Buyers Guide: Software Music Sequencer Reviews -

The hardware sequencer was first used in the late 1960's and early 1970's. It was shortly after this that software sequencers emerged in the early 1980's.

I started producing music back in 1999, quite a bit after the invention of a sequencer, and by far we have come a long way with the technology.. I have experimented with an array of sequencers, to eventually find the one that best suited my music making needs. If you want to start producing music with software then the sequencer is considered to be the heart of your studio.

Image-Line FL Studio Producer Edition
Great overall useability, made for the beginner and the expert, and if you find that you need more from a program you can also use this monster as a VST plug in, inside of another sequencer like Cubase, or Protools. This program gets a 10/10 in my books and has a great price to match ($149).

Cubase SX
This program is great for automation of effects, a great equilizer, and an amazing mixing interface. A power house of a sequencer. Although I found the midi scoring to be very time consuming, if you click down your own midi patterns ($579)

Protools
The combonation of protools with the tascam usb 428 mixer to create a manual mixing interface, is a killer feature, I'm a huge fan of hands on music gear. This program is used buy many professionals as an industry standerd for recording software.

Sonic Foundry Acid
I started producing music with this program, buy using a bunch of premade loops and mixing them down, it has a very easy to use automation feature, VST compatibility and the program is very straight forward and easy to use ($299).

Audacity
This program first originated as a university project that has developed over the years form a single track recording program all the way up to a multitrack recording software, this program is fairly simple and may not have all of the features you are looking for, but the price cant be beat , it's free ($0)..

The Round Up

I know there are other sequencers out on the market i just wanted to showcase the top 5 that i have used. Out of all these programs each one seems to have its highlighted features. There is no best program, its what works best for you, and which one fits within your budget. Try out some demos and then purchase or download the sequencer you fell most comfortable with.