Nord User Forum

Does anyone have a tip for an easy-to-understand tutorial on YT about midi settings and midi connections to external keyboards?

What do you want to understand? Is it about one of the Nord Stages? Then I'd recommend to look through the videos from Mark Laporte (https://www.youtube.com/@MyKeysToMusic).

It wouldn't probably be a big thing to explain in a few sentences - without the need of a video.

Edit: Sorry, I missed the title. Mark Laporte is still working on his NS4 course. But as I said: Tell what you know about MIDI and what you want to learn - and you may get a short explanation.

I use the new stage 4 with another keyboard (Genos2). I would like to be very flexible with the two keyboards. First and foremost, I want to put organ sounds from the NS4 on the right split keyboard of the Genos2. On the other hand, I would like to use the NS4 to control the Genos2's automatic accompaniment but use the sounds from the NS4. It's about the individual MIDI settings in both devices in order to achieve my goal. Unfortunately I'm inexperienced when it comes to Midi.

Using MIDI to connect an external keyboard to a sound generator usually is an easy thing. When it comes to the NS4, there are 3 ways of using external keyboards - and all these ways want their own MIDI channels to work correctly.
a) Global MIDI: An external keyboard controls the whole NS4; and global settings can be controlled via this channel;
b) single layer MIDI and engine type MIDI: every one of the 7 Nord sound generators (2x organ, 2x piano, 3x synth) can be controlled from an external keyboard respectively one of the three engines (organ, piano, synth) can be controlled from extern with all their layers;
c) ExtKB: a distinct selection of layers can be controlled from an external keyboard.

Only the use of external and internal controllers needs to be checked.

From the technical side, I'd describe your first attempt (NS4 organ on part of Genos2 keyboard) the other way round: One split zone of the Genos2 keyboard sends MIDI notes to the Nord controlling one of the two organ layers. The Nord will need to be set in order to receive the notes on the same channel.

I'd describe the other attempt this way: You hope to be able to create MIDI commands from the accompaniment section of your Genos if you control it from extern. If I were you, I'd check this first. But the NS4 isn't an audio workstation, so multitimbrality is limited: You can't import NS4 sounds into your Genos, you need to forward the MIDI note commands back to the NS4 where the note commands originally come from - and with every instrument on another channel to control another NS4 layer.

In theory, you may be able to do things like that (with local off on both Nord and Yamaha), but I wouldn't. It doesn't sound flexible to me at all - but rather complex.