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Also, I have Robert Silverman's 7 CD Mozart set, and not only does it sound great with wonderful imaging (Kimber's Iso-Mike process is the only time I've ever heard omnidirectional mikes give what I consider really good stereo) but the performances are, in my opinion, nonpareil! Next time you speak with your friend Mr. Silverman, tell him that I think he is probably the premier interpreter of Mozart piano music in the world today, and that I treasure those performances!

 

I will tell him the next time I speak to him, George. I know that he will appreciate your comments. Of course I am somewhat biased, but I agree that the Mozart Piano Sonatas collection sounds great and his performances are truly wonderful.

"Relax, it's only hi-fi. There's never been a hi-fi emergency." - Roy Hall

"Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted." - William Bruce Cameron

 

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I don't think that the ultimate goal of domestic reproduction of music recordings is the recreation the original event in one's home but to enable the listener to connect at an artistic (aesthetic, emotional, intellectual and spiritual) level with the music.

 

Well, the term for a quality reproduction system is "high-fidelity" which means a high degree of faithfulness. If that "faithfulness" of reproduction isn't in regard to the original musical performance, then what is it being faithful to? It might be a debatable point to some, but not to me. The "ultimate goal of domestic reproduction of music recordings is, without a doubt the recreation the original event in one's home". This has to be the goal, or the whole thing becomes a matter of "if it sounds good to me, that's all that is necessary". This attitude is fine for the individual owner, but it's anathema for the industry - a lot like playing a game of water polo where the goals float free with the wind and tide and the players never know where they are at any one time. Not a good situation.

 

Sound quality or accuracy in the reproduction of the original event does help to create the illusion that we are listening to an event but mostly at a sonic (and not musical/artistic) level.

 

R

 

That is all playback equipment is supposed to do - create an illusion that we are listening to an event, live, without the technology getting in the way. Now, it is debatable whether the goal is to recreate that performance in one's listening space, or to virtually transport the listener to the venue where the performance is taking place. My feeling is that it depends on the music. You can have a system that's so transparent that a small ensemble such as a string quartet or small jazz band seems like it's in the room with you, but one can never fit a symphony orchestra in one's living room, and in that case it's important that the playback transport the listener virtually to the venue where the performance is taking place. To accomplish the latter, my feeling is that the illusion is heavily dependent on the recording itself. To give the illusion that one is in a large concert hall, the recording must be true stereo, recorded minimally with all imaging and hall-acoustic clues present in the recording.

George

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Well, the term for a quality reproduction system is "high-fidelity" which means a high degree of faithfulness. If that "faithfulness" of reproduction isn't in regard to the original musical performance, then what is it being faithful to?

 

[A]ll playback equipment is supposed to do - [is] create an illusion that we are listening to an event, live, without the technology getting in the way.

 

+1

 

If a stereo system comes close to faithfully reproducing the 'live' event, it should also do the same for any studio recording.

 

P.S. And please, this is not an invitation to start another lengthy "absolute sound" debate. :)

"Relax, it's only hi-fi. There's never been a hi-fi emergency." - Roy Hall

"Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted." - William Bruce Cameron

 

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Well, the term for a quality reproduction system is "high-fidelity" which means a high degree of faithfulness. If that "faithfulness" of reproduction isn't in regard to the original musical performance, then what is it being faithful to? It might be a debatable point to some, but not to me. The "ultimate goal of domestic reproduction of music recordings is, without a doubt the recreation the original event in one's home". This has to be the goal, or the whole thing becomes a matter of "if it sounds good to me, that's all that is necessary". This attitude is fine for the individual owner, but it's anathema for the industry - a lot like playing a game of water polo where the goals float free with the wind and tide and the players never know where they are at any one time. Not a good situation.

 

My comments should not be read out of context and they were directed at

 

There are, of course, always exceptions to any generalization. But when a maestro conductor with a world-wide reputation, like George Cleve listens to cassettes of his performances on a ghetto-blaster boom box, and finds it more than sufficient to study the orchestra's performances, you gotta wonder about musicians and audio.

