I received this question from one of my readers this week:

Hi Eric,

I use a very similar live setup to yours using 3 controllers - one of them being a Nord Electro 3. I use that NE3 for its Native Organ Sounds, but would love to have Mainstage reach out and change the patches for me using the midi program change function in Mainstage - have you had any luck having mainstage send midi messages to change the patches on your Nord?

-Paul

Hi Paul,

Love your setup, and yes, there’s a very simple way to send program change messages using Mainstage. Here’s how: 

1. Open MainStage, and select a template or your project.

2. Under the Channel Strips window on the RH side of the screen, and click the “+” button to add a new channel strip.  

3. Select External Instrument as the channel strip type, then set which output you want to send your program change message through. 

4. Under the “External Instrument Inspector Window” at the bottom of the page, select midi output, or the >> if your screen isn’t huge. Then set the program change number you want to use.

Just repeat this for each step, and you’ll be good to go. Good luck!