Re: historic recording materials

["Bill Troop" billtroop@xxxxxxxx]

As a pianist I can't take Rachmaninoff's remark very seriously. You need a microphone (or a horn) to capture Rachmaninoff's pianism. There is no player piano that can capture the ineffable lightness of his touch as he plays the acoustical version of the Spinning Song -- which by the way does not exist in a decent CD transfer that I know of -- you will have to listen to the 78s or a good LP transfer to get at the meat of it. (It's also famous for having required 17 takes -- for a three minute piece; the later electrical version is inferior.) (A good transfer, made from 78 to tape without doctoring, was used by James Irsay a decade or so ago for a show he did on WQXR.) There is so much more than simple pressure to the striking of a key . . . moreover, every piano is different, and every pianist adjusts his performance to the particular instrument. Not the least defect of player piano systems is that the reproducing instrument is unlikely to be one that the performer has heard. Yes, some sense of a pianist's dynamics and phrasing can be gleaned, but there is so much more to a pianist's performance than that, that the poorest acoustic recording gives a far superior idea of a pianist's work than the best reproduced mechanical player.


What we hear from a recording differs substantially according to the recording technology, the restoration and transfer technology, our listening equipment, etc. etc., even as what we hear live is different depending on where we are sitting in a hall or room. . . . . Horowitz was shrill in the front row of Carnegie Hall; limpid from the balcony. For whom was he playing? From whence should he be judged?


On Sun, Mar 9, 2008 at 8:02 PM, flash mailto:flash@xxxxxxxx wrote:

mailto:raphael@xxxxxxxx: ≪[Aeolian pianos] were a close to ideal

synthesis of analog and digital: the pneumatic system particularly of

the later pianos was quite sensitive, and phrasing essentially perfectly

captured.  but it is a little weird to behold one of the old Aeolians

thundering out a Cortot or Hoffman or Rachmaninoff performance, like a

ghost playing a recital. ≫



Rachmaninoff was very impressed with the technology and made many

recordings using the Aeolian recording piano. After having heard a

playback of one of his performances, he once said, "I have just heard

myself playing."