Soundboard Resonces and the Wogram Article

[Horace Greeley]

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At 07:57 PM 2/4/2006, you wrote:
>Recordings can be deceiving and I don't like to rely on them for a 
>true picture of a piano's tone.  I've heard some beautiful 
>recordings on Yamahas that were very un Yamaha like in their overall 
>impression.  Recording has gotten so sophisticated lately in terms 
>of the ability to manipulate tone so I'm generally reluctant to draw 
>any conclusions that way.

It's been like that for well over thirty years, and is very trackable 
when listening to recordings spanning the period.  Abram Chasins 
wrote about the problem as early as 1957.

To get any faint idea of what instruments actually sound/sounded like 
in real performance venues, you have to go back to the air-tapes that 
were made in the mid-1950s.  A few of these have been released on CD 
in relatively unadulterated form.  One that is often readily 
available is the Horrorwitz "return" concert to Carnegie 
Hall.  Anything done after ~ 1960 starts to get into multi-track 
using different microphone types and various kinds of electronic 
"enhancements".

Horace



>
>
>David Love
>davidlovepianos@comcast.net
>-----Original Message-----
>From: pianotech-bounces@ptg.org [mailto:pianotech-bounces@ptg.org] 
>On Behalf Of Erwinspiano@aol.com
>Sent: Saturday, February 04, 2006 7:04 PM
>To: pianotech@ptg.org
>Subject: Re: Soundboard Resonces and the Wogram Article
>
>   David
>   I hear what your saying & I agree.  I'm not sure this answers any 
> of your 2 question directly but  I just listened to a CD of Ron 
> Overs piano.  A   71/2  ft played by Scott Thile.  Scott is a very 
> talented player but the other real talent is in Ron & 
> his  piano.  I have listened to many good to horrible piano 
> recordings & most probably Steinway Ds so I have a good feel for 
> this sort of thing. At first I though it wasa really good D but 
> then as I listened closely I realized how purely powerful & clear 
> the tone was.  Especially the top four  treble octaves.  The whole 
> piano was good but Rachmaninoff really showcases the trebles & they shined.
>     Pure tonal power.  Oh...My  ...Gosh.  The Rachmaninoff  was 
> gorgeous but the pianist had a lot to work with. Quite a good 
> recording & the sound was what I personally have always hoped for 
> intuitively. The recording subdued the bass a bit but still the 
> whole piano was a dream.
>   A preferable sound?  Oh yeah Baby!!
>    Dale Erwin
>My experience so far is that the RC&S boards with cutoff and fish etc., are
>better, but different.  By better, I mean more predictable, better success
>rate, fewer quirky things like killer octaves, dead trebles, unsmooth
>transitions, thuddy low basses, distortions in the tenor, strange
>resonances, dead spots.  There are some qualities that change and my attempt
>in all this is to understand why and whether those other intangibles are
>also controllable.
>
>David Love
>davidlovepianos@comcast.net
>
>

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