Position of piano left and right hands on the stereo image

[Plush]

Always right hand (treble) on the left and bass (left hand) on the right for classical music.
Player perspective sounds wrong for this music. When you study recording, this what is taught for a reason.

You can feather in piano sound by moving off of hard left / hard right panning. Moving towards 7 'o clock and 4 'o clock can be helpful sometimes.



Sometimes for jazz, player perspective is used.

[joelpatterson]

My problem is I was trained on the piano, so since an early age I saw it as a stereo instrument-- bass left, treble right. True, you don't necessarily "hear" it that way, but tell me the pianist who listening on headphones would not be jarringly disoriented if this scheme were reversed?

And then I found as a practical matter: when you DO splay out the perspective in a grandiose left --> right pattern for solo piano recordings, each note has its own unique "space" to sound in: you can hear everything clearer and especially little flourishes and trills come through easily, and clarity is something of a watchword in my world.

This has all given me an aversion to "bunched up" mono-ish piano mixes where there's just this cloddhoppery "mass" of jumbled notes... so I'd use basically this approach always in a chamber-type music collaboration, violin centered and the piano generously panned left/right. Oh, one more thing-- absolutely vital to check this in mono to be sure ALL is merry and bright, and all the instruments are distinct, even when lined up in "totem pole" fashion.

[edva]

For live sound, I pan it as per the orientation on stage, which is usually bass on left, treble on right. For recordings, usually player's perspective, bass on left, treble on right. I am not a fan of "fifty foot wide pianos", so I don't hard-pan it fully left and right, but usually about 30 to 40% spread. My 2c, YMMV.

[joelpatterson]

Originally Posted by edva

... not a fan of "fifty foot wide pianos"...

You mean Bosendorfers?

[RobAnderson]

I was a bit of a pianist in a past life, but having treble on the left (as it would be from the audience perspective) does not bother me in the least.

For classical I will always go treble left, bass right. For pop/jazz, I'll usually do what works best in the mix, but I'll usually start with the "audience perspective" and go from there (I usually do audience perspective for the drummer too).

Sometimes when the piano is hard panned, it doesn't have the cohesiveness to punch through a dense mix, or it sounds weird when blended with the main pair; other times hard panning is the right thing to do. Sometimes panning in from the edges a little is what is needed; heck, sometimes mono piano is just what the doctor ordered - it really depends on the recording and the mix.

For what the OP is describing however, I'd go with the more classical approach of audience perspective: treble left/bass right. How far to pan depends greatly on how the piano and/or the duo was mic'ed in the first place: Let the sound of the recording dictate how far in or out you pan the piano, but 8-5 or 7-4 panning seems like a logical starting point if hard panning is not cutting it.

[edva]

Originally Posted by joelpatterson

You mean Bosendorfers?

Bwhahahahaha! Only the "tiger striped" ones!

[joelpatterson]

Originally Posted by edva

Bwhahahahaha! Only the "tiger striped" ones!

I understand they've got a few prototypes in development that not only have the couple of extra notes on the low end, but dozens, way down past the limits of human hearing.

[nevets@milwpc.co]

Just like you would be at the piano, bass out the left speaker, treble right.
This should work like a charm for any issues with panning, etc...

Flux:: sound and picture development

[tourtelot]

Interesting article. Funny that I work with an engineer who is a trained pianist and after I patch the piano mics, he ALWAYS comes back and re-patches them.
Freakin' hilarious!

D.

[Ozpeter]

For classical music it is almost impossible to avoid using the audience perspective of the instrument if there are any other instruments involved, unless using close mic techniques (which are not to my personal taste).

But I would avoid thinking in terms of bass and treble localisation - think audience or player orientation. Most good grand pianos if naturally mic'd (allowing the soundboard and lid to play their proper role in contributing to the overall sound) will not sound that sharply defined in terms of bass right and treble left in the audience perspective. In my view, for classical music, if you can localise the left/right location of each string, your mics are too close. There should be more ambiguity than that (which will vary with each octave if not each string). Yes, a preponderance of bass to the right but only that.

[joelpatterson]

Originally Posted by Ozpeter

... ambiguity ...

You know? That right there puts the spit-polish shine on a dilemna that has haunted me forever... probably even longer than that.

