I've been posting a series of FluidPatcher tutorial videos on YouTube. They each cover different aspects of bank files, with lots of examples and explanations of FluidSynth and MIDI principles.

The latest lesson digs into using the MIDI file player. As usual, making a lesson has the side effect of making me find bugs, reconsider how things work, and add features that I hadn't realized I needed. I've added these changes to the GitHub repository, so you can apply them to your own SquishBox setup if you desire.

Putting these lessons together has been instructive in the same way that teaching always is. Nothing exposes mistakes in your code—or errors in your thinking—quite like trying to explain something to somebody else. I've found that in my more traditional teaching work, too. It's useful, but also a little humbling and strangely comforting: I'm pretty sure I'm not the only person going through life trying to understand and get better at things I have to pretend I'm already good at.

That's one of the things I like about working on these musical gadgets. I'm certainly not a professional programmer, electrical engineer, or any of the other things required to make them, but I can still make something useful and worthwhile. We're all hacks to varying degrees at just about everything. In the end, what matters is what you create.

[FluidPatcher Lessons playlist on YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL4a8Oe3qfS_-CefZFNYssT1kHdzEOdAlD)