Isolate Piano from Loud Stage

[prochlea]

I sorta like a three mic approach... one over the sound hole, one over the mid strings pointed towards the hammers, and one over the low strings pointed away from the hammers. I would leave the low mic panned center, and then experiment with panning the other two... not fully right or left, but enough to give you a little bit of stereo image.

[weaverra]

http://www.earthworksaudio.com/our-m...series-2/pm40/

[pdc]

The biggest part of his question is isolation. No, it is not entirely possible to isolate with a wrap or drapery. Why? You have strings and a resonator inside of a wood box that resonates, sitting on a stage that is resonating. You will never have concert piano quality sound. This is why most of the tours and large houses of worship I deal with have a MIDI'd piano, or a digital/modeled grand. You will be hacking the EQ no matter which mic you are using, especially Crown PZMs (which I use in addition to a MIDI'd Steinway with a Kurzweil sound module).

[pdc]

Originally Posted by weaverra

http://www.earthworksaudio.com/our-m...series-2/pm40/

This system is nice, yet extremely expensive for the average church. My church loves it. It is very good if your music style allows you to mic from that position. It is a more percussive sound, because it is mounted so close to the strings at the top of the piano, so the classical pianists will not like it as much. It is super simple to set up and take down if you are constantly moving your stage or swapping pianos.

[[Director] drew ryan]

Along with micing the piano in such a way as to close the lid, you could also isolate the brass section as well. We built some gobos by making some frames from 1x4s and then faced one side with Hardie Plank/Siding. Then we filled the box with celulose, stapled grill cloth and hardware fabric over that to close up the box.

We built several of these and line them up in front of the brass section. It helps reduce stage noise and alos isolates the brass from other instrument mics.

I think the next time we make these we will probably use rigid mineral fiber instead of the loose celulose.

[weaverra]

Originally Posted by pdc

This system is nice, yet extremely expensive for the average church. My church loves it. It is very good if your music style allows you to mic from that position. It is a more percussive sound, because it is mounted so close to the strings at the top of the piano, so the classical pianists will not like it as much. It is super simple to set up and take down if you are constantly moving your stage or swapping pianos.

I am trying to push to get one of these. We have a Steinway B series piano. It seems like for our situation it would be best since we really would like to close the lid. The piano placement was a last minute decision and thus was not put in the best place. Do you have any recordings with it? I would be interested in listening to some real life situations.

[pdc]

We don't generally record music anymore.

If you can deal with the jazz type attack, you will like it. The system does not require as much EQ IMO.

If you contact your local Earthworks rep, they can loan you a demo unit.

[Jay M]

Originally Posted by pdc

The biggest part of his question is isolation. No, it is not entirely possible to isolate with a wrap or drapery. Why? You have strings and a resonator inside of a wood box that resonates, sitting on a stage that is resonating. You will never have concert piano quality sound. This is why most of the tours and large houses of worship I deal with have a MIDI'd piano, or a digital/modeled grand. You will be hacking the EQ no matter which mic you are using, especially Crown PZMs (which I use in addition to a MIDI'd Steinway with a Kurzweil sound module).

Is it possible to modify a piano to output midi?

A friend of mine told me that most TV shows you see don't use a real piano, it's just a digital piano in a beautiful acoustic looking enclosure. The short answer was because "it's impossible to make piano sound good in a live situation"

Impossible is a dirty word to me, but.. I still haven't figured out how to make a piano sound good.

I guess on a big TV production the artist isn't the boss, so the producers are able to force the artist to use what works best for the greater good. I learned that lessen from a great drummer who pointed out to me that playing quietly will make the while band sound better, even if the drums themselves sound lame.

As a non-pianist, I must say that new digital pianos sound amazing. It's just nearly impossible to get a good pianist to play one.

~Jay

[Jay M]

While I was waiting for your answer, I did a search. I found this:
http://www.emusician.com/gear/0769/m...ianobar/145861

Moog PianoBar. I think it would work well if you have an open-minded group to work with.

~Jay

[pdc]

Originally Posted by Jay M

Is it possible to modify a piano to output midi?

A friend of mine told me that most TV shows you see don't use a real piano, it's just a digital piano in a beautiful acoustic looking enclosure. The short answer was because "it's impossible to make piano sound good in a live situation"

Impossible is a dirty word to me, but.. I still haven't figured out how to make a piano sound good.

I guess on a big TV production the artist isn't the boss, so the producers are able to force the artist to use what works best for the greater good. I learned that lessen from a great drummer who pointed out to me that playing quietly will make the while band sound better, even if the drums themselves sound lame.

As a non-pianist, I must say that new digital pianos sound amazing. It's just nearly impossible to get a good pianist to play one.

BTW, most tours I have been on have a piano shell with an 88 key controller installed.
~Jay

Yamaha and others make baby grands and grands with midi triggers and sound modules built in. Osteen's guys tried to get a real sound out of an acoustic piano. finally Yamaha gave them a piano with acoustic output and MIDI output.

What we did was basically the same thing on Steinways. We removed the key tray and instaledl the MIDI triggers underneath the keys. So, I had an option for acoustic and mics or all Kurzweil sounds.

The newest Roland V-Pianos are very, VERY good. If they are good enough to be used by the best of the best worship leaders and worship bands in the country, they are good enough for a church. I will bet you my house that they sound more realistic and better than any acoustic piano a church will have. Church acoustics and instruments cannot compare to the music halls and pianos emulated. Most churches don't have humidifiers, maintain temperature and tuning. These V-Pianos are THE BOMB!

You cannot defy the laws of physics, and people need to get over themselves. They are there to play for God Almighty and not themselves. It is not showtime. The piano is not there for their personal gratification. If the pianists won't be team players for you, they are not team players for the church and for God. That is how I look at it.

[Frank DeWitt]

We were able to get just piano by putting a mic UNDER the piano. Lay down under there and look around, we found a place where three large pieces of the piano frame form a small triangle we put a mic up in there not touching the piano but surrounded by piano on all sides and above. (It is mounted on a short stand sitting on the floor.) It sounds good and doesn't pick up the room including a drum kit right in front of it.

If that doesn't work for you, try this. http://www.slamgrand.com/

[Gracetech]

Our piano sounds awesome mic'ed. I've even used other methods and got great results. I've had people come up to me after concerts and ask what piano the pianist was playing cause they were surprised it could keep up, volume wise, with the rest of the band. I use to explain that there was no way possible for the piano to keep up with the rest of the band without being mic'ed but now i just tell people that they are special pianos made by "Elves and Fairies". Funny thing but they understand that and accept it more than the real answer.

crt