Blue Cat's rule too! Since the IL Minihost is now "unstable" in Reason (Reason crashes if you delete the VST) I tried the Blue Cat's PatchWork VST host. It comes in two versions FX and Instrument.
The instrument version is recommended for midi routing. They have a free demo version that has a short 1s silence once a minute.
For Midi work it is very flexible with its routing (but non-graphical - so RTFM
).
I can let it receive Midi from Reasons sequencer as usual by assigning a Midi lane to it.
But then any VST Midi can be routed anywhere. So you can set it up like this:
Midi ARP/Player VST - routed to VST Synth : VST Synth to Audio out (demo cuts out audio 1s per min)
Midi ARP/Player VST - routed to EzKeys (volume =0 if you don't want to hear EzKeys) : Once I have what I want in the Midi Player I just record that snipped into EzKeys and Drag-n-Drop it into Reasons sequencer.
This way I can hear the synth sound that I want (any VST synth) - and I get Midi into Reason.
Some VST Midi devices let you drag-n-drop directly, so then you obviously do not need EzKeys or any other VST Midi recording device. But just a few do that.
This worked so well that it doesn't even feel like a work around. Now all VST Midi players/arps/sequencers etc are available (I'm gonna test more VST players, but the first time this setup was tested, it just WORKED!)