How to Listen: A Course in How to Critically Evaluate Sound Quality

[tonmeister2008]

Sean,

I think this is a very interesting idea. I wonder what would serve as a reference for learning the different sonic attributes. For example, I have been encountering products that have made me change my assumptions on the capabilities of audio reproduction. Since I will sometimes say, "I never knew it could do that", how would one know, until they heard it done.

There is also a downside for critical listening. While one may make better buying decisions, it may also lead people to focus upon what's missing. As a correlate to the above, once I know something is possible, I would have a very difficult time losing that new-found experience.

On another note, with all due respect, one of my goals in 2011 is to listen less critically to my stereo. Not sure if this is possible. But, I do think educating people about the process and composition, such as you are, is laudable.

Thanks Robert. One of the downsides of critical listening is that you will become more sensitive and aware of colorations and distortions in recorded and reproduced sound. Your audio equipment and recording may never sound as neutral as they did before, much like the experience of tasting really well prepared food or good wine

After doing research in the 1980's-90's in the perception of resonances, which in involved hours measuring the absolute detection thresholds of an added resonance/antiresonance, I became very hypersensitive of colorations in loudspeaker/headphone or room resonances. At the same time, if evaluating sound quality is your professional or hobby, critical listening becomes easier as you gain the analytical skills to describe what you're hearing.

In terms of what should be used as a "reference" it depends on the training task. If you are simply identifying/classifying added distortions or resonances - this is a relative task -- then you don't necessarily need the world's most transparent loudspeaker or headphone to do the task, as long as it's capable of reproducing the distortions. Still, I recommend a very accurate and transparent playback system for teaching critical listening.

 

[tonmeister2008]

I'll second that and ask a question: Why does it seem that so little of HK's product line is readily available in the US?

Tim

Good question. I think part of the problem is we have so few distributers in the US, whereas in Europe HK sales are very good. The market for up-scale HK receivers and executive systems may be larger than the US , although I am guessing here.

Besides the HK 990, two HK products I think are very good but not available in the USA are the HK MS100 and MAS100 (executive stereo sound system). They both did very well in our listening tests against competitor's products.