Poor recordings - are they genre related?

[Dave2002]

Is there something about certain genres of "music" which generally seems to lead to poor recordings?
Also, do some genres get characterised and influenced by marketeers rather than musicians?

If you look back over the history of recordings sold to the public, from (say) 1950s on, some companies changed the way their records sounded for marketing/profit reasons. This was even if the master recording was actually quite good - and arguably it made sense. For example, if a company was aware that many buyers of its recordings had equipment with poor bass response, and perhaps poor treble too - that company might boost the bass and also the treble. However, they'd have to make sure that they didn't boost the bass too much so that the stylus jumped out of the groove.

There definitely were companies which shaped their published recordings to maximise profits, rather than to give the best possible sound on good equipment. As I wrote just a few sentences ago, some of the master recordings were good.

Now - come into the digital era - much less need for this - perhaps. So why are some recordings so dreadful - including some newly recorded and very recent ones.

I bought a CD of the John Wilson orchestra playing Rogers and Hammerstain movie music today in a charity shop. The recording is terrible, IMO. It just sounds flat - completely dull. It's an EMI recording from 2012. There is no ambience. I think the dynamics have been flattened completely out of existence. It just hits me as an awful recording the moment the CD starts. So why? Is it because it's film music? However, it's not a film soundtrack.

Is it the musicians' "fault". I doubt it, as I've heard the JW orchestra live on several occasions and it sounds very much more lively and dynamic that this. Some film soundtracks from the 1940s onwards to 1960 sound dull, but there's no need to aspire to that level of quality surely.

So, why?

[visualnickmos]

I bought a CD of the John Wilson orchestra playing Rogers and Hammerstain movie music today in a charity shop. The recording is terrible, IMO. It just sounds flat - completely dull. It's an EMI recording from 2012. There is no ambience. I think the dynamics have been flattened completely out of existence. It just hits me as an awful recording the moment the CD starts. So why? Is it because it's film music? However, it's not a film soundtrack.

Very informed comment. I am so often in awe of many (nearly all that I've heard) EMI, Decca and RCA recordings from the1950s, and '60s at how wonderfully clear, ambient, detailed and 'fresh' they sound, and stereo absolutely coming into its own. Then often equally (negatively) amazed at how many recent recordings sound exactly as you describe! Surely they must 'cut' a test CD before pressing the mass-produce button? If they do, then how on earth can they let it out of the door? Very puzzling...

[pastoralguy]

I was never impressed with Tasmin Little's EMI recordings. They always sounded quite 'flat' and uninviting which I stupidly attributed to the lady herself. And then I heard her play a few concerts over a short period and was stunned at her sound and her projection of musical ideas.

Her most recent discs from Chandos are, imho, infinitely more representative of her playing.

[Pulcinella]

I was never impressed with Tasmin Little's EMI recordings.

Must listen again then: I thought the Brahms/Sibelius and Bruch/Dvorak couplings were fine!

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Very informed comment. I am so often in awe of many (nearly all that I've heard) EMI, Decca and RCA recordings from the1950s, and '60s at how wonderfully clear, ambient, detailed and 'fresh' they sound, and stereo absolutely coming into its own. Then often equally (negatively) amazed at how many recent recordings sound exactly as you describe! Surely they must 'cut' a test CD before pressing the mass-produce button? If they do, then how on earth can they let it out of the door? Very puzzling...

Sometimes it's the case of "too many microphones". The rot started with Decca Phase 4, which was interesting in its time, but not really a good idea. I was involved in a recording at CTS Studios in the mid-1980s and was horrified by the artificially of at all - a mike over every orchestral musician's stand. The result had impact, but no real depth.

[Dave2002]

Thanks for the replies so far. I just wonder if some marketing genius has decided that the people who want to listen to film music played by a fairly decent orchestra are really just not interested in the sound anyway, and will use the recording for background listening - or maybe that's how they feel that they (the listeners) think that film music should sound and therefore "give them what they (think) they want"!

Personally, even if I do sometimes use music as background, I really can't stand recordings which are flattened to the point of ditchwater.

[richardfinegold]

I thoughtthat this thread, based on the word genre in it's title, would be a comment on the mixing of pop music. I don't listen to many pop recordings outside of my car radio but when I do play something on a home system I am always struck by the terrible up front in your face unnatural sound. Google the "Loudness Wars" and see that this is a real concern amongst many people.
I really think that the perceived superiority of vinyl vs. digital in large part stems from this. The original mix on most classic rock lps is much preferable to the remix done a few decades later on CD, by which time the distortion in perception of how music
should be mixed infected the responsible engineers. I have a Tea for the Tillerman CD that is simply unlistenable, but when I heard some audiophile version of it at a show, in High Res digital and vinyl, they both sounded 'normal' to me.

[kea]

The recording industry seems to have a rule that harpsichords are too quiet and should always be normalised to 0dB. As a result harpsichord recordings always sound two to three times louder and more tiring to the ear than anything else in my collection, and nothing at all like the way harpsichords sound in real life. I don't get it.

