Help, please, regarding recording setup

[TropiRock]

Hi to all from a newbie. I do a lot of songwriting and home recordings (guitars, drums, vocals, keyboards), but find keyboard stuff to be the most difficult for recording. I own two Yamaha keyboards, good but not great ones. My keyboard of preference is a Yamaha YPG-235, not that it really matters. When I'm recording anything from either keyboard, I send the output direct from the keyboard into a 24 track Tascam 2488 PortaStudio. Nothing inbetween, just a straight in and out.

First issue: I have difficulty keeping the volume consistent. If I strike a key or chord a little too hard, the volume rises noticeably, like a little "blast" of volume. It's hard to keep a completely steady touch when playing a piece, especially if one hand has to quickly jump several notes or more. I'm probably doing a bad job of describing the issue, but hope that someone out there will understand. Volume inconsistency can be an issue with even a real stringed piano, but nowhere near as severe as with the electronic keyboard. I'm just curious if anyone has experienced this and might have a suggestion or two.

Second, the "Grand Piano" voice always sounds thin and phony to me when I'm recording, so I'm hoping that someone might have found ideal settings (reverb, chorus, compression, eq, or whatever) which produce a more realistic piano sound. I've played with the limited settings in the keyboard itself and also settings available within the Tascam unit, but nothing seems to produce the richness of a real piano. Not even close.

Thanks in advance to anyone who might offer advice.

 

[The Y_man]

. My keyboard of preference is a Yamaha YPG-235, not that it really matters. .

It does matter actually.

See page 58 of the manual. Set the touch response to "4" if you want no touch sensitivity at all.

Hope that helps!

The Y-man

 

[TropiRock]

Thanks, Y-Man. I'll give that a try.

To help others who may stumble onto this thread regarding the second issue, I played with the settings again this evening and here's what worked best (to my ear, at least):

On the keyboard, I added a little extra reverb and dropped everything down 1 octave electronically. Then on the Tascam recorder, I added a bit of chorus (not too much, it makes the sound somewhat hollow) and bumped up the mid and hi eq parameters by a factor of +2.

I wouldn't say it sounds as rich and full as a Bruce Hornsby recording, but at least it's a better sound than I had before.

Thanks again -- it's much appreciated!

 

[The Y_man]

Using the dual voice function (to overlay say 2 piano voices) can help too.

The Y-man

 

[TropiRock]

Thanks again! I'll play with the dual voices function. (Hmmmm, I wonder how it might sound if I leave one voice set on "Grand Piano" in the normal octave and layer that with Grand Piano in the dropdown octave? Look out, Bruce Hornsby, here I come.....)



Can you tell I don't often record keyboard? I mostly do guitar/drums/vocals and only occasionally use one of the keyboards. The little nuances have been downright frustrating. Your suggestions have been kind, Y-Man. Good on ya.

 

[The Y_man]

Good luck - let us know how you go!

The Y-man

 

[TropiRock]

Gidday, Y-Man!
Your suggestions have been spot on and NOW that Yamaha is giving the rich sound I was seeking. I added a dual voice as you suggested (Voice 1 is Grand Piano dropped an octave and the dual voice is Grand Piano in the regular scale). I tweaked the Dual Voice volume about 15dB lower than Voice 1 (it's "brighter" and seemed to jump out too much), tweaked the Dual Voice pan to spread it out a bit more, tweaked the reverb, etc. Added a little more chorus on the Tascam recorder and.....voila!! Step aside, Bruce Hornsby! It really resonates and while not as rich as a true stringed piano, is close enough for rock'n'roll. I'm indebted to you, my friend. Since I don't play the keyboard often, I made prolific notes and saved the Yamaha settings in the registration database.

BTW, I have made many great Aussie friends over the past 9 years or so. I owned a hotel in Florida which I sold earlier this year (that's the TropiRock thing, www.tropirock.com) and the hotel became a favorite of the yachting industry. Many of the captains and crew members are either Aussies or Kiwis. Cool folks, like the Y-Man.