After working on it for several months, I am officially moving all of my MainStage blogging, tutorials, and patch design to a separate website. When I started focusing on MainStage about 3 years ago I had no idea how much this part of the site would grow, and it’s finally time for it to have it’s own dedicated space on the web.

The new site is called Patch Foundry. The new site offers a completely retooled series of patches built from the ground up using the tricks I’ve learned from some of the best sound designers and mix engineers in the world.

The people I’ve worked with on building these patches are incredible- I got advice and help legendary keyboard players that have played with groups ranging from Casting Crowns to Charlie Daniels. To read a bit about what top session and live players are saying about the patches, check out the testimonials on the first page (just scroll down).

The big announcement is an entirely new line of patches and templates. Keyboardists have written me for years asking if there was a MainStage template specifically for their keyboard. I’ve created several in the past for clients, but the template didn’t do much good by itself. If the patches didn’t have controls thoughtfully mapped to the custom preset, the knobs and sliders were basically useless live. There had to be a better way.

I spent months experimenting, and came up with a solution. I went through every single keyboard currently sold in the USA, and created a template for it. That’s right- if you bought a new keyboard in the US in the last 6 months, I have a template for you.

But I didn’t stop there. I built an entirely new line of patches that automatically map every important control across every single template I’ve created, each with a custom color based on the type of instrument it is, and easy-to-understand control labels. No matter what controller you use, each patch will map the most important controls to your knobs and sliders automatically. This took literally hundreds of hours of testing an refining, and the results are incredible. No more mapping onscreen controls in confusing ways to your controller. No more hunting for the right control live, or wondering what knob is controlling which sound. We call it the Nashville Standard, and all of my patches from here on will be compatible with it.

Here’s the kicker: I’m offering all of my templates for free on www.patchfoundry.com/freemainstagetemplates. If you have a keyboard controller, there’s probably a template for you available for free. If you have an older keyboard that you want mapped, I’ll build you a custom template that will work with the new line of patches for just $5, with the condition that I can share it on the website for free after I send it to you.

There’s lots more to come in the future, but I’m releasing the first patch collections today. The first packs are "Ultimate Pianos Pack" which include 50 of my favorite piano sounds geared for pop/electronica/rock, and the "Ultimate Worship Bundle" which has a whopping 100 patches for modern worship/praise keyboardists.

I'm also including 20 free MainStage patches from the new packs for signing up for my new newsletter. Here's where you can get it: https://www.patchfoundry.com/email-signup

www.ericwbarfield.com will stay up and shift focus to my personal music career and studio work, and I will be doing all of my MainStage blogging at www.PatchFoundry.com from now on. If you want to sign up for the new email list for www.PatchFoundry.com, click here. I’ll be including more MainStage related stuff in this new e-mail (along with some music business advice), including free patches, tutorials and more.