Festival Piacenza Musica 2021: the concert hall, multitrack

The Festival Piacenza Musica is the Nicolini Conservatory’s September event. The 2021 edition, from 11 to 19 September, was subtitled “…E risonavan per l’aere”, a line from Dante, to whom three talks were devoted: some thirty free events, more than fifty musicians, almost all of them teachers at the institution, between the concert hall and the cloister.

From 11 to 14 September we recorded it: audio, video and photos.

The opening night

On 11 September, the presentation of the book for the Conservatory’s 180 years and the opening concert. Enrico Dindo conducted the orchestra and played as soloist, in a Beethoven programme.

We followed it from the afternoon rehearsal to the encore. The video from six camera positions: three GH5S, two camcorders and a camera on the stage; then the multi-camera edit in 4K, with colour grading. The audio multitrack: four spot microphones, two stereo pairs, a mid-side pair, a shotgun microphone and a cardioid on the solo cello, plus an ambisonic microphone at the rehearsal. Thirteen tracks, to be mixed afterwards.

And the photos: 555 shots in RAW, from the rehearsal to the applause.

The days after

• 12 September. “Qui dove il mare luccica” in the afternoon, “Perché sei tu Romeo” in the evening, and the “American song book”.
• 13 September. Sarlo’s piano recital, a talk, “Peter and the Wolf”.
• 14 September. The string quintet with Schubert, the solo violin, the moving gimbal shots of “Acque erranti”, and the evening concert-talk.

Each event had its own recording project, with its own tracks and cameras. 1,130 files in all, about 1.6 terabytes.

The festival was covered by Piacenza Music Pride, on 25 August and on 11 September 2021, in Italian. The concert hall of that evening, with the control room and network rebuilt the following year, is told in The Nicolini’s concert hall rebuilt.

Photos: GR STUDIO SRL, 11 September 2021.