Mainstage 3.2 crashing with Vintage B3 organ

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Level 1

4 points

Mainstage 3.2 crashing with Vintage B3 organ

I tried to use my usual MainStage concert this weekend, in which I rely heavily on the built-in Vintage B3 plugin. Since the 3.2 update, whenever I use expression (CC#11) with the organ, MainStage freezes/crashes, with whichever notes were held down at the time stuck on. It requires a force-quit to stop the hanging notes and the frozen app. This now happens every time I try to use expression with the organ plugin.

To test if my concert file had a conflict or some corruption, I started a new concert file from scratch. Once I tried to "paste as alias" with a Vintage B3 channel, the same problems arose.

My MainStage concert is a little bit complex, with 4 keyboards, several layers, splits and aliases. In fact, I typically run my organ channel strips as aliases. However, this concert file had been running smoothly for quite a while until now with the 3.2 update.

Is anyone else experiencing this, or does anyone have any suggestions?

Thanks!

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Mainstage 3.2

OS X 10.10.5

Retina MacBook Pro 2.8GHz i7

MainStage, OS X Yosemite (10.10.5)

Posted on Aug 30, 2015 7:30 PM

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Answer 1

rc tech

Level 2

240 points

Aug 31, 2015 1:28 PM in response to michaelf88

It seems to work fine for me, do you have your concert posted somewhere? I would be happy to take a look.

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Answer 2

michaelf88 Author

Level 1

4 points

Aug 31, 2015 3:35 PM in response to rc tech

Thanks for offering to check it out!

Here's a link to my MainStage concert file. This is the file I've used for a while without this crashing issue until 3.2. **

https://www.dropbox.com/s/odxrgdi4eiqtkke/FCC%20MF%20Concert.zip?dl=0

Here is the brand new concert file that I just began to create from scratch yesterday. I have 3 basic patches created in it so far, including an organ-only patch. I seem to be able to play the organ patch just fine, including expression (CC#11), but once I paste the organ channel as an alias in another patch, the same crash occurs when expression is applied.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/mrhy2sd6g7foaw6/New%20Concert%20MF.zip?dl=0

Makes me think that this bug might only be related to using expression with "alias" Vintage B3 channels. That, or it's just my system for some reason. 😕

**This concert file should also illustrate a new and unrelated bug in 3.2. In my setup, I run one Kontakt instance as multi-channel (not stereo) and use aliases. This way, I have just one virtual "rack" of sound samples, all assigned to output 3-4 inside Kontakt, and in each MainStage patch I route (alias) Kontakt's "3-4" output to a new bus so that I can apply audio plugins and aux sends that are unique to each patch. In MainStage 3.2, these bus assignments got lost, and even if you reassign them, they do not "stick" when you save the concert. It's annoying, but not nearly as glaring and urgent as the organ-crashing bug.

Thanks again for any input!

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Answer 3

rc tech

Level 2

240 points

Aug 31, 2015 4:34 PM in response to michaelf88

I can confirm that I see the same problem, but it only hangs when I copy a channel strip and paste the channel strip as an alias. I didn't see any hanging while actually playing. Do you see a hang outside of when you are pasting as an alias?

I did notice that I can copy a patch and use paste as alias to create an entire alias of your organ patch without any problems. Maybe you can just copy and paste the organ channels instead of pasting them as an alias? The organ itself doesn't take up very many system resources when it isn't in the active patch, alias in general were added to MainStage to make it easier to deal with audio unit sample based instruments some of which have large memory consumption (like Ivory).

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Answer 4

michaelf88 Author

Level 1

4 points

Aug 31, 2015 4:58 PM in response to rc tech

Thanks, RC. I'm glad you see the same problem and it's not just me!

Yes, I think I can play the organ normally when it's a regular channel strip and not an alias. Like you say, I think it's when it's an alias that using expression causes it to crash.

The reason I like to use aliases for organs is this: I like to approach it as if I have just one organ for the entire gig, often with different drawbar settings per patch (as controlled by the screen controls you see in my concert file). If I want to make a tweak to the "guts" of my organ -- change something with the rotary cabinet, or something on the "expert" page, I want it to apply to every instance of the organ in my concert. I don't want to have to go into each and every patch and make said change. I would gladly put the organ at the concert level to accomplish this, but I don't believe there's a way to program different drawbar settings, etc., via screen controls for each patch in that case. (I'd love for someone to correct me if I'm wrong about that.)

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Answer 5

JantoMac

Level 1

0 points

Sep 9, 2015 11:08 AM in response to michaelf88

michaelf88 wrote:

I'm glad you see the same problem and it's not just me!

Well, there's three of us at least. I just found this topic because I was getting mad with "paste as alias" crashing MS3. Looks like we found a really nasty bug.

I'll stay away from "paste as alias" menu until next update, although I can play the patches I already saved without a glitch. Kinda weird.

RC is right: I got used to work with it in MS2 to save RAM and CPU resources when using AU third party instruments. Apple VIs are much less resource-hungry, but anyway I prefer to keep the CPU indicator as low as possible...

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Answer 6

JantoMac

Level 1

0 points

Sep 12, 2015 3:12 PM in response to JantoMac

Update. Last night gig was a nightmare.

The trouble began with "paste as alias" crashing MainStage 3 while programming the set list. Then I read all the posts in this topic and I programmed new patches without aliases. I kept the "aliased" patches though, since they were playing fine.

Everything went smoothly through rehearsals (4 hours) and sound check (2 hours). On the first song of the first set, after a few bars the B3 crashed. I restarted MS3 but after a minute or so it happened again. I don't know if I was using CC11 or another controller: Percussion On/Off, Leslie Slow/Fast, Distortion On/Off. I was concentrated on playing and I just went nuts.

Luckily enough, it was the only patch of the first set with an "aliased" B3: I played the following songs without a problem, until the last one. Then the B3 crashed in the same way: another "aliased" patch. But I was too nervous and angry to notice it.

Through the second set I got a clue: I could play the B3 on a couple of songs through the end, and both had a "real" B3 (I mean not "aliased"). Suddenly I remembered this topic: from then on, all I had to do was to avoid the "aliased" patches and everything went fine.

I still can't understand why it all worked perfectly before the gig. It's a really weird issue, I really hope that someone at Apple will take notice and try to fix that with the next update.

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