Natural Sound

[ddk]

see David, you own it lock, stock, and barrel. can't argue with that. disagree if i like, of course.

Peter just needs to man up and stop trying to please everyone. you OTOH, are not afflicted with that.

.

Peter definitely owns it and he has his own style.

david

 

[PeterA]

Religions are not cults .


Certainty is an enviable position to be in and it always threatens the insecure.

david

So very true.

The thread started out being about my new system and how I got here. I hope some people found it interesting.

At this point the thread reveals more about the personalities behind the avatars than it does the system. I hope that changes and we get back on track.

 

[Tim Link]

When it comes to natural sound, I take interest in the room because I work in acoustics. You ended up taking all the acoustics out as you moved toward a more natural sound, and that's very interesting to me. I've recently played around with the listening room we have here at ASC, setting up a system and listening to music with the room completely bare - just a thin carpet on the floor and a little wooden chair to sit on. What I heard was incredibly lively and vibrant. I wouldn't call it "unnatural" but just the wrong kind of natural - naturally too reverberant - although it had it's charms. As I added acoustics a little bit at a time I ran into some problems where it did not sound natural because I had removed many echoes but left a few, which then stood out clearly with a bizarre zing. Turned out that was a floor to ceiling bounce as I hadn't treated the ceiling or floor at all. You could hear it easily clapping in the middle of the room. The music took on a weird, very unnatural sound. We threw a couple SoundPlanks on the floor and it fixed it. So I'd say in a room you can get a natural or unnatural sound with various levels of reverberance. A good listening room should be a nice sounding space for anything. It should be nice to talk in there, to sing or play an instrument. How much reverberance you want will depend on taste and the speaker's dispersion characteristics. I find narrower dispersion speakers like my big horns can make a room sound overly damped with less absorption. I took down heavy curtains that were quite helpful with my wider dispersion speakers. Your new speakers are similar to mine, being corner horns.

So far I'm mostly talking about treble frequencies. When it comes to bass I don't know if it's possible to call room modes natural sounding. I think if you can break them up or damp them that will be a better sounding room period. It's just not natural having deep bass that was recorded in a larger venue play back in a smaller space. Some trickery can be useful, and bass traps can do that without making the room sound unnatural. I think a nice large canvas tent set up outside would be an interesting environment to listen to a good system. It would be exceedingly well damped in the bass but you could have enough reflective surfaces to get some good room ambience. My guess is it would sound great in there but you'd need adequate bass power due to the lack of room reinforcement.

Anybody tried playing their system in a big tent?

 

[Steve williams]

And FWIW, religion his not a cult

However the analogy being used is a poor one IMO. I would go so far in saying that all of us follow a direction or path that they find appealing to their ears. This is their own cult. Many of you as I stated who are involved in this post have reached out to me is many times complaining privately about how they and their systems are being attacked and how I need to sanction this person or that person.

Frankly we are all grown men here and I find it interesting how people can react so immaturely and childish when their reality is challenged as to their sonic direction. I hate being asked to get involved as it serves little purpose. I have even been told by members that unless I do something asked of me they will leave the forum and post elsewhere. I can't tell you how offensive I find this as it gives the impression that these people feel themselves to be better than the rest of the pack

Have we all forgotten that this is just a hobby.

 

[Steve williams]

Well said, Steve!

Thanks Al but for me it is these type of situations that encumber all of my time on a daily basis. I keep my private interactions with members' complaints .....private...... but I could write a book about the demands and the threats I have received from members that I either did nothing or I didn't do enough only to end the conversation so many times with the threats "I'm leaving" and to further the threat that they will be sorely missed when people can't read about their systems. I just shrug my shoulders as they truly feel they are more special than the rest of the members.

Again, this is a hobby. To many (if not most) the hobby does become a cult with followers of that type of sound. Does this make them bad , wrong or way off track ......I don't think so. Different strokes for different folks. I admire Peter's enthusiasm for putting forth this new direction in his sound system. Not everyone agrees and frankly many disagree. That's OK. All I ask is that we agree that disagreement is OK and discourse is also OK. I merely added my thoughts with the hope that the discourse, not only in this thread, but in the entire forum is conducted in a kind and professional manner. Frankly, that's the way grown ups conduct themselves

 

[microstrip]

Francisco

This thread has gone in a multitude of directions. I like discussion. There has been plenty here but surely you must agree that the thread has taken some twists and off topic posts. (...)

