Roland MSQ-100 MIDI Sequencer

Let me say it quickly: This is a seriously well-designed little machine, that performs extremely well and is rock solid.

The diminutive size aside, the MSQ-100 can sequence a complete MIDI arrangement (16 channels across a single MIDI wire). It is easy to grasp, and the work modes are quite intuitive and quickly gets in your fingers. You can record in Step mode or in real time. There is no quantization of recorded notes. If you want quantizing you

I had enough confidence in the unit to even use it live.

Dump it

For storage, the MSQ-100 is equipped with a cassette interface, that converts MIDI information to modulated tones, that can be written to and read from tape.

For live use I had 2 units – one was playing while the other was loading from tape. Casette loading time for a medium sized song was about 2 minutes, so it was vital that the load was successful in the first take, since there was not time to repeat the process before the start of next song. Problem was voltage drops that could occur with switching of the light system. These would give you a dreaded “load error” in the display. An ugly sight towards the end of the current song…

Technical

Manual Roland MSQ-100 MIDI Sequencer