The Smiley Smile Message Board

On a nerdy note, anyone know what make and model the much loved tack piano at Columbia was ?

COMMENT:  I cannot tell you the "make and model" of the Columbia tack piano.  I can relate this; there is no such thing as a tack piano actual model. No piano manufacture makes a tack piano per say. Tack pianos are modified regular pianos. Usually the modification is permanent. This makes old upright pianos ideal candidates for modification.

See this link for tack piano information and modification techniques >>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tack_piano

Other modifications used in studios for pianos to make them sound different or to "cut" through the mix is to (1) place masking tape on all the strings and under the hammers right at the strings. (2) Coating the felt of the hammers with acrylic in order to harden the felt is also an option. This was done on the famous grank piano of Studio 3 United on Sunset, used by Brian quite often.

Most pianos that have been "tacked" all sound about the same from a recording engineer's point of view. Uprights are easiest to mic. Since the piano is forever changed -- even removing the tacks from the hammers changes the felt -- so unless the hammer heads are replaced a piano modified with tacks stays that way. Usually you will see an older upright piano modified, not a grand piano. The old upright tack will be stored at the end of a hallway. Being on a dolly, it is rolled into the studio when needed.

To give more of a honky-tonk sound, the piano is tuned with a wider spread between sympathetic strings. Or, if the piano tuner is not around, record the piano at normal speed, then add a second track recorded slightly slower (or faster) and combine the two. If masking tape is used (rather than tacks -- such as on a grand piano), with the correct amount of EQ, and if down in the mix, a mock-tack-piano sound can be realized in a pinch. In some cases, it is preferred.

Good Listening,

~Stephen W. Desper

 

Great stuff Stephen...Why are upright pianos easiest to mic?

Thanks.

I guess it's the fact they are relatively compact - just pop the lid open and place a nice pair of mics, one on each side. With grand pianos, the sound doesn't come from one relatively small hole, it sounds grander but the sound has to be picked further away to get the real sound, and then you have leakage problems... That from my very narrow experience, I'm sure my personal recording guru has more insight (once again Mr. Desper, thank you very many for these nuggets of information)!

Thanks guys. I was just wondering coz whichever piano it is that BW used on Pet Sounds and Smile it does sound fab as many have remarked. I believe Western,Gold Star and Columbia all had an upright of some kind. I was wondering if it was like the Challen as used by The Beatles which had some kind of moving part which turned the piano into a "jangle box" .

COMMENT:  I'm speaking of full upright pianos, not the minuet type -- those don't record well. The full-upright can be bought for a few hundred dollars. Through the tacks and de-tuning, you've made a new instrument. If you're going to modify a perfectly good piano and make it into -- what is really -- a different instrument, the upright design is ideal. It records well. It's fun to play. It stores in tight spaces. It's easy to modify. And, to answer your question, the harp is completely exposed on the back. The tack sound comes right through the sounding board. One or two mics and you've got a great sound. The upright takes EQ quite good. That is it responds to EQ making it versatile fitting into a mix with respect to frequency allotment.

Once while recording Charles Lloyd for his WARM WATER album (by the way, there's singing on it by Brian and Carl, Alan and Michael) I suggested we try this -- and we did -- it's on the album.

We took two full-upright pianos that were normally tuned. We positioned the pianos so that their backs were facing each other with about three or four feet between them. I fashioned a wedge or stick to hold the sustain pedal down, on both pianos. Now with the dampers lifted the strings were free to "sing" in sympathy with any outside sound. Charles had been meditating for an hour before he did the solo, but he got down cross-legged between the two pianos with his flute. Before we started recording he played with the effect of freely resonating strings all about you. In this case, I placed microphones, two in-front of each piano. Also had a mic on the flute itself. Well Charles got lost in all this playful trail to his flute notes. This could have easily been done with speakers and mics -- the speakers replacing Charles' flute. But this was done to stimulate Charles jazz playing of the flute -- free form and all -- to take him & his flute to another sonic dimension, to see what "jazz" would be forthcoming.

Use brass tacks . . .   ~swd 

COMMENT: The pianoforte is one of the hardest instruments to record. Any type of piano behaves the same. The sound is omni-propagated. It does not come out of a hole here or there. The sound is full and complete from just about everywhere. This makes it hard to get a sound that will please many people. Everyone has personal experiences with listening to a piano and so set different standards of excellence. I posted some time back on recording Brian's pianos.    ~swd

COMMENT:  Ash, read the info at the link I provided. There you will find a list of well-known songs using tack pianos along with some music history.   ~swd
 

Thanks Stephen. Great Charles Lloyd story. At my home studio i love it when my piano "rings" when i'm playing guitar or my kid plays his drums.
I'd read the piece about tack piano you provided. I searched for quite a while trying to find out which kind of pianos were at the LA studios but had no luck. I was however able to find details of The Beatles bowel movements during the Revolver sessions ! It's sad that there's so little info about pianos played by people such as Ray Manzarek and the LA session team on so many great records. The Kind of Blue piano is available as a sample set but I dread to think what Miles would say at my attempts to play So What.
I bought the Abbey Road keyboard package a while ago and love the Mrs Mills piano but unfortunately the mechanism that turns the Challen piano into a jangle box was broken by the time Propellerheads sampled it. I'm gonna pick up the Synthogy Ivory 2 upright pianos set as that sounds like it'll do the trick. I'd love to have 3 or 4 real pianos but my family don't want to sleep in the garden ! That's the English weather for you.
Thanks for all your insights on the board and thanks for all your great work with The Beach Boys. As you can see it's still much appreciated.

That's fantastic, Stephen.  This was at Brother, then?  Oh, and do you happen to recall which track this experiment was put to tape for?  After reading your story, I'm curious to check out the results.

