The Ensoniq Mirage was pretty much the first affordable sampler. It was gritty and grainy (and a lot has been made of this "lo-fi" characteristic) but, at the time, it gave me the chance to be able to have an almost infinite wealth of sounds at my fingertips.

Much has also been made of the on-board filter and various editing options, but there are quite a few videos on YouTube that explore these in some detail, so I'm not going to attempt to delve into any of those functions here. I played around a lot with sampling when I first got it, but also relied on third-party sample disks bought through the back pages of "One Two Testing" and "Making Music". So, this demo doesn't attempt to delve into any of the programming or sound design, but is simply a run-through of a number of sounds from the library of 70 or so disks that I assembled over the first few years of owning it.

It was recorded through an Alesis Multimix, using a little of the onboard reverb, direct to a Roland R-05. Sounds marked with an asterisk * are my particular favourites.

00:00 Piano (with honkytonk variation )
00:33 Sax and Acoustic Bass
00:50 *Trumpet (with muted variation)
01:15 *Cellos and Violins (with sustain, pizzicato and filtered variations)
02:34 *Orchestral Percussion
02:58 Clav
03:12 *Strings and Choir
03:43 *Full Pipe Organ
04:03 *Breathy Bass and Perc Bottle
04:34 Cup Gongs and Crotales
04:54 Various Orchestral Hits and Stabs
05:09 *Various Electric Sounds on Wheels (sound crossfades between two samples on mod wheel)
07:18 Tablas and Sitar
07:36 Harp
08:14 Stacked Strings
08:30 Log Drum and Gong
08:48 Xylophone
09:04 Latin Percussion
09:15 Doo Vocal
09:20 *Prepared Piano
09:40 *Tone Cluster and Opera Gong
10:09 Choir Pad
10:41 *Pizz Strings
11:08 *Tremelo Strings
11:36 *K-Muse Sample Pack
12:13 Fairlight Hits
12:25 Yamaha Grand
12:40 PPG 2.4
13:01 *MIDI Orchestras
13:45 Explosions
13:56 Human Voice and Stab
14:33 Flute and Harp
14:53 Various Synth Sounds (including the weirdness that results when a sample fails to load correctly!)
15:17 Orchestral Hits
15:34 *Shakuhachi and Strings
15:58 Space Talk and Moog Bass
16:13 *Megachord (and "Beat It" sample)
16:49 Doo Vocal
17:04 Spine Tingle
17:12 *Juno Brass
17:30 *Soft Brass
17:45 Water and various farmyard sound effects (self-sampled from BBC sound effects LP)
18:12 *Perc Chiff (with and without reverb)
18:47 Electro Drums and Bass
18:56 *Breath String and Horizon
19:27 D50 Atmosphere
19:42 Choir and Warm Bell
20:04 MT32 Drums
20:13 Fairlight Strings
20:36 *Soft Strings
21:27 Voices
22:02 *Industrial Choir
22:17 Guitar Pick and Electric Bass
22:33 Doo Vocal
22:49 Various Synth and Bass Sounds
23:24 Brass Section
23:29 *Whirly Hose and Cello
23:55 Mandolin
24:17 Guitar Chords
24:27 Bells
24:41 Stab
24:47 Pluck Brass
25:04 *Drum Roll and Alarm Bell
25:16 Orchestral Hit
25:27 *D50 Bellstring
25:43 *Nylon Synth
25:53 Synth
26:07 Horns

UPDATE 2021: I've just installed the Rhythmic Robot Sahara emulator and have to say, it's pretty much spot on. Hear for yourself: [ Ссылка ]

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