Piano-music.org

Recording 72 continues the weekly rhythm — another full piano session captured on the Yamaha DC7XE3. Each session is a chance to refine both the playing and the production, and the small weekly improvements should be audible over time. Thanks for listening.

It has been over 10 years since the last recording posted here. A lot has changed, including a brand new piano — the Yamaha DC7XE3. This is one of the first recordings captured on it, and I think you will hear the difference immediately. The depth, warmth, and dynamic range of this instrument is remarkable. I hope you enjoy listening as much as I enjoyed playing.

I believe it is the best sounding piano audio I’ve ever captured. Please forgive me for taking so long – almost 2 years to post new music.

The last podcast to be recorded on my Yamaha DC3M4. It goes away tomorrow, and though it’s only been 4 years, I feel as though I have a tremendous amount of history with that wonderful piano. I actually had to pick and choose from about 2 hours worth of recordings since I’m not sure if the old format will be supported on the new piano. I’m truly excited about the capabilities and the sound of the new Yamaha DC7XE3Pro, but it’s also sad to see my old piano leave the studio. I’m sure it will end up in good hands!

Yet another all-original podcast. I did use some pretty familiar chord progressions, but I also tried out some new styles.

You may not hear any familiar melodies as this podcast is mostly original. I’ve adopted a fairly new process to recording the podcast. It has been working out okay so far. It also gives me an opportunity to select the best recordings out of many, and there was a really bad 15 minutes of recording I was happy not to have included in this podcast. You may notice that it may have a slightly different sound than previous podcasts. I’m still perfecting the audio recording and mixing aspect of the podcast even after almost 5 years.

I think this might end up being my favorite podcast to date.

I think this is probably the first podcast ever to be original-free, although, it does contain some originality. Those who like consistently quite and peaceful podcasts may not enjoy this one as much since I get a bit loud in some parts. It may be a few months before the next podcast is posted, but I’ll try to make it softer. I’m blown away at the number of downloads that happen on a daily basis.

What a crazy couple of weeks it has been! I won’t bore you with all the details, but the end result is I finally have a new podcast. You’d think after 3 years of doing this I’d have it down but I don’t. This podcast required a massive amount of editing, but I think it turned out okay. I did find some ways to improve the audio over the previous podcasts. The only issue is there’s too big of a dynamic range so had to go a little overboard on the compression and limiting.

I finished mixing the Soundwave album last week so I’m back at it – thanks for your patience. This podcast, I only used “Hosannah” for a brief period. The rest is original – some from previous podcasts and some that’s fresh and new. An interesting stat about this podcast is it’s the first to be exactly 30 minutes long! I admit, I stretched the end out a little, but it was already pretty close. I added a bit more gain both at the pre amp and in software using a little more compression and gain on the limiter to try to even out the level a bit. There is quite a bit more dynamics in this podcast compared to the previous two or three. This time, I wanted to keep the dynamics as original as possible, especially during the soft parts, and I didn’t change the level on some of the louder midi notes like I have in the past. I think it turned out better this way.

In a way, a lot of this podcast sounds repetitive to me compared to previous podcasts. It’s becoming a little challenging to keep things unique considering there is already over 30 hours of podcasts.

Still searching for the best mic placement and mix, but I think its getting there. Most all the tunes are repeat or new originals. You may recognize one or two of them. Peace.

This podcast does have familiar melodies from others, but I believe it has some uniqueness. One melody from the chorus of “Pour My Love on You” was used at the end. An estimate of 129 billion people have lived throughout the history of the world. Only 5 billion have experienced the freedom we enjoy, and 3 billion are alive today. How rare freedom is.

This podcast, I used the songs, “Came to My Rescue” and “I Will Exalt”. Since I actually recorded this podcast over a month ago, I had to refer to planning center for the song names.

It’s finally finished! The songs used are mostly original. I did play a familiar melody at the tail end. Most of it is a little more fast-paced than the norm.

Be sure to check it out if you haven’t heard it yet. A couple originals are included as well. One was from a previous podcast. I’m still on a quest for the perfect piano mix. Mic placement and EQ has been changing every podcast. I really need to swap out my NT1000 with something else. It isn’t very balanced across the frequency spectrum. Maybe I’ll be able to afford the mic I’d like to replace it with in a couple months.

I used only one song this podcast. It’s by Robbie Seay, and it’s called “Crazy Love”. The rest is original. This podcast is actually a second take since the first didn’t record properly. I always thought recording to MIDI would eliminate having to re-record podcasts, but not true. I did learn that the Disklavier does not like any kind of MIDI signal coming into it when recording so hopefully this will be the last time this happens. Draw near to Him and He WILL draw near to you.

The rest is original. I used a different acoustic piano sample for editing the MIDI this week, and it actually disguised a lot of the small timing issues which is good and bad. The good is it took me half the time to edit (~4 hours instead of ~8). The bad is I notice them when playing back on the DC3, but I’m pretty sure most people won’t notice. For those who do, you’ll have the CD to look forward to. My plan is to make it as perfect as possible. Stay tuned!

The rest is somewhat original. A familiar melody came to mind towards the end, but I couldn’t pinpoint where it came from. Feel free to leave a comment if you recognize it.

I also played “Amazing Love” and “You are My King”. The rest is original. Even though I didn’t spend as much time fixing timing issues as the last podcast, I did spend most of the weekend editing.