This has got to be one of the most incredible things I’ve read about in a while! Listen to the Before and After recordings of Rachmaninoff’s performance of his arrangement of Kreisler’s Liebesleid on the homepage of the Zenph website and you’ll see what I mean. I couldn’t believe how beautiful the “After” recording was, so I had to do some digging around on the site to figure out what it was all about. The article on “the piano re-performance” was an excellent introduction into the unbelievable creativity and technology behind this recording and other such projects. This explanation in the article finally helped me understand the process:
“Zenph Systems of North Carolina has developed an analytical process which it describes as separating the original performances from the recording. Its goal is to translate original recordings into data that will accurately render the originals on an appropriate instrument, free from the constraints and limitations imposed by technology in the era of the recording.”
Later in the article, one discovers that:
“For solo piano, there are 12 points of analysis for each note played by the performer, defining its start time, pitch, duration, loudness, sustain, release and the characteristics of the damping applied.”
Check out this live performance of Joshua Bell playing Grieg’s Violin Sonata No. 3, Second Movement, with “Rachmaninoff” at the piano:
I’m curious to check out this Zenph re-performance of Rachmaninoff Plays Rachmaninoff. Pretty amazing stuff, don’t you think?!
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