 

While I do agree that the main goal of domestic reproduction of music recordings is the recreation the original event in one's home but I don't think that it is the ultimate; this latter is, as mentioned, to enable the listener to connect at an artistic (aesthetic, emotional, intellectual and spiritual) level with the music. That connection can be enhanced by sound quality but only to a lesser extent, as can be proved the myriad of reports on musicians with low-fi systems...

Sound quality and above imaging (spatial reconstruction) is very much an audiophile thing that music lovers don't really value so much.

 

That is all playback equipment is supposed to do - create an illusion that we are listening to an event, live, without the technology getting in the way. Now, it is debatable whether the goal is to recreate that performance in one's listening space, or to virtually transport the listener to the venue where the performance is taking place. My feeling is that it depends on the music. You can have a system that's so transparent that a small ensemble such as a string quartet or small jazz band seems like it's in the room with you, but one can never fit a symphony orchestra in one's living room, and in that case it's important that the playback transport the listener virtually to the venue where the performance is taking place. To accomplish the latter, my feeling is that the illusion is heavily dependent on the recording itself. To give the illusion that one is in a large concert hall, the recording must be true stereo, recorded minimally with all imaging and hall-acoustic clues present in the recording.

 

This ability to create a sonic illusion of a musical event is, in practice, only true for classical and some jazz because most other recordings use multi- and close-mic'ing and do not portray a single performance or event but collage of several "moments"...

 

And the problem is that technology does get in a way (more so at both ends of the chain) and, as you've mentioned, the result is also very much dependent on the recording and mastering processes (mic positioning, EQ and tonal balance, etc.).

 

After all those "interferences" (technology, recording, playback, etc.) have been added, the reproduction is different from the live sound and in my view it's the decisions at the recording/production side of the equation that most influence the end result.

 

R

"Science draws the wave, poetry fills it with water" Teixeira de Pascoaes

 

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+1

 

If a stereo system comes close to faithfully reproducing the 'live' event, it should also do the same for any studio recording.

 

P.S. And please, this is not an invitation to start another lengthy "absolute sound" debate. :)

 

 

Yes, I think that goes without saying. If it's faithful to the sound of live music played in a real space it should be faithful to what's on any recording made anywhere of any type of music. The caveat here is that studio-bound recordings will only sound like what the engineers/producers/musicians heard on playback if the speakers used in the home are the same make and model as those the recording was originally mixed on because the studio recording doesn't exist until it is laid-down as a recording (mostly due to the electronic instruments employed). I might also point out that this doesn't seem to be all that important except in an academic sense.

George

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My comments should not be read out of context and they were directed at

 

 

 

While I do agree that the main goal of domestic reproduction of music recordings is the recreation the original event in one's home but I don't think that it is the ultimate; this latter is, as mentioned, to enable the listener to connect at an artistic (aesthetic, emotional, intellectual and spiritual) level with the music.

 

I would think that would go without saying. That's the reason for listening to music in any case!

 

 

That connection can be enhanced by sound quality but only to a lesser extent, as can be proved the myriad of reports on musicians with low-fi systems...

 

Ah, but that's because musicians aren't generally interested in SQ. Their interests lie with the way the music is made, not how a recording of it ultimately sounds.

 

Sound quality and above imaging (spatial reconstruction) is very much an audiophile thing that music lovers don't really value so much.

 

+1 but I think that's what we have been saying here in this thread.

 

 

 

This ability to create a sonic illusion of a musical event is, in practice, only true for classical and some jazz because most other recordings use multi- and close-mic'ing and do not portray a single performance or event but collage of several "moments"...

 

Yes, quite.

 

And the problem is that technology does get in a way (more so at both ends of the chain) and, as you've mentioned, the result is also very much dependent on the recording and mastering processes (mic positioning, EQ and tonal balance, etc.).

 

Again, yes.

