Replacing the MS-Acccess frontend for accessing linked tables with SQL Server?

Since you've indicated in comments that you may want to replace the front-end entirely, check out Visual Studio Lightswitch. I'm working with it presently, and it's great... Too simplistic for a full-fledged .NET developer, but great for throwing a front-end on some data without having to engage a development team.

SQL Server Management Studio allows you to create multiple versions of queries where you can see the SQL text and results simultaneously.

You can use dotted-notation to refer to tables in separate databases on the same server like:

SELECT * FROM database.schema.table

If you need to query data from multiple servers, you can create linked servers in SQL Server that provide all the capabilities of an Access front-end. This allows you to use 4-part dotted-notation like:

SELECT * FROM server.database.schema.table

For example, this code creates 2 Databases on the local SQL Server, with 2 tables that contain a single record each. The SELECT at the end joins data from the 2 tables into a single output:

CREATE DATABASE Test1 ON PRIMARY 
    (NAME = 'Test1_Data'
        , FILENAME = 'C:\Temp\Test1_data.mdf'
        , SIZE = 10MB
        , MAXSIZE = UNLIMITED
        , FILEGROWTH = 10MB
    )
LOG ON
    (NAME = 'Test1_Log'
        , FILENAME = 'C:\Temp\Test1_log.mdf'
        , SIZE = 10MB
        , MAXSIZE = UNLIMITED
        , FILEGROWTH = 10MB
);

CREATE DATABASE Test2 ON PRIMARY 
    (NAME = 'Test2_Data'
        , FILENAME = 'C:\Temp\Test2_data.mdf'
        , SIZE = 10MB
        , MAXSIZE = UNLIMITED
        , FILEGROWTH = 10MB
    )
LOG ON
    (NAME = 'Test2_Log'
        , FILENAME = 'C:\Temp\Test2_log.mdf'
        , SIZE = 10MB
        , MAXSIZE = UNLIMITED
        , FILEGROWTH = 10MB
);
GO

USE Test1;
GO
CREATE TABLE TestTable1
(
    ID INT NOT NULL PRIMARY KEY CONSTRAINT PK_TestTable1 IDENTITY(1,1)
    , TestText nvarchar(255)
);

INSERT INTO TestTable1 (TestText) VALUES ('This is table 1 in database 1');


USE Test2;
GO
CREATE TABLE TestTable2
(
    ID INT NOT NULL PRIMARY KEY CONSTRAINT PK_TestTable2 IDENTITY(1,1)
    , TestText nvarchar(255)
);

INSERT INTO TestTable2 (TestText) VALUES ('This is table 2 in database 2');


SELECT * FROM Test1.dbo.TestTable1
UNION ALL
SELECT * FROM Test2.dbo.TestTable2;

The output is:

ID  TestText
1   This is table 1 in database 1
1   This is table 2 in database 2