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Platinum Member Username: Jan_b_vigneDallas, TX Post Number: 18664 Registered: May-04 | . From a musician/sound tech's point of view ... https://www.premierguitar.com/articles/22043-acoustic-soundboard-its-all-in-your -head |
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Platinum Member Username: Jan_b_vigneDallas, TX Post Number: 18666 Registered: May-04 | . From an audio reviewer, who also happens to be a musician, and a discussion of two points of view ... https://www.stereophile.com/content/clowns-left-me-jokers-right . |
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Bronze Member Username: Liquid_sunPost Number: 67 Registered: Apr-10 | Thanks for sharing the articles. So basically at our homes we are listening to the production rather than to our speakers. True. I completely agree that live music should be reference for everything we are investing in our home systems. However, listening on a high fidelity system through high quality productions (esp. with live recorded music) gives extraordinary almost live like feeling when listening at home. This feeling you cannot achieve with poorly system. When doing a proper setup for my speakers which i do always before critical listening (thanks to you Jan ) my reference is Bill Evans Trio - Waltz For Debby recorded live at the Village Vanguard, New York City, 1961 (Riverside Records). This recording is so good that listening at home is like the whole band is performing in front of me. The size of the soundstage, the energy, the dynamics imaging etc are simply incredible. |
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Platinum Member Username: Jan_b_vigneDallas, TX Post Number: 18668 Registered: May-04 | . By now there really is little you're listening to that has not been manipulated by several individuals in the recording and post production process of creating a sellable product. The further you move away from "audiophile" recordings - not remasters of a Steely Dan album - the more likely it will be that the recording bears little actual resemblance to the original performance. That, however, represents the dichotomy of recordings of popular music vs "audiophile" recordings of (mostly) unfamiliar music. First, allow me to correct one of the semantic errors I consider problematic in audio. You do not "listen to" your speakers. Speakers are by their nature inert items which make no sound on their own. Nothing in an audio system makes a sound - unless you drop it on the floor. You can listen to music reproduced through your system, which would include speakers or headphones. Then however we have to return to a question I asked many, many months ago; are you a subjective listener? Or, are you an objective listener? If you are the objective type, as long as the specs for the equipment match your ideals, there is nothing that will influence the sound of the system. Components have no character and only transducers (speakers, phono cartridges, tape heads and microphones) affect the "sound of" the music. Of course, you never truly listen through the components, you are always hearing the room's influence on the pressure waves created by the loudspeakers. Therefore, whether you are an objective or a subjective listener, as long as you are sending music through a loudspeaker positioned within your room, you are still not truly listening to the quality of music created solely by "the system". On the other hand, if you are a subjective listener, you assume EACH component in the signal chain has some influence on the final presentational character of the music as it exits the loudspeaker and is then influenced by the room's acoustic signature. And there's the rub as far as a reference goes. Commercial recordings exist because of multiple stages of post production manipulation of the "master" recording. Even the master seldom reflects exactly what occurred in the original performance, certainly not if you are interested in what you would have heard within the studio vs what you would have heard from the master tape produced to send on to post production processing. There may not even have been an original performance as such as many recordings today are pieced together from disparate bits accumulated from different musicians playing in different studios across the globe, often at different times, and pieced together without all of the musicians having actually played together or even seen one another. That means different studios, different microphones, different isolation booths, different producers working with different systems at different times. Each with their own "reference systems" and each with their own idea what the final product should "sound like". Due to the nature of musical instruments and whether microphones "like them" or not, the guitar or bass your favorite performer uses in concert might not have even been the actual instrument they played in the studio. 