Modern Recorded Sound

[Ferretfancy]

I find the comments on the Karajan Aida interesting, as I think I'm right in saying that Culshaw and his team deliberately went for a very wide dynamic range, and it was also the first time that they used closed circuit television to cue the offstage singers in the Nile Scene and elsewhere. I no longer have the original LPs with that hideous gatefold cover from Cecil B de Mille, but I don't remember the dynamics seeming too extreme, the use of perspectives is still very impressive. The CD dynamics seem wider than I remembered on the LP, but I have made big equipment upgrades in recent years which possibly accounts for that.
I listen in a room about 28 feet long by 13 wide, with the speakers on the narrow wall, and surround speakers about halfway back in the room, and if I have a complaint it is usually not about dynamics, but rather about over close microphone positioning, particularly on solo piano. This is something that BBC engineers often do better than some commercial rivals, when broadcasting from the Wigmore Hall, for example.
The ear is easily fooled into perceiving wide dynamics if there are clear perspectives and a good sense of depth, convincing in living room conditions. Unfortunately those virtues are exactly what many modern orchestral recordings seem to have lost, they batter our ears at the climaxes, but never sound real. It can be done, even today, when conditions are right. One stunning example is the opening scene in Simon Rattle's recording of Szymanowski's King Roger, you may need to warn the neighbours though!

[Mahlerei]

Ferret

I was thinking of the EMI Aida, with Freni and Carreras, not the Decca version (which I now realise was the one floss was probably referring to). Karajan's EMI operas - Otello, Aida, Pelleas and Don Carlos - all seemed dynamically OTT to me. I don't know the earlier Aida, so can't comment on that one.

[Il Grande Inquisitor]

Ferret

I was thinking of the EMI Aida, with Freni and Carreras, not the Decca version (which I now realise was the one EA was probably referring to). Karajan's EMI operas - Otello, Aida, Pelleas and Don Carlos - all seemed dynamically OTT to me. I don't know the earlier Aida, so can't comment on that one.

Karajan's EMI Verdi operas suffer dreadfully from 'knob twiddling', the voices frequently drowned out by the over-inflated orchestral sound. The Decca Aida is wonderful, mahlerei, and well worth hearing - Tebaldi, Bergonzi and Simionato at their very finest.

[Mahlerei]

Hello IGI and a happy new year to you :) Thanks for the tip re: the Decca Aida. I have the Solti/Price at the mo and used to have Muti as well. Another oen for the new year wish list.

[Il Grande Inquisitor]

Hello IGI and a happy new year to you :) Thanks for the tip re: the Decca Aida. I have the Solti/Price at the mo and used to have Muti as well. Another oen for the new year wish list.

And a Happy New Year to you too, mahlerei. I see that Decca is reissuing the Solti Aida in February.

[Flosshilde]

Karajan's EMI Verdi operas suffer dreadfully from 'knob twiddling', the voices frequently drowned out by the over-inflated orchestral sound. The Decca Aida is wonderful, mahlerei, and well worth hearing - Tebaldi, Bergonzi and Simionato at their very finest.

It's the Decca, with Tebaldi et al, that I was referring to. The singing may well be wonderful - it's the over-all balance that I find difficult.

[BetweenTheStaves]

I can identify with Bryn re dynamic range in cars to the extent that if I have my wife with me then I don't listen to classical music. Her hearing is much more acute than mine and so I find myself turning the volume up to hear the quiet bits over the engine and road noise.....only to then be anticipating the loud bits and then turning it down to save my wife's hearing or perhaps the resulting angst.

Ferretfancy hits the nail nicely on the head for me regarding dynamic range and listening in the home and the benefits of subtlety in the mix.

Digressing slightly OT but does anyone else think that the presenters voices on classicfm (the when I turn over to avoid the text trolls on R3 breakfast) have too much equalisation that makes them 'chesty'?

[Mandryka]

Many people blame producer Michel Glotz for the peculiar sound and balance of Karajan's 1970s EMI recordings (his Tristan suffers from some of the same eccentricities). I heard once that HvK wanted to create a mix that would do for quadrophonic as well as normal stereo, though that may have been apocryphal....whatever, Glotz described himself as 'an extension of (von K's) will in the control room', so maybe Karajan was to blame after all.

[Mandryka]

Culshaw and Legge were great producers, but they had the good fortune to find great engineers, notably Gordon Parry, James Lock, Kenneth Wilkinson, Christopher Parker, Douglas Larter and others. I doubt if the dynamic Decca approach to opera recording would have got under way successfully without their pioneering ingenuity. On the other hand Legge disapproved of stereo at first, and Christopher Parker tells some nice anecdotes about recording the Karajan Rosenkavalier in stereo while Legge supervised in a separate mono control room.
James Lock once described how they solved a problem recording the pilgrims in the Solti Tannhauser (produced by Christopher Braeburn ) The male voices were supposed to process across the stage, but found it difficult to keep together while on the move. They therefore to keep the chorus in one place, in front of a group of microphones which slowly rotated on a turntable, thus producing a constantly shifting balance which could be panned across the stage.
It would be great if an insider from that era could give us a definitive history of the early stereo era in addition to Culshaw's excellent books.

The Solti Tannhauser was produced by Ray Minshull.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

The Solti Tannhauser was produced by Ray Minshull.

It was indeed, but it was very much in the spirit of Culshaw. But when Solti's first Vienna Die Zauberflote was issued, it suddenly became clear that the Culshaw era was well and truly over.

[Ferretfancy]

Sorry about the Braeburn / Minshull slip!

[Petrushka]

Sorry about the Braeburn / Minshull slip!

Christopher Raeburn actually, Ferret. I often used to see him in London whenever the VPO were in town the last time being when Haitink conducted them in Mahler 9 at the Barbican on 2004.

[Flosshilde]

I don't think anyone has mentioned loudspeakers and the part they play in this yet.

So many only sound balanced when played at a very high volume.

Of all the speakers I've heard, Harbeth seem to solve the problem. I've had a pair for a couple of years now, one of the first things I noticed was all the CDs I'd written off as poor recordings due to what seemed to be excessive dynamic range, were now fine!

BAsil, I thought I'd follow this up as I'm planning on buying some new speakers. After much searching on the web I eventually found somewhere that actually sold them, but have decided that at £1300 for the cheapest set they are a little outside my price-range!

[Ferretfancy]

Petrushka -Raeburn, I'll get it right eventually!

Bws.
Ferret

[Basil]

Flosshilde,

They're not cheap, but I think it's worth spending as much as you can afford on speakers, I bought the SHL5's.