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The Truth about many "Audiophile" Piano Recordings

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Are these microphones??
I know next to nothing about either recording or Classical music but are people really recording piano with the microphones inside it?
I most enjoyed Mario's PlayClassics recordings done with his TRT (Truthful Recording Technology). For these he offered calibration files, etc with
which you could set the playback level to match what the mic's heard in the studio. One of the most innovative ways of closing the Circle Of Confusion
just a bit further. I own half a dozen of these recordings and found them some of the most realistic 2ch sounds I own.

 
I guess that it is a few key mechanisms or hammer returns that are clacking when released. They've put the microphone really close to the strings and key mechanisms, so we're probably picking up a piano imperfection that is very near the microphone. Notably the mechanistic noises are quieter or inaudible when he plays high or low notes than in the middle register. I think they've put the mic really close to F4 or therabouts.

I'll wager you can hear it quietly while you're playing, but you'd never notice more than about 3m away from the instrument. It reminds me a lot of what my digital facsimile sounds like if I turn the volume off.

my guess is it is a piezo mic on the soundboard. why? stupid choice
 
I'm unsure as to whether you have played an acoustic grand or upright in person before but from a player's perspective, placing stereo microphones in close proximity to the hammers produces rather accurate results. That is precisely how the piano sounds to the player and is why many pianists will be dissatisfied with a more distant recording.
Many audiophiles however claim their goal is to recreate a live experience. That certainly does not entail listening things as the individual players in the band do. That's a self centered way to approach it. I don't want to sit right next to the piano player (unless it's Yuja Wang)... (I know, I made the joke before).
 
I don't want to sit right next to the piano player (unless it's Yuja Wang)... (I know, I made the joke before).
I had to gaagle that, now I get it, me too!
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Like many pianists, Arrau dealt with Steinway in the United States who did not accept the slightest criticism of their instruments.

If unfortunately a pianist dared to make reservations publicly, then the Steinway service was cut off...

Jorge Bolet had to suffer from this, as did another pianist closer to us who stood in his way and complained in the press about the arrogance of this piano maker.
I found out that about Bolet (not that I was very curious) when I enjoyed an advantageous stage seat just to his left at Carnegie Hall.
 
Are these microphones??
View attachment 223200

Edit: These object images are the same as @goat76 kindly posted in #181 above!

I know next to nothing about either recording or Classical music but are people really recording piano with the microphones inside it?
I most enjoyed Mario's PlayClassics recordings done with his TRT (Truthful Recording Technology). For these he offered calibration files, etc with
which you could set the playback level to match what the mic's heard in the studio. One of the most innovative ways of closing the Circle Of Confusion
just a bit further. I own half a dozen of these recordings and found them some of the most realistic 2ch sounds I own.
....
....
Hello @Sal1950,
Thank you for your reviving my above old post #186 dated August 9, 2022.;)

As I wrote in my post #189, highly possibly those are/were "PZM or Boundary" microphone(s) they installed inside the piano.

In my post here #175 (dated June 27, 2023) on my hosting remote thread "Lute Music and Other Early Music: Stunning Recordings We Love", I again discussed about this specific piano recording for András Schiff, where I wrote as follows under the below spoiler cover.
Very much interestingly, however, I (we) hardly see microphone(s) at least in the video image even though the recording quality is amazing and stunning.

Accordingly thereafter, we discussed a lot about possible microphone(s) and their settings in the posts #171, #174, #178, #180, #186, #189, #190, #191, and #193. Our final possible consensus after these interesting discussions was that the splendid recording engineer would have used tiny PZM microphone(s) (or so-called boundary microphones) inside of the Steinway piano. The technology and engineering of microphones looks now far beyond of my very limited knowledge, I assume.

In any way, excellent recording of piano/harpsichord is always a great challenge for recording engineers, and the HiFi reproduction of such recorded tracks is always great challenge for our home audio systems.
Edit:
As @mSpot kindly shared here,,,
Regarding the "Andras Schiff Live Performance in Bachfest 2010 Leipzig", you can find the entire video on YouTube;
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLhIP1CNbYhVObXv7ByHmE5oETjj6RXyAN
and
The concert was filmed and released by EuroArts, and available from various sources including Apple Music:
https://music.apple.com/ag/album/andrás-schiff-plays-bach-live-from-bachfest-2010-visual/1595036780

I am happy finding in the ending credit that "A production of EuroArets Music International
in coproduction with NHK, Japan".
I know nowadays NHK Japan frequently uses those PZM (Boundary) microphones in concert recording and also in daily TV programs/interviews.
 
