The last time I wanted to record a voice announcement on my computer was a few years back, and as I recall I hooked up my Microsoft Lifechat headset and used Audacity to do the recording.
Now I want to record a "recitation", which consists of me playing my piano and talking over it.
I have a Casio CDP-230 digital piano but I've never tried hooking it up to my computer and making a recording. It does have a USB midi port on it, but I've never used it.
Has anyone else done something like this? I'm wondering what the easiest way to simultaneously record from a microphone and a digital piano would be.
On Mon, Jun 22, 2015 at 05:20:36PM -0600, Frank Cox wrote:
The last time I wanted to record a voice announcement on my computer was a few years back, and as I recall I hooked up my Microsoft Lifechat headset and used Audacity to do the recording.
Now I want to record a "recitation", which consists of me playing my piano and talking over it.
I have a Casio CDP-230 digital piano but I've never tried hooking it up to my computer and making a recording. It does have a USB midi port on it, but I've never used it.
Has anyone else done something like this? I'm wondering what the easiest way to simultaneously record from a microphone and a digital piano would be.
not having done it either, I nevertheless have a thought...
Still use Audacity, just make a separate track for the voice, then you can mix it down to however many tracks you want. that way you can redo the voice if you mess up, or re-mix if you don't like the levels. that's hard to do if you record it all into the same (set of) track(s).
I'd assume your piano also has an audio output, so you could plug it into a computer's line input and record from that. I'd further assume you'd prefer a "real" piano sound over midi. but I might be wrong there.
Good luck, and let us know how it goes.
On 06/22/2015 07:20 PM, Frank Cox wrote:
The last time I wanted to record a voice announcement on my computer was a few years back, and as I recall I hooked up my Microsoft Lifechat headset and used Audacity to do the recording.
Now I want to record a "recitation", which consists of me playing my piano and talking over it.
The USB MIDI port won't give you audio, just MIDI text.
What sort of sound card do you have? While most consumer PC sound cards won't let you mix one channel at mic level and one channel at line level, yours might actually be an exception, but the model of it would be needed to make that determination. Most pro-quality audio interfaces will let you do this, or are line input only.
To do this with a consumer card, you could set it for line level input and then run one channel straight from the piano's audio output and one channel through a mic preamp hooked to you microphone, with the output hooked to the other line input channel. Now, if you want to do stereo on the voice and piano, you'll either need a four channel card or you'll need to overdub, which Audacity among other programs can do. Ardour and Mixbus can do latency compensation for overdubs, but I don't know if Audacity can or not.
A Zoom H4N works well for this wort of thing, either doing its own recording or being a USB-connected soundcard, which is supposed to work ok even in a Linux.
On Tue, 23 Jun 2015 10:15:35 -0400 Lamar Owen wrote:
The USB MIDI port won't give you audio, just MIDI text.
That's what I thought. To this point, I've never done anything MIDI and I really don't know much about that; I just use my piano for the purpose of playing the piano.
What sort of sound card do you have?
description: Audio device product: 6 Series/C200 Series Chipset Family High Definition Audio Controller vendor: Intel Corporation
I think I will try to do this with Audacity as Fred Smith suggested. If I record the speaking part first, I can then somehow play it back and record the piano track while listening to the voice track to get the timing right. What I'm doing doesn't really have a beat or rhythm like a song -- it's a dramatic reading, but some of the words have a note or chord to sound along with them so getting it coordinated will be the challenge.
Thanks to everyone for the help and suggestions. I'll give this a shot and see what develops. The last time I used Audacity I just had a sound effect and a voice part. I recorded the voice part with Audacity, spliced in the sound effect and that was it. This is going to be a bit more complex.
On Tue, Jun 23, 2015 at 11:14:08AM -0600, Frank Cox wrote:
On Tue, 23 Jun 2015 10:15:35 -0400 Lamar Owen wrote:
The USB MIDI port won't give you audio, just MIDI text.
That's what I thought. To this point, I've never done anything MIDI and I really don't know much about that; I just use my piano for the purpose of playing the piano.
What sort of sound card do you have?
description: Audio device product: 6 Series/C200 Series Chipset Family High Definition Audio Controller vendor: Intel Corporation
I think I will try to do this with Audacity as Fred Smith suggested. If I record the speaking part first, I can then somehow play it back and record the piano track while listening to the voice track to get the timing right. What I'm doing doesn't really have a beat or rhythm like a song -- it's a dramatic reading, but some of the words have a note or chord to sound along with them so getting it coordinated will be the challenge.
Ah. You can also use Audacity to speed up or slow down a track by small amounts, without changing the pitch. This might allow you to make small adjustments in the speed of the voice recording to help make it fit in with the music the way you want.
