HiFi & Sound reproduction

[jayne lee wilson]

That's illogical. How can it sound 'natural', if it sounds like something else? It was recorded electronically in a studio/studio conditions and was not performed or heard in a concert hall.

What a VERY STRANGE notion... any idea where the Vienna Phil, the Berlin Phil, RCAmsterdam, RLPO etc tend to make most of their recordings? Crammed into the local TV Studios perhaps?

Barring intractable acoustic/audience problems, a classical engineer will usually set up her microphones to try to bring the space around the orchestra onto the tape, not just the band itself. To call it an illusion does NOT mean it doesn't exist*. This is the Grand Paradox! If the recording is a good one then you do REALLY hear at least some of the acoustic characteristics of the hall. The better the reproducing system, the more vivid that presence is.

*To spell it out - it is an illusion because you are not actually there in the hall where the recording took place, OK? Phew.
(But you could also call it an illusion because....look, if you want to go any further, this will turn into the Metaphysics thread...)

[Beef Oven]

What a VERY STRANGE notion... any idea where the Vienna Phil, the Berlin Phil, RCAmsterdam, RLPO etc tend to make most of their recordings? Crammed into the local TV Studios perhaps?

Barring intractable acoustic/audience problems, a classical engineer will usually set up her microphones to try to bring the space around the orchestra onto the tape, not just the band itself. To call it an illusion does NOT mean it doesn't exist*. This is the Grand Paradox! If the recording is a good one then you do REALLY hear at least some of the acoustic characteristics of the hall. The better the reproducing system, the more vivid that presence is.

*To spell it out - it is an illusion because you are not actually there in the hall where the recording took place, OK? Phew.
(But you could also call it an illusion because....look, if you want to go any further, this will turn into the Metaphysics thread...)

I'm only questioning the 'natural' bit. The illusion part is uncontentious. A recording in a studio can sound like a live performance but it cannot sound natural because to do so it must sound like a recording!

[jayne lee wilson]

I'm only questioning the 'natural' bit. The illusion part is uncontentious. A recording in a studio can sound like a live performance but it cannot sound natural because to do so it must sound like a recording!

Oh Yes It Can! (From metaphysics to pantomime). That's the "art which conceals art" bit. The best recordings and the best equipment are indeed the most "natural-sounding" - they absent themselves, sounding "as if you were really there". Which brings us back to La Grande Illusion...

[Beef Oven]

Oh Yes It Can! (From metaphysics to pantomime). That's the "art which conceals art" bit. The best recordings and the best equipment are indeed the most "natural-sounding" - they absent themselves, sounding "as if you were really there". Which brings us back to La Grande Illusion...

And on that note, I'll let you have the last word

[Nevalti]

That's illogical. How can it sound 'natural', if it sounds like something else? It was recorded electronically in a studio/studio conditions and was not performed or heard in a concert hall.

I usually prefer live recordings made with simple microphone set ups as they really can sound realistic. Studio recordings made with close miking at each instrument (almost) and an engineer pushing sliders up and down tend to sound artificial and anything but realistic. They can be more 'impressive' and they can clearly emphasise the different threads of the music but they are certainly not natural.

Sadly, at Von Karajan's peak of ability he was normally recorded on Deutsche Grammophon who, at the time, virtually always used close miking. Von Karajan's performances do shine through the engineers fiddling but I think it a great shame that many of his performances were spoilt that way.

[Gordon]

Sadly, at Von Karajan's peak of ability he was normally recorded on Deutsche Grammophon who, at the time, virtually always used close miking. Von Karajan's performances do shine through the engineers fiddling but I think it a great shame that many of his performances were spoilt that way.

Don't blame the engineers too much here; HvK was an inveterate fiddler himself, mostly in his later days at DG and EMI [about early 70s after he fell out wth DG]. Unfortunately the EMI/Electrola engineer - Wolfgang Gulich - he worked with in Berlin was also a bit of an odd-ball balancer so many of his 1970s recordings sound odd. Re-issues have cleaned them up a bit. One would have thought that Peter Andry the EMI producer would have intervened but with HvK no one else had control!!

The early DG's from the 1960s are much better balanced [mostly Gunter Herrmanns]. HvK's Meistersingers from Dresden is an exception in the 1970's period - EMI used the East German VEB engineers.

[Nevalti]

Where does it say that?

