WTF-Beta

Peeve

The PT recital is live, with 20 submissions!

Here's my contribution, the one that triggered my complaints about the audio of my new phone.

Here's my description of the piece:
This is my “original” arrangement of the Carol of the Bells. Years ago, I wanted an arrangement of this song that had all the parts I liked that I'd heard in different people's arrangements. But no single arrangement I found had all the parts I wanted in the same score. So I took an arrangement by Margaret Goldston, which I think is pretty close to the original by Mykola Leontovych, and then I took an arrangement by post-classical pianist Michele McLaughlin, and smooshed those together to make this arrangement.

I actually did the arrangement years ago, in a very analog way. I literally printed out multiple copies of each score and cut them up and glued them onto a sheet of paper and then hand-wrote in various additions and adjustments. The crazy thing is, McLaughlin's score is written in 6/8 time, and Goldston's score is written in 3/4 time, and I go back and forth between the two versions multiple times, so the score just looks like spit up. I call it my Frankenscore. (I believe I've shared another arrangement I did like this, of Pachelbel's Canon, that arrangement also resulted in a Frankenscore).

The other detail I wanted to share is that (as most of you know) I've been sick and wasn't able to practice consistently, so this recording is very much a "warts and all" practice recording (with apologies for making excuses).

@Axtremus ok so obviously my useless memory cannot be relied upon to tell me who has what piano!

@mik and @adagiom I don't know about the expense of battery replacement, but after a certain point, I don't like to put money into old tech.

Beside the non-existent battery life, my old phone was also showing all kinds of bugginess and problems, camera taking forever to open, websites crashing etc.

I was very happy to replace it.

But @mik if you do decide to get a new phone, be sure to look for a deal or promotion, don't pay full price.

Onions

@jon-nyc good to know I’m not alone!!

@Axtremus my phone is the iPhone 17 pro max, I should learn more about its hardware.

Re that Yamaha, it sounds just gorgeous. I wish I had (local) friends with pianos like that!

BTW remind me what your piano is, in my memory you have a European piano, but I don’t know why I think that.

Usually I don’t do any kind of checking before posting, but just now I was going to post “Van” in response to “Diesel,” as in the actor Van Diesel of Fast and Furious fame.

But something made me decide I better double check.

As it turns out, his name isn’t Van, it’s Vin.

Who knew?

@Axtremus so you’re saying it’s me, I’m the problem?

Kidding aside, that’s beautiful @axtremus ! Both your playing and your piano’s lush sound.

This makes me think 1) my piano needs to be tuned. 2) I probably should put my phone somewhere else to get it a little farther from the piano. Also 3) I didn’t play my piece very well (that part’s ok though, because I’ve been sick and I have a built in excuse).

Anyway, once the PT recital goes live, I’ll share the recording here and you all can hear how shitty it sounds.

More to the point, @axtremus that recording sounds so nice! Thank you for sharing it!!

@AdagioM ahh! I totally misinterpreted what you meant!

Yes I could certainly do that! Funny that it didn’t occur to me.

Although, the old phone’s recording quality wasn’t that great either, and I should probably try to figure out if this issue is more connected to the iOS than to the hardware. Because if it’s the iOS, then eventually it will surface on the old phone.

Also, let’s be honest, I don’t want to keep my old phone alive for this! I was actually trying to figure out if I should sell it or not. When we got our new phones, they called the discount they gave us a “trade in,” but then the guy said “oh, we don’t want your old phones, they’re too old. You can keep them.” Huh? How is that a trade in then?

@AdagioM said:

Can you use your old phone just as a videocamera, and airdrop the recordings to your new phone?

I have avoided doing anything that would require me to have to later sync up the video and audio. I just want one file, easy peasy. I know, not realistic.

Maybe my first step should be to try a different app that lets you control the settings.

Also, I should probably consider adding an external mic, then in theory at least, I should be able to still have one file, but the audio input would be different.

Maybe.

@mik Mr. SK and I got some deal so we both upgraded. It was worth it, I was worried our phones were going to die, and I didn’t want him to go on his trip with a dying phone (we got the new phones before he went to Japan last month).

I am very happy with the new phones and not having to worry about it anymore.

Thanks!

@Daniel said:
Maybe the audio has settings you can change?

from what I’m reading, I either need to use a different app (i.e., not use the phone’s built in video recording app) or an external mic, or both.

But I prefer to keep my piano recording process as streamlined as possible, so I’m not too keen on the idea of adding equipment or learning a new app… we’ll see.

So a while back, I got a new phone -- no, I didn't get the iPhone Duo! (waaaay too expensive). I got an iPhone 17 and for the most part, I like it and am happy with the upgrade. (going from the 12 to the 17 is pretty cool btw)

But I just did a piano recording for the Piano Tell recital, and I noticed two things, one worse than the other.

1. The camera quality is so good, too good really. My Yamaha music desk is super shiny, and all I have on it is an iPad, so the rest of the music desk reflects my face. Well, the new phone's video picked up my face reflected in the music desk like it was a mirror! My old phone did not do that. The image quality is so clear, I'm pretty sure someone could use AI to identify me from that reflected image. I generally try to keep a little anonymity when I post piano videos, so the next take I did, I put a black folder there to prevent the reflection.

2. The audio quality of piano recordings on the new phone may not be as good as the old phone. I don't know whether it's the hardware, the iOS, or a combination of both, but I feel like the audio is much more flattened than it used to be. Like there's some default/pre-set mixing or equalizing, so the overall volume in the recording is more consistent and lacking in dynamics than it is live, and the overall effect is sort of... flat and bland.

Maybe one of these days I will finally force myself to use an external mic or digital recording device....

But for now, it's probably good enough. I missed many days of practice while sick, so my playing isn't worth the trouble of a good mic anyway!

Whiskers

@AdagioM sounds like a fantastic trip!!

@chas sorry to hear about your eyes your eye troubles! I hope they get better and that the medicine isn’t too hard to tolerate!

@Mary-Anna wow! Glad your son made it but sorry to hear about his friend.

I’ve been reading about the impacts, it sounds just like a nightmare!

@AdagioM yikes, glad they were able to land!

@jon-nyc said:

Wow. My sister is scheduled to fly tonight from Seattle to JFK and it looks like the flight is going to happen.

Wow! Lucky her!

@mik hopefully your flights on Tuesday won’t be impacted!

@jon-nyc not yet. But by the time I’m scheduled to fly it will be close to 14 days since my positive test.

I went to the doc yesterday — I have a middle ear infection in one ear, plus presumably a sinus infection, and for the last several days I’ve been constantly nauseous and dizzy.

The “acute” phase of Covid is basically over I think, but if this secondary infection doesn’t resolve, it’s probably not a good idea to fly.

Ugh. First half the world stops because they can't access their email, and now this....

I'm supposed to fly next week for a conference. I'm already hesitant because I'm still not recovered from the effects of covid, but this really makes me want to stay home!