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I found out that about Bolet (not that I was very curious) when I enjoyed an advantageous stage seat just to his left at Carnegie Hall.
Oh, Jorge Bolet!
Your discussion reminded me his performance and recording on César Franck "Prélude, Choral et Fugue, etc." FOOL-20378 421 714-2 London-Polydor, to which I am listening right now...
WS935.JPG
 
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Sorry to contradict you, but Schnabel recorded his Beethoven sonatas on a Steinway, as shown by the production sheets. This point was revealed by Remy Jacbos, producer at EMI and responsible for reissues. It had been rumored for a long time that it was a Bechstein. But that's not the case.
And Claudio Arrau at Philips made all his records on a Steinway and even for some of them, on an old Steinway from the beginning of the 20th century kept in Chauds-de-Fond in Switzerland.

For the rest, I agree with you, the Philips records recorded by Arrau, whom I had the chance to know well, are very often beautifully captured. Neither too close, nor too far, nor strange timbres. Note that some were recorded in multichannel and are therefore available for some in the form of files from Pentatone.
You're probably right, but this is the sort of post that convinced me that Schnabel was using a Bechstein for the Beethoven sonata cycle:


I'm not sure where I read that Arrau used a Bechstein.
 
You're probably right, but this is the sort of post that convinced me that Schnabel was using a Bechstein for the Beethoven sonata cycle:


I'm not sure where I read that Arrau used a Bechstein.
All piano makers have this type of list of pianists stating that they played and loved them, which does not mean that they did not play other pianos on their tours and in the recording studios. . Schnabel recorded his sonatas in Berlin and London mainly for EMI on several Steinway models. When he came to play in Paris in the years 1910-1920, it's a safe bet that like Kempff, he played on a Pleyel, for example. Kempff, who was a follower of Bechstein before the war, recorded on Steinways for Deutsche Grammophon.
I attended Arrau's recording sessions (notably in Dresden with Colin Davis for the Beethoven concertos), he played on a Steinway. I've seen him play I don't know how many times, always on a Steinway. And apart from the old American videos where he plays Baldwin (notably Mendelssohn's rondo capriccioso), all the other European and American videos from north to south are played on a Steinway when Steinway stopped punishing him...
Even Rubinstein was punished by Steinway in the United States: he recounts it in his Memoirs.

What is very surprising is to see again that the EMI records are indicated played on Bechstein, whereas the person responsible for EMI reissues, Rémy Jacobs had published a notice saying that the production sheets indicated Steinway... Perhaps Perhaps this comes from a confusion with the few Schuberts recorded by Schnabel which are possibly on Bechstein? I pointed out to Mr. Jacob that the presentation text of an EMI box set did talk about Bechstein, but what to do when the production sheets say something else?

This story will never end.
 
I found out that about Bolet (not that I was very curious) when I enjoyed an advantageous stage seat just to his left at Carnegie Hall.
I knew Bolet well in Paris (when I was music and culture editor in Le Monde). He was a man of great kindness and simplicity. He played in Europe on Bechstein and in the United States too but had played on Baldwin. He liked the Steinway, but much less the management of the brand in the United States, whose arrogance was terrible. But nevertheless, he also really liked the Bechsteins which he told me were more difficult but more interesting from a sound point of view if we managed to tame them.
Unfortunately, his Decca records are for the most part, not all, poorly recorded and do not convey the magic of his sound...
Alicia de Larrocha told me her detestation of the sound of her Decca records which she left because of this, she told me, given her strained relations with her producer, to go to RCA where her records were admirably performed. well recorded however. But in certain works she was no longer at the top of her means, however what she does in Granados remains magnificent.
 
This talk of piano brand shenanigans reminds me of a skit in "A little nightmare music" where the Steinway can't be played without a credit card. Sadly the show is quite hard to track down in its entirety.
 
