This was originally posted on September 2003, but I've since moved the music files to be with the rest of the tunage at cStudios. -- March 2005
I mentioned
GigaStudio previously, and I have my first full recordings to offer up from the new gear.
I decided to sit down and noodle one evening about a week ago and started forming a rough chord progression. Throughout the session I recorded three improvised takes on my sequencer. While the third fell out of favor with me over the past 10 days, the first two I'm pretty pleased with.
improv iiBoth are solo piano pieces, recorded with the Bosendorfer Imperial Grand library for
GigaStudio (more info in the link at the top of this text). The pieces are reflective and a bit meandering. I was experimenting with shifts between minor and half-diminished sounds. One clear example of this is in improv.ii starting around 2:23 where the progression starts off: Gm - Cm7(b5) - Gm7(b5) - Cm7.
Full disclosure: I did clean up the performances a touch here and there in the sequencer, either softening some of the velocities or deleting errant notes (which means the weird ones you hear I didn't feel were definitive clams). improv.i only had three spots touched, improv.ii about six, but the vast majority of what you hear is as originally played.
The next thing I'd like to fix in my setup is to get a good controller. These recordings were done with a DX7-II controlling
GigaStudio, and frankly I'm amazed that any of the feel comes off as expressive as it does at times, credit due to the makers of the Bosendorfer library, no doubt. The original recordings contained a few accented notes that were so very out of place, obviously not what I would have intended on a real piano. But some of the accented notes I left in still worry me that they're not what would come out on a real piano, but I just can't really know, so some listens I drive myself crazy.
BTW, I've kept recordings of the untouched originals if you're curious (I'm geek enough to always be interested in behind the scenes stuff like that) and also have the third improv which I'm not thrilled with, though it has its moments. It's slightly more up tempo than the other two, a swing feel to it.
Contact me to vote for posting these.
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