PNO Scan

My acoustic piano (a Steinway grand) is now also a digital piano, thanks to the magic of PNO Scan. It's basically a sensor strip that goes under the keys of the piano (and to the sustain pedal) and senses the amount and duration of the pressure on the keys. I also got a mute rail installed, so that I can mute the natural piano sound, and a pair of speakers installed under the piano that plugs into my computer to transmit the computer-generated sounds. The result is that you can play the piano and have another sound come out; for example, a trumpet sound, like Calvin is demonstrating. Another very handy result is that I can play after the kids go to bed by plugging some headphones into the computer. Nice! Finally, it does a bunch of other stuff like recording music (in Garage Band on my Mac) or accompanying students, even slowing down or speeding up to stay with them (using the Home Concert Xtreme software). In a nutshell, it's awesome.

Here's a duet I recorded with myself in about 15 min of work...yeah, it's not perfect but it's just a quick and dirty project to demonstrate the concept. Fun!

Schumann Beim Kranzewinden