"Black Backgrounds" in Music Reproduction?

[microstrip]

(...) I distinctly remember Myles B. Astor, a reviewer himself, starting a thread (possibly on his own site) on the term a few years ago, and treating the term as a disconcerting new phenomenon that he did not approve of.

Yes, a dozen posts using the inoffensive argument that he could not hear such thing at Carnegie Hall. Fortunately a reviewer (Steve Lefkowicz) dropped in to explain it with a good photographic analogy. BTW, I participated in the thread, as DDK did.

 

[Al M.]

Yes, a dozen posts using the inoffensive argument that he could not hear such thing at Carnegie Hall. Fortunately a reviewer (Steve Lefkowicz) dropped in to explain it with a good photographic analogy. BTW, I participated in the thread, as DDK did.

Ok, then you'll also remember that he treated it as a relatively new term. So much for it allegedly being a term already found in TAS in the 1980s or 90s.

 

[PeterA]

If you insist on addressing sound reproduction as if it is real music you will always add confusion. Two very different things. Can I suggest you to read what the creators of the recordings aim to?

I have never insisted that sound reproduction is real music. What a strange and nonsensical post distracting from the subject.

 

[Ron Resnick]

Fortunately a reviewer (Steve Lefkowicz)

Steve is a good man! He is a member of our Orange County Audio Posse.

 

[microstrip]

Ok, then you'll also remember that he treated it as a relatively new term. So much for it allegedly being a term already found in TAS in the 1980s or 90s.

The fact he ignored it does not prove anything. Robert Hartley used in Stereophile in December 1996, in a Wadia review.

 

[PeterA]

I distinctly remember Myles B. Astor, a reviewer himself, starting a thread (possibly on his own site) on the term a few years ago, and treating the term as a disconcerting new phenomenon that he did not approve of.

I found this comment by MEP from 2020 on Audio Nirvana. I completely agree with his sentiment.

 

[Al M.]

The fact he ignored it does not prove anything. Robert Hartley used in Stereophile in December 1996, in a Wadia review.

Link to that reference?

 

[hopkins]

I found this comment by MEP from 2020 on Audio Nirvana. I completely agree with his sentiment.

View attachment 145734

You may be interested in reading this:

Audio Philosophy

 

[Al M.]

Link to that reference?

Ok, found it:

Wadia Digimaster 2000 Mk.2 digital processors December 1996

Follow-Up from December 1996 (Vol.19 No.12): Wadia Digital has offered four upgrades of its 2000 Digital Decoding Computer since the model's 1989 debut. The first was a streamlined power supply that was much more aesthetically pleasing than the square metal box supplied with the first units...

www.stereophile.com

The updated 2000 bore a strong family resemblance to the 27, both units producing a wonderful tangibility of instrumental and vocal images. The ability to create the impression of instruments and voices hanging in space against a black background seems to be a common Wadia quality. The updated 2000's soundstaging (like the 27's) was terrific—wide and deep, with razor-sharp image specificity and a sense of transparent space between images.

That settles it then, thanks. The term is at least almost 30 years old. You were right.

 

[PeterA]

Ok, found it:

Wadia Digimaster 2000 Mk.2 digital processors December 1996

Follow-Up from December 1996 (Vol.19 No.12): Wadia Digital has offered four upgrades of its 2000 Digital Decoding Computer since the model's 1989 debut. The first was a streamlined power supply that was much more aesthetically pleasing than the square metal box supplied with the first units...

www.stereophile.com

The updated 2000 bore a strong family resemblance to the 27, both units producing a wonderful tangibility of instrumental and vocal images. The ability to create the impression of instruments and voices hanging in space against a black background seems to be a common Wadia quality. The updated 2000's soundstaging (like the 27's) was terrific—wide and deep, with razor-sharp image specificity and a sense of transparent space between images.

That settles it then, thanks. The term is at least almost 30 years old. You were right.

Terrible language (in my opinion, of course.). I would never want my system to create the impression of instruments and voices hanging in space against a black background. Instruments and voices don’t hang. They are grounded. They exist in the context of the space with other instruments and voices. The sound actually expands in the space to fill the voids and moves toward and around the listener.

