Let's also then close down the forums and all discussion related to audio gear if we are not judging. Let's all buy one thing, whatever it is and be happy
"How can we ever truly know if we are hearing exactly what is on the recording?"
- Thread starter tima
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Let's also then close down the forums and all discussion related to audio gear if we are not judging. Let's all buy one thing, whatever it is and be happy
i don't want to get tube lovers all riled up. because i do think that tubes objectively do musical truth. but relatively, i get more truth from the darts and MSB. call it personal preference for what in my mind gets out of the way better. and when you have a system that can really get cooking with large scale music, the differences becomes profound on the musical truth issue......and on the darts even relative to other solid state too. the tonal rightness of the 468's at warp 9 is a thing to behold.
i think larger scale music really separates the men from the boys on musical truth. no place to hide the sameness and artifacts.
I agree! OTOH you may or may not not beat AER or Feastrex on solo female vocals or "girl w/guitar" music.
But it'll be very close where the others won't come close on large scale.Mike, would Scheherazade qualify as larger scale? When I lined up my 1961 Pierre Montreux/LSO Decca vinyl for visitor Paul, I wasn't expecting a great sound, previously it had sounded a bit shut in and grainy.
But if getting closer to "musical intent/truthfulness" was a genuine feeling of timbral accuracy where I could really recognise instrumental character way more clearly, and much less feeling of the mechanics of reproduction, then the adrenaline rush, as much as of suprise as anything, made me appreciate my vinyl was way closer to "the real thing" of live music.
Quite how close this was all to how the conductor and musicians heard it recording this album 59 years ago, or to how the composer conceived the work 132 years ago, is another matter Lol.
But if getting closer to "musical intent/truthfulness" was a genuine feeling of timbral accuracy where I could really recognise instrumental character way more clearly, and much less feeling of the mechanics of reproduction, then the adrenaline rush, as much as of suprise as anything, made me appreciate my vinyl was way closer to "the real thing" of live music.
Quite how close this was all to how the conductor and musicians heard it recording this album 59 years ago, or to how the composer conceived the work 132 years ago, is another matter Lol.
I agree! OTOH you may or may not not beat AER or Feastrex on solo female vocals or "girl w/guitar" music.
totally agree that for specific types of music certain driver types can really be special and the ultimate truth. but there is always a piper to pay when doing everything.
in what share of my 7000--8000 Lps and my 20+tb's of files will those driver types yield the highest truth and dynamic ease?
that's the question we are asking.
not to say that those driver types are one trick ponies. not at all. they can serve all types of music, but not at the ultimate level. lot's of different completely legit priorities.
i'm no expert on classical music, and only have a viewpoint of a lover of classical music and do listen to more classical full orchestral than anything else. so my viewpoint is as a listener. i view 'larger scale' as more a venue and ensemble size than degree of fireworks. if a big band or full orchestra or live rock concert is being recorded with a reasonable degree of recreation of venue, then it's large scale. your system is going to have to be able to do the bottom octaves effectively and move some air to capture the ambiance and pressurize your room. and you need your first watt to be special, and also the headroom to be able to scale quickly on the peaks and not get hard or confused and relate the musical tension in the power of the recording.
lots of system assets come into play when it's a large venue and there are lots of different musical sources and ambient clues.
Scheherazade certainly swells and soars, maybe not like some others, but ease and authority matter. agree on the vinyl; i do hear that the vinyl captures the ambient bed of those large scale recordings much more consistently than digital. there is more there.....there.
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Well Mike, I've heard some good pressurisation of rooms, incl 200-250 sq ft with 3W 45 tubes on 107dB eff AG Duos and 90W 211s on Apogee Duettas. The "first watt" is magical on those Duos. Big Spectrals SS on Apogee Divas in a 900-1000 sq ft room were also pretty compelling. No first watt magic on the Apogees, just ALL the wattage doing the conjuring trick.
I guess this is a crucial part of the illusion of effortless like live/eliminating awareness of the reproduction chain, that gets you closer to the core of the musical message.
But reproducing the original intent? A frankly thankless mental gymnastics routine.
I guess this is a crucial part of the illusion of effortless like live/eliminating awareness of the reproduction chain, that gets you closer to the core of the musical message.
But reproducing the original intent? A frankly thankless mental gymnastics routine.
tubes + horns can do high SPL's. big ss + Apogees can do high SPL's. they can fill a room.
sort out a large orchestra at full tilt boggie and hold together full frequency? another question entirely.
i have a friend who has the largest Apogees with 800 watt Tube Research amps a side. those could really rock. not heard them in 10 years now, so my reference for that is not fresh. he just built a new home and room and next year i will hear them. maybe they can do it all.
Ked has heard those. Believe he really likes them. More convincing Apogees/tubes setup than the Grands/Nats he's also heard.
Full tilt/boogie Warp Nine? You're one of the chosen few, Mike.
Full tilt/boogie Warp Nine? You're one of the chosen few, Mike.