 

After all those "interferences" (technology, recording, playback, etc.) have been added, the reproduction is different from the live sound and in my view it's the decisions at the recording/production side of the equation that most influence the end result.

 

R

 

While all of this is true, and reflects the reality of the current state-of-the-art, the goal is still and must be for audio manufacturers to build equipment that is as transparent and as true to the sound of live music played in a real space as is possible. Otherwise, IMHO, the industry is running open loop with no goals and no discipline and this ultimately serves no one.

George

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I am sorry for you. But I do think that the technology is just not there to be really real.

 

That's the rub, isn't it? I don't think the laws of physics will allow us to ever get there unless some foolproof way is found to make truly massless loudspeakers and to totally dial-out the listening room and replace it with an accurate facsimile of the original performance space. I think that is unlikely - at least for the foreseeable future.

George

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That's the rub, isn't it? I don't think the laws of physics will allow us to ever get there unless some foolproof way is found to make truly massless loudspeakers and to totally dial-out the listening room and replace it with an accurate facsimile of the original performance space. I think that is unlikely - at least for the foreseeable future.

I honestly don't know if this is a contentious issue (like God, DBTs and USB cables); if so, tell me to shut up and ignore me...

 

What about binaural recording for your second point? The first point is a technology issue that may or may not get "close enough" (e.g. nanotechnology)

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I honestly don't know if this is a contentious issue (like God, DBTs and USB cables); if so, tell me to shut up and ignore me...

 

 

No, it's not a contentious issue, but it should certainly be the "pie-in-the-sky" goal of the high-end audio equipment industry.

 

What about binaural recording for your second point? The first point is a technology issue that may or may not get "close enough" (e.g. nanotechnology)

 

I don't find binaural close enough. Yes can be very lifelike, but it cannot distinguish sounds from the rear of the listener from sounds coming from the listener's front, although it is great for side-to-side. I used to have a pair of binaural headphones that had a pair of binaural mikes in the ear cups. I'd have a friend walk around where I was sitting while jiggling a bunch of keys while I was blindfolded. I (nor anyone else) could tell whether the keys were being jiggled in front of me or behind me. This phenomenon was replicated when I got hold of a Sennheiser binaural "head" one time. Using the same technique on it while I wore headphones in another room, gave the same result, confirming my earlier experiment. While Binaural is fun and can be uncanny at times, I don't think it is good enough to recreate that "accurate facsimile of the original performance space" to which I alluded in my earlier post.

George

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"People will hear what you tell them to hear" Thomas Edison. BUT!

 

 

Edison's people used to go from city to city carrying out what he called "Tone Tests". This early form of AR's famous "Live vs. Recorded" demonstrations had musicians on the podium pretending to play while an Edison phonograph played the same "tunes" on the same podium. Edison reported that the audiences were amazed that they couldn't tell the difference. I suspect that is what caused the old boy to make that statement. IOW, the demonstrators told the assembled audience that Edison Phonographs were so life-like that there was virtually no difference between live and recorded. Also, keep in mind of course that Edison was almost deaf and could hear very little himself! :)

George

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Edison's people used to go from city to city carrying out what he called "Tone Tests". This early form of AR's famous "Live vs. Recorded" demonstrations had musicians on the podium pretending to play while an Edison phonograph played the same "tunes" on the same podium. Edison reported that the audiences were amazed that they couldn't tell the difference. I suspect that is what caused the old boy to make that statement. IOW, the demonstrators told the assembled audience that Edison Phonographs were so life-like that there was virtually no difference between live and recorded. Also, keep in mind of course that Edison was almost deaf and could hear very little himself! :)

 

Have you heard any original Edison Cylinders? Some years ago I was at the Edison museum in Ft. Meyer's, Florida and heard some cylinders. Definitely worth a trip if you are in the area. There were also some light bulbs that had been burning for over 50 years and some very interesting plants, bushes and trees in the botanical garden.

