In Apple MainStage, aliases are linked shortcuts to a sound patch that can be reused, without the need for new instances of the instrument and plugins used on the channel strip. They are extremely useful for reoccurring sounds, and help to reduce CPU load and RAM usage.
Say you have an acoustic piano patch that shows up in every single song. Instead of creating a unique patch for each instance, you can use an alias to tell MainStage…”Hey, just take this earlier piano patch and use it here!”. This means there won’t be any duplicate instances of effects on the piano patch taking up resources.
How to Create an Alias
- Copy a patch by highlighting it and pressing ⌘C (Command-C).
- Paste it as an alias by pressing ⌥⌘V (Option-Command-V).
Other Things to Keep in Mind…
- Effects, controller filters, sends, and I/O on an aliased patch affect the linked aliases.
- Volume, panning, splits, layers, and velocity scaling are independent for each alias.
- Channel strips can be added to an aliased patch without affecting other linked aliases.