Reports of some of the new products unveiled at this year's Frankfurt Music Fair which will be winging their way into the shops over the coming months.

What is Library Music? What does a Music Library do? Freelance engineer Richard Elen answers these questions and more as he takes a look inside one of the world's premier recorded music libraries.

High quality sampled bass sounds that you can play from any MIDI keyboard, sequencer or drum machine are offered by the 360 Systems MIDI BASS. Tony Hastings assesses its performance.

£600 (almost) buys you this boxful of MIDI-controlled digital effects processors. But can they be good quality? Ian Gilby dragged himself out of the studio long enough to give us his opinions.

Ian Gilby casts his eyes and ears over Roland's new budget-priced rhythm composer, the TR505.

Could hi-fi giants Technics have set a new standard with the digital sounds of their PX1 MIDI Piano? Consultant keyboard player extraordinaire, Rick Wakeman, checks out its performance.

When a well-respected signal processor manufacturer like Drawmer moves beyond the realms of noise gates and compressors into MIDI control, it's yet another indication that the recording world is recognising the importance of MIDI. Paul Gilby dropped his copy of the Financial Times to take an exclusive look at the brand new Drawmer MIDI Management System.

In a rare interview, Asia's illustrious keyboard player talks synths, samplers and Mellotrons with David Etheridge.

Mark Jenkins reports on this recent addition to the popular CZ range of polysynths and suggests that the Phase Distortion synthesis it employs could well be the answer for those of you caught in the 'analogue versus digital' dilemma.

Hybrid Technology's Chris Jordan, designer of the Music 500 Synthesizer for the BBC Micro, speculates on the future of MIDI and what developments it requires to satisfy the needs of more adventurous users and the promise of more advanced technology.

Keyboard programmer Paul Wiffen brings you the latest developments on the Sequential sampling system: the new 2002 rack-mount, and the superb Digidesign visual editing software. He also takes a look at the Prophet 2000 and passes on some useful tips for using its 'mapping' function to the full.

This month film music composer Robin Lumley discloses his own route to fame and fortune in an effort to get you started on yours...

Tony Hastings takes you through the recording of a song using the facilities of the Pro 16 MIDI Sequencer software from Steinberg Research.

Tonmeister Course lecturer, Francis Rumsey, explains how timecodes are used to synchronise audio to video in Part 3 of our series.

Prophet Competition results, late news and hot gossip!