Get the Best Piano Sound Possible with PNOScan at Your Sound Studio in San Antonio

Dedicated musicians and music enthusiasts know that there is no way to completely produce the warm, tangible feel of a live performance on a recorded track, for better or worse. However, that does not mean that expert audio engineers won’t keep trying, and we have come pretty close here at Windmill Valley Recording, your recording studio in San Antonio, Texas. The PNOScan, a type of MIDI piano recording technology made by QRS Music Technologies, plays a big role in our day-to-day recording and sound engineering. Owner, Carl Scheel, recently installed this high-tech device on a newly purchased Yamaha C6 grand piano, and our clients have already noticed a difference in the quality and range of piano sound we are able to capture. Here is an overview of how our grand piano and the PNOScan can improve your next piano tracking date:

• Quality sound: First and foremost, Yamaha grand pianos are an industry standard on stage and in the studio. They have a reputation of great quality and great sound. The PNOScan is design to record the best sound quality of any piano recording technology on the market. This is because PNOScan uses an optical lens to sense when you are pressing a key, how hard you are pressing it and when you let go. This means it can capture the full intended range of how you play. In other words, the PNOScan does not merely record what you play—it records the reality of how you want your song to sound, based on how you play it.
• Non-invasive: An optical lens might sound like a strange and potentially invasive or distracting piece of equipment to have near your piano. But the PNOScan lens is installed underneath your piano keys, and then linked via USB to a recording device. This makes your playing experience virtually indistinguishable from if you were not being recorded at all.
• No keyboard necessary: Many musicians appreciate the recording possibilities and convenience of a keyboard, but still prefer to play an old fashioned piano. With PNOScan, you get the best of both worlds. And attaching the PNOscan to your computer allows you to record notes, and or the midi data of your performance. This creates the possibility to have the different options you would find on a keyboard. At Windmill Valley Recording – your recording facility in Texas, you get the unbeatable sound of a piano recorded with great quality microphones, and the versatility of a keyboard and the ease of recording that comes only with the PNOScan.
• Any style: Because of the adaptability of the PNOScan, it is ideal for piano players of all stripes, and will help your playing stand out for the better in any context. Whether you are in a jazz, rock, or country band, accompanying a talented singer or want to record some solo work, the PNOScan will help your creativity by creating more choices for the sound you want.

We were able to utilize the grand piano to add the string pad he wanted to layer on the the track, grabbing synth sounds from stock instruments inside of Pro Tools. Later we decided to add another synth sound triggered by the already captured midi data on 2 of the other 8 tunes, one being “Quest for Tides” and the other being “Where Did The Whales Go”. No extra recording was needed. The captured midi data was appropriate to use as the trigger (or player) for this synthesizer instrument sound called “sea spray”. I am so proud of Dennis and the finished product that he has produced at Windmill Valley Recording.