164 channel mixers and 18 different mics on just the drum set mean there is no real reference quality as time and phase issues create slurred and colored recreations of the original event. For the most part, modern commercial recordings have long ago left behind any semblance of reality. At least that is, in comparison with previous recording techniques and the very best of the "audiophile" recordings, which IMO reached their apex with the mid 1970's and through the early 1980's Sheffield Direct to Disc analog recordings. Sheffield returned to very simple, and very minimal, microphone techniques which captured the performers playing together as they would have in an actual concert performance. There where no tapes used in the initial run of the LP's pressed. The mics (usually no more than three) routed to the mixer to create a stereo feed to a cutting lathe which created the master disc as the performance played out. No spotlighting of performers and no over dubs or edits. If someone screwed up, the recording was stopped, a new master disc was put on the lathe and the performance began again from the beginning. Entire sides of an LP were cut in real time. No eq, no time delays or extra circuitry between the mics and the cutting head. Of course, the nature of producing the master disc meant only a handful of LP's could be pressed from several masters before the original master disc was too worn to produce clean copies. Tapes were recorded during the original performance but sold only with the disclaimer that these discs were not taken from the original master lathe cuttings. CD's produced by Sheffield, while of excellent overall quality, were taken from these tapes as were later re-issues of the most popular recordings. In any case, one person controlled the "sound" of what went into the final product. Every aspect of the recording and monitoring systems were named for the buyer's use on the back of the jacket. Therefore, the listing of all instruments and equipment allowed the formation of a fairly realistic mental image of what should be expected from the final product on each and every Sheffield disc. Sheffield discs therefore were highly consistent products which could be used to establish a reference character of certain instruments as they were presented in numerous productions. Variations from the original performance heard in the studio were kept to a minimum in order to maintain a consistent sound from a specific piano or string instrument. Of course, differences would be perceived by the listener due to their own system and room acoustics. If the listener perceived a variance between Sheffield discs, it was due to a variance in the selected instruments and the specific studio or venue used in the original performance from recording to recording or to the character of the listener's system and room. Obviously, the character of the same recording played back through solid state and Klipschorns would be noticeably different than when played through tubes and electrostatic panels. Most Importantly, the entire performance was recorded by all musicians simultaneously as if the effort was to perform, not to "make a record". Microphones were placed so the time and phase arrival of each instrument's output would reach the microphones in real time as if the final mix were exactly what a listener at the original performance would have perceived. Prior to the late 1940's and the advent of tape as a recording medium, this is how all recordings were made. To be the most faithful to what would have been heard at the original performance, one microphone would have captured the event - or, as we know from the binaural recordings made in the 1970's, two identical microphones placed as if they were within the ears of a "dummy head". There have never been recordings produced - at least, that I am aware of - which were as faithful to the original performance as were the original Sheffield discs. They began the "audiophile" recordings craze and other companies copied many of Sheffield's techniques, though the music was generally of a lower quality level than what Sheffield was turning out. My computer is not caring much for the ecoustic site this evening. I'm going to stop here and I will continue tomorrow. . |
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Gold Member Username: MagfanUSA Post Number: 3538 Registered: Oct-07 | Even WORSE are movies where 'effects' are manipulated to produce the biggest visceral effect on the listener. Nobody has any idea what any of that stuff is supposed to sound like. People who consider themselves 'discriminateing' listeners and confine themselves mainly to movies are fooling themselves. And in multi-channel systms of 5.1 and above, I have no idea how much music has actually been mixed with that kind of reproduction in mind. Which leads to yet another layer of fog and appreciation of effects and 'WOW' over musical values. |
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Platinum Member Username: Jan_b_vigneDallas, TX Post Number: 18669 Registered: May-04 | . No one should expect "reference sound" from a film soundtrack. Setting aside the foley effects and grand explosions, the music which accompanies a film has never - actually never - ascribed to the minimalist concept of recording. That is not to say there aren't excellent film scores for judging certain aspects of a system's performance, only to say you must address each recording on its own merits. If you like jazz on the more structured side - no improvs and no "jazz chords" - you might find a copy of Bernard Hermann's "Taxi Driver" of value. It is well recorded and the music is scored and performed to meet the highest standards of "soundtrack" music. It is intentionally emotional with obvious emphasis placed on various instruments in order to produce the emotional impact of the action occurring on screen. If music is not to be about emotions and emotional recall, then you might as well listen to MP3's on an iPhone. Where to place such a recording however is not at the beginning of your endeavors to create a reference sound for yourself - though that too is not to say you shouldn't go ahead and pick up a copy of the soundtrack, it scores high on the most vital aspect of music; does this make me want to sit down and only listen to the music? The contrasts between the Sheffield recordings (let's take the Sheffield Harry James recordings to keep things on a more or less even keel) and the Hermann soundtrack are numerous and obvious to virtually any listener. Yet, they both share the goal of making music that, when reproduced through any system, is interesting. Assuming we all can agree the system can only