(There are a few companies/artists that produce more realistic recordings, to be fair. But surprisingly few.)

[pastoralguy]

Mrs PG and I listen to 'pop' music reasonably often but I always have to turn down the output of the sub-woofer since the constant boom-boom-boom-boom of whatever bass line is playing threaten to drown out whatever sound is emanating from the main speakers. Of course, pop music has little or no dynamic range so finding a suitable volume tends to suit the whole album.

We do enjoy Talking Heads, Annie Lennox, Amy Winehouse, The Beatles, The Stones, ABBA,UB40 and various compilation albums covering various decades. Currently, I'm listening to a Delphian album called 'La Pasionaria which consists of songs by Piazzola and Valentina Montoya Martinez. It's a small ensemble of vocalist, string quartet, double bass, piano and percussion and has a wonderful sense of immediacy.

[Ferretfancy]

Is there something about certain genres of "music" which generally seems to lead to poor recordings?
Also, do some genres get characterised and influenced by marketeers rather than musicians?

If you look back over the history of recordings sold to the public, from (say) 1950s on, some companies changed the way their records sounded for marketing/profit reasons. This was even if the master recording was actually quite good - and arguably it made sense. For example, if a company was aware that many buyers of its recordings had equipment with poor bass response, and perhaps poor treble too - that company might boost the bass and also the treble. However, they'd have to make sure that they didn't boost the bass too much so that the stylus jumped out of the groove.

There definitely were companies which shaped their published recordings to maximise profits, rather than to give the best possible sound on good equipment. As I wrote just a few sentences ago, some of the master recordings were good.

Now - come into the digital era - much less need for this - perhaps. So why are some recordings so dreadful - including some newly recorded and very recent ones.

I bought a CD of the John Wilson orchestra playing Rogers and Hammerstain movie music today in a charity shop. The recording is terrible, IMO. It just sounds flat - completely dull. It's an EMI recording from 2012. There is no ambience. I think the dynamics have been flattened completely out of existence. It just hits me as an awful recording the moment the CD starts. So why? Is it because it's film music? However, it's not a film soundtrack.

Is it the musicians' "fault". I doubt it, as I've heard the JW orchestra live on several occasions and it sounds very much more lively and dynamic that this. Some film soundtracks from the 1940s onwards to 1960 sound dull, but there's no need to aspire to that level of quality surely.

So, why?

This is an important topic which tends to be ignored in the magazines, possibly because they are anxious to avoid criticising the record companies.

One reason for poor recordings of classical music is that there are fewer ideal venues compared with the great locations of the past. We don't find many Sofiensaals or Kingsway Halls these days. Another reason is the much higher session costs and tight schedules. At the same time that costs went up, engineers were able to use more microphones, spot miking all the sections of the orchestra and multi tracking for later mix down.

In the early days of stereo many of the best recordings were engineered by brilliant pioneers who had developed great sound with very simple means. As an example, Decca's Das Rheingold was made using only a nine channel mixing desk designed by the company's own team. There's no doubt that simple techniques give a more convincing impression of musicians playing in a recognisable acoustic. Such recordings are phase coherent. Unfortunately great care is needed to achieve the desired results, and this means experimentation which might seem time wasting today.

As mixing desks began to sprout more and more channels with multi track recording, this became popular, but increased tape hiss and background noise became a problem. For a short while Dolby noise reduction went a long way to save the day,but Dolby depended on very accurate calibration, and again this could be time consuming.

Of course, the classical world has different requirements from pop music. Even in the mono days pop sound was balanced by the sound team, and not by a conductor, and Decca's Phase 4 was originally used for pop rather than classical.

Then came digital and all the arguments about CDs v.LPs. I am convinced that the technical differences, at least for the home listener are not as great as some may claim, it's the studio techniques and the microphone placing that really matter.

I still listen to my vinyl recordings and wouldn't be without them, but I fight shy of buying recent orchestral recordings because they are often so poor. It's interesting that chamber music recordings are often excellent. I suppose there's no need to multi mike a string quartet!

[jayne lee wilson]

Very informed comment. I am so often in awe of many (nearly all that I've heard) EMI, Decca and RCA recordings from the1950s, and '60s at how wonderfully clear, ambient, detailed and 'fresh' they sound, and stereo absolutely coming into its own. Then often equally (negatively) amazed at how many recent recordings sound exactly as you describe! Surely they must 'cut' a test CD before pressing the mass-produce button? If they do, then how on earth can they let it out of the door? Very puzzling...