On 6/23/2015 10:14 AM, Frank Cox wrote:
On Tue, 23 Jun 2015 10:15:35 -0400 Lamar Owen wrote:
The USB MIDI port won't give you audio, just MIDI text.
That's what I thought. To this point, I've never done anything MIDI and I really don't know much about that; I just use my piano for the purpose of playing the piano.
midi is the electronic equivalent of sheet music, or the song roll on a player piano. its just codes for notes and timings, its not the audio.
do note, if this is a stage grade electric piano, using big phone plugs, the audio level out is not quite the same as consumer line level that a computer input would want to record, you'll likely have to crank the recording level way up, increasing the noise floor of the recordings. the cure for this is something called a 'DI box' (Direct Input), or using an amplifier or mixer that has a consumer line (1V P-P) output. an alternative might be to use the headphone output of the synth, with it set to moderately loud volume levels (say, 6-7 on a 0-10 scale)
Once upon a time, John R Pierce pierce@hogranch.com said:
do note, if this is a stage grade electric piano, using big phone plugs, the audio level out is not quite the same as consumer line level that a computer input would want to record, you'll likely have to crank the recording level way up, increasing the noise floor of the recordings. the cure for this is something called a 'DI box'
Line-level is line-level. A keyboard will be putting out an unbalanced line-level signal, and a DI box converts that to a balanced mic-level signal (usually XLR) for a soundboard. Since most computers don't have XLR (or other balanced) input, a DI box is not needed or useful.
Some computers/sound cards only have unbalanced mic-level inputs instead of line-level (and some can be configured for mic or line); if you don't have a line-level input, your best bet is to get something that does (even a basic USB sound "card"), not to amp up the line-level signal to mic-level (especially because most of the mic inputs are mono, not stereo).
On 6/23/2015 10:54 AM, Chris Adams wrote:
Line-level is line-level. A keyboard will be putting out an unbalanced line-level signal, and a DI box converts that to a balanced mic-level signal (usually XLR) for a soundboard. Since most computers don't have XLR (or other balanced) input, a DI box is not needed or useful.
pro gear is typically +4 dBu, even if its single ended (unbalanced), while consumer stuff is -10dBV. +4 dBu is about 3.5V P-P, while -10dBV is about 0.9V P-P. you're right, I didn't mean that sort of DI box, you just need a level attentuator ("L-pad") to drop the unbalanced pro signal to something a consumer device can cope with (3.5V P-P will likely overdrive the input stage of the computer line input, causing rather nasty distortion).
On Tue, 23 Jun 2015 10:41:42 -0700 John R Pierce wrote:
do note, if this is a stage grade electric piano, using big phone plugs, the audio level out is not quite the same as consumer line level that a computer input would want to record,
My piano does indeed the big phone plugs.
I have some adapter plugs in my junk box that will probably serve to allow me to do the physical hook-up here. I was really hoping to be able to get this done without having to purchase additional hardware.
I'll have to dig out the manual for my piano and do a bit of reading to see what's really going on with those plugs and whatnot. The only thing I've ever plugged into it so far is headphones.
I was looking at a higher-end digital piano a while back that can record a wav file to a flash drive that you just plug into the piano. Which is starting to sound like a very handy feature to have available. That gives me one more reason to consider upgrading my piano someday, I suppose.
On 6/23/2015 2:05 PM, Frank Cox wrote:
I'll have to dig out the manual for my piano and do a bit of reading to see what's really going on with those plugs and whatnot. The only thing I've ever plugged into it so far is headphones.
if you can plug in headphones, then you can plug it into a computer line-in jack with a suitable cable, just set the headphone volume on the piano for about 60-70% of full range, thats a good approximation of 1V P-P line input.
make sure the piano is plugged into the same power strip or wall outlet as the computer to minimize potential for ground loop hum/buzz on your audio.
now, if you're going to be doing a /lot/ of this, and want to be able to do it in realtime (playing while reading), getting a little mixer panel, with an XLR microphone and integral digital recorder (typically recording to an SD card), might be useful. something like.... http://tascam.com/product/dp-006/ or http://tascam.com/product/dr-40/
that 2nd one is a pocket sized digital audio recorder with integral stereo microphones and line input, it will record 4 tracks (stereo mics, stereo line in) concurrently directly to an SD card, you can then edit the audio files in audacity or whatever to clean them up and balance the levels, etc. the recordings will also be much higher fidelity and cleaner sounding than most any PC sound card inputs.
On Tue, 23 Jun 2015 14:26:19 -0700 John R Pierce wrote:
if you can plug in headphones, then you can plug it into a computer line-in jack with a suitable cable, just set the headphone volume on the piano for about 60-70% of full range, thats a good approximation of 1V P-P line input.