I knew Bolet well in Paris (when I was music and culture editor in Le Monde). He was a man of great kindness and simplicity. He played in Europe on Bechstein and in the United States too but had played on Baldwin. He liked the Steinway, but much less the management of the brand in the United States, whose arrogance was terrible. But nevertheless, he also really liked the Bechsteins which he told me were more difficult but more interesting from a sound point of view if we managed to tame them.
Unfortunately, his Decca records are for the most part, not all, poorly recorded and do not convey the magic of his sound...
Alicia de Larrocha told me her detestation of the sound of her Decca records which she left because of this, she told me, given her strained relations with her producer, to go to RCA where her records were admirably performed. well recorded however. But in certain works she was no longer at the top of her means, however what she does in Granados remains magnificent.
Thanks for setting the record straight. More reminiscences, s.v.p.
 
I attended Arrau's recording sessions (notably in Dresden with Colin Davis for the Beethoven concertos), he played on a Steinway. I've seen him play I don't know how many times, always on a Steinway. And apart from the old American videos where he plays Baldwin (notably Mendelssohn's rondo capriccioso), all the other European and American videos from north to south are played on a Steinway when Steinway stopped punishing him...
Well, there's US vs. Europe and public vs. private. Arrau played a Steinway at home in LIttle Neck.
 
I bet they all play what, where, and from whom pays them the biggest perk, or at least provides the best services.
Like a nice piano in their homes.
 
I bet they all play what, where, and from whom pays them the biggest perk, or at least provides the best services.
Like a nice piano in their homes.
pianists buy the pianos they have at home. The postman gives them a reduction, the one he gives to his resellers, but the pianists pay for their instrument.
I knew Nelson Freire very well who had three Steinway concert cues and a Model B at his home in Rio de Janeiro: all paid for out of his own pocket and the last one delivered from the United States to Brazil, which costs a fortune in freight... The first had been imported from Hamburg during the dictatorship of the Brazilian generals who had passed a special law so that imports would not bear the 100% tax applied to the piano... because a Brazilian brand made a grand piano and wanted to be protected: but what professional would have played an Essenfelder? Nobody... So the generals admitted that Nelson Freire could legitimately demand to work on a large Steinway.

For concert service in Europe, it is rarely Steinway which provides the service and they are professional rental companies, unlike in the United States. But today the popular piano is Steinway, closely followed by Yamaha whose CF III is sublime, then Fazzioli, Bechstein and finally Bösendorfer who has a few but rare fans (including Andras Schiff)...

in Euroe, It is the organizer who pays for the rental of the piano, its adjustment or its transport. Except when the pianist follows his own: which is extremely rare. Michelangeli, Pollini did that. Schiff does. Richter was followed by Yamaha everywhere but paid nothing to Yamaha, a rather unique case. The Japanese were so proud that Sviatoslav Richter loved their piano more than anything...
 
pianists buy the pianos they have at home. The postman gives them a reduction, the one he gives to his resellers, but the pianists pay for their instrument.
I knew Nelson Freire very well who had three Steinway concert cues and a Model B at his home in Rio de Janeiro: all paid for out of his own pocket and the last one delivered from the United States to Brazil, which costs a fortune in freight... The first had been imported from Hamburg during the dictatorship of the Brazilian generals who had passed a special law so that imports would not bear the 100% tax applied to the piano... because a Brazilian brand made a grand piano and wanted to be protected: but what professional would have played an Essenfelder? Nobody... So the generals admitted that Nelson Freire could legitimately demand to work on a large Steinway.

For concert service in Europe, it is rarely Steinway which provides the service and they are professional rental companies, unlike in the United States. But today the popular piano is Steinway, closely followed by Yamaha whose CF III is sublime, then Fazzioli, Bechstein and finally Bösendorfer who has a few but rare fans (including Andras Schiff)...

in Euroe, It is the organizer who pays for the rental of the piano, its adjustment or its transport. Except when the pianist follows his own: which is extremely rare. Michelangeli, Pollini did that. Schiff does. Richter was followed by Yamaha everywhere but paid nothing to Yamaha, a rather unique case. The Japanese were so proud that Sviatoslav Richter loved their piano more than anything...
I wonder if you knew Joseph Spencer? He had a company that would transport pianos (usually Steinways, as I recall) to recording studios. He would tune and otherwise adjust the instruments. Was active in the 1960s and 1970s, clients included the Rolling Stones and Vladimir Horowitz. Actually, was more interested in harpsichords and Baroque tunings.
 