Steve, nothing is off topic when someone explains his system in opposition to other systems, misrepresenting them using a "new language" that is intrinsically ambiguous unless we travel to Utah.

At the risk of irritating some people I will quote from issue 1 of TheAbsoluteSound (using a scanner, not google!) on The Reference System.

 

[tima]

This thread is about a systemwide approach to a specific type of sound. I had no idea it would be so controversial and that people would make things so personal.

[off stage shrieking]
It's a Cult! It's a Cult! Take the children inside!
[/off stage shrieking]

At this point the thread reveals more about the personalities behind the avatars than it does the system.

At this point it is really wierd. Aside from the nomal offtrack wanderings and "congratulations on your journey" posts, there is a lot of crying and complaining about the phrase "natural sound" and its use as your thread title.

What do you expect at the audio salon?

There is a certain 'sense' that several feel either threatened or insulted by the effort to characterize or classify a type of sound. Some think the exercise is arrogant. Maybe some feel the phrase "natural sound" co-opts too much or something they hold dear but do not label as such. Some dismiss the effort as your description of what you like and giving it a fancy name.

Lot's of smoke, little heat.

People who have interest in a topic use their intelligence to understand the topic and contribute.

Then there are the kibitzers.

I don't say there is a lot of disagreement because very little opposing view is offered, at least one that has much rationale behind it. Plenty of bellyaching about the notion of "natural sound" with scant original thinking or positive ideas for some alternative. The proxy for that, though itself not contributory, is to complain about the use of 'HiFi' as characterizing sound that is less than natural. I have yet to see a well thought out explication of what 'high fidelity' means to those who choose it in opposition. (Were that to happen tournment grounds might be in its own thread, but like or not things are playing out here.)

if you’ve read these threads you already know there are many of us who find the term “natural” to be much too loosely defined to be of much value.

If you want to understand natural sound don't go to an audio forum, go to a concert hall.

Efforts to conceptualize and clarify a certain approach to system building and assessment over the past few years here at WBF has led some of us to the point where we are now. I've said many times that the phrase "natural sound" does not have the explanatory power to stand on its own - at least for those encountering it without the background of what we've gone through. David and I may have small differences here - that's okay. I come to the notion from the angle of using live acoustic music as one's reference or guide when assessing system goals and results. . However, having participated in discussion here, I accept "natural sound" as a shortcut to both a concept and an actual stereo listening experience.

I think Peter accepts that but might say it differently. For all the pam-ing from others, Peter actually lays out his thoughts about what he hear's from a system he finds natural sounding. I've yet to see this from others, the 'hi-fi-ers' as it were.

What is Natural Sound?
​

Hearing David’s four systems play music over seven days allowed me to understand the qualities of a “Natural Sound” system. I came up with this list to describe what I heard.

• No aspect of the sound calls attention to itself
• The sound is balanced
• The system sound is absent from the presentation
• Wide listening window: able to enjoy most/all genres of music
• Portrays the character of each recording, nuanced venue information
• Allows a wide range of volume adjustment for what is most appropriate for a particular recording and still be engaged
• Superior information retrieval
• Natural resolution, not “detail”
• Able to scale up and down, large to small
• No “sound”, only music
• Room is energized and music is “alive”
• Enjoyable outside of listening sweet spot
• Images are stable as listener moves around the room
• Draws listener into the music
• Relaxing, zero fatigue
• Open, effortless, and dynamic sound
• No need to crank the volume
• No added or artificial extension
• No analysis of the sound into bits and pieces, music experienced as a whole
• Result is beauty and emotion.

 

[rbbert]

[off stage shrieking]
It's a Cult! It's a Cult! Take the children inside!
[/off stage shrieking]

And yet...your system is chock full of components, cables, room treatments, etc. that are the very antithesis of "natural sound" as characterized by David and Peter?

