MainStage Live Tracks

Hello my fellow LP/MS Users! I am very new to Logic and Mainstage but not to programming and running backtracks in live shows...My band usually maps out the first 3 songs in our set to run back to back with a click going to me (drummer)...but in doing that..that never gives us the freedom to either repeat the chorus x2 or extend the ending if we want to...SO my question is...

Is there a way that i can play the tracks thru Logic or Mainstage and be able to select parts to repeat or switch to another song by pressing either a button on my laptop or my Roland spds pad??? Please HELP!! been looking all over the net and haven't found a good description for this or video!..

THANKS!

p.s and also if it can be done...is there a delay in starting and stopping the track like start/stop spacebar in logic has a little bit of??

This is possible.

The general flow is this: You need to have a panel control called "selector", in its inspector select "patch names or markers". You'll also need the Playback plug-in. You'll need to export the backing track(s) from Logic with markers, or you can add them in Playback. You can navigate from marker to marker in a non-linear fashion and have them repeat.

This should work without any delay, although it may require a decision to be made a bar or two early, depending how you set up Playback.

Yep, just use markers. Exporting a track from logic with markers in as a wav or aiff will automatically put the markers into mainstage. then you can select whether or not it responds on the following beat or on the following bar after your message to keep it in time.

Create buttons or pads in the layout screen of mainstage and learn them to the spds pads that you want to control them with.

then in edit assign them to the playback plugin to control next marker, previous marker, and anything else you want.

the cycle one is cool cos you can just hit cycle and it will just loop between two markers, so you can play your chorus over and over. but maybe if you just wanted to repeat the chorus you'd just hit previous marker some time in the last bar then it will jump back to the start of your chorus.

thats about it!

What is the playback plug-in?

For an in-depth description please refer to the manual. Page 123, Chapter 8, Playing Back Audio In ManStage,

What is the playback plug-in?

A feature in Mainstage 2.

Hello my fellow LP/MS Users! I am very new to Logic and Mainstage but not to programming and running backtracks in live shows...My band usually maps out the first 3 songs in our set to run back to back with a click going to me (drummer)...but in doing that..that never gives us the freedom to either repeat the chorus x2 or extend the ending if we want to...SO my question is...

Is there a way that i can play the tracks thru Logic or Mainstage and be able to select parts to repeat or switch to another song by pressing either a button on my laptop or my Roland spds pad??? Please HELP!! been looking all over the net and haven't found a good description for this or video!..

 

THANKS!

 

p.s and also if it can be done...is there a delay in starting and stopping the track like start/stop spacebar in logic has a little bit of??

What you are asking to do is absolutely possible.

Playback is a new plug-in. Its technically a software instrument but only plays back audio files. Its not a 'sampler' but a kind of backing track audio file player.

I know it was already mentioned, but if you build your backing tracks in Logic and add Markers that divide up the arrangement, you will be able to send commands to Playback to make it skip to specific markers or even cycle (repeat) a single marker as many times as you like.

If you are using MIDI drum triggers, those can be made to turn off/on cycle so that it will repeat a section. When you turn off cycle, and it reaches the end of the current marker, it will continue playing into the next marker.

You can also use several instances of Playback to provide custom metronome sounds for anyone in the band. I know sometimes my drummer likes to hear a 'beep beep beep' style metronome, but I prefer a side stick. Anyhow, each instance of playback can be routed to the mains, or to individual outs to provide any kind of monitor mix you need.

The exact steps are maybe not that clear, and it would take a long time to explain it. But I can give you some tips.

• Name the Set "folder" after a song name and put all of your patches for that song inside the folder.

• Select the folder and put your channel strips with Playback inside each set. This way as you switch through patches Playback will continue to run.

• You can set Playback to automatically start playing when you switch into a new Set (song) or not, its up to you. We found it to be easier to simply start it manually.

• Several channel strips with Playback plugins can exist in a single Set. If you put them in the same group, they will all operate like one big multitrack playback system. Making one in a group play, makes them all play. Turning cycle on in one, makes all of them cycle, etc, etc.

• You will also need to learn how the screen controls work. In Layout, you assign your drum trigger to control a button or drum pad screen control, then you can map the screen control to a plug-in parameter like Playback's Cycle feature, or its marker changing functions.

• You can use your drum triggers to trigger play/stop, or switch which marker is currently playing, which is great during rehearsals.

• Mapping a "selector" screen control to an instance of playback will make it display the entire marker list and it will highlight which marker is currently playing. With this screen control you can click with the mouse to change the marker, but there's no MIDI control options via the Selector.

• To make a button/pad switch to a marker, you need to set the mapping min/max for the "Go to marker" parameter of Playback to a single marker, a single value. Then when you press that button, or trigger your drum pad, it will go to a specific marker.

Hopefully, that will help you get up to speed more quickly. Took me some work to get it all going, but its pretty much exactly what I want.

Good luck