The technology that allows any room with an electricity supply to be bathed in sound at the flick of switch and turn of a dial, is perhaps one of the most significant advancements in the history of music and culture. The revolution that began with the phonograph and more recently given us surround sound, is still going strong.
Nowadays acoustic technology is so advanced that aside from the décor you would have a hard time telling a sitting room from a symphony hall in terms of the sound quality modern stereos can generate. For music afficioniados this has inadvertently opened up a can of worms because many of the most revered performances were given before the advent of digital technology. And as anyone who has listened to an analogue recording knows, the frustrating common denomenator amongst non-digital sound recordings is an annoying hiss, like the sound of air streaming out of a flat tyre.
This problem so niggled at and perplexed one of the country’s top software wizards that he decided to do something about it, and a whole lot more besides.
Based at his home office/recording studio in North Carolina’s Research Triangle Park, John Q. Walker is leading a team of software developers whose aim is to overcome the technological shortcomings of yesteryear’s acoustic recording devices by developing new “automatic transcription” software that’s something like straight out of an Arthur C. Clarke sci-fi manual.
According to Walker the idea is really quite simple. “We take piano recordings and convert them back into the precise keystrokes and pedal motions that were used to create them … which can be played back with phenomenal reality on corresponding computer-controlled grand pianos,” he says. The new performance can then be recorded using up to date digital recording techniques ensuring consumers will be able to utilise the benefits of all the most advanced features in their stereo boxes or their computer systems.
If, by resurrecting the musical performances of past masters like Glenn Gould and Rachmaninov, Walker is comparable to Frankenstein, then his monster is the Yamaha grand piano that he’s been using to give live performances nationwide. For the first time in decades audiences can hear, practically note for note, some of the most celebrated piano recordings as they would have been played. To listen for yourself, click here.
After giving the world premiere of the new technique on 25th September last year, Zenph Studios has already been commissioned to deliver re-recordings of piano greats for Sony, due for release in 2007.
So far the technique has only been applied to piano recordings.
It’s not just live audiences and home-listeners who will benefit from the technology, which has more applications than mere buzz elimination. It also has important ramifications for the collection and storage of the works of great musicians, past, present, and future, and will allow students to analyse the keystrokes and pedal movements of the world’s best players in greater detail than ever before.
Fortunately for up and coming musicians the novelty of going to see a live piano performance minus the pianist is not expected to replace live performances featuring humans. But Zenph’s technological breakthrough will certainly raise the bar of audio recordings as the sounds of past masters are brought back to life in the 21st Century.
It is conceivable that this technology could be extrapolated to cater to other instruments. In the not too distant future we might be able to listen to new recordings of entire symphonies, rock concerts, and even bootlegged albums. Thanks to Walker and his team the world’s greatest music looks set to live forever.
