After a few days of tinkering around with files and listening to what I have done so far, I’ve re-recorded a few tracks which to me were beginning to sound very laboured in the way I was playing. I must admit that at times during my recording I was playing safe and making sure that at least I was able to play the piece without too many mistakes, but on reflection I felt I wasn’t being nearly positive enough in my approach to some of the pieces, and so I redid them and overall the new performance are much, much better than the old ones. It seems as though I’m getting more confident in my approach –perhaps I didn’t think I could really play them in the way I now can.
I’ve swapped a few pieces from CD to CD to better balance out the individual programmes, but after listening to the tracks I’ve done so far Wayne is of the view that there are a couple of unisons on the piano which are slightly out of tune. I must admit I can’t hear them nearly as well as he can, and that probably means my sense of hearing is perhaps not as good as it once was, but these things become apparent only over time, and whilst they are not serious it does mean that eventually I will have to redo a number of tracks, quite probably at the factory in Newcastle where Wayne can keep a fatherly eye on proceedings and I can get my hands on a 2.9 metre piano…
If I ever think that these recordings can be issued publicly, I am going to need to make sure that everything is spot on and that includes my playing. Whilst I am happy with the achievement so far, it has proved to me that given the right repertoire and environment I can, even at my age, produce something that approaches ‘professional’ quality, whatever that means. Some of the tracks I’ve done so far really do bring out the best qualities of the piano and since I’ve come this far I really think I should give it a go and see how it comes out.
After all, right at the beginning of this blog I did say that the piano was challenging. I’m beginning to understand more fully what that means.
The other learning curve has been in the recording setup. I’ve now got it as optimum as my equipment will allow – and overall the sound is pretty much indistinguishable from a professional CD. This also has the advantage of no equalisation or compression whatsoever, and I’ve also managed to get the noise levels down to -108Db, which is not bad going. It makes we wonder whether I need to perform noise suppression any more – so far the results indicate maybe not. But then again, I’m not in a soundproof room or recording studio, so I’ll need to monitor this fairly carefully for future recordings.
This is fun.