I'm always rather puzzled at this kind of sweeping criticism of "recent recordings..." Is it simply a case of not buying many new releases?
If you want to hear how good recent recordings can sound try:

Mendelssohn Symphonies 1-5 - COE/Nézet-Séguin/DG
Dutilleux Symphony 2 - Lille/Ang/Naxos
Brahms 4 - Champs Elysées/Herreweghe/Phi
Schubert 8 - Basle/Venzago/Sony
Gubaidulina Tempus Praesens - Lamsma/BIS

All this year, CDs or hi-res downloads, all you could wish from orchestral sound in their various balances
Further back.... I was listening to the Sibelius Vn. Concerto Original Version last night on BIS (1991). Goodness, with a dynamic impact like this, no wonder back in the day, some listeners complained that the dynamic range on some DDD orchestrals was too wide for their systems to cope with (partly due to the modest powers of British Integrated amps of the time). A true state-of-the-art stunner, worth getting just to see how capable your system is....(in vast spacious low-level resolution as well).

[MickyD]

I agree about decent recording venues. I love the vintage recordings of the Academy of Ancient Music for the most part, when they were recorded in St Jude's, Hampstead and Kingsway Hall. But their recordings made in Henry Wood Hall sound very flat and dry to me.

Some of my really favourite recordings of film music are those done in Kingsway Hall by the National Philharmonic Orchestra under Charles Gerhardt in the 70s for RCA Victor. Absolutely terrific sound.

[Ferretfancy]

I'm always rather puzzled at this kind of sweeping criticism of "recent recordings..." Is it simply a case of not buying many new releases?
If you want to hear how good recent recordings can sound try:

Mendelssohn Symphonies 1-5 - COE/Nézet-Séguin/DG
Dutilleux Symphony 2 - Lille/Ang/Naxos
Brahms 4 - Champs Elysées/Herreweghe/Phi
Schubert 8 - Basle/Venzago/Sony
Gubaidulina Tempus Praesens - Lamsma/BIS

All this year, CDs or hi-res downloads, all you could wish from orchestral sound in their various balances
Further back.... I was listening to the Sibelius Vn. Concerto Original Version last night on BIS (1991). Goodness, with a dynamic impact like this, no wonder back in the day, some listeners complained that the dynamic range on some DDD orchestrals was too wide for their systems to cope with (partly due to the modest powers of British Integrated amps of the time). A true state-of-the-art stunner, worth getting just to see how capable your system is....(in vast spacious low-level resolution as well).

I'm certainly not dismissing recent orchestral recordings out of hand, it's just that I've bought highly praised CDs only to find that they are often poor. I recently bought the Naxos recording of Shostakovich 7 with the RLPO and Petrenko, a conductor I admire. In no way do you ever feel that this sound represents the Philharmonic Hall. To my ears it's a very synthetic balance which becomes hard to listen to.

One set that has given me great pleasure is the huge Mozart 225 box with recordings from different sources beautifully presented in excellent sound, and more than that, amazingly consistent. I'll probably spend my remaining days listening to it

[visualnickmos]

I'm always rather puzzled at this kind of sweeping criticism of "recent recordings..." Is it simply a case of not buying many new releases?
If you want to hear how good recent recordings can sound try:

Mendelssohn Symphonies 1-5 - COE/Nézet-Séguin/DG
Dutilleux Symphony 2 - Lille/Ang/Naxos
Brahms 4 - Champs Elysées/Herreweghe/Phi
Schubert 8 - Basle/Venzago/Sony
Gubaidulina Tempus Praesens - Lamsma/BIS

All this year, CDs or hi-res downloads, all you could wish from orchestral sound in their various balances
Further back.... I was listening to the Sibelius Vn. Concerto Original Version last night on BIS (1991). Goodness, with a dynamic impact like this, no wonder back in the day, some listeners complained that the dynamic range on some DDD orchestrals was too wide for their systems to cope with (partly due to the modest powers of British Integrated amps of the time). A true state-of-the-art stunner, worth getting just to see how capable your system is....(in vast spacious low-level resolution as well).

I think you may have misconstrued what I said; maybe I was too vague. I am absolutely NOT making a 'sweeping criticism' of modern or even recent recordings - subtle difference, I know - but what I AM saying is that I'm amazed at the frequency with which I hear said recordings that are - well - not well-recorded! That's all. I agree - there are some real stunners in the modern recordded œuvre. I have many, indeed. I don't do downloads, by the way... I prefer real libraries where I can blow the dust off.

Anyway - I hope that's cleared up any confusion.

[Conchis]

I thoughtthat this thread, based on the word genre in it's title, would be a comment on the mixing of pop music. I don't listen to many pop recordings outside of my car radio but when I do play something on a home system I am always struck by the terrible up front in your face unnatural sound. Google the "Loudness Wars" and see that this is a real concern amongst many people.
I really think that the perceived superiority of vinyl vs. digital in large part stems from this. The original mix on most classic rock lps is much preferable to the remix done a few decades later on CD, by which time the distortion in perception of how music
should be mixed infected the responsible engineers. I have a Tea for the Tillerman CD that is simply unlistenable, but when I heard some audiophile version of it at a show, in High Res digital and vinyl, they both sounded 'normal' to me.

Richard: I'd be interested in hearing which CD version of Tea For The Tillerman you've been listening to - the original CD from the 80s, or the remaster from the early 2000s? I have the latter and seem to recall it sounding fine.