Do it right, but a real gramophone from the early 20th century
Natural Sound
- Thread starter PeterA
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Al, These are some good observations. Thank you. To me, a car radio is rarely irritating because it makes sins of omission. Frequency extremes are compromised. Modern music is compressed to overcome the ambient noise in a car. Older music, particularly dynamic classical music, is very difficult to hear in the car, but this is not because of the car radio, it is because of the noise one hears while driving. Listening while not driving can be very satisfying because of lower expectations.
Home stereos, by contrast, often commit sins of commission, and with them come much higher expectations. Frequency extremes at home also often have clear limitations, but not because they are absent, but because they sound so fake. They are jarring and irritating, both in the treble and the bass. One could argue that these failings are objectively less, but I am not so sure. I think they are certainly subjectively more, precisely because of the expectations.
I do not think car radio fails gracefully. It succeeds quite well at achieving its goals, IMO. Expectations are lower, so success is easier to achieve. Expectations for owners of high end audio systems are much higher. At times they fail, and not even graciously, to meet those expectations, so they are sold and something new is tried. And so it begins again.
I agree with your comment about the importance of solving problems inherent in our efforts to reproduce music at home. It is much better to solve the problems than it is to mask over them. Wires were introduced that masked over hot drivers for instance. But once those drivers are abandoned, then what happens to those wires? Big, heavy, powerful amps are designed to solve the problem of driving inefficient speakers, but what if drivers were not so limited? It seems to me that new problems are often created when trying to solve other ones.
The contention arises from the notion that some listeners think most of the major problems were solved long ago, and so we have vintage systems like mine and others. Yet other listeners think new is usually better and surely gets them even closer to the absolute sound. Perfect sound introduced in the '80s was soon thereafter "solved" by introducing lots of masking of emphasis and accents, smoothing, and covering over. But later more enhancements in speakers and electronics and cables were introduced to bring more "detail" and alternatives to different absolute sounds. More recently, digital failings were discovered and addressed, some think solved, while even newer problems with, for instance, streaming are introduced. So new interfaces, new advancements, and so it goes.
Yes, It does take a lot of work, often an extreme amount of effort, to select and set up a system that presents believable or convincing music in the listening room. I do not think we should aim to fail gracefully. We should aim to succeed with a system of components that bring us as close to a natural sound and the music as possible, while knowing there is a reference and a goal.
I agree with both notions, succeeding, as well as failing gracefully. As Peter said, trying to get as close to natural sound and the music as possible, that is succeeding. But failing is always part of it as well, since you can never fully reproduce live music; the recording itself is a limitation, too. But failing gracefully is indeed better done by sins of omission, rather than sins of commission, which tend to be artifacts added to the sound.
Unfortunately people seem to miss that reality is an audio/visual/tactile process and stereo is just a two channel sound process. The only possibility of not distinguishing reality from sound reproduction is either intentionally limiting or distorting our view of reality - extremely easy to do, or using spirited beverages or some illicit substances during reproduction.
Al, since we can never fully reproduce live music in our listening rooms, should we (and equipment designers) set out to fail gracefully, or should we rather set out to succeed by trying to get our systems to sound more natural and closer to our reference and goal of live music?
I set out to do the latter with my new system.
Again, I don't see where the contradiction is, Peter.
We will succeed in some measure, and we will fail in some measure. Yes, everyone sets out to succeed, and nobody "sets out to fail gracefully". Yet where the system inevitably fails compared to live music, it should do so gracefully, not in an irritating manner.
Wrt reality, partially, yes. There is a conceptual or apperceptive process that is necessary and unifying.
Vladimir Lamm will tell you that we perceive sound on various levels: conscious as well as subconscious or intuitive. We perceive sound not just with our ears, but with the whole body.
May be the way to go. I play 78’s with a lowly shure on a second arm on my 301.