I can't get over this feeling that the clarity of sounded notes on a piano get murky in some kind of direct algorithmic proportion to the distance away you are from them... or put it more this way: from the back of a hall, a French horn will sound as French and horny as you could possibly want-- being right up next close to it would be counterproductive and pointless. But! This same duality does not exist for a piano, right up close you are wrapped in the grandeur and subtleties and overtones-- back of the hall, it's washy at best and fogbound at worst.

This probably comes back to the fact that-- essentially-- the piano itself is a huge compromise between instruments that can play pure tones in their registers, but only cover a very limited range of the spectrum, and the way a piano pretends (or succeeds) to cover the whole range at once, while also being a percussion section to boot. A whole little mini orchestra right at your fingertips. There would have to be drawbacks with so much goodness crammed into such a small package. I guess I think the most honest sound it makes is the first "ping" as the hammer strikes the strings, sometimes I think that if all anyone ever played on a piano was Chopin... ah, but I'm daydreaming.

When the sound coming out of a piano starts to devolve into a chalky-type sound, like when it's miked from too far away, I shudder. Obviously-- I have piano chalk sensitivity.

[Ozpeter]

Joel, for me (for classical music) the correct distance is as usual a matter of judging the best ratio between direct and indirect sound - which will vary according to the different spaces the piano is located in - but also it's to do with how much width is appropriate or not.

For piano solo at least some sense of width is necessary IMHO (coupled with some sense of which way round the piano is, getting back to the topic) so great distance is inappropriate. For chamber music eg piano trio, piano quintet etc somewhat less sense of size is acceptable - it should scale to the placement of the other instruments - a little more distance is good. For piano concerto, a great wide piano close up sounds all wrong to me. It shouldn't extend as far as the first violin to the left nor beyond the first cello to the right - because it won't in the concert hall! So we're talking something that's getting closer to mono (but not a point source of course).

For me, similar considerations can apply for small-group jazz. You don't want it to sound like one false move and the piano lid will snap shut with the rest of the players trapped inside it (in other words, the piano shouldn't be wider than the rest of the group combined).

However... motto of the day is, (apart from, "most people who buy lottery tickets don't win") is, "Recording Engineers Have No Rights" - by which I mean, there's no hard and fast right way to do things - it's horses for courses, personal preference, what the artist wants, all that stuff.

[jnorman]

i would never want to hear a piano spread across the stereo spectrum as if the piano was as wide as the image - that is about as unrealistic as i can think of,especially in a ensemble setting. i pretty much always use spaced omnis on piano, and i try to never put them any closer than just outside the lip - such that the stereo image is wide but there is no particular definition of treble or bass on either side. i try to get a diffuse sound.

[joelpatterson]

I can be an extremist, is that what everyone is getting at? The bra burner of the piano recording world, its Jane Fonda and Ho Chi Minh? I can live with that... you know, come to think of it, the last two times I encountered a piano in an ensemble setting, I totally left it alone-- just miked the group overall and let it ring out where it may... so I guess I'm not really such a Carrie Nation figure, after all.

[Ozpeter]

Originally Posted by joelpatterson

you know, come to think of it, the last two times I encountered a piano in an ensemble setting, I totally left it alone-- just miked the group overall and let it ring out where it may... so I guess I'm not really such a Carrie Nation figure, after all.

IMHO that's often a good approach - perhaps coupled with a single spot at the tail of the piano to add focus if it's a bit too diffuse (and if not required, don't actually use it in the mix).

[oncloudnine]

Hi there,

Sorry it took me a while to get back to this thread. I really appreciate all the feedback. I'm sort of relief it seems this was a hot topic not just for myself.

I'll do some research and try to find the reasons behind the treble-left/bass-right perspective. I guess it has something in common with the most usual lay-out for orchestras (violins - left; bass voices - right) and how the brain processes the music and the sound.

I've tried before a couple of times to mike the duet just using a main pair and have regretted it afterwards. There was something missing, but the venue was not precisely helping. I guess it would work properly in a more appropriate venue.

