Ensoniq ESQ-1 • ESQ-M Sound Library

120 Great Sounds New For Your Vintage Synth

A cool collection of sounds for your mixes

3 Banks of 40 •120 Patches

Mac or PC Sysex & Midi File Format

Get All 3 Banks • ONLY $30.

Just Click On Buy Now & Get Your New Sounds Today

Ensoniq released the ESQ-1 in 1986. The ESQ-1 is a hybrid digital-analog synthesizer and as a result it had many cool analog synth features included such as a ring modulator and oscillator-sync. One of it's great features that set the ESQ-1 apart from other similar synths at the time is the voice architecture. You could choose from analog, digital or samples or any combo since there are three independent oscillators per voice. The ESQ also had a built-in sequencer that can store up to 24,000 notes in 30 sequences and 10 songs. Ensoniq also released the ESQ-M rackmount module which was essentially the same thing minus the keyboard.

Programming the ESQ from the front panel was a real challenge due to the tiny LED display. However, if you connected your ESQ-1 with your computer your could purchase some of the early editing software that was just staring to become available. I bought a copy of Dr. T's (remember them?) "X-OR" which was the first multi device editor and librarian for the Macintosh, and it made creating patches for the ESQ-1 a whole lot easier. X-OR went on to become MOTU's "Unisyn" which we are still using to create sounds for synthesizers.