Setup Ivory standalone w/Soundflower or patch at concert level

Question

I'm playing around with using Ivory's standalone program, and using Soundflower to route the audio back to MainStage. This works as a proof of concept.
Here's what I trying to get my arms around on this:
1. Memory. Am I saving anything doing this? Seems that Ivory Standalone is using about 384 MB of RAM (according to Activity Monitor). The MBP has 4 gig in it.
2. Flexibility. I lose MS' ability to control parameters per MS patch, as Ivory is not acting as an AU here. But okay, per patch, I could EQ, process, mute as needed. Limitation is also that it's always one of Ivory's piano sample sets that's loaded, but then just one.
I know I could put Ivory at the concert or set level within MS, but I've not figured out how to mute it when not needed or effect/EQ it differently for different songs. Anyone know to do this? I could instantiate Ivory at the concert level, route it to a BUS, then add that bus per patch and EQ/effect ad nauseum. Is that the right routing? if so, then it's essentially functionally equivalent to hosting Ivory outside of MS without the complexity of SoundFlower and routing the audio around at a system level.
3. Stability. Anyone using Soundflower "for real"? prone to crash??? etc etc etc.

Answer 1

I've found out most of this on my own.