PianoArp
Acoustic piano over synth arpeggios, filmed.
PianoArp is a music-and-video project pairing self-composed synth arpeggiator loops with acoustic piano melodies played over them, captured as short performance videos. It runs on a deliberately minimal two-rig setup and a repeatable capture-to-export pipeline, designed so the system stays out of the way and the playing remains the point.
The problem
Turning casual piano playing into polished, goosebump-inducing performance videos usually demands a heavy studio and workflow. The goal was a lightweight, low-cost setup that makes shipping finished pieces easy without automating away the actual musicianship.
What I built
A two-rig system on roughly $670 of gear: a bag-sized 'go' rig (tablet, a 25-key Bluetooth controller, GarageBand) for composing loops anywhere, and a 'capture' rig (laptop, audio interface, a matched small-diaphragm condenser pair, headphones) for recording an acoustic upright. Software cost is zero, with a clear upgrade path to a hardware synth and a pro DAW only when real ceilings are hit.
How it works
Compose a synth loop anywhere on the go rig, then record piano against the loop played through headphones as a silent metronome so the mics capture pure acoustic tone. A hand clap serves as a video sync marker, and an ffmpeg-based pipeline handles mix, sync, and export back at the home rig.
Where it stands
Active project with a defined spec and workflow. Music stays personally composed by design (no auto-composition, no upload automation), keeping the tooling as scaffolding around the performance rather than a replacement for it.