A bit little while after booking our lunchtime concert in Leatherhead's "Music on Thursdays at LMC" series, the world changed forever...
We postponed our concert from May to October as apparently everything would then be back to normal.. We exchanged so many emails with our friend Peter Steadman who organises the Festival and we had to move the date again and again, until Peter told us about his brilliant idea: to create an e-Festival!! Among other artists we were asked to produce a pre-recorded e-concert specifically made for the Music on Thursdays audience. And that's what we did. The concert was promoted on the Festival's website and on our Fb fan pages, and it was premiered on the 8th of October (Thursday of course) on YouTube. (link included at the end, please skip to 14 minutes 20 seconds)
It was quite a special experience for us as we had to simulate a concert as it would be presented live, which is not as simple as it sounds...
When something is recorded (even if it should feel like a non-stop performance) it has to be more prepared and staged than a live concert, it takes more time and effort and here is why. When you have the option to re-record something that did not go so well, you do it.. When you talk about a piece and do not phrase something in a proper way or when there is quite an audible slip in the performance, you want to fix it, you become more picky.
The audience probably becomes pickier too; that's how it feels! Of course, we are talking about very rough editing. The recording is still amateur and cannot be compared to a professional video production. We just wanted to rewrite some parts in order to keep to a minimum recording standard. It isn't a flawless recording, but the most important thing, which is achieved, is that the energy passes to the audience (who enjoyed our performance a lot according to the feedback). Also, the music is expressed and communicated in a very satisfying way for us! We would like to thank Peter for organizing the Festival and for inviting us to be part of it!
Due to Covid-19 we had to create some videos during the lockdown and this has been good experience for us! Little by little we are learning a new skill which we will definitely continue to use in the post-Covid-19 era (if this is a realistic prospect). This was one of our longest videos and we are really happy with it!
We enjoyed the whole process very much and we also had the chance to work on two pieces we are preparing for our first album recording in a few days. We will keep you posted about this adventure in the future! For now enjoy our performance!