Mike, the Apogees Divas setup I heard came closer to the "like the real thing" than any other system I've visited in terms of dynamic scale and tangibility. It's ability to range up and down the energy spectrum was way beyond anything I know. Truly exhilarating and a step closer to the live illusion. A function of the Spectral amps and excellent large room synergy. Imaging was crazy impressive too, reality in drumkit spread/definition for this drummer anyhow, was unrivalled.
But the downside was a kind of homogeneity in tone, and weirdly grey/grainy timbre, that just clumped all albums as samey sounding. This I put soley down to the Kondo tube pre and maybe cabling in the system. Maybe even the crazy OTT battery banks/inverters system powering the rig - helping w dynamic headroom but not transparent.
And so, half the illusion of the band in the room. The other half, not even a close facsimile.
But the downside was a kind of homogeneity in tone, and weirdly grey/grainy timbre, that just clumped all albums as samey sounding. This I put soley down to the Kondo tube pre and maybe cabling in the system. Maybe even the crazy OTT battery banks/inverters system powering the rig - helping w dynamic headroom but not transparent.
And so, half the illusion of the band in the room. The other half, not even a close facsimile.
PS I heard subsequently that the Divas xovers settings were poorly chosen. The amps are now all-AR. And I believe the problems are different.
Apogees...careful what you wish for.
Apogees...careful what you wish for.
For those who want to listen to simple transparency to recordings, try simple systems first... Devore orangutans with 10 to 20w SETs, or berning quads. Beryllium driver horns like TAD and Radian do it big time. Don't complicate stuff while trying to listen for this.
Good post, and it echos a claim made by an outspoken audio salesperson almost 30 years ago. This person claimed that my CD on his speakers (Magnepan 3.6's possibly?) probably sounded better than being at the actual concert.
Having been at some outdoor events I acknowledged that he could be right, maybe I had a better seat in his store than on some bug infested lawn.
CD in question:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heart_Still_Beating
Just an example where a good recording could possibly be better than a bad seat (or lawn spot) at a live event.
The copy is better than the original, or at least more enjoyable, especially if it rained.
It is all attempts at recreating a live experience as all recorded music is live in its origin. Its all a compromise, every bit of it. Just like tuning a race car, making a car fast AND corner well are compromises at completely different ends of the spectrum.
The recording process is the first stage of compromise and you just keep compromising from there at every step of the way from mixing all the way to format and then your infrastructure. No matter how much money you toss at it, no compromise recordings replayed on no compromise systems are compromises. Its all been stepped on several times by the time it hits our ears.
Now this is where the OCD/obsession...fun begins in this "Hobby", our dedication and commitment to our vision of what the music should sound like. Everyone here that has "measured rooms" has made changes to said room over time to adjust the flavor if you will. When people in the recording industry want to use your system to evaluate their work, you automatically earned your lifetime non revocable "We are not worthy" card.
That being said there are two things I enjoy immensely, Neil Peart arena double kick drums, Genesis arena bass pedals neither of which I have ever heard even come close to faithful reproduction in a home environment...ever. Both of these items make me smile ear to ear, its an expected part of the experience. Where in the process is that magic lost I am not sure.
We all have our own flavor/style/commitment level and at the end of the day if you are happy, piss on whatever anyone else says. If you are not happy well then you have work to do and money to spend. Through my listening visits and other audio visits I have a clear definition of where I want to go and how much I am willing to spend and from there its endless tweaking, acceptance and just enjoying the music.
P.S. Marc the sax solo on Gunners Dream is truly one of the most amazing, well mixed, gnarly, emotional solo's ever, from the first note of the intro all the way to the last note of the outro, an amazing moment in music. A subject for another thread.
The recording process is the first stage of compromise and you just keep compromising from there at every step of the way from mixing all the way to format and then your infrastructure. No matter how much money you toss at it, no compromise recordings replayed on no compromise systems are compromises. Its all been stepped on several times by the time it hits our ears.
Now this is where the OCD/obsession...fun begins in this "Hobby", our dedication and commitment to our vision of what the music should sound like. Everyone here that has "measured rooms" has made changes to said room over time to adjust the flavor if you will. When people in the recording industry want to use your system to evaluate their work, you automatically earned your lifetime non revocable "We are not worthy" card.
That being said there are two things I enjoy immensely, Neil Peart arena double kick drums, Genesis arena bass pedals neither of which I have ever heard even come close to faithful reproduction in a home environment...ever. Both of these items make me smile ear to ear, its an expected part of the experience. Where in the process is that magic lost I am not sure.
We all have our own flavor/style/commitment level and at the end of the day if you are happy, piss on whatever anyone else says. If you are not happy well then you have work to do and money to spend. Through my listening visits and other audio visits I have a clear definition of where I want to go and how much I am willing to spend and from there its endless tweaking, acceptance and just enjoying the music.
