Grand Piano Session Footage (Patreon)

Direct link: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1667aeG3UXHto3j0uMTm9ZxYcNS4PwRjl/view

A couple of weeks ago I rented out a room in which I recorded a bunch of grand piano footage for the medley, and I'm finally able to share with you how it turned out. I'm happy to report that it was a great success!

The main motivation for shooting a real grand piano as opposed to my usual keyboard is due to a single track that's been haunting me ever since I arranged it: Cynthia's theme. I knew it had to be in the medley but from day 1 I had lingering doubts if it was even possible to play. Sure, there's a handful of covers out there (and some of them are quite impressive!) but not a single one that I've seen plays the left-hand arpeggios doubled up an octave like in the original. Some might argue that it's a small detail, but I really believe that the extra octave fills a space that makes the track feel somewhat empty without it, so I decided to challenge myself to see how I can make it happen.

I only have 2 hands, so it became clear that this was going to be a 2-person job. I could record both parts independently by myself, but to ease the workload and make the performance more impressive, I wanted someone to perform it beside me. Lucky for me, my girlfriend happens to be a talented pianist, so I pitched the idea. Naturally, after hearing the piece she was intimidated at first, but with a little coaxing I managed to convince her to give it a shot.

Now I'm in a position where I have someone talented enough to play this extraordinarily difficult piece with me, so I'm thinking to myself, "does a keyboard seem like an appropriate instrument to play such a piece?" After a few dead ends the stars aligned, and I was able to rent out this ideal space with an instrument worthy to play this piece on.

The attached clip is a mere 30 seconds but the amount of practice and preparation that went into making it happen was borderline madness. Now that that massive hurdle is behind me, it feels like it's all downhill from here on out.