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Have you heard any original Edison Cylinders? Some years ago I was at the Edison museum in Ft. Meyer's, Florida and heard some cylinders. Definitely worth a trip if you are in the area. There were also some light bulbs that had been burning for over 50 years and some very interesting plants, bushes and trees in the botanical garden.

 

 

When I was a teen, I had my grandmother's Edison cylinder player and all of her cylinders. I even rigged a GE VRII stereo pickup to play the cylinders back "electronically". I have to say that I cannot believe that anyone thought that these acoustically recorded cylinders sounded in the least like real music. OTOH, I used to stop by the AR showroom on Broadway in NYC when they had their showroom there in the early 1960's and I heard their live vs recorded demonstrations a number of times. They never fooled my 15-year-old ears either....

George

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To skew this debate a little, I find that I actually hear different from myself from time to time.

 

Sometimes it is down to wax build-up (yuk), and other times it seems to be down to dehydration - although I am speculating somewhat.

 

But I know that I need to be careful when making changes to my stereo, as changes to my ability to listen are just as - if not more - influential.

 

Today, for instance, my hifi isn't sounding great to my ears, but yesterday it was really on the money.

Front End: Neet Airstream

Digital Processing: Chord Hugo M-Scaler

DAC: Chord Dave

Amplification: Cyrus Mono x300 Signatures

Speakers: Kudos Titan T88

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When I was a teen, I had my grandmother's Edison cylinder player and all of her cylinders. I even rigged a GE VRII stereo pickup to play the cylinders back "electronically". I have to say that I cannot believe that anyone thought that these acoustically recorded cylinders sounded in the least like real music. OTOH, I used to stop by the AR showroom on Broadway in NYC when they had their showroom there in the early 1960's and I heard their live vs recorded demonstrations a number of times. They never fooled my 15-year-old ears either....

 

Cool. I never had a cylinder player or cylinders as a kid, just some 78's. I did have a wire recorder, and was that ever a disaster, horrible wow and flutter, broken wires spliced with knots and occasionally a tangled mess.

 

I heard an AR live vs. recorded demo with the Fine Arts Quartet in Payne Hall at Harvard. (The Music Department used this as a recital and lecture hall.) From my seat, I couldn't hear any differences. I was far enough back so that I couldn't aurally position the individual instruments. For me, I found the most impressive part of the demonstration to be the musicians' consistency between the original performance and the live performance.

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When I was a teen, I had my grandmother's Edison cylinder player and all of her cylinders.

 

I have never heard an Edison cylinder player but, when I was very young, my grandfather had a wind-up 78 rpm console on his farm that had no electricity. I couldn't count how many times I listened to "The Old Gray Mare" and "The Smoke Goes Up the Chimney Just the Same" on that machine. :)

"Relax, it's only hi-fi. There's never been a hi-fi emergency." - Roy Hall

"Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted." - William Bruce Cameron

 

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I have never heard an Edison cylinder player but, when I was very young, my grandfather had a wind-up 78 rpm console on his farm that had no electricity

 

Did it have a wooden stylus too? A neighbour had one that used them.

 

How a Digital Audio file sounds, or a Digital Video file looks, is governed to a large extent by the Power Supply area. All that Identical Checksums gives is the possibility of REGENERATING the file to close to that of the original file.

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Cool. I never had a cylinder player or cylinders as a kid, just some 78's. I did have a wire recorder, and was that ever a disaster, horrible wow and flutter, broken wires spliced with knots and occasionally a tangled mess.

 

I heard an AR live vs. recorded demo with the Fine Arts Quartet in Payne Hall at Harvard. (The Music Department used this as a recital and lecture hall.) From my seat, I couldn't hear any differences. I was far enough back so that I couldn't aurally position the individual instruments. For me, I found the most impressive part of the demonstration to be the musicians' consistency between the original performance and the live performance.

