Need a Mainstage 3 tutorial recommendation.

[RABid]

Yep. All these years and I have not used Mainstage 3, until now. Was always hardware or DAW. Anyway, I watched a few tutorials and they were all short, choppy, and incomplete. Not one of them told me how to assign a MIDI channel number from the controller to the sound source.

 

What I want to do: Connect my Beatstep Pro to my Mac and use the three sequencing channels on three instruments in Mainstage. In the future I also plan to pick up a Keystep pro to add to the system. So my steps to get started need to be...

 

1. Add an instrument to Mainstage 3

2. Pick a patch on that instrument

3. Assign the instrument/patch to a MIDI channel of the controller

4. Repeat steps 1-3 until I have instruments and patches for each channel of each controller.

5. Save the setup.

 

It should not be hard at all, but i did not see how to assign MIDI channels.

[RABid]

Well, I found a couple of really good Mainstage 3 tutorials. About the first thing the guy did was put a CPU meter up which I thought was a very good idea. Sadly, he only did 4 total videos and then stopped. He never got to the point of how to split MIDI channels to different patches but I did gleam what I think is the area I need to be in. I really wish the guy had done more videos. (Jerron Archer Music) But, I think I picked up enough information to get where I need to go.

 

By the way, I REALLY like the Beatstep pro. Enough that my next purchase will be the Keystep Pro.

[Tusker]

Hi Robert, controllers (and their midi channels) are defined in the LAYOUT screen. When I was learning MainStage I purchased a training course from Macprovideo and I enjoyed their approach. I believe Groove3 and Lynda also have MainStage courses. There may be others. Some initial training is helpful as MainStage is conceptually both like and unlike a Daw. If you use Logic Pro, much of it will be intuitive to you. MainStage is amazing! I've been able to set up complex and precise set-lists so much more quickly with software instruments than with equivalent hardware. All the best!

[JB Sherry]

Rabid, it sounds like you're falling into the trap of trying to use a standard MIDI flow paradigm to work with Mainstage, but you've got to follow the Mainstage paradigm. I set up my first Concert using the cheapo Midi Controller that is on my desk to input notes into Finale. I then went to play my concert from a better Controller and mistakenly thought I could set the new controller to a MIDI channel and all would be well. But, Mainstage recognizes the device, not just a channel.

 

As Tusker says, you'll need to first add your device in Layout mode. If you've got that one controller in your concert, then when you add a patch it should be assigned to that controller automatically, and it should be assigned to the whole range of the controller. It's important to note that a Patch in Mainstage is equivalent to a Performance in standalone multi-timbral instruments. I've attached some illustrations of my Lucy In The Sky patch. You'll notice in my attachments that I've got a number of zones spread out over the keyboard ( including a Tampura on a single note ). There are 2 buttons for triggering audio playback of the drum pre-chorus drum part and the chorus drum part. You can see that there are channel strips corresponding to all the sounds.

 

Mainstage is very performance-oriented, but it should do what you want. I suspect that if your device is a sequencer and you want to play back sounds that have seperate timbres but overlapping ranges, you'll need to start by adding your Controller, then adding multiple channel strips to a single patch. From there, instead of editing the layers to adjust the ranges, it looks like you need to do this thing here.

 

Other VST hosts may be better suited to using with a sequencer. That said, if you get the above set up and save it to use as a template, you can then just change the synths assigned to the channel strips and it should be pretty quick to get a new project going.

 

HTH!

[midinut]

Robert, I found Abe Mendoza (sp) tutorials are good ones. I also went through the macprovideo ones as well. I went ahead and subscribed as there are a pot load of tutorials for other things I"m working with too (Logic, Ableton, Cubase, NI stuff, u-he stuff, Adobe programs, photography, etc). Also, check out Jim Daneker. He has a program called BackStage Pass that is a MainStage template (but so much more). He"s the keys player for Michael W. Smith and it"s sorta oriented towards Praise & Worship, but what he"s got MainStage doing is nothing short of miraculous! Watch a couple of his videos and you"ll wanna drink his Kool-Aid too! lol

 

Good luck and keep us posted on your discoveries.

[Cabo]

I found this MainStage course very helpful --

 

https://courses.sundaysounds.com/courses/mainstage-mastery/lectures/2745591