[studer58]

I think the realm of acoustic physics could help us here...does anyone remember seeing those 3D plots of the propagation patterns vs frequency of various instruments ? It verified that the Stradivarius/Guarneri school of violin building (where they sprinkled dry tea leaves onto the soundboard while bowing, and the leaves gathered around the nodal peaks..or away from them, can't recall which..) were onto something, even 100's of years ago ? I think you'll find anything other than a clear spectral dispersion from high to low (or low to high) when viewing the 'bounce' off a piano lid from left to right. We'd all love it to be so simple, but life (and audio) just inconveniently often isn't so. Similarly, if you got an XY or ORTF mic pair and turned it 90 degrees (ie up/down rather than left/right) about a metre from a classical guitar, would you expect it to tell you where the bass and treble strings were on the guitar ? It should be a simple one to try out...but maybe put your guitarist up on a ladder to minimize the comb effect of the floor bounce !

For what it's worth, my mid distance concert piano miking invariably gives me an 'interleaved listening experience' with bass and treble notes popping out in a non predictable sequence from left to right...almost like a wilful child deliberately adding uncertainty and randomness to a planned, theoretically event. Sure, there's a broad progression from bass to treble, but there's inconsistency too, and I've grown to like it that way.

Or are my matched pair of Sennheiser MKH mics just poorly calibrated...?

[Ozpeter]

Your mics are telling the truth - that's how it is - the result of the soundboard, frame and lid (etc) doing their bit.

[benoïde]

Originally Posted by studer58

I think the realm of acoustic physics could help us here...does anyone remember seeing those 3D plots of the propagation patterns vs frequency of various instruments ? It verified that the Stradivarius/Guarneri school of violin building (where they sprinkled dry tea leaves onto the soundboard while bowing, and the leaves gathered around the nodal peaks..or away from them, can't recall which..) were onto something, even 100's of years ago ? I think you'll find anything other than a clear spectral dispersion from high to low (or low to high) when viewing the 'bounce' off a piano lid from left to right. We'd all love it to be so simple, but life (and audio) just inconveniently often isn't so. Similarly, if you got an XY or ORTF mic pair and turned it 90 degrees (ie up/down rather than left/right) about a metre from a classical guitar, would you expect it to tell you where the bass and treble strings were on the guitar ? It should be a simple one to try out...but maybe put your guitarist up on a ladder to minimize the comb effect of the floor bounce !

For what it's worth, my mid distance concert piano miking invariably gives me an 'interleaved listening experience' with bass and treble notes popping out in a non predictable sequence from left to right...almost like a wilful child deliberately adding uncertainty and randomness to a planned, theoretically event. Sure, there's a broad progression from bass to treble, but there's inconsistency too, and I've grown to like it that way.

Or are my matched pair of Sennheiser MKH mics just poorly calibrated...?

+10000

My experience has been the same for solo piano, duets etc. The propagation patterns of frequencies is also very differently represented if you use ORTF or AB stereo miking, the soundfield is very different - as it should be.

[sonare]

So far no one has mentioned the differences in sound propagation with a modern cross-strung piano and a piano-forte.....

[NEWTON IN ORBIT]

Hi, I usually never post in this sub forum, and a lot of what you fellas are discussing, I don't get a lot of time to experiment with.

If this is the wrong thread to post this question to and I should create another, please let me know. It's kind of on topic, kinda off question.

I realize you are mostly discussing grand pianos in a classical / symphonic context here, but does anybody regularly have to suffer through miking a Yamaha upright of any kind? Or any upright for that matter?

I have one in my tiny studio, and am starting of late to get a lot of clients asking to use it instead of sampled pianos.

I have kept up with the tuning and maintenance, (has a humidifier etc.) however I do find it difficult to mic in any other context than Rock, or R&B, maybe folk. IOW, when it is a sparse, quiet mix altogether, with the piano itself carrying most of the weight, this is where it can be problematic for me.

The problems I encounter are things like pedal noise, too much attack of the hammers, "boxy" sound if too close, and (like Joel) undefined sound if too far away.

I have tried LDC's in spaced pair, above the piano, down over the strings w/ kick board off, on axis to the strings, off axis, far away (3-4ft up), behind the back ....wow, you name it. I even tried a crown pzm pair near the hammers, and on the lid and back.

So far, the best I can come up with on this piano, seems to be an ORTF pair of SDC's, almost dead center, on axis of the strings / hammers, and as far back as I can get them without hitting the pianist in the face

We are only talking a foot or so back here.