 

 

To be painfully honest, it was mostly the tape-hiss that gave it away for me - every time, without exception. Most of the people assembled were in their late 20's on-up, and I was a 15. I could easily hear the tape hiss (this was before Dolby) and even at 15 ips tape speed, the hiss was readily apparent to me. I thought I could hear other differences too, but none as reliably as the hiss.

George

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To be painfully honest, it was mostly the tape-hiss that gave it away for me - every time, without exception. Most of the people assembled were in their late 20's on-up, and I was a 15. I could easily hear the tape hiss (this was before Dolby) and even at 15 ips tape speed, the hiss was readily apparent to me. I thought I could hear other differences too, but none as reliably as the hiss.

 

AR had gotten smart by the time that I heard the demo at Payne Hall. They had the tape playing continuously, so the tape hiss couldn't serve as a clue. Cheating, perhaps? Yes, if they were selling tape recorders, but they were selling speakers.

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Did it have a wooden stylus too? A neighbour had one that used them.

 

No, it had a replaceable metal "needle". I don't think I would use the term "stylus" to describe it.

"Relax, it's only hi-fi. There's never been a hi-fi emergency." - Roy Hall

"Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted." - William Bruce Cameron

 

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Did it have a wooden stylus too? A neighbour had one that used them.

 

I have an original Edison.

 

I restored it and it works. When I was looking years ago by replacement needles the grandfather of a friend gave me several original needles and really could not call needles, are metal and very thick. This gentlemen sent me to tell with my friend to use lemon tree thorns so had less wear of the cylinder. The only two cylinder that I have are also original, "Edison Gold Moulded Records".

 

BTW, this was the beginning of the tangential arms made famous Goldmund then :)

 

Regards,

 

Roch

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AR had gotten smart by the time that I heard the demo at Payne Hall. They had the tape playing continuously, so the tape hiss couldn't serve as a clue. Cheating, perhaps? Yes, if they were selling tape recorders, but they were selling speakers.

 

 

Somebody must've told them that the tape hiss gave the game away to those who could hear it.

George

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Well, the term for a quality reproduction system is "high-fidelity" which means a high degree of faithfulness. If that "faithfulness" of reproduction isn't in regard to the original musical performance, then what is it being faithful to? It might be a debatable point to some, but not to me. The "ultimate goal of domestic reproduction of music recordings is, without a doubt the recreation the original event in one's home". This has to be the goal, or the whole thing becomes a matter of "if it sounds good to me, that's all that is necessary". This attitude is fine for the individual owner, but it's anathema for the industry - a lot like playing a game of water polo where the goals float free with the wind and tide and the players never know where they are at any one time. Not a good situation.

 

 

 

That is all playback equipment is supposed to do - create an illusion that we are listening to an event, live, without the technology getting in the way. Now, it is debatable whether the goal is to recreate that performance in one's listening space, or to virtually transport the listener to the venue where the performance is taking place. My feeling is that it depends on the music. You can have a system that's so transparent that a small ensemble such as a string quartet or small jazz band seems like it's in the room with you, but one can never fit a symphony orchestra in one's living room, and in that case it's important that the playback transport the listener virtually to the venue where the performance is taking place. To accomplish the latter, my feeling is that the illusion is heavily dependent on the recording itself. To give the illusion that one is in a large concert hall, the recording must be true stereo, recorded minimally with all imaging and hall-acoustic clues present in the recording.

 

I agree with you. While nothing is perfect, I find two big things that have been major breakthroughs in getting us much closer to the sound of the live event. First, discretely recorded multichannel sound (Mch). Second, continued improvements on the room acoustics front, including DSP room EQ.

 

I am a classical music listener who goes to a lot of live concerts. Like most, I had continuously upgraded my system trying to get closer to the sound I heard live. But, while there were always incremental improvements from the upgrades, there still are, I always felt we were not that close to the goal in stereo. I enjoyed it musically, but I wondered why it was not closer to live sound.

 

That all changed nearly 8 years ago for me when I discovered the two breakthroughs I listed above. This was the biggest sonic epiphany I have ever heard in my life, and it put all the incremental differences from stereo upgrades in perspective as micro steps by comparison.