P.S. Marc the sax solo on Gunners Dream is truly one of the most amazing, well mixed, gnarly, emotional solo's ever, from the first note of the intro all the way to the last note of the outro, an amazing moment in music. A subject for another thread.
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As expected, it seems our individual preferences determine if we are hearing exactly what is in the stereo recording ...
There are intrinsic compromises in the stereo system and a lack of standards on how to overcome them - what we call recording techniques are just different ways of encoding more spatial information in the two channels. Considering also the circle of confusion referred by F. Toole (the lack of quality and accuracy of the tonal balance of control and mixing rooms of studios) IMHO we should not have any hope that we are ever knowing exactly what were the recording engineer or artist exact sound intentions.
However when a few audiophiles share preferences they can start talking about their group findings, focusing on some types of recordings and systems that react very positively to them. They create and share a group standard, but not around the artist intentions. It is a fun part of this hobby, that drives our search and feeds our debates.
F. Toole said a lot when he wrote that considering the playback conditions "(...) stereo seems less like a system and more like a foundation for individual experimentation". He starts his famous book explaining why.
There are intrinsic compromises in the stereo system and a lack of standards on how to overcome them - what we call recording techniques are just different ways of encoding more spatial information in the two channels. Considering also the circle of confusion referred by F. Toole (the lack of quality and accuracy of the tonal balance of control and mixing rooms of studios) IMHO we should not have any hope that we are ever knowing exactly what were the recording engineer or artist exact sound intentions.
However when a few audiophiles share preferences they can start talking about their group findings, focusing on some types of recordings and systems that react very positively to them. They create and share a group standard, but not around the artist intentions. It is a fun part of this hobby, that drives our search and feeds our debates.
F. Toole said a lot when he wrote that considering the playback conditions "(...) stereo seems less like a system and more like a foundation for individual experimentation". He starts his famous book explaining why.
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Yes, the stage, concert hall ambience, etc is there in the recording, but we have to get it out the distribution media and process it. And sorry, each pair of golden ears seems to have the a very different right system to show transparency to recordings.
Independently of other parameters I consider the ESL63 with a Quad 606 or ELectrocompaniet amplifier a system that shows most of the recording - more than the Soundlab's or XLF's surely. But in the listening conditions I have I prefer the Soundlab's or the XLF's for my listening and as such consider them "better" speakers for me.
BTW, when I listened to the WAMMs I found that the DCS Vivaldi shows significantly more of the recording low level information in some of my recordings than I ever supposed to be encoded in them - and it helped to recreate a better feeling of the real and enjoyment.
I also find that difference between changing components or changing recordings is strongly related to listening levels - debating one of them without addressing the other is misleading. For example, on average I listen louder when listening to Soundlab's than in Quad ESL63.
How can we be sure...?
How can we be sure there is a god or that we are not just a figment of our imaginations?
Of course we can never be sure.
It is a leap of faith. That the recorder has pure motives in his attempt to faithfully capture real music in real space. Most importantly we have a reasonable memory of what live music sounnds like. We are of course defeated at the outset.
Our only hope is that there are sufficiently accurate cues to allow us to delude our senses in the illusion of reality. Who knows if that illusion has any real bearing to reality.
I think that is one of the reasons we do poorly on a\b blind tests. We are to compare details rather than illusions.
What are we searching for? The sound of a females voice. The sound of a cello. Or are we looking for the joy or the sorrow of a broken heart.
Who knows.
How can we be sure there is a god or that we are not just a figment of our imaginations?
Of course we can never be sure.
It is a leap of faith. That the recorder has pure motives in his attempt to faithfully capture real music in real space. Most importantly we have a reasonable memory of what live music sounnds like. We are of course defeated at the outset.
Our only hope is that there are sufficiently accurate cues to allow us to delude our senses in the illusion of reality. Who knows if that illusion has any real bearing to reality.
I think that is one of the reasons we do poorly on a\b blind tests. We are to compare details rather than illusions.
What are we searching for? The sound of a females voice. The sound of a cello. Or are we looking for the joy or the sorrow of a broken heart.
Who knows.
The goosebumps and being drawn into the music during my listening sessions is the only affirmation that I need to realize that I have achieved something.
I listen mostly to music of my youth and my systems transport me back to those carefree days when those songs were new, inspiring and thought provoking.
A measure of a good system is how involving it is and if it drives you to experience strong emotions.
I listen mostly to music of my youth and my systems transport me back to those carefree days when those songs were new, inspiring and thought provoking.
A measure of a good system is how involving it is and if it drives you to experience strong emotions.
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Ask musicians if what's on the albums (tapes) is the music they recorded.
Be ready for multiple answers depending ...
We cannot find all the answers, unless of very specific music recordings.
Bruce our local professional music recording engineer knows best... for each artist musician.
Be ready for multiple answers depending ...
We cannot find all the answers, unless of very specific music recordings.
Bruce our local professional music recording engineer knows best... for each artist musician.
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