously given up the competition against the ST on the music front, and
didn't  bother  to  spend  a  few  pennies on installing a MIDI port this time
either.   Say,  haven't Commodore even heard of the MIDI standard??  How COULD
they  release  a computer in 1991/1992 with these abilities, and NOT include a
MIDI port?


1992/1993

Commodore  launches two new Amiga models, A1200 and A4000, with some great new
graphics features and enhanced operating speeds.  This time; surely, they MUST
have  included  a  MIDI  interface,  in order to at least TRY to gain a little
foothold  in  the  music  industry?   Maybe  they  could  try to get the music
industry  to look differently at the two new models, and start thinking of the
new  Amigas  as computers that can be used to produce music?  Surely Commodore
must have seen this possibility and grasped the opportunity??!  Fat chance.

But surely they must have included a Digital Signals Processor (DSP), allowing
professional  level  sampling  and  speedy sample handling?  Come on now, they
can't  go and release a new home computer today without a DSP???  Sorry folks,
but that's just what they did...  I know, it's a laugh.

The  way  I see it, Commodore has now chosen to give up all competition in the
music  field.  I'm out.  The Amiga never was meant to be a musicians computer;
Commodore  has  time  after  time  denied  us  serious  musicians  using their
otherwise  so  wonderful  computer.   It  is  a computer for video titling and
colour  cycling.   If  you aren't into digitising a million colours or playing
football  games,  then  you're not advised to go for the Amiga.  Commodore has
successfully made sure of that.

I'm  going  for  the  Falcon  now.   Or  maybe  an IBM compatible.  Thanks for
everything  Commodore,  but  I'm  not going to hang around waiting for you any
more.

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