For years, the hardest part of MIDI karaoke was not playing songs — it was finding them. vanBasco answered that with a companion service, vanBasco’s MIDI Search, an online search engine for MIDI and karaoke songs listed right in the official site’s navigation alongside Products, Downloads, Skins and Support. Understanding what happened to that service, and what replaced it in practice, will save you from a lot of dead links and dubious song packs. This guide gives you the history straight, then the legal, working ways to build a library today.
What MIDI Search was, and its status now
MIDI Search helped users find MIDI and karaoke files across the web at a time when search engines indexed files poorly. Its fate is tied to the official site’s: that content has been frozen since September 20, 2006, with no active maintenance since. Treat the service as a historical feature, not a living tool. Pages or videos implying it is a current, updated song finder are describing the past. The player itself is unaffected — v2.53 still plays any valid .kar, .mid, .midi or .rmi file you bring to it, from any lawful source — but the discovery layer has to come from modern methods.
Legal ways to find .kar and .mid songs today
- Start with dedicated legal MIDI karaoke sources. Our Songs & Resources guide to free .KAR and MIDI songs from legal sources collects the reputable starting points and explains the copyright position in plain language.
- Check whether a song you want exists as a properly licensed karaoke product first. For popular titles, a licensed backing from a service such as Karaoke Version is often the highest-quality lawful route, even when the format differs from a home-made .kar.
- Look for public-domain and traditionally arranged material, where MIDI files circulate legitimately and widely — hymns, folk songs, classical themes and children’s songs are the richest vein.
- Make your own files for songs you cannot find. Turning a MIDI file you are entitled to use into a .kar with synchronized lyrics is a skill, and it produces exactly the song, key and tempo your household wants.
Judge a file before it joins your library
Not every file that downloads is worth keeping. Play a candidate all the way through once. Check that the lyrics exist and are timed to the music, that the melody is recognizable and complete, and that the arrangement does not collapse in the bridge where many amateur files fall apart. Note the loudness relative to your other songs and set its saved volume in a playlist straight away. Files that fail get deleted immediately — a small library of trusted songs serves a party better than a huge folder where every third pick is a disappointment.
What to avoid
Avoid bulk ‘28,000 songs’ packs and any source whose pitch is that copyright does not apply to them. A karaoke file of a copyrighted song embodies both a composition and an arrangement; treating random packs as legal because they are old or obscure is a mistake this site will not help you make. Avoid executables disguised as song packs, and avoid re-downloading the same untested files from multiple mirrors — repetition is not verification. The frozen state of MIDI Search is an inconvenience, not a licence to lower your standards.
Build discovery into a habit
Keep an ‘inbox’ playlist for new finds, audition with Scanning mode, and promote only the keepers into your named playlists with their key, tempo and volume set. Over a few months that habit produces something no search engine ever gave anyone: a personal library where every song is known, lawful to the best of your careful judgement, timed correctly and set up for the voices in your house. That library, more than any single feature, is what makes a 2004 player still feel modern.
Good habits that make this stick
Guides are only useful if the result survives the next session, so finish with three habits. First, test MIDI Search with one familiar song before you rely on it with a group — familiarity makes differences obvious instead of debatable. Second, save whatever you set up: a named playlist, a written note of a setting that worked, or the verified installer kept with its checksum, so a future you is not reconstructing tonight’s success from memory. Third, change one thing at a time from here on. Once a setup works, most later confusion comes from two well-meant tweaks made together, after which nobody can say which one helped. A karaoke library and a player configuration are both long-term assets for a household; the households that enjoy them for years are the ones that treat a working setup as something to protect, not something to keep redecorating.
Finally, remember the boundaries of the software itself. vanBasco’s Karaoke Player v2.53 is the final release from March 2004: freeware for personal, non-commercial use, Windows only, and focused on .kar, .mid, .midi and .rmi files with .vpl playlists. Working within those boundaries is not a limitation to apologise for — it is exactly why the player is still fast, predictable and useful. If a future need falls outside them, such as MP3+G or streaming catalogues, add a modern tool alongside vanBasco rather than forcing this player to be something it never claimed to be.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is vanBasco MIDI Search still running?
No, not as a maintained service. It was part of the official site, whose content has been frozen since September 20, 2006. The player still works; the search service is historical.
Where is the safest place to get songs now?
Start with the legal sources collected in our Songs & Resources section, and consider licensed services such as Karaoke Version for popular titles. Avoid bulk packs that ignore copyright.
Can I use songs I already own in other formats?
Owning a recording does not automatically make a .kar file of the same song lawful to download from anywhere. Use sources that are entitled to distribute the files they offer, and make your own files only from material you are entitled to use.