On the AVI Q&A page - third item: "Aren't Class D amps more efficient? Why don't you use them? They can be more efficient but at the moment the best ones still have more distortion than the best Class AB linear amplifiers, in practice the average power dissipation of a linear amplifier playing music is usually quite low so the energy savings of a Class D design are minimal." My underlining. A bit lower down it says that they average 40W at 'normal domestic listening levels' - whatever that means. Played 'loud' they will produce a lot of heat. Bear in mind that you have a potential 2x(75+250W)=650W heat-source in that box.

As for breaking them if playing long and loud, the user's ears are likely to be the first thing to break!

1. Have you heard how loud kids play 'music'?
2. Ask the neighbours how loud your hifi is turned up by your kids when you are out.
3. They will only sound loud in a small room. They won't sound loud if played in a large enough room/hall or out-doors.
4. I often listen 'loud' but from other parts of the house.
5. The realistic volume of an orchestra is pretty damn loud - assuming that you play at realistic volumes.

By the way, I didn't say you would break them, I said they probably have thermal cut-outs (to prevent them from breaking).

Please understand, I am not knocking AVI nor you for choosing them. What I said was that active speakers are a dead-end compromise with no upgrade route when you become aware of their shortcomings. As this thread is all about offering advice on selecting a system, that is something the OP (and anyone else) should obviously bear in mind. I expect you did consider that, but you chose, for your own reasons, to ignore it. Most people do not ignore that big drawback and they do not choose active speakers.

[MrGongGong]

And on that note, I'll let you have the last word

which should be

ACOUSMATIC

IMV

I'm just a bit puzzled by (and I know and participate in many recordings of all sorts of stuff including orchestras) the idea that somehow music is different to other arts
IMV it's time we got over it ("Ceci n'est pas une pipe" style) and stopped pretending that a recording is something other than what it is !!
It might, of course, be wonderful, terrible or move you to tears

"realistic" is an odd word in this , don't you think ?
and reminds me (again !)of the great sadly late Iain Banks and the Wombles

[Nevalti]

..............Basic requirements? Neutral tonal balance, high-resolution at low levels, bags of power. And it's not easy to achieve, as Nevalti and I can both attest. But when you do...

I would add two other qualities that are usually ignored because most people are simply not aware of them.
1. The ability to retain fine, quiet details within loud complex passages such as the opening 'crescendo' in Mahler's 5th or Dire Straits 'The Man's too Strong'. They can both sound very messy on a mediocre system but suddenly they make sense when played 'properly'.
2. The ability to retain a constant tonal balance and dynamics regardless of what volume you choose to listen at.

Some amps sound wonderful at one particular volume setting and very ordinary or decidedly 'wrong' at other settings. The ATC P1 is a good example of how it should be done. The Musical Fidelity M6 500i is a good example of a potentially fabulous amplifier that is just too compromised at differing volume settings. At a certain level it is a seriously good, world class amp, but if you drop below that level it all goes wrong.

(I'm pleased to see that there is at least one person here who understands what I am talking about Jayne.)

[Nevalti]

....."realistic" is an odd word in this , don't you think ?
and reminds me (again !)of the great sadly late Iain Banks and the Wombles

I think I understand the point you are trying to make but, if I do understand, I disagree.

If friends come round and play music in my lounge, and I record them, I can play that back with such realism that most blindfolded people would not know if it were live or recorded. That is undoubtedly 'realistic'.

The fact that most music was not recorded in my lounge does not stop it from sounding 'realistic' albeit it will not be as realistic in my lounge as my own recordings. One can, to a large extent, visualise, with closed eyes, a solo performer, a quartet, a band or even a full orchestra spaced out in front of your arm-chair. That is 'realistic' to me but we are perhaps diverging into semantics rather than sound reproduction.

[Phileas]

What I said was that active speakers are a dead-end compromise with no upgrade route when you become aware of their shortcomings. As this thread is all about offering advice on selecting a system, that is something the OP (and anyone else) should obviously bear in mind. I expect you did consider that, but you chose, for your own reasons, to ignore it. Most people do not ignore that big drawback and they do not choose active speakers.

ILTWTL

[jayne lee wilson]

ILTWTL

Heavens, Phileas! In that case, you REALLY need an upgrade!

(sorry, but it was an open goal...)

[jayne lee wilson]

which should be

ACOUSMATIC

IMV

I'm just a bit puzzled by (and I know and participate in many recordings of all sorts of stuff including orchestras) the idea that somehow music is different to other arts
IMV it's time we got over it ("Ceci n'est pas une pipe" style) and stopped pretending that a recording is something other than what it is !!
It might, of course, be wonderful, terrible or move you to tears

"realistic" is an odd word in this , don't you think ?
and reminds me (again !)of the great sadly late Iain Banks and the Wombles

Hmmm... we're headed back towards metaphysics again, but This is Not a Pipe (and the crackjaw obviousness of its "insights") is a bit of a cultural cliche, n'est-ce pas? This is Not A Knowing Smile!