reflect what is sent through the system, thus neither adding nor subtracting anything of its own into the music, then both recordings are of equal merit in that the two sources are very high quality though not equivalent. In other words, you can very much enjoy the music and you can get the sense of how music affects you without needing the most "accurate" recording techniques. You may even begin to formulate ideas which deal with how intentional deviations from "accuracy" are worthy of consideration. (There is one audio store here in Dallas which claims its components are highly "accurate" and buying from them assures an "accurate" playback. I've always found their idea of "accurate" to be a bit of a subterfuge which is telling the buyer they need not concern themself with developing a "reference", the shop has done all the hard work for the buyer. Give us your money and we will give you "accuracy" - or, at the least, accuracy as the shop owner perceives it to be. The shop thus becomes the chef and you dare not cross the chef when it comes to the taste of, and satisfaction derived from, the final product - presentation is everything with this shop IMO. Yet, for me and particularly for my musical (p)references and for my reference qualities which go into a great music playback system, their components and systems tend to be less than "interesting" and fall short of being musical even when the components are known for their inherent musicality. Some of my reaction to their tastes in systems may be due to their store's acoustics and I've only once heard one of their systems outside of their shop. Yet it comes down to how they are selling vs what they are selling IMO. Like a politician saying, "Trust me.", audio shops IMO have a certain obligation to show they can deliver on their promises.) "Interesting" though is subjective. It is also why no one could, or should, live only on a diet of Sheffield quality recordings. You should not be picking your recordings because they make your system sound "good" or sound a certain way. That is putting the cart in front of the horse and that has always been a consistent issue with "audiophiles" vs "music lovers". An old saw is the audiophile's system costs more than their record collection while the music lover reverses the per centages. . |
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Platinum Member Username: Jan_b_vigneDallas, TX Post Number: 18670 Registered: May-04 | . So, when I asked a client what they were looking for in a system or a component, the most typical answer was, "Tight bass, clear mids and clean highs." And, while I would have occasionally appreciated a response that said, "I want something that makes the music interesting", "interesting" is not by itself a reference for anything that means something. Another very common response I was given by clients was their desire to have their home audio system sound like their car stereo. For whatever their personal reasons, they found the sound of their car system was more "interesting" than their home system - or I assumed whatever contact they had made with live music itself. The clients who had that reference certainly never could explain what they found interesting about their car systems or the music they heard played back through their car systems. They only knew that was a reference sound for them because, to their way of thinking, it was more interesting - even, I assumed, than the real thing. Of course, I had no idea what their car's system "sounded like". And I certainly didn't have any idea what they found "interesting" about that presentation. I made it clear to those clients that I could not take their 3500 cubic foot domestic living room and recreate the acoustics of their car's roughly 120-200 cubic foot automotive interior. We moved forward from that understanding. There was actually a time when car systems were not the ideal for anyone's reproduction of music. However, I certainly remember adding an underdash 8 track player and some upgraded rear deck speakers to my 1964 Oldsmobile's system, with the output of the tape deck running through the amplifier of the OEM in dash AM only radio. Waaaaay more better, as a friend would say. Not accurate and barely what we would call musical today, but better. In 1964 no car system, and most home systems, did not have to concern themself with many of the values now associated with a premium playback chain. When the music was the only thing the designers had to deal with, they made the most of making the music "interesting". And I remember in the early 1980's when the Japanese luxury brands such as Acura and Lexus began selling their cars with factory equipped upgraded systems designed for them by major name brand audio companies. The after market car audio business began to catch hold at that point and, though brands such as Pioneer, Kenwood and Craig had been in the business of selling after market components for many years, lines like Yamaha and Nakamichi began to think they should have a share of that profit. I distinctly remember the Yamaha rep doing a presentation for the store's staff and claiming the Yamaha head units actually allowed the listener (the driver of the car that is) to appreciate the "imaging" of the system. Needless to say all of the store staff broke out in laughter, and a bit of horror, at the thought of driving down the road while the car coming the other way had a driver who was paying attention to the "imaging" of the system made by speakers that were behind him and at his feet mounted in the door kick panels. By this time (the early to mid 1980's), the major subjective review magazines of the day were discussing (sometimes creating) values which were said to be of importance in a home audio system of superior quality. Imaging, soundstaging, detail retreival, depth