I also never hear razor sharp image specificity when I listen to live music. Transparent space between images makes me think of a void, a nothingness. The space between images is filled with the energy created by the instruments filling the space everywhere. What he is describing here seems completely unlike real instruments in real spaces and very artificial.

Thank you for the link and quote. It is very revealing.

 

[Al M.]

I also never hear razor Sharp image specificity when I listen to live music. Transparent space between images makes me think of a void a nothingness. The space between images is filled with the energy created by the instruments Filling the space everywhere. What he is describing here seems completely unlike real instruments in space and very artificial.

Agreed, it's artificial.

Thank you for the link and quote. It is very revealing.

You're welcome, but Francisco thankfully led me to that link.

 

[microstrip]

Agreed, it's artificial.

Audiophiles knowing the sound of Wadia DACs in the 90's would not loose their time reading old reviews ... IMO they sounded etched and aggressive.

 

[the sound of Tao]

Try spending time in a vocal booth in a recording studio, most people freak out after short time. You can hear your own heartbeat.

That’s so true. I worked in both film and tv commercial production for the first twenty years of my working life and was usually in an audio recording suite a couple of sessions a week producing voice over and recording for much of it and the sound booth was such a disquieting space to go into. I guess perhaps that lack of spatial location sound sets off warning signals in the psyche a bit like feeling blind to what’s happening in the environment.

Maybe some listeners are just more sensitive to that spatial reckoning experience… maybe that’s why some of us prefer listening in a relatively normalised room where there are managed reasonable low level external sound fields rather than listening in a highly insulated sound room or headphone setup where if a recording was done in a void also there is mostly just the music and a void. Sometimes that’s a tilt of the experience (a bit trippy) and some may really love that but generally feeling connected to hearing music and also the world around for me is better more connected and real (for me). Then it comes down to turning or sliding perception into the music and letting the background fall away, like we do in listening to music live. I also have always preferred live recorded performances as well. Maybe inky black backgrounds can in circumstances be unhelpful things, or just different maybe… let’s never forget in space no one can hear you scream.

 

[tima]

Synthetic electronic music is a different kettle of fish. Much more it is potentially constructed and ambience can be a built feature or a very dry recording sound can be created so ambient noise may be dependent on how it is conceived to then be performed and recorded.

I suspect a fair amount of recorded synth performance never touches an oxygen molecule.

 

[Holmz]

…. I don't think of silence as blackness, I suppose.

It would if you had a black heart.

Usually with enough time in a quiet place, the noise floor gets low enough to hears one’s own heart beating.
Most domestic rooms are well above that, usually you need some anechoic chamber.

In fact it was used by Harry Pearson in the booklet format of The Absolute Sound - so probably in the 80s or 90s. He used the word "quietness" to help explaining it.

Courtesy of google (AI free) recent use - 01-14-2025 - Robert H. Levi, Positive Feedback, review of the Acoustical Systems Archon Improved MC Cartridge

@Ron Resnick asked a similar question, back in June ‘24.

Post in thread 'Does Tonal Balance Affect Perceived Pace and Perceived Resolution?'
https://www.whatsbestforum.com/thre...ce-and-perceived-resolution.39019/post-983734

Thank you for replying to my post. But I don't understand your post, and it does not sound correct to me. "Higher distortion speakers for lower level listening"?

Low distortion amps and speakers need to be turned up loud?

Systems that sound quiet when they are not quiet?

I have no idea what you're talking about.

I am 80% sure that quietness (blackness) is tied up with IMD. (It might be harmonic distortion, but I kind of doubt it.)

If one is creating extra tones between instruments that the space around the original sparse instruments can quickly disappear. We either have more instruments at the same original places, or more instruments appearing near/between the original instruments.

Daughter and I were in a shop in SoCal and a Jadis was playing into some Orangutan 98s.
She said, “Wow that sounds big”.
And I asked, “Does it sound quiet?”.

 

[the sound of Tao]

I suspect a fair amount of recorded synth performance never touches an oxygen molecule.

Yes, it’s a really interesting choice beyond the composition and the technique of playing how the musician and audio engineer choose the process with the recording of the instrument to alter the outcome for the music. Another place where I tend to prefer live recorded music, not just for its spontaneity but also because it’s not so preanly processed.

