The Legacy of Duo: Viola and Violoncello

The Legacy of Duo: Viola and Violoncello is the latest album from Vivid Productions. It features two masters of their instruments in Japan – Yuki Hyakutake (Viola) and Masaharu Kanda (Cello). The album is the first work of Vivid Productions joint project “Project OVEST Duo” with composer Tatsuhiko Nishioka’s NOISIA Co., Ltd.

The Legacy of Duo features a wide range of repertoire, from baroque to contemporary songs.  The music is performed by two masters, and the songs are meticulously crafted to convey the charm of music. We invite the listener to enjoy the rich sound of Wien Hall in Fuchu City, Tokyo where the album was recorded.

The recording was made at Wien Hall in Fuchu City, Tokyo in September 2021 when the heat was still lingering. Even in the latter half of September, the temperature was still high, and the air conditioning had to be turned off during the recording. The session was held while cooling the equipment with Ice, but with the teamwork of all the staff we were able to complete the recording safely.

Recording Engineer Kengo Nishimoto from Vivid Productions tells us “Before beginning this recording session we discussed the main goals of the recording. Producer Tatsuhiko Nishioka stated that he wanted to “clearly capture the touch of two masters that Japan is proud of.” The artists wanted to “make a recording that makes the most of the ambience and reverb sound of the hall.”

The Wien Hall in Tokyo where the recording was made has a profound sound and a rich history of great recordings. Although Tokyo in September 2021 was still in the middle of summer, it was a recording session with many restrictions on the use of the hall due to the influence of COVID-19.

The choice of microphones is always a key part of any recording.  For this album, I selected this combination of microphones:
-Ribbon microphone to capture the player’s touch clearly.
-Condenser microphone as the main microphone for recording performances while taking advantage of the sound of the hall.
-Condenser microphone as an ambience microphone for picking up the reverberation of the hall.

I originally wanted to use the Neumann M50 or M150 as the main mic, but I chose the Neumann TLM 50. The reason I like to use this series of mics is because of their excellent phase characteristics, which accurately capture the nuances of musical harmony and reverberation. I prepared four Neumann KM120s for the ambience mic, but I didn’t use them in this mix due to the excellence of the main microphone.

As a result, we were able to obtain sound that satisfied all of the staff, with the characteristics of the two types of microphones successfully fused. Regarding the noise processing in the song, it is not processed because of the request of the player, “The noise during the performance feels the player’s reality, but it is a kind of musical sound, so please leave it.”

I am very interested in how listeners feel about the high-resolution sound created in this way. So, please enjoy the performances of these two masters who are the pride of Japan.”

The Legacy of Duo was recorded in Stereo PCM 384 kHz. It is available in that format as well as Stereo DSD (up to DSD 512) exclusively at Native DSD Music. This is a DSD Exclusive, Not Available on SACD release.

Yuki Hyakutake – Viola
Masaharu Kanda – Cello