Or are you also planning to soon rid yourself of most of it and reconfigure as Peter did?

 

[PeterA]

And yet...your system is chock full of components, cables, room treatments, etc. that are the very antithesis of "natural sound" as characterized by David and Peter?

Or are you also planning to soon rid yourself of most of it and reconfigure as Peter did?

You don’t seem to understand what is being discussed here. The list I used to describe the characteristics of a natural sounding system does not mention components, cables, or room treatments. The list is about characteristics recognized by the listener when listening to the system. Me specifically.

If you read my sublime sound thread, it should been clear to you by my description of its sound after a year and a half of experiments that I thought it became a natural sounding system. I did not switch systems because that was not a natural sounding system. I took what I learned by evolving that system and realized in order to go further, I would have to change the major components. I had already learned from the set up experiments how to improve that system and make it sound natural.

After my trip to Utah, I realized that I had to change my gear to go further down the path of natural sound.

You seem to be here only to argue and yet, as Tim pointed out, you offer no counterpoint.

The fact that Tim understands this discussion and the points I am trying to make tell me that his system is not the antithesis of my system. Teams review of the LP 2.1 deluxe phonostage makes clear that he understands what natural Sound means.

 

[Bobvin]

Ok, here‘s a question...

I have an engineered acoustic space. I know some would say it is “damped” but I was happy when I walked into the showroom at Magico a few weeks back I heard very much the same as my own room. Perhaps a little more lively, but the room was also at least double the volume. I want to have some professional musicians come play live, un-amplified for myself and a tiny audience. Is the sound in my room going to be anything but “natural”?

If I try to build a music system that approaches that sound, will it not be “natural sound”?

I’m not trying to be a wise-ass, honestly. I’m completely serious. If those same musicians play upstairs in my overly live, echo-y, reverberant room, is that not also ‘natural sound’ even though it is going to be vastly different from my music room? If I build a system to match that sound, which system is more “natural sounding”?

 

[PeterA]

Bob, here is my take:

You will hear the natural sound of those instruments as played in those different rooms. Both sounds are natural. We want to hear the distinct character of the space in which the instruments are being recorded from our systems. At least some of us do.

If the listening room has a strong sonic signature, it will be part of what you hear when playing your recordings. How strong an effect it has will determine if what you hear from the system is natural. It will sound more or less natural. There are degrees of natural and IMO there is no absolute sound because different pianos in different spaces sound different. There is Just a range of believable sound. That too is likely controversial.

 

[Mike Lavigne]

If I build a system to match that sound, which system is more “natural sounding”?

you want to build a system in your room that can play recordings you consider to have a natural balance 'naturally'. over time in your listening travels, including your life spent training your ears on how life sounds. this includes your system building experiences. you have found your own sonic reference. and it is solid enough in your mind that it can lead you to where you want to get to.

it is wrong thinking to rely primarily on what you hear from acoustic instruments in your own listening room. too small a sample size. your room is a wild card. those experiences might help to confirm a choice, but it should not be the fundamental source of direction. you own thousands of recordings and those are what needs to sound natural. and the reproduction system should give you a natural balance over a wide variety of music and types of recording venues and mic approaches.

certainly there are people who focus on hitting very specific limited genre sonic targets and characteristics for their systems. there are no wrong choices. and matching how a live violin sounds in your room with your system is one of them. will that result in a system that can do any type of music naturally? will you win the lotto?

it's possible. but hope is not a plan.

just my 2 cents, YMMV, and all that stuff.

will your 'damped' downstairs or 'live' upstairs be more natural with a live instrument? who can say? too many variables and matters of personal taste. the question is whether that answer has 'significant' relevance to system building. i'm on the 'doubt it' side of that.

personally i find conversation in a listening room and intelligibility tells me a great deal. and we can all do that.

 

[ack]

... we are close to 900 posts now, and no independent opinions of this new system... fascinating waste of bandwidth. I am outta here for the time being...

