Freak out wrote:I don't really know anything about the EXT Function
Ah, you really should! The primary reason it exists is to do exactly what you want... to play an additional sound from the Nord's keyboard, in addition to the sounds that are built in. The additional sound would be something located in an EXTernal device (another keyboard, a sound module, a computer, an iPad). It's probably much simpler than you think. To get started:
Say you wish you could layer a 3rd synth sound on your NS2... and you can get the kind of sound you want for that third sound out of your Roland G70. Okay...
Plug a MIDI cable cable from the MIDI OUT of the Nord into the MIDI IN of your Roland.
On the Nord,
* Set the MIDI Global Channel to Off. (Shift+MIDI buttons, Page Up, then turn the knob clockwise until you get to the last possible setting, which will be OFF.) This turns off the "simple" default mode where the Nord will basically trigger anything you attach, and let us instead tell it exactly what we want it to do.
* activate just Slot A; turn OFF the piano, organ, and synth sections; and turn off any Splits for now. We want to start simple!
* Turn ON the EXTernal section.
* At the bottom of the EXT panel, press the PARAMETER BUTTON until PROG CHANGE is lit.
Now play the Nord keyboard, and slowly rotate the big PARAMETER KNOB which will send PROGRAM CHANGES to the Roland. You shoud hear the Roland playing, and changing to different presets as you turn the knob. Stop when you find a sound you like.
Now play the Roland keyboard with one hand, and the Nord with the other. You will be hearing no Nord sounds, but you will be hearing two different Roland sounds... the one you are playing on the Roland itself (probably on MIDI channel 1, if you're curious), and the one you are triggering from the Nord's keyboard (on MIDI channel 14, just because that happens to be the Nord default for the EXT function on Slot A).
Now you can turn on a native Nord Synth sound for Slot A, and another on one Slot B, and voila, three layered synth sounds! Two from the Nord, one from the Roland, while still leaving the Roland keyboard free to play a sound of its own. If you want, you can now add a fourth layered synth sound, by turning on the EXT section of Slot B and using the PROGRAM CHANGE parameter again to pick yet another Roland sound (this one will happen to be on channel 15). Now you have four layered synth sounds on the Nord... two being played from the Nord itself, and two being generated by the Roland.
Just like the Piano, Organ, and Synth sections, the EXT section does not have to cover the whole board. You can use the Nord's SPLIT functions to assign the EXT panel so the Roland sound will play over just over part of the keyboard range. You could have the Slot A Ext Roland sound play on one part of the Nord keyboard, and the Slot B Roland sound play on another part of the keyboard. You can octave shift the sounds, balance their volumes, etc. You can store all the settings as part of a Nord preset, so that when you call up a Nord patch, it will automatically call up the Roland sound you want the Nord to trigger, including all those other parameters (which key range, what volume, whether you want the sound to sustain when you press the sustain pedal, etc.).
So really, since you have another keyboard, you probably have everything you need to do what you want to do, quite easily!
By default, the Nord Parameter knob will only let you select from among the first 128 sounds of the Roland, but you can go into a menu to access any Roland sound at all. And then there are a number of other parameters you can change, all the "CC" functions. So if, for example, on a given patch, you want the big Nord EXT Parameter knob to control filter sweep on your Roland sound, you can do that (assuming that function is supported on the Roland side). You can get as fancy as you want to get.
