3.5

34MainStage User Guide
• If your MIDI interface has a single MIDI output: You need to connect the MIDI In of the
second tone generator to the keyboard MIDI Thru port. A third device can be connected
to the MIDI Thru port of the second unit, and so on.
The MIDI Thru port replicates the signals coming into the MIDI In port of the device. It is
preferable to use a direct connection from the computer MIDI Out port to a device, rather
than chaining too many units, one after the other. Doing so can cause timing problems in
the chain, if numerous MIDI commands are sent quickly. This is due to the slight delays
introduced by each MIDI In to MIDI Thru transaction. As such, a multi input/output MIDI
interface is recommended in studios with several MIDI tone generators and controllers.
Connect Multichannel MIDI devices to MainStage
Multitimbral MIDI devices can simultaneously receive MIDI data on multiple MIDI channels.
Each MIDI channel can be assigned a tone or sound, such as piano, strings, bass, and
so on.
To take full advantage of the capabilities of such multitimbral devices, you should use
separate MIDI Out ports (from the computer MIDI interface to the MIDI In ports) for
each device.
MainStage is capable of channelizing MIDI data (routing it to MIDI channels 1 to 16) and
sending the channelized data to specific MIDI Out ports.
In effect, having a multi-output MIDI interface is something like having more MIDI channels.
In this scenario, it would be like having 64 independent MIDI channels—with 16 channels
per port (A, B, C, and D).
Not only does this allow you to play up to 64 different sounds simultaneously through
your tone generators, it also allows full MIDI control for each channel of each device. This
becomes increasingly important when arranging and orchestrating such a large number of
instrument parts.
If your computer offers several MIDI inputs, you can connect the MIDI outputs of other MIDI
expanders and controllers to it.