If you are a pianist looking to share your music with others, whether your original arrangements or sheet music from another arranger, there are some basic things you need to have if you want to get a professional sounding recording. If you have not recorded before and don't know where to begin, I hope this article will be helpful in giving you a basic idea of what it requires. Here, I will share what products I use to produce my piano solo recordings plus explain the technique I have learned for recording a live grand piano.

Before we start... the links in this article are not affiliate links. I do not make anything off of sharing the products that I use or suggest. I just want to share these things with you in order to help you in your playing! Let's jump in!

Recording Software (DAW)

The first thing you will need in order to record professional piano audio is a good recording software. These programs are called DAW's, or "Digital Audio Interfaces". When I first started recording piano solos, I experimented with using GarageBand on my iPad. However, I never used these recordings for anything but personal listening and I didn't feel like it created the best sound. GarageBand would be a good product to use if you're looking for a free and simple way to quickly record something like a song preview for sheet music, but if you want to produce professional audio for distribution, you will likely want to look for a more sophisticated software.

I use a Windows computer and the software I chose to use is PreSonus' Studio One (for those with Macs, I have heard that Apple's Logic Pro is very popular among professional musicians, but Studio One can be used on these as well). The reason I chose Studio One originally was because it came in several price tiers and I was therefore able to get a lower priced version of the software with the features I needed most (plus, it looked the easiest to use to me!). This led me to get the Studio One Artist version and I currently use Studio One 6. However, the price tiers were recently removed by PreSonus and they only offer one Pro 7 version for one price. It is a fairly reasonable price compared to other DAW's, but there are less expensive options available still. You should do research on the various options that are available and compare prices (keeping in mind how frequently you might need to pay to upgrade to the next version) to see what will work best for your needs and budget.

Audio Interface

An audio interface is an essential tool for recording piano solos well, whether using a live or digital piano. The audio interface is what will transfer a good quality sound from your keyboard or piano to your computer. It will also help reduce latency (lag between playing a note and hearing it) for digital keyboards to be unnoticeable. If you use a keyboard to record and can tolerate a lag between your playing and hearing the sound, recording can be done without an audio interface, but it won't be as good of quality if you are looking for a professional recording.

The audio interface I started out with was PreSonus' lowest priced interface (the AudioBox iTwo) but it has now been discontinued. It was good for recording using a MIDI keyboard (more on that below), but it did not have the quality and features I needed to record the live piano well. So, I recently upgraded to a Focusrite Scarlett 18i8 3rd Gen since I wanted the ability to record up to four microphones at once if needed. There are lower priced Focusrite audio interfaces with less microphone jacks than what I have if you only need one or two available at any given time. Again, make sure to do plenty of research to determine what would be the best for you.

Interesting tip: I love to buy all of the recording products I need from Sweetwater.com since they always have amazing customer service and free shipping, plus great deals! Whenever you are unsure of what program, device, interface, etc. would be best for what you will be doing, you can always give them a call and they walk you through the process of choosing exactly what you need. They will gladly give you suggestions, advice, and input. I highly recommend using them since they have helped and taught me so much!

Recording a Digital Piano

Using Built-in Keyboard Sounds

If you are going the digital route for your piano recordings, there are a few options you have to choose from for recording. First, if you have a keyboard with built-in samples/sounds, you can record those sounds using your audio interface. For example, I have a Yamaha CP4 Stage keyboard which had quite descent built-in sounds and I could record using these.

Using built-in sounds would be the most affordable way to record since the sounds are already included with your keyboard. To record using this method, you would use the L-MONO and R jacks to transfer this sound to your device. You can do this by plugging a 1/4" audio cable into one or both jacks and then plugging the other ends into their respective jacks in your audio interface. This should transfer the sound directly into your DAW. I have done this before with my Yamaha CP4 Stage but didn't prefer the result as I felt I could get a more realistic sound from the next option.

Using a Piano VST Plugin

A VST plugin is a software you can download to use within your DAW. This works by using the MIDI feature of your keyboard. "MIDI" is short for "Musical Instrument Digital Interface" and is simply a language that the keyboard and computer use to communicate the notes you are playing. Instead of recording your keyboard's sounds, you will play the VST plugin's sounds using your keyboard as a "controller". I upgraded from my Yamaha keyboard to a StudioLogic SL88 Grand keyboard that was solely a MIDI keyboard so that I could have a better controller to use for digital recording.

There are many piano VST's available and some will sound more realistic than others, some will use different piano brands and sound brighter or more mellow, etc. You should look into the options that fit your budget and listen carefully to the sound of each (preferably through good quality headphones or speakers) one to see what you think you will prefer.

I personally tend to prefer a brighter piano sound but also enjoy the ability to have a more mellow sound for coming up with ideas. If you are looking for something that is in a reasonable price range that provides good quality sound and many sound options to choose from, I would highly recommend the Garritan Abbey Road CFX Concert Grand. This is what I have used for most of my recordings and it is very customizable when it comes to piano brightness, dynamic range, room reverb, and even tuning. They also offer a lite version (which I originally started out with) which is less expensive and has less options if the basics are all you need.

