Congratulations to the winners and thanks to Peter for organising and IK Peter and OTS Greg for providing the prizes

Hi everyone – where do you get your free midi files from – I mean legal ones obviously! I’m particularly interested in folk and classical music which is mostly out of copyright. I’ve used various sites a long time ago but want to ensure I am using a legitimate site to download from

Yep I would keep reading your blogs Peter. Industry insights are interesting but I’d suggest that you write about what you want to write about 🙂

Good luck everyone!

Come on everyone this is a great giveaway deal to enter! I can’t believe more people haven’t commented!

They missed out Richard Shindell!

Thanks Peter – the blog is really interesting and confirms what we all either knew or were becoming increasingly aware of in terms of the toxicity of certain platforms and the civility and kindness of this one. I imagine if you put Facebook through this process it would come out as 80% toxic!

Hi everyone. I was thinking the other day about the music that first really moved me emotionally and I wondered what other people’s first ‘tear jerkers’ were?

Mine were my sister’s single of ‘Reflections of My Life’ by Marmalade when I was around 12 and the first movement of Tchaikovsky’s 6th (Pathetique’) symphony.

I was a miserable child 🙂

My favourite thing about Linked Musicians is knowing that it is being run by someone who is genuinely passionate about music and who is encouraging people by creating a caring environment.

Apart from the forums the area that I enjoy most is the Open Mic Section which I can see developing into a friendly and interesting discussion area where we…Read More

Wow great prizes!

Great news. Two well respected companies there. I have a fair bit of IK stuff from buying one of their Max suites when it was on offer. I don’t have any Orange Tree samples I have read good things about them. Are the libraries shown the ones that will be in the giveaway?

NI have just released their ‘The 110 best free Kontakt instruments in 2026’ list. There were a small number in there I hadn’t come across before

https://blog.native-instruments.com/best-free-kontakt-instruments

Tom Service is a Marmite presenter here in the UK on the classical music station BBC Radio 3 – people either love him or hate him. For the record I love Tom but hate Marmite! He also writes for the Guardian newspaper / website and I thought people might enjoy his latest column about comparisons between classical music and heavy metal. He seems to…Read More

From the devil’s violinist to devil’s horns - why classical and heavy metal are a natural pairing

With ear-splitting excess, flamboyant virtuosity and a talent for transgression, where classical music has led, metal has followed. Let’s hope the Philharmonia’s Metal Orchestrated concert turns it up to 11

www.theguardian.com

Congratulations Peter and many thanks for all the hard work you have put into this place. Thanks too to @Lamia6 who, as you say, has been critical to the successful development of the forum. A great team!

Ah there I was thinking I’d found a new bargain!  🙂

I keep telling myself that I am not buying anymore sounds as I spend so little time playing music at the moment but I couldn’t resist this one for the price of a couple of pints of beer – in the UK it is £12 as VAT is added but still seems a snip at the price. Gorgeous!

Aethervox – Soundbox Pack

Thanks Peter – this looks very interesting – downloaded!

As you say Peter the FFOSSO free instruments are pretty impressive – I’ll be downloading this latest one

Must check them out – are they prog?

Thanks @lamia6 !

You really don’t need this hassle from an idiot with nothing better to do!

Welcome to Linked Musicians K! @pssst-instruments

Excellent news! Hold the front page 🙂

I posted this in the deals forum but thought it might be useful here too

It is at version 4 so I assume it is something the developer thinks is worth their effort!

https://www.kvraudio.com/product/js80p-by-attila-m-magyar

Free midi generators are like buses – there are none for ages then two come along at the same time 🙂

I’m sure that they pretended that they were doing this on last year’s April Fools Day. Amusing to see it actually being released!

This might be worth a try. It is at version 4 so I assume it is something the developer thinks is worth their effort!

https://www.kvraudio.com/product/js80p-by-attila-m-magyar

This looks interesting! Might help with composer’s block? Haven’t studied it in detail but I assume it is providing some functionality similar to Kontakt’s composition tools?

