Mike Garson

"My whole life I awaited in disbeliefe that there would ever be a great piani sample library. Finally, Ivory came about, and I have used the Steinway sample on at least 100 recordings, and no one has ever questioned that it wasn´t my real piano"

Garson's stage rig is elegant and powerful. His piano is a Yamaha GranTouch Disklavier digital piano. "They put a real piano action in there," says Garson. 'Feel is really important to me, and it feels right." Atop the GranTouch sits a Yamaha Motif 8, to the left of which are a fully pumped-up Kurzweil K2600 and the remote for an offstage KSP-8 effects processor. A pair of M-Audio BX8 monitors flank the piano and on its music rack is a Freehand Music Pad Pro, which holds Garson's charts. Yamaha P90 and Kurzweil PC2 digital pianos are placed offstage.

Garson's stage rig is elegant and powerful. His piano is a Yamaha GranTouch Disklavier digital piano. "They put a real piano action in there," says Garson. 'Feel is really important to me, and it feels right." Atop the GranTouch sits a Yamaha Motif 8, to the left of which are a fully pumped-up Kurzweil K2600 and the remote for an offstage KSP-8 effects processor. A pair of M-Audio BX8 monitors flank the piano and on its music rack is a Freehand Music Pad Pro, which holds Garson's charts. Yamaha P90 and Kurzweil PC2 digital pianos are placed offstage.

Garson's stage rig is elegant and powerful. His piano is a Yamaha GranTouch Disklavier digital piano. "They put a real piano action in there," says Garson. 'Feel is really important to me, and it feels right." Atop the GranTouch sits a Yamaha Motif 8, to the left of which are a fully pumped-up Kurzweil K2600 and the remote for an offstage KSP-8 effects processor. A pair of M-Audio BX8 monitors flank the piano and on its music rack is a Freehand Music Pad Pro, which holds Garson's charts. Yamaha P90 and Kurzweil PC2 digital pianos are placed offstage.

Garson's stage rig is elegant and powerful. His piano is a Yamaha GranTouch Disklavier digital piano. "They put a real piano action in there," says Garson. 'Feel is really important to me, and it feels right." Atop the GranTouch sits a Yamaha Motif 8, to the left of which are a fully pumped-up Kurzweil K2600 and the remote for an offstage KSP-8 effects processor. A pair of M-Audio BX8 monitors flank the piano and on its music rack is a Freehand Music Pad Pro, which holds Garson's charts. Yamaha P90 and Kurzweil PC2 digital pianos are placed offstage.

Garson's stage rig is elegant and powerful. His piano is a Yamaha GranTouch Disklavier digital piano. "They put a real piano action in there," says Garson. 'Feel is really important to me, and it feels right." Atop the GranTouch sits a Yamaha Motif 8, to the left of which are a fully pumped-up Kurzweil K2600 and the remote for an offstage KSP-8 effects processor. A pair of M-Audio BX8 monitors flank the piano and on its music rack is a Freehand Music Pad Pro, which holds Garson's charts. Yamaha P90 and Kurzweil PC2 digital pianos are placed offstage.

From the Synthogy Soundcloud page:

November 22, 2010 - Ivory II Grand Pianos | Steinway Concert D Grand Mike Garson "The Things" An original improvisation by Mike Garson Mike Garson, Composer/Pianist, Mike Garson Publishing (BMI) mikegarson.com

On the road with M-Audio: “Last year I sat in with Gwen Stefani and her band during one performance. They brought me up to play on a song with them, and I played it off a ProKeys 88 stage piano, using the internal piano sounds. It was fun playing on it and it sounded great!"

No stranger to road life, Garson has recorded and toured with Bowie since the early 1970s. On this outing, his rig included a Yamaha Motif ES8 synthesizer and DGT2A Disklavier GranTouch combination. Both units were connected via MIDI to a Yamaha P90 which provided additional sounds, and a vintage 01V digital mixer housed in an offstage rack, plus a variety of outboard effects.

No stranger to road life, Garson has recorded and toured with Bowie since the early 1970s. On this outing, his rig included a Yamaha Motif ES8 synthesizer and DGT2A Disklavier GranTouch combination. Both units were connected via MIDI to a Yamaha P90 which provided additional sounds, and a vintage 01V digital mixer housed in an offstage rack, plus a variety of outboard effects.

Garson on M-Audio’s EX66 reference monitors: “Since Ive gotten the EX66 reference monitors, my musical output has more than doubled—this has to do with the great sounds I’ve been getting through the speakers. The statistics show that Ive doubled my output of composing—the sound helps inspire that, because when the sound is right I feel more inspired to compose. I removed my NS10 nearfield monitors, and I put the EX66’s right on my piano—they sound great and I’m really happy with them. I’m writing more, the sound is inspiring me and they are very powerful.

“Ive been a happy camper with the EX66’s—I love to blast them loud with a SBX subwoofer also. I have to inspire myself, and the sound is what does it for me. They sound as good as speakers that cost two or three thousand dollars. Theyre more exciting than my NS10’s, and are more emotional for me. I kept the NS10s on my piano for 23 years—now I’ve retired them and I’m using the EX66’s. They have a very accurate frequency response—when I heard them for the first time, I knew I wanted them.”

Garson on M-Audio’s Sputnik microphone: “I use the Sputnik microphones to get a better recording of my acoustic nine-foot concert grand piano. I have a pair of them in order to record the piano in stereo. I use TAMPA preamps with the Sputniks—they are a really excellent combination. I get a great piano sound using these great products together. As soon as I heard my first piano recording with the Sputnik, I heard that it was 30 to 40 percent better than the prior microphones I was using. The Sputniks are warmer and capture the essence of my sound a lot more accurately. My engineer first hooked them up, and he immediately heard the difference between it and the other microphones that I was using—he really seemed very impressed. I’d say that it gives me a more accurate representation of what I actually played. The combination has allowed me to compose a lot of music and I’ve been putting four or five new songs on my MySpace page each week because I’ve been so inspired.”

“I use the Oxygen 8 v2 and FireWire 410 on the road with my laptop. The Oxygen 8 is for fooling around, composing on the road, and just jamming on the bus to keep me from going bored from country to country. I usually jam on the bus with the Oxygen 8, FireWire 410 and Ableton Live.”

“I use the Oxygen 8 v2 and FireWire 410 on the road with my laptop. The Oxygen 8 is for fooling around, composing on the road, and just jamming on the bus to keep me from going bored from country to country. I usually jam on the bus with the Oxygen 8, FireWire 410 and Ableton Live.”

“I use the Oxygen 8 v2 and FireWire 410 on the road with my laptop. The Oxygen 8 is for fooling around, composing on the road, and just jamming on the bus to keep me from going bored from country to country. I usually jam on the bus with the Oxygen 8, FireWire 410 and Ableton Live.”

“I use GForce’s M-Tron, Minimonsta:Melohman and Oddity software synthesizers quite a bit—I like to mix my acoustic piano with all kinds of crazy electronic sounds, including these plug-ins."

“I use GForce’s M-Tron, Minimonsta:Melohman and Oddity software synthesizers quite a bit—I like to mix my acoustic piano with all kinds of crazy electronic sounds, including these plug-ins."

“I use GForce’s M-Tron, Minimonsta:Melohman and Oddity software synthesizers quite a bit—I like to mix my acoustic piano with all kinds of crazy electronic sounds, including these plug-ins."