 

[Al Stewart]

On the topic of acoustical treatment, it seems noteworthy that many of the spaces where live acoustical music is heard have been expertly engineered to deliver sound to listeners in a precise way. https://interestingengineering.com/...-science-behind-their-architectural-acoustics

 

[rbbert]

You don’t seem to understand what is being discussed here. The list I used to describe the characteristics of a natural sounding system does not mention components, cables, or room treatments. The list is about characteristics recognized by the listener when listening to the system. Me specifically.

If you read my sublime sound thread, it should been clear to you by my description of its sound after a year and a half of experiments that I thought it became a natural sounding system. I did not switch systems because that was not a natural sounding system. I took what I learned by evolving that system and realized in order to go further, I would have to change the major components. I had already learned from the set up experiments how to improve that system and make it sound natural.

After my trip to Utah, I realized that I had to change my gear to go further down the path of natural sound.

You seem to be here only to argue and yet, as Tim pointed out, you offer no counterpoint.

The fact that Tim understands this discussion and the points I am trying to make tell me that his system is not the antithesis of my system. Teams review of the LP 2.1 deluxe phonostage makes clear that he understands what natural Sound means.

Wrong, wrong, wrong. Both you and David have posted about the importance of no or minimal acoustic treatments as well as staying away from "fancy" audiophile cables. Wilson speakers could hardly be more more different than vintage horns, in so many ways.

How can you say I offer no counterpoint?! I and many others have been saying from near the start of this thread that your stated sonic goals are in line with those of most of us here, but you insist on disagreeing with that. Most of us have our systems in our signature or our profile (or both). Do you think Mike L.'s, or KeithR's, or dminches', or microstrip's systems don't result in "natural sound"? You strongly imply that because you occasionally listen to live acoustic music you are the only one able to judge "natural sound"; if you have only been into serious audio pursuits since 1993 many of us here have 20+ years on you of listening extensively to live acoustic music and building our systems to try to reproduce that in our homes.

 

[tima]

Wrong, wrong, wrong.

Sheesh - more bellyaching. Make a positive contribution sometime.

Peter offered you a great suggestion that in my view might give some weight to your words, make your comments more credulous, and possibly be interesting to read:

Could you start your own thread in which you describe your system and how you go about achieving “high Fidelity”? And could you please defined the term as you and nearly all others define it so that we can understand you you were approach?

I and many others have been saying

This is tiresome.

This 'social appeal', sometimes in advertising called 'social proof', has not been convincing. You offer no testimonials. And without a cogent, organized and well-described perspective it is hard to know what it is you claim that the "many others" standing at your shoulders believe - and agree to.

You strongly imply that because you occasionally listen to live acoustic music you are the only one able to judge "natural sound"

That is BS. And false.

 

[ddk]

When it comes to natural sound, I take interest in the room because I work in acoustics. You ended up taking all the acoustics out as you moved toward a more natural sound, and that's very interesting to me. I've recently played around with the listening room we have here at ASC, setting up a system and listening to music with the room completely bare - just a thin carpet on the floor and a little wooden chair to sit on. What I heard was incredibly lively and vibrant. I wouldn't call it "unnatural" but just the wrong kind of natural - naturally too reverberant - although it had it's charms. As I added acoustics a little bit at a time I ran into some problems where it did not sound natural because I had removed many echoes but left a few, which then stood out clearly with a bizarre zing. Turned out that was a floor to ceiling bounce as I hadn't treated the ceiling or floor at all. You could hear it easily clapping in the middle of the room. The music took on a weird, very unnatural sound. We threw a couple SoundPlanks on the floor and it fixed it. So I'd say in a room you can get a natural or unnatural sound with various levels of reverberance. A good listening room should be a nice sounding space for anything. It should be nice to talk in there, to sing or play an instrument. How much reverberance you want will depend on taste and the speaker's dispersion characteristics. I find narrower dispersion speakers like my big horns can make a room sound overly damped with less absorption. I took down heavy curtains that were quite helpful with my wider dispersion speakers. Your new speakers are similar to mine, being corner horns.

