Conference napalm::commusic_v1

    Well, you'll need to go out looking for some good percussion patches.
    I have yet to see a snare, ride or crash patch.
    
    Also, your assumption that you can take ONE track of the ESQ-1
    sequencer and use it for the on-board percussion sounds is incorrect.
    Each ESQ-1 track in a sequence can be assigned to one and only one 
    internal patch.  
    
    So you'll definitely need more than one track for the percussion.
    However, if you have n percussion instruments, there is a way you
    could tie up only n/2 tracks.
    
    What you could do is if you have say a SNARE patch and a RIDE patch,
    modify the SNARE patch to become a split keyboard patch.  I.E. make
    all notes above middle C be RIDE and all notes below be SNARE.
    
    However, I wouldn't be surprised if you discovered that 8 tracks
    was enough even without resorting to this.
    
    Also remember that you've only got 8 voices.  This limits how complex
    your percussion and non-percussion parts can be.
    
    Bottom line is that you can get away with this for a little while
    with the ESQ-1 but if you're going to do anything halfway serious
    you will need a drum machine.  But the good news is that you can
    get decent drum machines pretty cheap these days: Last I heard,
    Sam Ash was selling the Casio RX-1 (what I use) for a little over 
    $200.  The RX-1 is a lot of machine for that money.  It has:
    
    	o 12 built-in PCM sampled voices (all good but not great)
    	o You can create your own drum sounds by sampling (that feature
          alone is worth the $200+).
    	o Seperate outputs for each instrument, or stereo outputs with
          a hard-wired stereo field, or mono outputs
    	o A mixing section - one volume control for each output
    	o Full MIDI implementation (also IN, OUT and THRU as I remember)
    	o Dump data to audio cassette capability
    
    I'm sure there are other good deals around for discontinued models
    and such.
    
    	db
    	o 
    

    
    Thanks for your input, Dave.
    
    I figured the way the demo was done was to put Simmons-like tom
    and snare  patches together as a split.  The snare was limited to
    a small range of notes while the toms had a wide range so that a
    very low tom could double as a bass drum. Or maybe they used a high
    tom as a snare and had the bass as the second patch in the split.
         
    Plus, of course, there were no cymbals.  So you could get by with
    one track.  
    
    If you saw my current setup you would laugh but my drum machine
    is built into a Lowery organ and a cymbal consists of gated white
    noise.  An ESQ-1 can do better than that, I'm sure, though it would
    not be *realistic*. This would then obviously require another sequencer
    track.
    
    I am quite aware of the 8 note limitation.  The thing that I loved
    about the demo (and a similar demo on the Sequential MAX) is that
    someone spent a lot of time in the arrangement so that no more than
    8 notes sounded at once, yet allowed what sounded like three or
    four polyphonic parts (piano, strings, "synth" lead) *plus* bass and 
    drums. 
    
    I'm surprised the Casio is so cheap...when it came out it was like
    $500 wasn't it?  Guess it hasn't proved too popular.  My problem
    is that if I can get my wife to swallow the $1400 or so for the
    ESQ-1 she will fall over if I say I need a drum machine too.  I
    do not plan to be Tom Scholz and could probably borrow a 707 from
    a friend in a pinch.
                                                       
    Now what about the sequencer depth question?
    
    Brian
          

    
    For anyone else who might be remotely interested, I *sort of* got
    my answer last night at the Ensoniq clinic.  Although billed as
    an ESQ-1 clinic primarily, most of the time was spent showing how an ESQ
    plus two Mirages could sound like everything from the Berlin
    Philharmoniker to the Desi Arnaz orchestra playing the "I Love Lucy"
    theme.
    
    The clinician built up a drum track in real time on stage while
    demonstrating how easy it is to use the sequencer.  He used a
    Simmons-type patch, with kick on the bottom note and the rest of
    the board giving pitched toms.  He used a relatively high tom for
    his snare, no cymbals.  OK for screwing around at home, I think.
    
    On the other hand, he also did a 12 minute demo using the aforementioned
    3 machine setup where he soloed over a sequence using one Mirage
    primarily as a drum machine including (get this) a drum solo using
    a double bass kit (Look out Pete Cook) and fit the *entire* sequence
    in 10,000 notes (actually he had 210 bytes of memory left).  I think
    he made extensive use of repeats to cycle short patterns so as to
    save space (you ESQ buffs know what I mean, right?  I.e. to have
    a pattern of N notes play X times you need N+(X-1) notes of storage).
    Whole thing was pretty impressive.  Now after I buy my ESQ I'll
    need to get two Mirages  :-)
    
    BTW, relative to this sampling controversy thing that has been going
    on, the clinician demonstrated how you can sample off your turntable
    by doing a sampled version of Yes' "Owner of a Lonely Heart" which
    was hilarious because half of that song *is* samples.
    
    

    I'm a new ESQ-1 owner, and I've been seqencing drum tracks for my
    TR505 with the ESQ's sequencer.  Works great, and you can get any
    kind of feel you want, unlike the TR's sequencer.
    
    A neat trick is to use up to all eight tracks in the ESQ's sequencer
    to lay down different parts of the drum track, and then merge them
    together when you're satisfied with the result.
    
    I discovered a minor nit when using this technique.  If you've got
    your drum parts in the sequence, you can't use the transpose option
    when building a song, because it will transpose the drum sounds
    too, which will definitely not give the desired result.
    
    It would be neat if a track could be designated "immune from
    transposition" for this kind of application.  Maybe for V3.0 ?
    
    

    Re: Notes versus clocks, and the ESQ sequencer:
    	
    The sequencer memory is taken up by note-on's and note-off's, not
    by note duration.  It costs the same number of bytes to play a scale
    in 32nd notes as it does in whole notes.
    	
    By the way, controller information (pitch bend, mod wheel, CV pedal,
    breath controller, etc) burn storage much more quickly than note
    information.  That's why "remove controller data" is such a useful
    option.  (note- it does NOT remove key velocity- that's part of
    the note itself.)
    	
    Those of you catching sequences from aftertouch keyboards should
    be very careful- aftertouch is a controller just like mod wheel,
    and uses up storage very quickly.  Might be best to either disable
    it entirely, or put just the parts that require aftertouch in sequences
    with aftertouch enabled, and the rest in non-aftertouch sequences.