and width, "palpable presence" were replacing musical values such as timbre and tone or temporal impact. The differences were plain to see; what was coming into vogue was the adoption of values which clearly had to do with the recording and its veracity rather than the values of the performance and its emotional pull on the listener. It was rather simple to say the system imaged well if you could identify the vocalist was center stage and the lead guitarist was not. Not much difficulty to tell whether the violins were to your left or not. Did you hear the piano player move their feet to get in position for the next piece? OK, the system had good detail retrieval. Even the sound of the HVAC systems in a venue switching on and off or the sound of the subway trains running near the venue were deemed of value to the "acccuracy" of the system. One listener pointed out a car door slamming outside the venue during a recording and said that made his system more "realistic". All of which, IMO, are only artifacts of the recording process as they have absolutely nothing to do with the performance of the music and their absence would in no way degrade the music or its performance in any reasonable manner. And, yet, by their removal we often get a glimpse of the first signs of manipulation of the recording possible by editing or overdubbing. So, is the recording the better or the worse for their inclusion? The Bill Evans recording makes the case for both sides of the proper response to that question. With the emphasis placed on the recording's qualities however, whether the first or second violinist played with a certain instrument whose timbre could be recognized and appreciated was being eroded as a "priority" to faithful playback of the original event. The questions of whether the score was performed competently and with emotional connection, clear intent and forward momentum while also producing a tone that suited the score and the concepts of the composer, the conductor and the performers was being pushed aside and was rapidly falling to the wayside. What mattered was what the recording did to show off the system, not the performers doing their job as best they knew how. I believe I have mentioned J.G. Holt's attempt at creating an audio glossary which could be used by Stereophile's readers to place everyone on the same page when certain descriptive terms where used; https://www.stereophile.com/reference/50/index.html IMO it was a brilliant concept which allowed everyone to know what someone meant when they said a component was, let's say, "warm", meaning the music reproduced through that component was perceived to have certain values which made the presentation different than if the music were heard to be neutral or even cool. It was a gigantic effort by Holt that went largely unused as not many audio buyers wanted to be bothered to learn what anyone else meant, not even the reviewers they were using for their equipment recommendations. I have even been told such a glossary doesn't matter because it only matters what the individual using the term meant by the use of the term. Which, of course, simply ignores the reason for a common language shared by those attempting to communicate with others. Sort of like one person speaking English to the street vendor in Rome. The most typical reaction from the American speaking English when they are not being understood is to simply shout louder in the same English to make themself "understood". Therefore, we have to understand what a "reference" means before we can go out in search of one. . |
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Gold Member Username: KbearCanada Post Number: 1204 Registered: Dec-06 | The past several weeks I have been selecting tracks for a reference disc. Over the years I have grown to appreciate the need for good reference recordings of live acoustic instruments, where there is no amplification or studio tricks employed. I still have examples of amplified recordings on said disc, as this makes up a lot of what I listen to on a regular basis, but I recognize that the test disc is not a disc to sit back and enjoy. Rather, it is meant to reveal certain things about the performance of a system. Thus, I have tried to choose songs not simply because I like them (if I do then bonus), but because each one is there to tell me something specific about the system. This is not to say that a performance that is largely a studio creation cannot reveal things. I think it can, but the focus would be on other aspects of the sound. The Stereophile test discs are very useful, because they contain music that was recorded very simply and they explain, based on the mic(s) used and the location, what cues to listen for. On top of a couple of selections from those discs, I have two Sheffield recordings, a Naim Audio disc of piano and bass guitar, a track from the Trinity Session, and a track from Neil Young's performance at Massey Hall. These are more or less the audiophile recordings that I've chosen, which I believe are quite authentic to the actual performance. I have paid attention to live acoustic performances when I've had a chance to hear them, but this doesn't happen as often as I'd like. Still, remembering to some degree how that music sounds is very helpful in gauging how close a system can create the illusion of a live performance, and this is now the illusion that I'm looking for. That raw, lively, dynamic quality. The discussion of Bill Evans' Vanguard recordings (in this thread and the B&W vs. Monitor Audio thread) was very interesting and has prompted me to pick up the 3 disc set. Over time I have learned to appreciate jazz and classical more and more; discovering these new (well, for me) forms of music can be very exciting, and I haven't even begun to scratch the surface. |