Thank you ever so much for the help!
that 2nd one is a pocket sized digital audio recorder with integral stereo microphones and line input, it will record 4 tracks (stereo mics, stereo line in) concurrently directly to an SD card, you can then edit the audio files in audacity or whatever to clean them up and balance the levels, etc. the recordings will also be much higher fidelity and cleaner sounding than most any PC sound card inputs.
Now that looks like one dandy gadget! I might have to look at getting one of those at some point.
Never knew such a thing existed until now.
On 06/23/2015 05:14 PM, Frank Cox wrote: <<>>
I think I will try to do this with Audacity as Fred Smith suggested. If I record the speaking part first, I can then somehow play it back and record the piano track while listening to the voice track to get the timing right. What I'm doing doesn't really have a beat or rhythm like a song -- it's a dramatic reading, but some of the words have a note or chord to sound along with them so getting it coordinated will be the challenge.
. thinking about that, i agree to voice then music.
i was thinking along lines of a song, not a reading.
a reading would be more like adding music to a silent film where the music accents the action.
in your case, the music would accent the tone and emphasis of your voice.
as for usb, i thought back to when i went to a band recording set up with a friend, i was cautioned not to step on any of the cables connected between the equipment. i was told that they were usb cables and they were fragile. the cables also connected to a computer. maybe there was something special going on as like they were using all digital musical instruments.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USB#MIDI
anyway, how about posting where we can listen to your efforts.
On Tue, 23 Jun 2015 11:14:08 -0600 Frank Cox theatre@melvilletheatre.com wrote:
On Tue, 23 Jun 2015 10:15:35 -0400 Lamar Owen wrote:
The USB MIDI port won't give you audio, just MIDI text.
That's what I thought. To this point, I've never done anything MIDI and I really don't know much about that; I just use my piano for the purpose of playing the piano.
MIDI is used to translate your piano keystrokes into a digital format a computer can understand. You play on the keyboard, and the computer outputs the score of what you are playing, so that you don't need to write the score by hand. :-) That sort of thing.
I think I will try to do this with Audacity as Fred Smith suggested. If I record the speaking part first, I can then somehow play it back and record the piano track while listening to the voice track to get the timing right. What I'm doing doesn't really have a beat or rhythm like a song -- it's a dramatic reading, but some of the words have a note or chord to sound along with them so getting it coordinated will be the challenge.
Record first whatever has less silence --- if the piano part is continuous, record that first. Usually words have silence in between, and can be cut and shifted around (slightly) to match the piano. But if the piano is intermittent, record the voice first, and then cut&paste piano parts later, as you would with a sound effect.
Either way, for best results some dubbing and some tuning with Audacity will be unavoidable. :-)
HTH, :-) Marko
i did not know you had such talents Frank. ;-)
On 06/22/2015 06:20 PM, Frank Cox wrote:
The last time I wanted to record a voice announcement on my computer was a few years back, and as I recall I hooked up my Microsoft Lifechat headset and used Audacity to do the recording.
Now I want to record a "recitation", which consists of me playing my piano and talking over it.
I have a Casio CDP-230 digital piano but I've never tried hooking it up to my computer and making a recording. It does have a USB midi port on it, but I've never used it.
Has anyone else done something like this? I'm wondering what the easiest way to simultaneously record from a microphone and a digital piano would be.
i can not say that i have and not just because i do not play piano. :-)
i will make a suggestion, do it like it would be done in an actual recording studio.
1st- lay down the piano on a track until you get it like you want it to sound. 2nd- record the talk on a second track. 3rd- when you have second track like you want, mix the 2 to 1.
this way, you only have 1 thing to concentrate on at a time.
trying to play piano and keep beat can be difficult if you are also trying to read and talk.
that is presuming you can chew gum and walk at the same time. ((GBWG))
hth.
On 06/22/15 19:20, Frank Cox wrote:
The last time I wanted to record a voice announcement on my computer was a few years back, and as I recall I hooked up my Microsoft Lifechat headset and used Audacity to do the recording.
Now I want to record a "recitation", which consists of me playing my piano and talking over it.
I have a Casio CDP-230 digital piano but I've never tried hooking it up to my computer and making a recording. It does have a USB midi port on it, but I've never used it.
Has anyone else done something like this? I'm wondering what the easiest way to simultaneously record from a microphone and a digital piano would be.
1.) You can record the MIDI output with a program called MuseScore. MuseScore can then export the file in MP3 format which you can import into Audacity. Piano part done.
2.) Then record the voice part into Audacity on a separate track from a USB microphone plugged into your computer. Voice part done.
3.) Edit and mix the two tracks to your heart's delight with Audacity. Project done.
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Chris Adams -
Frank Cox -
Fred Smith -
g -
John R Pierce -
Lamar Owen -
Mark LaPierre -
Marko Vojinovic