Tatum, Art (1909-1956)/Yamaha Disklavier Pro grand piano
Tatum, Art (1909-1956)/Yamaha Disklavier Pro grand piano
表演者: Tatum, Art (1909-1956)/Yamaha Disklavier Pro grand piano
专辑类型: 专辑/Re-Performance
介质: CD
发行时间: 2008
唱片数: 1
出版者: Zenph Studios
专辑简介
专辑为电脑控制的钢琴，Yamaha Disklavier Pro grand piano，在高精度MIDI信号下，重现的1949年的Tatum专辑《Piano Starts Here》的演奏。演奏信息从原始专辑中提取，具有更好的音质和（原专辑所没有的）双声道。前13轨为普通立体声录音，后13轨为仿真人头录音。
关于原演奏者：
Art Tatum,原名亚瑟.泰特姆二世(Arthur Tatum,Jr.),出生于1909年，逝世于1956年，爵士摇摆音乐家，钢琴演奏家，亚瑟泰特姆是爵士历史上最特别的音乐家之一，双目失明的他有着非凡的技巧，鲜明的风格和崇高的威望，作为钢琴家，他是无可争议的权威。且其风格和谐完美，远远超过与他同时代的其他音乐家。亚特泰特姆自幼接受了较为正规的音乐训练，然而能成为一名出色的音乐家主要还是靠他自己勤奋的自学。他虽然因尿毒症而英年早逝，但这丝毫未影响他的声誉。在今天看来，他的唱片所表现出来的才华仍能然当代所有钢琴家们感到汗颜。
关于Zenph Re-Performance：
WHAT IS A ZENPH RE-PERFORMANCE?
ZENPH STUDIOS takes audio recordings and turns them back into
live performances, precisely replicating what was originally recorded.
The Zenph software-based process extracts every musical
nuance of a recorded performance, and stores the data in a highresolution
digital file. These re-performance files contain every detail
of how every note in the composition was played, including pedal
actions, volume, and articulations – all with micro-second timings.
The re-performance files are played back on a real acoustic piano
fitted with sophisticated computers and hardware, letting the listener
“sit in the room” as if he or she were there when the original
recording was made. The re-performance is then recorded afresh,
using the latest microphones and recording techniques, to modernize
monophonic or poor-quality recordings of great performances.
专辑评论by Spider Robinson：
Computer-intelligence specialists speak of the Turing Test. A machine is deemed to be sentient
if a human who text-messages with it at length can’t tell it isn’t human. Similarly, if you hear
someone in the next room play piano just like Art Tatum, for over half an hour…can you really
be sure Tatum is dead? You’re about to run the experiment for yourself.
But bringing a musical giant back from the grave wasn’t enough for Zenph Studios; been
there, done that. With this compact disc you don’t just get to hear Art Tatum recreating his
immortal Piano Starts Here album on a better piano for better recording equipment. In addition,
as if lagniappe were needed, through the magic of binaural technology you also have
the option to be Art Tatum: to hear the music precisely as he was hearing it while he played it.
Only for thirty-nine minutes, I’m afraid – but as often as you like. (Whether you choose to play
“air piano” along with him is your own affair.)
For the benefit of those unfamiliar with his work, Art Tatum was a creature from another galaxy
altogether, who from October 13, 1909 to November 5, 1956 lived here on earth disguised
as a jazz pianist – an impersonation given away only by the stunning speed, dexterity and
musicality with which he played, far beyond the capabilities of a normal human nervous
system. (The biographical details of his human persona are easily found on the Web at
zenph.com/Tatum – or just ask any piano player.) His pianistic prowess has not been exceeded
to this day, and has been equaled only occasionally by prodigies like Oscar Peterson.
He has been called the greatest instrumentalist on any instrument in any musical genre by
numerous authorities including Mssrs. Horowitz, Rachmaninoff, Gershwin, Rubinstein, Basie,
Peterson, Charles and Barron.
But while Tatum’s legendary performances are still unequalled, the recording and playback
technology of his time have long since been left in the dust. Anyone with a modern laptop can
probably make better recordings, and certainly listen to them. Enter Zenph Studios. As with
their acclaimed 2006 re-performance of Glenn Gould’s The Goldberg Variations, they used
great software, great skill and keen musical sense to convert the original performance into
a digital high-resolution MIDI document which perfectly mimics the mechanical details of the
performance itself: tempo, attack, touch and so on. While they were at it, they retroactively
repaired some tiny errors caused by tape transcription to vinyl – incorrect speed, missing segments
and the like. Then they used that MIDI file to instruct a Yamaha Disklavier Pro concert
grand piano, producing a re-performance that is different from the original vinyl release only
in its superior sonic fidelity and dynamic range, and in its slightly more accurate account of
what Tatum actually played that night of April 2, 1949.
Nearly sixty years later, on September 23, 2007, the album was re-recorded in the same
Shrine Auditorium in which nine of its famous thirteen tracks had first been recorded live, for
a live audience again, with the piano placed at the same spot on the stage. Zenph Studios
even restored the original track order, rearranged on later vinyl and compact disc releases.