78’s have limited bandwidth and hiss and crackle, and its not a warm medium like vinyl. But on the best ones, voices come through with spooky clarity. The experience can be time-machine-like.
Of course failure is part of any endeavor I just don’t see the grace in that as it relates to high end audio. Nature and severity of the sin matters, what’s added and what’s lost?
david
This thread reminds me of the conceptual discussions we used to have over beer in college that were often motivated by concepts from philosophy class.
Recall all of the consternation and rejection of the very simple and comprehensive term I chose to use for the title of this thread and as the main descriptor of the sound of this system.
Natural Sound is a different approach to the hobby. It is the simple rejection of the Glossary of Audio Terms which breaks music down into pieces. It is an alternative view that appreciates music holistically and refers to what we actually hear from live acoustic music at the concert hall as our reference to guide us as we assemble and set up our systems.
My posts in this thread are an attempt to describe this system, the process of setting up and fine tuning it, and the resulting sound. Philosophy is certainly a part of it.
Sorry but wasn't that also HP's Absolute Sound reference?
Yes, this seems to have been the premise on which he based his philosophy. However it evolved to goals of pitch black backgrounds, pinpoint imaging, image outlines, tight fast bass, continuousness, and air between instruments. These are bits and pieces as David Karmeli describes them. They are distractions and confusing and lead people to search for sonic attributes from their gear in their listening rooms rather than music presented naturally the way we hear it in the concert hall.
In my opinion, Harry Pearson lead us astray. Music is not an assemblage of sonic attributes. I do not hear these things when sitting in front of the orchestra or jazz trio.
Natural Sound is about balance and information and music being presented naturally and filling the listening room. It involves conscious gear selection and specific set up decisions. The wrong cable or powercord, filter, acoustic panel, or tweak will ruin it, but it may get you closer to the type of sound for which HP was advocating.
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Black backgrounds are a bad term in my opinion as well. They don't exist in real music. A "calm background" I think describes more what we should be looking for -- it also hints at lack of electronic noise, which is an enemy of natural sound. In addition, it leaves space for hall ambience, which is in contradiction with the term "black background". I experienced a clear transition to calmer backgrounds with switching from a Pass B1 buffered preamp to my current Octave preamp, and it serves the music well.
"Tight fast bass" can be desirable with some instruments, for example electric bass guitar (depending on tuning and playing), but is misplaced with stand-up bass (a desirable "controlled" reproduction is different). But since it depends on instrument and music, I would not advocate for a wholesale dismissal of the term "tight fast bass". Of course, if everything is "tight" and "fast", it is an artifact.
I am a bit puzzled by the term "continuousness" as well. And yes, pinpoint and outlined images are not real.
I disagree Peter. Forget his specific choices for gear, his writings on natural sound and “gestalt” as well as continuousness are among the best audio “philosophy” writings out there. His “real instruments in real space” is the cornerstone of a natural sound seeker. The language he developed was to help to describe how close a stereo (in his opinion) was getting to that paradigm...it doesn’t matter if you agree with his specific choices or not.
Brad, I don’t know anything about his gear choices. I was never at Seacliff. I’m talking about his language, his terms, and how those ideas encouraged listeners to break music down into pieces and to seek sonic attributes from their gear. I think he played a large role in developing the “hi-fi“ type of sound, but perhaps there were other more potent forces.
Peter, when I was still besotted w megaWatts SS amps, and tall brutally inefficient multi driver behemoth crossover spkrs, stuff like "sledgehammer bass" and "blacker than black backgrounds" were the things I craved from hifi at home. Now I've evolved over a decade into a system of medium power triodes, high efficiency full range drivers w minimal crossovers, and I appreciate music at home for being more like music, artificial terminology banished, I'm super happy w my lot and the decisions I made to get here.
It seems like you are too.
It seems like you are too.
Continuosness was the opposite of breaking things into pieces...I am not sure you have read a lot of what he wrote but are more working off others (poor) interpretations of what he wrote.
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