 

Since then, my music listening has been on an entirely new plateau. Absolute perfection is not there and likely never will be, but I no longer lament the considerable gap between live and recorded sound. And, honestly, though I have heard many stereos costing hundreds of $thousands, they do not come close. A number of concert going friends have made the same discovery about Mch and EQ and are just as happy with their sound.

 

Classical is where the Mch recordings are on SACD, BD-A, BD-V and now downloads. Other genres like rock, jazz, etc. unfortunately have very little music to play in Mch. It is also true that all Mch classical discs recorded in the last 10-15 years were in natively recorded hi rez, but that is a secondary, more minor benefit sonically. Nice to have hi rez, though.

 

A visit to sa-cd.net will reveal just how much repertoire is there. It is tiny compared to that on CD, of course. But, I have more than 2,500 discs on many TB's of NAS in hi Rez Mch. It is enough to make me happy, though I would always welcome even more choices.

 

Good Mch recordings succeed in transforming your listenteng space into the illusion of the live venue, rather than trying to bring the performers into your room. Even a string quartet or concert piano would be implausible in my room. Reducing the room's acoustic signature through treatments and/or EQ improves the illusion and the pure fidelity of the sound immeasurably.

 

I honestly never dreamed that audio in the home could ever sound this good or that my own system could sound so much like the live event.

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I agree with you. While nothing is perfect, I find two big things that have been major breakthroughs in getting us much closer to the sound of the live event. First, discretely recorded multichannel sound (Mch). Second, continued improvements on the room acoustics front, including DSP room EQ.

 

I am a classical music listener who goes to a lot of live concerts. Like most, I had continuously upgraded my system trying to get closer to the sound I heard live. But, while there were always incremental improvements from the upgrades, there still are, I always felt we were not that close to the goal in stereo. I enjoyed it musically, but I wondered why it was not closer to live sound.

 

That all changed nearly 8 years ago for me when I discovered the two breakthroughs I listed above. This was the biggest sonic epiphany I have ever heard in my life, and it put all the incremental differences from stereo upgrades in perspective as micro steps by comparison.

 

Since then, my music listening has been on an entirely new plateau. Absolute perfection is not there and likely never will be, but I no longer lament the considerable gap between live and recorded sound. And, honestly, though I have heard many stereos costing hundreds of $thousands, they do not come close. A number of concert going friends have made the same discovery about Mch and EQ and are just as happy with their sound.

 

Classical is where the Mch recordings are on SACD, BD-A, BD-V and now downloads. Other genres like rock, jazz, etc. unfortunately have very little music to play in Mch. It is also true that all Mch classical discs recorded in the last 10-15 years were in natively recorded hi rez, but that is a secondary, more minor benefit sonically. Nice to have hi rez, though.

 

A visit to sa-cd.net will reveal just how much repertoire is there. It is tiny compared to that on CD, of course. But, I have more than 2,500 discs on many TB's of NAS in hi Rez Mch. It is enough to make me happy, though I would always welcome even more choices.

 

Good Mch recordings succeed in transforming your listenteng space into the illusion of the live venue, rather than trying to bring the performers into your room. Even a string quartet or concert piano would be implausible in my room. Reducing the room's acoustic signature through treatments and/or EQ improves the illusion and the pure fidelity of the sound immeasurably.

 

I honestly never dreamed that audio in the home could ever sound this good or that my own system could sound so much like the live event.

 

 

Thank you for your comments. I agree that properly produced surround sound can "succeed in transforming your listenteng space into the illusion of the live venue". Unfortunately, very few such recordings do it right. I have some of Ray Kimber's IsoMike recordings that have great surround with only the hall ambience in the rear and a pair of omnis up-front in the IsoMike stereo configuration, facing the musicians. But I still find most multichannel classical to be multi-miked, with artificial reverb in the rear channels, and still too many with actual program content in the back - Yeccchh!

George

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