This gets enough clarity, and is phase coherent (mostly), but is still a bit clicky sometimes. FWIW too, NOTHING...and I mean nothing I have tried, even straight up x/y with a stereo mic seems to be completely phase coherent on a phase meter above 8khz or so. Below there it's fine, but up in the treble range...it gets a little dicey.

This I don't get? It's not audible, and very slight. If I hadn't seen the meter, I would have never known. Still it bugs me.

Anyways, what I am getting at, is do you guys that do this all the time have any tips for taming the beast that is the upright?

The biggest thing for me right now, is pedal noise. With a classically trained pianist (the guy that tunes the thing actually) I had little to no issues with this. However, on your average player, sometimes the pedal noise can get WAY out of hand.

I've of course never really had any issue with grand pianos, but sadly, I don't have one of those.

To get get back on topic for one last second here, I usually do hard pan lately, or almost hard pan. It really doesn't seem to be unnaturally wide sounding with ORTF where I have it, and still has enough of a solid center image for me. It kinda just sounds like you are sitting at it. That said, this is an upright so...

I have been doing both player and audience perspective panning, depends where other things land in the mix for me. If it's a mix with full drum kit, I usually pan the treble side away from the hi-hat. Not sure why I do this, but yeah.

Anyways, thanks for any ideas. If I should start another thread about miking uprights, please let me know. I need to learn some new tricks, and fast.

I am thinking that there is room for improvement, and this cannot be the best I can get here.

Thanks,

john

[Ozpeter]

If I should start another thread about miking uprights, please let me know.

There have been a number of threads scattered through the forums on this subject - one I think quite recent - might be worth checking those (if you haven't already).

I used to be a pianist, so I prefer panning and wet/dry mix to sound like how it sounds to me as I'm playing a nice piano in a room with good acoustics. Also, I tend to be a bit annoyed by too much or too wide panning of lead instruments. Most piano tunes that I am familiar with focus upon the middle octaves anyhow, so not much width would be needed or manifested anyhow.

However, I still enjoy plenty of listener's perspective oriented piano tunes, so it possibly doesn't matter as much in the long run to people like me. Either way has it's costs and benefits.

[basmartin]

If the piano is closed miced, with one mic covering the bass and the other one the treble, I pan them bass left and treble to the right. I feel that the audience perspective is irrelevant in this case, because the audience doesn´t hear the piano from that perspective anyway. Grand pianos usually face the audience at the side, like this

[chris319]

Originally Posted by basmartin

Grand pianos usually face the audience at the side

Meaning the treble should be panned to the top and the bass panned to the bottom.

[Plush]

YOur questions and discussions are answered very simply. Just find a classical piano record by one of your favorite pianists on a real classical music record label and listen to how the piano is presented to the listener.

I'm talking about solo piano music, not concertos.

What do you hear? What were the choices of the recordist / tonmeister?

Invariably you will hear a well mixed piano with a not exaggerated width. YOu will also hear treble on the left and bass on the right.

If your hi-fi has a control where you can reverse the channels, then listen both ways. The bass on the left never sounds correct. In fact, the more you listen, the more it will bother you.

This has nothing to do with how a piano is heard in concert. It has to do with how an artistic statement in recorded sound is presented to the public.

[NEWTON IN ORBIT]

Originally Posted by Ozpeter

There have been a number of threads scattered through the forums on this subject - one I think quite recent - might be worth checking those (if you haven't already).

Thanks, I'll do some searching around. If I can't find anything new on mech. noise, I'll start a thread.

john

[jnorman]

sub forum?

anyway, i think chris has the right approach.

[chris319]

I'm going to record a piano in a month. Now I need to find a mixer with top and bottom channels. Joel, do you have one you can rent me?

Seriously, I will take the advice from this thread and record treble on the left and bass on the right, and not hard pan the channels.

The last time I recorded a (rented) grand piano it made all kinds of clunking noises. The pianist said no wonder -- it's a Young Chang. That was the day I put a Rode NT-1A on it and it broke up all to h*ll. This year I'll be using a pair of AKG D202Es. At least they will look cool:

http://www.coutant.org/akgd202/index.html