SoftSound ES1 Vol. 1

100 patches for the Apple ES1 synthesizer (ES1 available in all flavours of Logic since version 4).
SoftSound ES1 Vol.1 available from www.softsound.andersbau.dk
Current price US$16/€15 payable through PayPal.
Reviewed by David Mondrup

Commercial presets? Is this some kind of joke? Sure, we can appreciate that developers spend months on end recording audio or tweaking zeroes and ones to bring us extensive sound manipulation options and sample libraries, but, in all honesty; some bloke who calls himself Anders Bau does a few tweaks to one of the simplest synths currently available to the commercial market, and he wants us to buy the presets? Pay actual money?
Well, if you've ever struggled to get the most out of any synth, or if you've always just used presets as you haven't got a clue what those knobs do anyway, you might have to read on to get a better perspective on things.

The ES1 is a quite limited softsynth as softsynths go. I know that I have most often simply just passed it by to use one of the more advanced synths available in logic, thinking that a synth as simple as this could never come up with that lush pad or those realistic electric keys needed right now. Investigating this further for this article, I find it is true that the output of the ES1 is not necessarily what one would call fat, but you can always add extra effects to softsynths anyway (thank god for DAWs!), and, as I learned while exploring these presets, a lot can be achieved within the synth itself.

The preset list includes basses, keyboards, orchestral patches, percussive sounds, leads, special fx, pads, brass and sounds suited for arpeggiators. While trying to tweak a few of the presets myself, I found to my surprise that the knobs in the ES1 are actually pretty powerful, in that I only had to move some of the knobs very little to radically alter the sounds. This makes sense, if looking at it this way; in order to get the most out of those pretty few knobs available, Apple (or, more correctly, Emagic, who originally invented the ES1) had to make sure that each knob would give maximum effect. What this means for the SoftSound developer, though, is that great care has to be put into setting the parameters to get the exactly right result out of the synth.

So how do these presets sound? In short, they sound very good. As I make part of my living teaching synthesizing, I believe I'm pretty competent as to how synths work, and I have to admit I'm impressed with how much Anders Bau has managed to get out of the ES1. Especially his use of the LFO, not the least when combining it with the random waveform in precisely measured amounts, is admirably well performed. The results are sustained sounds that I would myself have reached to the ES1's big brother, the ES2, to program myself. However, seeing how much can be performed with something as small as this, I can look forward to saving CPU cycles in the future when reaching to the ES1 for some of the sounds where I would instead have tried out much more processor demanding instruments. Till now, I have almost exclusively used the ES1 for that one kick drum preset I'd found useful, but it is absolutely fair to say that I have now seen my ES1 come to new life. To listen for yourself, look to the SoftSound website for samples.

So, is it worth it to pay for someone tweaking knobs you could just as well have tweaked yourself? Well, any work you can do yourself can almost always be outperformed by someone more skilled at it. These presets have revealed a new side of the ES1 for me, and at US$16/€15, they're worth every penny and more - a true bargain. If you have the ES1, there's really no need not to get them.

SoftSound is a relatively new business in town, with only this one title on the market so far. According to the website, next up is a set of presets for another softsynth simpleton, the Steinberg A1, available to Cubase SX users. If the output maintains this fine quality level, we'll just have to look forward to that one. Welcome on the market, and good luck!