No it's not a Pipe (or even a mere pipe) and you can't smoke it or feel it, but it still looks like one. The Vienna Philharmonic, in the Musikverein isn't really at the end of your room, but (in some rare circumstances) it can sound and feel like it is. The notes, timbres, orchestral layout, acoustic, and some of the physical sensations will be (to an endlessly variable extent depending on the system) the same "as if you were there". That is what "reproduction" means with whatever imperfections. Not the real thing? Of course not, but if you can dream the sensation of a kiss or the smell of burning, think of what your sensory apparatus can do with all the clues an orchestral recording can offer. Our response differences in all this may be just variations in cerebral processing - some auditory nerves (and musical memories, and musical imaginations) might make more of a given input than others.

We are not microphones on stilts - we constantly process what we hear. But the more truthful (low-colouration, low distortion, good scale & power etc.) the signal is, the less there is in the way, the more the brain can do with it.

(**"realistic" is an odd term in many contexts (vide Raymond Williams in Keywords), but if you can't reference a classical recording (or playback) to that, what can you use in its place, as a reference in an evaluative terminology?)

[MrGongGong]

I think
If friends come round and play music in my lounge, and I record them, I can play that back with such realism that most blindfolded people would not know if it were live or recorded. That is undoubtedly 'realistic'.

or Acousmatic

" Acousmatic "; sound whose origin is not seen. The listener is not having any visual cue attached. The first recorded use of acousmatic sound was by Pythagoras way back in Ancient Greece. Pythagoras would place a black curtain between him and his audience when giving lectures. He did this so that his students would focus more on his speech than on his person. The word acousmatic comes from the Greek word akousma: what is heard.

aaah the sonic Turing test ?
But my question is still
Why would you want to do this at all ?
Don't get me wrong , i'm very keen on listening to high quality recordings of orchestral and other music in my living room
but wouldn't pretend that it's the same experience as sitting in a hall

This is an area that many in electroacoustic studies have long thought about when dealing with sonic events that have no obvious relation to the physical world
(but probably a bit OT for this discussion)

[Nevalti]

or Acousmatic

But my question is still
Why would you want to do this at all ?
Don't get me wrong , i'm very keen on listening to high quality recordings of orchestral and other music in my living room
but wouldn't pretend that it's the same experience as sitting in a hall

This is an area that many in electroacoustic studies have long thought about when dealing with sonic events that have no obvious relation to the physical world
(but probably a bit OT for this discussion)

OK, let's play that game.

If you listen to 1. A wind up gramophone, 2. A cheap transistor radio, 3. Actual live singing, 4. A top-notch hifi reproduction of that singing, all whilst wearing a blindfold what you hear, in each case, is acousmatic.

Sounds 1 & 2 you will immediately recognise as poor quality reproduced sound and you would recognise the type of system in use. You would probably not enjoy listening to music on those mediums for very long.
Sounds 3 & 4 you will be so similar that you would not know with certainty which is live and which is reproduced because the reproduced sound is very 'realistic'. One is real, the other realistic.

If someone assumes that the original live performance is the best version available, and generally people do, it makes sense to achieve a 'realistic' reproduction of that original live performance.

Acousmatic is simply a non-qualitative description, much the same as 'recorded'. 'Realistic' is very much qualitative. Realistic reproductions have high fidelity to the original performance.

You ask why I would want to achieve that high fidelity reproduction of the original performance and I am almost dumbfounded by the question. I have absolutely no idea why anyone would choose to buy or listen to a particular recording or live broadcast and then not bother to try to hear it as close as possible to how it originally sounded. If you are not even going to try to hear the best possible reproduction (at any given budget) then what on earth are you going to do? Are you going to deliberately manipulate the sound into something else? Are you going to listen to the tiny speaker on your iPhone? I very much doubt it. I am pretty confident that you will have a very good hifi system at home because it gives you much more pleasure than a transistor radio would. I am also pretty confident that you actually listen to music on your excellent hifi system for precisely the same reasons that I do.

A music lover, and that is probably most of us here, usually takes an interest in the nuances of a performance and not just the basic tunes being played. Orchestras are compared, conductors are compared, venues, recording techniques etc. You can appreciate none of those differences unless you have a system which allows you to hear it. Going up to a top-notch hifi system simply allows you to hear a little more. To some people that will be of no great interest, to other people, that little bit of extra 'realism' makes a huge difference.