One benefit of recording piano using MIDI vs. recording audio from your keyboard or piano is that MIDI is much more easily editable. Since it records the notes simply as a controller prompt for your VST software, you can delete notes, add notes, or move notes if you make a mistake during recording and it will not be noticeable in the finished product. It will sound just as if you had played the correct note. This is much more difficult to do when recording live audio and though it sounds like "cheating", it makes recording much faster if you are in a time crunch and/or having trouble with a song section.

Recording a Grand Piano

To record a live piano, you first need to make sure your room is quiet. I do not have sound treatments in the room I use for live piano recording, but I make sure that all fans, heaters, or other appliances are shut off so the microphones do not pick up the noise. You will also want to make sure that your piano is in-tune for your recording. From our experience, microphones tend to pick up out of tune notes more prominently than the human ear.

I record my grand piano using two sE Electronics sE7 small-diaphragm condenser microphones instead of using just one mic. I use these specific condenser mics because they were the best quality for their price and are some of the lowest priced good quality mics I could find. If you are interested in getting a different sound than condenser mics lend themselves to, there are many other types of microphones available.

Using two microphones allows you to focus on the bass section with one and the tenor section with the other. I place one microphone over the center of the bass section and several inches above the strings, and the other microphone a few inches above one of the sound holes near the tenor section (this gives a warmer sound than if placed directly above the tenor section strings). This placement allows you to do more precise editing to each section which will give you a better sounding finished product, but there are many other placements you can learn about online that achieve different sounds. If you are interested in testing using only one mic, there are many videos and articles available online that explain how to do that. It can take a lot of experimenting, research, and playing with settings to record live piano and make it sound just the way you like, but it can be done!

Mastering Software (Optional, but Helpful)

One final software to look into that is not necessary but creates a much better finished sound is mastering software. This software will bring up the volume of your audio and help round out the overall tone of your finished product by balancing the bass, mid, and treble. If you branch into creating orchestral tracks to accompany your piano recording, it will help to balance all the various instruments and create a more realistic orchestra sound. The fastest and easiest type of mastering software to use is the kind that analyzes your audio and then chooses the best balance for you. From here, you can make adjustments to determine what kind of sound you like best and even change the genre style it will master the audio to sound like. The least expensive, most straightforward software I know of that can do this is iZotope's Ozone 11 Elements, which I use on all of my most recordings.

Bonus Tip: Producing Videos

Editing Software & Stock Footage for Lyric Videos

If you are looking to create music or lyric videos, you might need a more advanced video editing software than the default program that comes with your computer (like Microsoft Clipchamp or Apple iMovie). For video editing, I use CyberLink's PowerDirector. This software was the least expensive software I could find that had the fewest problems and the best editing results. It also included an add-on for Getty Images' iStock videos that was much less expensive than an actual subscription through the iStock website, and this was very helpful to me since I do so many lyric videos with stock footage. If you want to start out using completely free stock footage like I did before upgrading to this, Pixabay.com is a great website with many options and I've used it for years! Any video editor can be a little difficult to learn at first, but there are plenty of YouTube videos teaching how to use the different software.

Cameras for Music Videos

The camera I use to record music videos is the Canon EOS Rebel t7. I recently added a second one of these cameras to make the recording and editing process easier for me (I only have to record a song once instead of twice to get two different shots). If you look at the link to the Rebel t7, you will notice there is an option to purchase a kit that comes with two lenses. This is the kit I have and I use the smaller lens on one camera for the wider shot in the videos (it allows things to be more zoomed out) and the larger lens on the other camera for the closer hand shot (this lens can zoom in very closely). The Rebel t7 has worked out well for me and is the only camera I have ever used for recording video.

Lighting for Music Videos

You will want to make sure that the lighting in your room is set well for a professional looking video. Recording can be done in front of a window if you have good lighting on your subject (the pianist) and make sure your camera settings are set correctly for the light coming into the lens. A great way to light your subject is to use a ring light, which is what I use in many of my videos. That is the only professional lighting equipment I personally use. To add light to walls, objects in the background, shelves, etc., I use small push lights or lightweight lamps laid on their sides. This is a technique that honestly probably isn't very professional but it is much cheaper than purchasing more lighting equipment and still gives a more professional looking result.

I have recorded in both a setting with a window in the background and without a window and each require their own lighting technique and camera settings. Whether you record during the day or night also makes a big difference. Each setting has its own challenges and takes much research and experimenting to learn, but it is worth it! I have done much work myself to figure out the best lighting techniques and I still often struggle to do it just the way I would like.

As always, do plenty of research to determine which video editing software, cameras, and lighting equipment are best for you!

Conclusion

When first starting, all of this can seem daunting, but as you experiment more with things they will get easier. It has taken many years for me to get all of this figured out, and with software oftentimes being discontinued or changing, it is a never ending task to determine what will be best to use and even learn new software. But I hope that these suggestions can give you a good starting point for researching which products will work for you!