Hmmmm..., interesting First.., in the drums area (with the boards you've listed for consideration) IMO I think the Juno-G has better acoustic drums. All three models you've listed have good guitar sounds plus all three have effects sections more than capable of taking a medicore guitar patch and making it sound much better, but the TR is only limited to ONE insert effect where as the ES and Juno G can run multiple inserts in a performance.

Poly.., in regards to the boards you listed.., the TR-61 is on the bottom end. Both the ES and Juno G have 128 note and if memory serves me correctly the TR only has 62 note poly.

All three of these boards have good synth sounds too. That area def falls down to personal taste, but all three cover the synth patches very well. However, you mentioned that sounds for electronica such as rap, hip hip ect aren't what you're looking for. You gotta keep in mind that this is the area these boards have always thrived in. All three boards you listed CAN produce good traditional styles of music.., but understand they're synth workstations and they'll be choc full of modern sounds geared towards electronica.

For ease of use.., if you thought the MiniMo (and in this case I'm going to assume you're speaking of the Yamaha MO series as you listed MiniMo and MM6 separately) was too difficult to use. If that's the case then scratch the Motif ES off your list. The MO series IS based on and built around the Motif ES. These two boards essentially have VERY idential OS's too. If you felt the MO was a bit difficult the actual ES version will most likely be MORE difficult for you as it has more features.

Looking at these three boards and taking your particular needs into account I think the Juno-G fits your needs best. The Motif ES is the MORE PRO model of the three, but you already stated the MO series was difficult. I say the Juno-G because.., it has great drum kits.., good pianos, good bases, decent brass, and would handle your styles of music with ease. It's also not difficult to use. PLUS the Juno-G has a built in 4 track audio recorder (something that would probably be right up your street as you could mix your live guitar licks with your midi tracks--I'd suggest expanded the memory of course).., and that brings me to another point. The Juno G is expandable! You can expand your memory..., AND you can add an SRX expansion board. For your needs I would strongly suggest you look into the SRX-01 (Drum expansion board) or the SRX-03 (Studio expansion board) as these boards BOTH have sound sets tailored to what you need. http://www.rolandus.com/products/productdetails.aspx?ObjectId=384&ParentId=37
http://www.rolandus.com/products/productdetails.aspx?ObjectId=386&ParentId=37

These links will take you to some great demos of these two SRX boards.

The TR can be expanded with sampling, but that's at an extra cost.

Good luck!

[This message has been edited by squeak_D (edited 04-21-2009).]