Can't send midi from instrument rack to external instrument

[filipblaauw]

Hi all, I just got Ableton today, so the program is very new to me.

What I try to set up:
scenes for each song I'm playing live. In these scenes, I will trigger patches with chain select. I created a "Patch selector" track, containing midi clips that change the chain number.

I created an instrument rack on track 1, and loaded External Instrument to the rack. On track 2, 3, 4 and so on, I load my AUs/VSTs into instrument racks. When I then go back to track 1, I'm not always able to send midi to the different external instruments.

Neither Sylenth1, Nexus, U-he Zebra, Addictive Keys or Arturia lets me send midi to them. So I'm a bit stuck... Do I do anything wrong? The very moment I add Omnisphere, Kontakt, Superior Drummer, etc into the instrument rack, I'm able to send midi to this channel.

I'm using the 64 bit version of Live, and have all my 32 bit plugins run through 32 Lives.

I have to admit it was way easier to setup in Apple Mainstage, but I decided to advance and hope you guys can help me get a grip of this. Thank you!

[chrk]

Neither Sylenth1, Nexus, U-he Zebra, Addictive Keys or Arturia lets me send midi to them.

Read up on what the 24.4 External Instrument does. It is a device for routing audio and midi to and from hardware instruments through the ports defined for your audio/midi interface.

These AUs and VSTs have access to the software ports built in, it's defined in the respective virtual instrument standard.

Drop the External Instruments.

[filipblaauw]

Thank you, I'll read more about it. So this means that some plugins can receive midi, others can't?

What is the recommended way to enable/disable a plugin from scene to scene? For now, I'm using chain selectors. Is there a better way?