COMMENT:  It was at the Santa Barbara retreat of Michael Love's.  As I'm sure you know, this time in Beach Boy history saw them embrace Transcendental Meditation. Look at the pictures of Mike in Sunflower -- long stereotypical white guru robe -- so it was around that time. Michael's retreat or complex consisted of several residences, a common kitchen, meditation gardens, landscaped grounds, open eating areas (everyone ate together). I visited on several occasions. Oh Yes! I almost forgot!  The retreat had a wall to the street, but was otherwise an incredible spot. It was on a cliff, overlooking the Pacific Ocean. The beach was below -- down a staircase. The weather was heavenly. It was a happy place. Peace -- Joy -- Love. Very idealistic. Organic meals, filtered water, drug free, share and share alike, help each other, study and meditation. Maybe six or eight girls and moms lived there. Some with babies and small children. So there were children about the retreat, but well behaved. I'm very sketchy on these circumstances . . . somehow, either there was a small studio there, or we had the sound truck there, or Jeff Peters had brought in some equipment . . . somehow it was possible to record at the retreat, at least mix six mics and record to two tracks. I recall seeing the one upright somewhere in the complex. We got it moved to a suitable room (if I recall, Charles had a view of the ocean while he was playing his flute) and rented a second piano. It was delivered and both were tuned. We placed the pianos while Charles was elsewhere in meditation. During that time I made two wedges or sticks of just the right length to wedge between the bottom of the keyboard housing and the sustain pedal. It was a very interesting "echo." It was like a tonal-rich-trail from the notes as he played a run-of-notes. After a while a din of past-played-notes would build up. You could meditate on that sound as it was miked in quad. It could be reproduced in complete surround -- that is how Charles heard it as he played.

It's on Warm Water, an album by Charles Lloyd. He and Mike were good friends and both into TM. Lloyd has played on several BB songs.

Good Listening,     ~Stephen W. Desper   

Thanks, Stephen.  Michaels retreat sounds like a wondrous place.  Oh, to be wealthy!  :)  It sounds like an idyllic time and place and I think it's nice when you take the time to share your remembrances like this.

I'm curious which song on Llyod's lp features the piano reveberation experiment?  I'll give it a listen and see if I pick it out.

"too much detail" is often an unintended consequence of recording a piano. Because of the way the sound emanates from the instrument, a listener at a concert or present in a studio will lose some of the attack of the hammers on the strings that might be recorded if it is miked closely.

Stephen, have you ever tried blu-tacking boundary mics on the *inside* of an upright piano, closing the lid and having someone play? It produces a surreal sound. I tried that with PZM mics in the late 80's, with the sustain pedal the sound almost seemed to swirl around indefinately between the Left and Right mics.

Sometimes I think I chose the wrong profession...should have trained as a sound recording enginner!

COMMENT:  Yes I've tried PZMs inside the piano -- didn't like it. I like them outside the piano, but not in the instrument itself. One different but good sound I got was using the Piano Pickup made by an early Barcus Berry model of piano pickup (predating the 4000) that fitted inside a grand piano over the harp. It had a pickup for each string-set. Now the model 4000 does it with one pickup, but back then it used many coils. This gave a clean sound to the piano. Since there was no acoustic pickup going on, the feedback factor was almost zero. Also pickup of adjacent acoustic instruments, like drums and bass guitar, were non-existant.  The use of this pickup greatly helped using a grand piano on stage during amplified concerts. The drums were no longer washed out and the piano could be amplified 25dB without feedback.    ~swd

For those computer recordists amongst us, Wavesfactory do a wonderful honky tonk tack piano VST. It is a very Wilsonesque, Smile type sound. I'd been searching for this sound for years, it's as close as you can get. (If only they'd had it for BWPS)

http://samples.wavesfactory.com/w-honky/ (http://samples.wavesfactory.com/w-honky/)

This company are wonderful, and do some very unique, well recorded sample sets, at about £8.50 a shot, which any computer recordist will tell you is a snip. No, I don't work for them!

You may also want to try playing a hammered dulcimer patch like a piano, then you get the You Still Believe In Me intro sound.

I'm interested.  Can you provide any audio examples of it sounding especially Wilson-esque?

For some time I've desired the late 60s BW home studio piano sound in sample form.

It doesn't sound very Wilsonesque. It's just a regular piano VST with a faked metallic sound layered on top of the beginning of every note

Here's some noodling with it, I only know a few tunes

http://vocaroo.com/i/s1vGN0ykPKME

Truly, the easiest and probably best way to get a piano to sound like the Wild Honey deal is to record it to two tracks, and then play around with detuning one ever so slightly.  That piano was not a tack piano, just tuned very brightly.

And the best way to get an actual tack piano sound is to go into one of the piano practice rooms in your university and stick 79 cent drug store thumbtacks into the felt of the hammers, removing them after you're done recording and fucking up one of the school's pianos.  :-X

Hey, it was a decade  ago, i was young and naive...

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COMMENT:  The roll-down strips stack up against actual tacks . . . like skim milk against whole milk.    ~swd

[mods: feel free to remove if the self-promotion is inappropriate!]

I just put this out:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NoMXEC4eVM8

has a tack piano in there (left channel) ... it was a kind of bad-sounding console (? - little upright) that couldn't keep it's tune, so I covered the thing in 'vintage' (i.e. NOS slightly rusty old) tacks!

Masterful engineering as usual, Donny, but...it's in stereo?  :o

ha, yeh the new album is in stereo ... i got an ampex 2-track in the deal with the 8-track !

I love the sound and production of the track!


And always good to see early 70's Mike Love dancing.

ha! that's true huh?