Blue Note, Prestige, etc. Rudy Van Gelder's Piano Sound

Discussion in 'Music Corner' started by 2xUeL, Feb 4, 2014.

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  1. Paul Saldana

    Paul Saldana jazz vinyl addict

    Location:
    SE USA (TN-GA-FL)
    I know some are tired here of Diana Krall, but her "Girl In The Other Room" piano sound is crazily holographic on my system (McIntosh, Magnepan).
     
  2. yasujiro

    yasujiro Senior Member

    Location:
    tokyo
    It is my favorite disc, too.
    #16248
     
  3. Steve Hoffman

    Steve Hoffman Your host Your Host

    Well, yeah, but I thought he meant jazz..
     
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  4. Mr Bass

    Mr Bass Chevelle Ma Belle

    Location:
    Mid Atlantic
    The problem with piano is that it is a full range instrument. Even in scored classical music where balances and harmonies are carefully planned, the piano is rather immiscible, which means it's like oil and water not blending. It is easiest to use it as a percussion instrument which is what Stravinsky sometimes did.

    In jazz and popular music where the arrangements and harmonic balances are more casual and often irregular, it is often the mixing engineer who has to force a balance between instruments due to unplanned discords and clashes between instruments. The piano poses a problem because its effects can interact at all frequency ranges. RVG had his way of dealing with this problem and others had their way.
     
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  5. Mugrug12

    Mugrug12 The Jungle Is a Skyscraper

    Location:
    Massachusetts
    :cop::cop: HOT TAKE ALERT :cop::cop:
     
  6. GregM

    GregM The expanding man

    Location:
    Bay Area, CA
    You misspelled strong take.
     
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  7. Carraway

    Carraway Well-Known Member

    Location:
    NE Ohio
    For a non-Rudy stereo jazz piano recommendation try Herbie Hancock's The Piano. It's solo Herbie. I've only heard the CD made from the digital back-ups, but I think it's quite good. The LP was a direct to disc recording, and while nearly all of them were performed far too safely to be engaging, I think this is an exception. It's not Nat-to-Neumann warm, though.
     
  8. Tired? Of Diana Krall???? :love:

    Her "All For You" CD sounds crazy good in my headphones, but that's neither here nor there.
     
  9. GregM

    GregM The expanding man

    Location:
    Bay Area, CA
    There's a lot of problems with piano, beyond all the octaves it encompasses. Is it a stringed instrument? Wood? Percussion? It uses keys, mallets, strings, wood. It has pedals. All the nuances of resonance and the percussive "ping" of the treble, upper register keys. As a recording engineer you have to make some sacrifices. You can't do justice to it all.
     
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  10. Mr Bass

    Mr Bass Chevelle Ma Belle

    Location:
    Mid Atlantic
    As a solo instrument it is somewhat possible to record it satisfactorily but yes when you require it to mix with other instruments major problems arise. But even a full range organ poses difficulty as well, so full range is an issue.
     
  11. yasujiro

    yasujiro Senior Member

    Location:
    tokyo
    Another difficulty with the piano (solo) recording is that the instruments has a space quantity while there is no common formula as to how it should be placed in the (stereo) acoustic space.
     
    Last edited: Mar 9, 2018
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  12. WillytheWoofer

    WillytheWoofer Forum Resident

    Location:
    velddriel
    Sorry guys I can't listen to anything sounding record in a tin emer. I am not talking only about piano, but also about brass instruments.
    Brass players f.i. can buy special mutes to create that old (terrible) sound. You get that first radio sound. So I really don't understand why a lot of people are so enthousiastic about very old records.
    On later Pablo records piano and brass sounds much better (just good) to me. All ECM records (Keith Jarret) sound great.

    Sorry Rudy (and others) I am selling all terrible sounding records. I don't care who's name is standing on. Only the result is important.
     
  13. hvbias

    hvbias Midrange magic

    Location:
    Northeast
    Did Van Gelder record Mingus Plays Piano (Impulse)? I've commented before that the piano sound on that album is really good, like approaching classical music recording quality.
     
  14. hvbias

    hvbias Midrange magic

    Location:
    Northeast
    There are loads of classical recordings out there that make recordings of piano (digital medium only) that sound damn close to a real piano on a wide bandwidth speaker system (plenty of bass extension and no compression with dynamics), was just listening to Koroliov play Bach's French Suites last night. Absolutely stunning recording quality and playing.
     
  15. Cassius

    Cassius On The Beach

    Location:
    Lafayette, Co
    The music. I' don't think I could bear to listen to much of the ECM catalog and later Pablo LPs (other than some of those Oscar Pederson albums) no matte how good they sound.
    Performance trumps sonics every time.
     
  16. WillytheWoofer

    WillytheWoofer Forum Resident

    Location:
    velddriel
    It seems we have a different taste of music.
    But I want both performance and sonics. There are so many good musicians in the world, and there are enough good sonics to find.
    Why should I listen when one of the two is not alright?
    I prefer to have 100 records I really like, than 500 I don't like.
     
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  17. yasujiro

    yasujiro Senior Member

    Location:
    tokyo
    Nope. He was reported not to like the RVG sound.
     
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  18. GregM

    GregM The expanding man

    Location:
    Bay Area, CA
    It's all relative. Compared to the Atlantic recordings, RVG was not bad at all.
     
  19. 2xUeL

    2xUeL Forum Philosopher Thread Starter

    Location:
    Albany, NY
    I think a while ago all threads older than x years or something were closed.
     
  20. fredhammersmith

    fredhammersmith Forum Resident

    Location:
    Montreal, Quebec
    Never thought about it. Interesting.
     
    2xUeL likes this.
  21. bleachershane

    bleachershane Forum Resident

    Location:
    Glasgow, Scotland
    Please feel free to correct me if I'm wrong on this, I'm new to Blue Note and not a huge jazz listener, but lately I've picked up some of the Blue Note starting points and whilst I've been thoroughly enjoying the music, I've noticed a trend (and others have talked about it here) with RVGs recordings. The pianos are often muffled, buried (even on piano led albums!) and generally lacklustre compared to his recording and mixing of other instruments.

    Is there a reason why? Is there a consensus as to why RVGs pianos were (in my opinion) so poorly treated? Are there any RVG recordings that buck this trend?
     
  22. Lonson

    Lonson I'm in the kitchen with the Tombstone Blues

    Personally I don't have a problem with the way RVG recorded the piano the way that many do. And I think you have to consider the input of the producer on a label sound by RVG as not all Blue Notes have a piano sound the same as a Prestige, etc. I think some Blue Note records have exemplary piano sound myself, and I often think that the way that he miked the piano generally leads to an impression of the sound during a piano solo is what you might hear if you were at the piano bench during performances, which is an interesting "view point" for listening. And the sound during ensembles often makes me feel as if I were hearing the piano (and the other instruments) as if I were sitting in front of the band in the studio or club.

    Anyway, previous discussion here (and there are other mentions if you search):

    Van Gelder's Piano Sound
     
    Last edited: Feb 2, 2020
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  23. bleachershane

    bleachershane Forum Resident

    Location:
    Glasgow, Scotland
    I didn't find that thread as I searched 'Rudy Van Gelder piano' in titles. I shall have a good look over that, Steve gives an excellent insight into why Rudy's piano recordings came out the way they did!
     
  24. Steve Hoffman

    Steve Hoffman Your host Your Host

    Reopened by request.
     
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  25. Jerry

    Jerry Grateful Gort Staff

    Location:
    New England
    Threads merged for one-stop shopping!
     
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