Uphill: Live and Fake!

Here's the final already finished, "off-the-shelf" piece for the Trek album. From now on, I'll have to become creative again. Ouch!

  Uphill by pethu 

This one has more of a "live combo" feel to it compared to previously published pieces, basically because it is slightly more live - but not much. In fact, the only authentic thing in here is my pretty Epiphone Les Paul:

However, the amp it runs through is a just a Fender Twin emulation inside the computer:

Moving on, the piano part that the entire piece is built around is played in real time by me on an S. Erard 1922 Half Grand Piano:

However, I'm not using a physical piano here and not even a sampled one. No, the Erard has been recreated as a pure mathematical model in the amazing Modartt Pianoteq software, so what you are hearing are — maths. Sounding very, very much like a piano.

Finally, the drums are sampled but neither played nor fully programmed by me. Instead, they are played by an artificial brain inside the Rayzoon Jamstix drummer software. When given a basic pattern to play, this "robot drummer" then tries to recreate all the little embellishments and imperfections of a real drummer — in fact, one has a choice of several artificial drummer personalities to spice up the rhythm!