The remaining four studio tracks from March 21, 1933, included in the original Piano Starts
Here album, were also re-premiered that night. The Los Angeles Times ran an editorial the day
before the new recording, observing that “because of Zenph, we have a lot more useful information
about how Art Tatum played the piano – knowledge that could conceivably lead to
a panoply of new creative works.”
Masterworks also recorded a second version of these re-performances, presented here on this
disc. Listen to the results with a good headphone system, and the music will reach your ears
precisely as it reached Tatum’s ears while he was playing it: that is, with the music itself seeming
to come from slightly ahead of you and just below your chin, low notes to your left, higher
notes to your right, arpeggios moving from side to side…whereas the sound of key action and
foot pedals being worked come from much closer and lower, and so on. On the live recordings,
the crowd noise comes from where it did for him: on his right and slightly behind him.
The effect is astonishing. I think most music-lovers who’ve ever heard Art Tatum have at least
tried to imagine what it must be like to be him, have the power to play like him – but never
before have we had such help with our imaginings.
It is safe to say the Zenph process is still in its early days. It still remains for the Zenph team
to develop a high-resolution, computer-controlled tenor saxophone – and then we can have
Coltrane back, to record A Love Supreme live for us. Likewise, Charlie Parker, Stan Getz,
Lester Young and Coleman Hawkins can be resuscitated as soon as the all the aspects of the
technology are concordant.
But some of the greatest performances by one of the greatest instrumentalists of all time on
any instrument in any genre is an excellent place to begin the conquest of Death. Everything
starts here.
– Spider Robinson
(Spider Robinson is an award-winning science-fiction writer and musician. He is co-author (with Robert A.
Heinlein) of VARIABLE STAR. He is co-author, with David Crosby, of the song “On the Way to the Stars,”
and was named for blues singer Spider John Koerner. )
关于仿真人头录音：
ABOUT THIS BINAURAL RECORDING
OF ART TATUM’S PIANO STARTS HERE
Our goal in this binaural recording was to tailor it to be realistic when heard from the perspective
of the pianist – through headphones.
With a binaural recording, the ambience of the performance venue is preserved more precisely
than with standard recording techniques, so that a convincing soundstage is achieved
during headphone playback. Binaural recordings are made with two small omnidirectional
microphones placed in the entrance to the ear canals of an artificial head. This dummy head
includes molded ears designed to mimic the acoustic properties of human ears. The two channels
of sound are kept totally separate, from the original recording venue to the stereo headphones
worn by the listener. You hear the piano laid out in front of you, bass in the left ear
and treble in the right ear.
This Tatum re-performance was recorded on a Sonoma workstation in seven tracks: five tracks
for the surround-sound version and two tracks for the binaural version. Before the session,
recording engineer Richard King spent considerable time setting up the dummy head for the
binaural recording. Our intention was to position the dummy head at the piano bench, so that
a headphone listener would be able to “get inside Tatum’s head,” to hear what he might have
heard as he sat at the piano – the ultimate headphone experience. We had carefully measured
the dummy head’s vertical position in our previous Gould recording, finding a spot where
the playing sounded most interesting. One side effect is that you hear the live audience’s
noise – and their applause – mostly in the right ear, much as Tatum would have heard them.
Enjoy the experience.
曲目
1 Tea For Two 3’11
(Irving Caesar / Vincent Youmans)
2 St. Louis Blues 2’41
(William C. Handy)
3 Tiger Rag 2’17
(D. James LaRocca)
4 Sophisticated Lady 3’14
(Edward Kennedy “Duke” Ellington)
5 Humoresque 3’48
(Antonín Dvoˇrák)
6 Tatum Pole Boogie 2’28
(Art Tatum)
7 Someone To Watch Over Me 3’35
(George Gershwin / Ira Gershwin)
8 How High The Moon 2’28
(Nancy Hamilton / William M. Lewis, Jr.)
9 Yesterdays 3’23
(Otto A. Harbach / Jerome Kern)
10 Willow Weep For Me 3’13
(Ann Ronell)
11 The Kerry Dance 1’04
(Frederick Feibel / James Molloy)
12 Gershwin Medley 3’53
(George Gershwin / Ira Gershwin)
13 I Know That You Know 2’40
(Otto A. Harbach / Anne Caldwell O’Dea / Vincent Youmans)
14 Tea For Two 3’11
(Irving Caesar / Vincent Youmans)
15 St. Louis Blues 2’41
(William C. Handy)
16 Tiger Rag 2’17
(D. James LaRocca)
17 Sophisticated Lady 3’14
(Edward Kennedy “Duke” Ellington)
18 Humoresque 3’48
(Antonín Dvoˇrák)
19 Tatum Pole Boogie 2’28
(Art Tatum)
20 Someone To Watch Over Me 3’35
(George Gershwin / Ira Gershwin)
21 How High The Moon 2’28
(Nancy Hamilton / William M. Lewis, Jr.)
22 Yesterdays 3’23
(Otto A. Harbach / Jerome Kern)
23 Willow Weep For Me 3’13
(Ann Ronell)
24 The Kerry Dance 1’04
(Frederick Feibel / James Molloy)
25 Gershwin Medley 3’53
(George Gershwin / Ira Gershwin)
26 I Know That You Know 2’40
(Otto A. Harbach / Anne Caldwell O’Dea / Vincent Youmans)