pianists buy the pianos they have at home.
I'm sure they get at least an "insider pricing" like big name reviewers get when buying gear.
There are just too many advantages for the manufacturers when the name is big enough not to try and
sway them. Money talks and BS walks, always been, always will be. LOL
 
I'm sure they get at least an "insider pricing" like big name reviewers get when buying gear.
There are just too many advantages for the manufacturers when the name is big enough not to try and
sway them. Money talks and BS walks, always been, always will be. LOL

This reminds me of a funny story when Nick Cave wanted a piano he fell in love with during the recording of the album "Idiot Prayer", it was a relatively small Italian manufacturer named Fazioli. :D


"The piano I played at Alexandra Palace was a Fazioli. There were limited pianos I could access during lockdown. There was, however, a Fazioli. I had never played one before but Dom Monks, the guy who recorded the Alexandra Palace performance, highly recommended this piano. The moment I sat down at the Fazioli, its warm, soft, nuanced sound spoke to me like no piano had spoken to me before. I was swept away by its extraordinary tonal range. It whispered to me. It roared at me. It was the most beautiful instrument I had ever played.
On a Zoom call to my manager I mentioned how much I loved the Fazioli. I reminded him that I still have the same nasty little Chinese upright I have had for over thirty years. I explained that I was sixty-three years old and suggested that perhaps it was time I got a nice piano. I said to my manager — I just love that Fazioli.
Now, one of the things you may or may not know about being a famous musician is that companies give you shit for free. The more famous you are, the more shit you get — you just have to wear one of their t-shirts or a branded cap or something. Being the principled individual that I am, of course, I have never sponsored a musical instrument (in that respect, I am virtually alone in my field) but I just loved that Fazioli.

So I said to my manager — Time to sell my soul. Time to make a call and get me a Fazioli.
My manager said — Consider it done!
So, the next day my manager rings up Fazioli, who have their headquarters in Sacile, in the Province of Pordenone, near Venice and an Italian woman answers the phone.
My manager says — I represent the great artist Nick Cave and I am wondering if I could get a free Fazioli (or something like that).
The Italian woman says — L’acttore?
My manager says — What?
She says — The actor?
My manager says — No, Cave. Cave.
And she says — Nick what?
My manager says — Nick Cave.
She says — Nick Cave? Who issa Nick Cave?
My manager says — Well, he is arguably the greatest songwriter of his time. He is one of the cornerstones of modern music. He is a national treasure. He is adored by millions. Italians love him.
She says — Who are you? What you want?
My manager says — Um, a free piano.
And she hangs up.

A couple of days later I’m on another Zoom call with my manager, and he is looking a bit cagey and I say — How did it go with Fazioli? Did you get me a free Fazioli?
And my manager says — Well, it seems like they have a rather inflexible policy around giving away £200,000 pianos to people they’ve never heard of.
And I say — Dude, are you my fucking manager or what? I just love that Fazioli!
So the next day my manager rings back Fazioli and the same woman answers the phone and my manager says — Look it’s Nick Cave’s manager again, can I speak to Mr Fazioli.
And the woman says — No.
And my manager says — Listen, my fucking job’s on the line here.
And she hangs up.

So, Andrew, I agree — the Fazioli is a glorious piano. Magnificent, as you say. As Herbie Hancock said about his Fazioli — that ‘one note announces the celebration of the freedom and creativity of the human spirit’. This is true. The Fazioli is warm and delicate and remarkably subtle, but has a deep, strong heart. It is full of angel tears and il sangue dei santi and encompasses the universe. It is a dream piano.And yet I wait for the day a giant removal van will pull up outside my house, my manager hanging out the passenger window, wearing a t-shirt with a piano on it, and a big smile on his face, screaming ‘Fazioli!’
Until then my little Chinese upright grins at me from the corner of my room. I walk over and sit down and I begin to play."

Love, Nick
 
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This reminds me of a funny story when Nick Cave wanted a piano ...
My GF swears her Shigeru is the best sounding piano on the planet (no one other than her very best alumni can touch it - I wasn't even allowed to dust it for a long time), and I think she plays the best Prokofiev around. I'll have to ask her how she build a brand preference.
 
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