‘Build, visualize, and share chord progressions.
A chord-track-style workflow with reharmonization’

https://k2get.github.io/chord-dock-site/index.en.html

Just back from the second Love Music Hate Racism gig I have helped to arrange in York (England) and pleased to say it was another sell out – the last tickets sold this morning which was a relief! The format was the same as last time with three punky bands and lots of young people moshing in somewhat alarming fashion in the eyes of this 66 year…Read More

I had the original -it eventually died and when I moved to York I gave it to someone who said he would fix it and sell it on but i don’t know if he ever did. Even broken it would probably be worth a bit today!

On March 10, 2026 at 7:55 pm William Heins said
joegyork If you like prog and folk then you must know Strawbs and Gryphon 🙂

A lot of demo stuff here- https://www.reverbnation.com/daylight

Certainly do William. Gryphon are still going though I have never manged  to see them and I don’t own any of theirs or Strawbs’ albums. My favourite folk /…Read More

Sounds exciting!

ELP were one of my introductions to rock / prog. As a teenager I had gotten into classical music after hearing Holst’s The Planets in a music lesson and around the same time Peter & The Wolf which made me realise that music alone could tell a story.

Other than that I was more into pop heavily influenced by my older sister – The Hollies, Marmalade…Read More

Appease who?

Am I correct in thinking what you’re saying is that you feel eg with Dolly Parton, a country artist, and the various hip hop artists being inducted is that these genres are clearly not rock — as Parton herself pointed out when she was nominated. Is that right? Basically, stick to rock, not country, hip hop, jazz, EDM, and other gen…Read More

@WilliamHeins what do you mean by

‘I had hopes that it was going to be a real Rock’n’Roll Hall of Fame but it seems to be Jann Wenner’s social engineering project sadly!’

Thanks @LinkedMusicians that sounds very interesting. Just ordered and and downloaded the Vaults Icky Bass too

By coincidence I was listening to Melissa Etheridge for the first time for years and I had forgotten what an astounding artist she is so she would get my vote! New Order / Joy Division would be my second choice

English folk singer (and composer of my favourite album of the 21st century ‘Songs From The Floodplain’) Jon Boden’s remarkable reworking of Kate Bush’s ‘Hounds Of Love’

Pink Floyd – I will forever regret not going to see them in Manchester (UK) and instead going to see Genesis in Leeds on their Invisible Touch tour. They were deadly dull and only played a short medley of their older stuff

Renaissance – I suppose they are the same genre (prog rock) but totally different sound and epic songs – sadly I think only…Read More

@LinkedMusicians I’m afraid I am too tied up with moderating my Facebook pages and gig organising for Love Music Hate Racism to take on anything else

Great band!

On January 28, 2026 at 11:45 pm Brian said
I have seen recommendations in a few forums to keep a list of your registered software products that involve NI.  It’s easy enough, so why not keep a copy.

I only use Windows, so no idea about other platforms.

If you run Native Access and select SUPPORT from the bottom left, then click “Create a Supp…

Read More

Fascinating discussion here and on other threads – a worrying time. Thanks particularly to Peter for his insights from someone who has been involved in the industry. Let us keep our fingers crossed!

Just downloaded this – looks fairly limited but I did like the sounds in the video

Just tired – not working now – never mind I wasn’t sure if there was anything I really needed 🙂 Still got the AAS Soundpack and Synthmaster Expansion pack to choose. Got the G Force Axess Electronica expansion (so so) and the OT Flugelhorn Ensemble (after a glitch that OT sorted out very quickly) so not doing too bad for freebies. Also got to…Read More

Ah thanks – thought about trying but didn’t! I’ll have another look but possibly too late now!

Sadly I missed out on this as my PC was in the room where visiting family were sleeping

This is really sad. There is so much trolling of people just trying to do a good job – as you know only too well @peter

We have a great organisation here in the UK called the Music Venue Trust. It exists to help grassroots music venues which are having a very challenging time at the moment for various reasons. In some cases the MVT have bought venues so that they are not subject to the whims of commercial landlords. We are fortunate enough to have a superb venue…Read More

Unfortunately this appears to be only available in Clap or native FL format only – not VST.