So far I'm mostly talking about treble frequencies. When it comes to bass I don't know if it's possible to call room modes natural sounding. I think if you can break them up or damp them that will be a better sounding room period. It's just not natural having deep bass that was recorded in a larger venue play back in a smaller space. Some trickery can be useful, and bass traps can do that without making the room sound unnatural. I think a nice large canvas tent set up outside would be an interesting environment to listen to a good system. It would be exceedingly well damped in the bass but you could have enough reflective surfaces to get some good room ambience. My guess is it would sound great in there but you'd need adequate bass power due to the lack of room reinforcement.

Anybody tried playing their system in a big tent?

Hi Tim,
It’s important to clarify that Peter didn’t abandon acoustics and room treatment he removed some very specific items from his environment, absorptive tube traps. My approach is very much similar to what you described, basically listen to the room and fix the issues in a manner and with materials complementary to the overall character of the space introducing giant absorptive panels in the domestic environment is the furthest from natural you can get, the acoustic panels are foreign to the space and work against or in competition to the existing feel and sound. That is apart from general issues with absorption stealing energy and information contained in the sound waves. The difference is managing the energy or killing it.

Floor reflections and/or absorption are always a consideration how much of a problem they are depends on the situation but dealing with reflections is easy, absorption is much more difficult to deal with and often the easiest answer is removing the absorptive material if possible. Bass is the most complicated parameter to deal with, not only regarding room acoustics and setup. It’s a challenge starting from the recording to the last component in the chain and everything in between and I’m not only talking about volume but quality. Most of the time we have to deal with bass in the speaker setup and seating position but IME when the system is capable of quality bass the ultimate solution is with floor design and not bass traps and definitely not any over the wall commercial product.

I used to DJ a lot when I was younger some of was in tents or outdoors a two speaker home system wasn’t handicapped by lack of boundary reinforcement and the only problem was the fleeting bass as you moved further away from the speakers.

Given your business it’s very interesting that you dealt with the room acoustics by ear and not measurement as many would expect!

david

 

[morricab]

Ok, here‘s a question...

I have an engineered acoustic space. I know some would say it is “damped” but I was happy when I walked into the showroom at Magico a few weeks back I heard very much the same as my own room. Perhaps a little more lively, but the room was also at least double the volume. I want to have some professional musicians come play live, un-amplified for myself and a tiny audience. Is the sound in my room going to be anything but “natural”?

If I try to build a music system that approaches that sound, will it not be “natural sound”?

I’m not trying to be a wise-ass, honestly. I’m completely serious. If those same musicians play upstairs in my overly live, echo-y, reverberant room, is that not also ‘natural sound’ even though it is going to be vastly different from my music room? If I build a system to match that sound, which system is more “natural sounding”?

Yes, it is a really good idea. By definition it will be natural sound as it is live unamplified. You might discover though that the room is too damped...or not. Keep in mind repetition is the key to making these mental associations...one and done is not likely to keep your aural memory alive for long. If you have a long association with live music then probably you already have a good mental construct for judging more or less “real” feeling.

 

[morricab]

Bob, here is my take:

You will hear the natural sound of those instruments as played in those different rooms. Both sounds are natural. We want to hear the distinct character of the space in which the instruments are being recorded from our systems. At least some of us do.

If the listening room has a strong sonic signature, it will be part of what you hear when playing your recordings. How strong an effect it has will determine if what you hear from the system is natural. It will sound more or less natural. There are degrees of natural and IMO there is no absolute sound because different pianos in different spaces sound different. There is Just a range of believable sound. That too is likely controversial.

I disagree Peter. A live piano in a room will always sound live, regardless of how it’s tone character, decay and dynamics change from the room or your distance to the instrument. Same for all other acoustic sources. Your brain intrinsically knows the difference. Practice allows a more precise dialing in to that sense of realism.

 

[howiebrou]

I want to reassure everyone that the intent is not to sanitize this forum.

BTW, and FWIW I can't tell you how many PM's I get reporting posts from many of you here who complain about someone's post as being offensive, off topic argumentative etc etc etc. Many of you are posting in this thread. I try to maintain equanimity to all. As the saying goes, challenge the post and not the poster. There have been several posts here today with members sniping at one another. I merely ask to keep things polite and we can all get along

I applaud this approach. We don't want the woke brigade setting up shop here please.