Piano Sketches 1 & 2

Following on from my last time where I discussed how important improvisation is in my life:

In the studio, I try to set aside time to improvise on the piano every day. I often record these moments just in case I stumble upon some material I want to revisit later. I have always just used Voice Memos on my iPhone (or sometimes even on my Apple Watch). But recently, I decided I wanted to get more serious about the piano recording.

I started playing around with microphone positions, and settled on placing a couple of Røde NT-5s pointing at the strings in addition to a Mojave MA-50 just to the left of center. This enabled me to record into Logic Pro and also do some post-processing. I can change the position of the microphones depending on what project I’m working on but for quick recordings like this, I am happy with the results.

The video is filmed on my iPhone which is just resting on the piano, but for future videos I will likely experiment with some wall-mounted cameras and a couple of angles just to add some extra spice. I figured I’d post these videos on my blog in the same way that I post my photographs; as a sort of journal, allowing some insight into my musical thoughts.

These tracks are all spontaneous, improvised little reflections of what’s buzzing around my brain at that particular time of day - I just sit down and see what happens. The main thing I try to do is only focus on each note as I play it - not judging the ideas or trying to get ahead of myself with ideas that are familiar or in my muscle memory. This is essentially my form of meditation.

For this second sketch I added one of my favorite plugins, Echoboy by Soundtoys.