What is MP3?

MP3 is short for MPEG Audio Layer 3, a compression method for sound (e.g. .WAV) files that maintains almost all of the original sound quality. but with a much reduced file size. An MP3 file is about 1/10th to 1/12th the size of a corresponding .WAV file. An MP3 file needs an MP3 player, which contains software that rapidly decompresses the file for immediate playback.

The advantages of MP3 and MP3 playback are:

1: High quality sound - potentially as high as that of the original .wav file from which the .mp3 file was made. It is sometimes described as 'near CD' quality, which seems an understatement - from a CD quality .wav file you get what is (to my ear) a CD quality .mp3 file.

2: The sound is that which the composer or performer intended - unlike MIDI, where your soundcard may play the music in a way that would be almost unrecognizable to the composer.

3: The files are shorter than the corresponding .wav file (about 10%), allowing economy of storage space.

4: If you have a CD writer, you can store an enormous amount of MP3 music on one 650Mb data CD.

5: If you have a CD writer and copyright permission, you can reconvert the MP3 files to WAV format, and use the .wav files to write a conventional audio CD which can be played back on any CD player.

The disadvantages of MP3 and MP3 playback are:

1: It is said that there is a slight loss of sound quality every time a .wav file is compressed to MP3 format. This may be so, but in my own experience it has been indiscernable).

2: It is also a disadvantage (though not for playback) that there is little in the way of editing or enhancing that can be done to an MP3 file unless it is first reconverted to WAV format.

MP3 playback on your PC

There are innumerable software MP3 players available for download, not all free, but the 'gold standard' is Nullsoft's 'Winamp'. It is the only one I use, it is free, and if you want to play MP3 files on your computer I strongly advise you to download Winamp. Although Winamp is used by most people primarily as an MP3 player, it will play many other sound file formats including MIDI. It also has a variety of other useful facilities built in, and these are well documented on the helpful Winamp download site.

Winamp will also allow you to utilize 'streaming' MP3 playback, which means that the file is played while downloading is still going on. This is the method of playback you will get if you click the 'MP3 PLAY LOFI' or 'MP3 PLAY HIFI' buttons on my site. With Winamp there is an option of saving the files at the same time as they are being played, so you can keep the ones you like.

Winamp setup is good at getting the best out of your PC, even if it is an old or slow one. The main initial difficulty that owners of slow PC's seem to find with MP3 playback is that the music does not play smoothly and continuously - there are jerks or 'skips'; at the worst, playback may stop altogether. The Winamp FAQ page is helpful about this problem. A certain amount of experimentation may be necessary to optimize playback on your machine. For what it is worth, I seemed to have solved this problem on my own (slow) PC by going to the Winamp Menu (click the top left-hand corner of the interface display), then:

(1) Options > Preferences > Plugins > Input > Nullsoft MPEG Audio Decoder > Configure > Decoder (I set Quality to 'half')

(2) Options > Preferences > Plugins > Output > Nullsoft wavOut plugin > Configure (I increased the buffer length to 4100ms and also reset the Output device from 'Wave Mapper' to my own soundcard).

If you reinstall Winamp, or upgrade to a higher version, it takes over your old settings, so there is no need to make a note of them.

Playing MP3 files from this site

All of the MP3 files listed on this site are available direct from my MP3.COM page and you may wish to go there to get them. (At all events, you should know about MP3.COM if you have any degree of interest in MP3 music; it is widely respected as the premier site). For convenience, I have provided click-button links in this site (the one you are on now) which will take you there, and connect you to the correct address for 'styreaming' playback.

To play an MP3 file, choose the piece you want to hear by going to 'THE MUSIC LIST' on this site and click on the thumbnail image to take you to the picture screen. Then click either the 'MP3 PLAY LOFI' button or the 'MP3 PLAY HIFI' button. This will connect you to where the files are stored om MP3.COM, and playback should begin after a short delay. The LoFi versions are non-stereo and the sound quality is not too great. The HiFi versions are stereo and excellent quality, but they may not play back by streaming if your computer is old or slow. You can still get these files by pressing the 'MP3 DOWNLOAD' button, and your Winamp will play them from the directory you selected (in Download Accelerator)for MP3 storage.

If you do not like to see the black Winamp interface while the music is playing, you can minimise it, or drag it up out of the picture.

Converting MP3 files to WAV format and vice versa

MP3-to-WAV conversion is done for the purpose of editing or enhancing the MP3 file (perhaps to shorten it, to compress a too-high dynamic range or remove peaks, or to add reverberation - reverberation, by the way can never be removed from a .wav file). It is also an almost-essential stage for producing an audio CD of the music.

WAV-to-MP3 conversion is done when the MP3 file is made. It needs a certain amount of preparation of the WAV file, for example (1) over-recorded 'peaks' must be removed (by normalization or some other method) because when recoded to MP3 they create unpleasant distortion; (2) many .wav files of music, including those made from MIDI, have too high a dynamic range (loud is too loud and soft is too soft and benefit from being corrected by dynamic compression).

Many conversion programs are available. The one I use is Lazarus' X-Codec, and I like it because the interface is very, very simple and easy to use, it is faster than most other conversion programs, it works in both directions, and it is free. X-Codec is not the best known conversion program, in fact it is quite difficult to find, and I will give two download sites which I found currently (10.05.01) have it - download xcodec.exe and download xcodec.zip

I recently read a very interesting article by Brad Smith, Webmaster for Tucows, called 'From MP3 to WAV format', in which he says 'Winamp is the easiest utility that I've found to date for this purpose', and gives clear step-by-step instructions.

Another one, which I have not tried, is Mp3 To Wave Converter 1.19 which, it says, 'will normalize your MP3s for a consistent volume and it'll even convert Winamp play lists (.M3Us or .PLSs) to WAV format automatically!'.