A Unique Recording Process for Pianists

Zenph Studios makes recordings of pianists in a unique process suited for the 21st century. The heart of the process is a nine-foot concert grand piano, a Yamaha Disklavier Pro. It's a richly-voiced piano, with a superbly-regulated action. It is also full of lasers, solenoids, and computers. It can record and play back a pianist's keystrokes and pedal movements with exceptional precision.

Recordings are captured as MIDI computer files. You may be familiar with regular MIDI recording, where each note strike and release is recorded in a MIDI "event." In this high-precision format, each note that's played results in seven MIDI events, capturing many more bits, as well as the hammer velocity and angle. The playback timing is on the order of 1 millisecond. Electro-optical devices sense hammer strikes and pedal movement; they measure 1,000 degrees of dynamic intensity and pedal accuracy to 1/1,000th of an inch. The Pro's quality improvement can be compared by analogy with digital photography - it's essentially the difference between a one mega-pixel photo and a ten mega-pixel photo. Professional musicians consider the playback as indistinguishable from live performance.

Recordings are made without the presence of a recording engineer. Musicians and engineers can do their jobs separately, at times convenient for each. There’s great flexibility and joy in this process. While recording at the piano, a pianist can sing or make other noises, use sheet music and turn pages, tap their feet, take breaks to do something else – and the piano can be badly out of tune. A pianist can record as long as he or she feels an improved take is being obtained. They get to concentrate on interpretation, rather than accuracy.

Later, a recording engineer appears to make the acoustic recording with microphones. Then we can retune the piano after every movement, can record with the lights and air conditioning off so there’s no noise, move the microphones inches and restart a performance, and so on. We also record live recitals, from which we can make audio recordings without audience sounds. A good take is never lost because of external noise, such as traffic or aircraft.

Our software lets us edit individual notes for accuracy, sound intensity, and timing, as well as editing the use of the three pedals. We can correct occasional wrong notes or any other facet of the performance, without a trace. The tempo of individual takes can be matched precisely. When a chosen performance is ready, it is played back by the piano, (which must then be accurately tuned) and recorded with high-quality microphones and the best modern audio equipment. Because the chosen take can be repeated as often as necessary to optimize settings, the levels and microphone positions can be adjusted to achieve ideal audiophile quality.

Few pianists ever get to hear themselves play "live," another unexpected benefit of the process. They get to hear what they sound like "out in the hall." While the piano plays back their performance, they can sit in different chairs in the room and hear what the audience hears when they perform. It's a huge revelation; they often sit with their scores and mark up phrases, having heard what they actually sound like for the first time.