Though I do struggle with the trend to hyper closeup recording for keyboard music with some music these days and to hear every element of key stroke and pedal on a keyboard hyper emphasised. In electronic music it really became a signature thing with musicians like Nils Frahm but it seems to have crossed over into other music recording artists as well… it’s up there with overlaying the noise of a record playing in a digital recording… I get where it comes from and hearing music on a turntable there is something about anticipation or connection with the noise of the record that sets up the experience of replaying a moment in time and a performance… it’s where art enters engineering… technically building layers in a sound field can change our experience of it but it can all be a bit heavy handed when added to the music. Maybe it’s either an issue of too much noise or not enough… maybe I’m having a goldilocks moment in preferences of wanting it to just be right for the music.

 

[Al M.]

I am 80% sure that quietness (blackness) is tied up with IMD. (It might be harmonic distortion, but I kind of doubt it.)

I agree.

A lack of quietness can also be related to room distortion, which is a kind of IMD as well, I think. My room suffered from that a long time, until I managed to tame the beast. Without that taming, even the quietest sounding, most exquisite gear would still sound in my room like distorted with noise.

Anyway, once the room sufficiently was taken care of, the first time I really experienced in my system a feeling of quietness, of a calm background, was when in 2019 my Octave HP 700 active tube preamp replaced a Pass B1 buffered passive preamp. The Octave revealed how noisy the little Pass really was (THD of the Pass was measured to be low).

The Octave preamp was just the first step, my system has only progressed since then.

 

[Holmz]

I agree.

A lack of quietness can also be related to room distortion, which is a kind of IMD as well, I think.

I don’t think so. But they are something.
They were either the early reflections, or later reflections that were tall enough to be attributed to being a new signal.

Maybe we should call them musical wraiths?
A wraith, or ghost, is not black, but not exactly a solid thing. (Usually grey)
I can easily picture you having success here.

I was never able to get the quietness until the speakers got pulled out into the room far enough to (maybe) get the early reflections far enough delayed to the point where they did not create the wraiths.
Recently had to get new speaker that can go nearer to the wall because of WAF… so I am starting again.

My room suffered from that a long time, until I managed to tame the beast. Without that taming, even the quietest sounding, most exquisite gear would still sound in my room like distorted with noise.

Anyway, once the room sufficiently was taken care of, the first time I really experienced in my system a feeling of quietness, of a calm background, was when in 2019 my Octave HP 700 preamp replaced a Pass B1 buffered preamp. The Octave revealed how noisy the little Pass really was.

The Octave preamp was just the first step, my system has only progressed since then.

Ahhh…

Can you please expound on what you did to the room?
Even though Valentine’s day is beyond us, I still have WAF overlording, but ideas and thought crimes are not prosecuted.

 

[Al M.]

Ahhh…

Can you please expound on what you did to the room?
Even though Valentine’s day is beyond us, I still have WAF overloading, but ideas and thought crimes are not prosecuted.

Hehe. -- The worst room distortion came from the ceiling. When you did the hand clapping test, a metallic 'zing' echo came back from the ceiling -- very bad.

The solution were ASC diffuser panels on the ceiling, around first reflection from speakers as measured by tweeter position mirrored on the ceiling (literally checked by mirror), which made the biggest difference. In addition, later pieces of cloth hanging from other areas of the ceiling. Here is a picture of the 10 diffuser planks, flanked by pieces of cloth:



I also have Isothermal TubeTraps and Window Plugs (both ASC). Furthermore SoundPlanks (ASC) and wooden diffusers, mostly on floor in front of the speakers:






The sound is now very much free of distortion even at high SPL (orchestral peaks up to 97-100 dBC; in rare instances peaks up to 105 dBC), despite the rather modest room dimensions (see my signature). On complex orchestral music there is good separation of instruments.

 

[tmiddle2]

Right, and "black background" is not a simple term. It obviously can and does lead to confusion, and thus complication. You need to spend more time explaining the unfortunate term than actually using it.

The very fact that the OP needed to ask the question what it actually means, a very legitimate question indeed, speaks volumes.

Trinity Sessions by the Cowboy Junkies would be a good example of “blackness as ambience” that most of us have heard.