The Best Part of the Inauguration was Pre-Recorded

In my Random Thoughts on the Inauguration post Tuesday I mentioned the classical quartet piece featuring violin, cello, clarinet and piano and how good it sounded. Given the 20 degree weather and windy conditions, the audio was remarkable. No wonder - it was pre-recorded:

It was not precisely lip-synching, but pretty close.

The somber, elegiac tones before President Obama’s oath of office at the inauguration on Tuesday came from the instruments of Yo-Yo Ma, Itzhak Perlman and two colleagues. But what the millions on the Mall and watching on television heard was in fact a recording, made two days earlier by the quartet and matched tone for tone by the musicians playing along.

The players and the inauguration organizing committee said the arrangement was necessary because of the extreme cold and wind during Tuesday’s ceremony. The conditions raised the possibility of broken piano strings, cracked instruments and wacky intonation minutes before the president’s swearing in (which had problems of its own).

“Truly, weather just made it impossible,” Carole Florman, a spokeswoman for the Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies, said on Thursday. “No one’s trying to fool anybody. This isn’t a matter of Milli Vanilli,” Ms. Florman added, referring to the pop band that was stripped of a 1989 Grammy because the duo did not sing on their album and lip-synched in concerts.

Ms. Florman said that the use of a recording was not disclosed beforehand but that the NBC producers handling the television pool were told of its likelihood the day before.

The network said it sent a note to pool members saying that the use of recordings in the musical numbers was possible. Inaugural musical performances are routinely recorded ahead of time for just such an eventuality, Ms. Florman said. The Marine Band and choruses, which performed throughout the ceremony, did not use a recording, she said.

Maybe they should have pre-recorded the oath of office too.

It doesn't surprise me that the Marines played live. All they have to do is look at the cold wind and it turns around and goes the other way.

Being a musician myself in a family full of musicians I was feeling sorry for the performers who had a really tough job of making difficult, beautiful music in horrendous conditions. I was amazed at how well they pulled it off. The fact that it was pre-recorded didn't even occur to me (it should have given the quality of the sound) but in retrospect doesn't really surprise me. However, a little disclosure would have been appropriate.

If you missed it, you can see the YouTube version here.