ITEN 0 Let’s talk
Our story
Photo, video & social April 2022 — April 2023 completed

The Lake Como masterclasses, on video

In spring 2022, for the International Piano Academy Lake Como, we filmed the lessons of Sir András Schiff, Stanislav Ioudenitch and William Grant Naboré: three cameras, the drone, 360°, ambisonic audio, a live control room and, at the end, the trailer.

Lake Como filmed from the drone in spring: blue water, a white ferry on the left, the Bellagio promontory with its pale houses and, behind, mountains with snowy peaks.

A masterclass lasts a few days: one teacher, one piano, one student at a time. What is said in those hours, if nobody records it, stays only with the people who were there. In spring 2022 the International Piano Academy Lake Como asked us to film both of its masterclasses.

April: Schiff and Ioudenitch

On 11 and 12 April 2022, the lessons of Sir András Schiff and Stanislav Ioudenitch. Three cameras in the room, each with its own job: one frontal, also on a gimbal, one on the zoom, one on the piano and the teacher’s voice, because in a lesson the words matter as much as the notes. The audio was recorded on a Zoom H3-VR, an ambisonic recorder, and we edited it in stereo under the pictures. Outside, the drone over the lake.

Then the edit, one lesson per student, in a wide and a close version. And on 12 April the group photo, teachers and students in front of the piano room.

Teachers and students standing in front of the Academy’s villa, on the cobbles, between the white shutters; through the open door you can see the pianos. Some of them are laughing.
The group photo, 12 April 2022.

May: Naboré, in Cadenabbia

On 17 May the second masterclass, in Cadenabbia, with William Grant Naboré. Three years earlier Naboré had been the executive producer of Margherita Torretta’s Scarlatti album, whose sessions we had filmed. This time the lessons and the final concert went through a live control room: the cameras fed a computer running OBS, and the control room recorded while the lesson was happening. Around it, footage with three lenses, the Insta360 One X2 360° camera and the ambisonic audio again.

Out of the control room came the lesson videos, one per student, the whole concert and an excerpt for Instagram.

A young pianist in tails plays a grand piano, filmed from the side; behind him the seated audience and the large arched windows with the light of the lake.
The concert on 17 May, as it came out of the control room.

The trailer

With the footage of the two masterclasses we edited the Academy’s trailer: the lake from the drone, hands on the keyboard, the lessons, the end credits with the three masters and the seven young pianists. Five versions, between September 2022 and April 2023, up to the final one.

263 files in all, about 3.4 terabytes: lessons, concert, drone, 360° and audio, all archived.

Photos and frames: GR STUDIO SRL.

The next story

In the dark, in the foreground, a video camera’s monitor frames the stage of the Conservatory’s hall with the piano. Photo, video & social

2022 — 2026Nicolini Conservatory, Piacenza

Almost two thousand shots: the Nicolini’s concerts in photographs

In 2022 and 2023 we photographed thirty-five concerts and events of the Nicolini Conservatory: 1,947 photos for the website, social media and the archive. And between 2025 and 2026, the New Sisters choir.

Read