The myth of "The Absolute Sound"

[STC]

8 minutes ago, jabbr said:

Of course many recordings are multi mic’d and mixed but some are true stereo recordings.

The true stereo recording that I use sounds great but it lacks a little bite.  Technically, I prefer multi mic’d. They are much more accurate and the playback can be manipulated to sound ‘correct’.
 

9 minutes ago, jabbr said:

Not so simple to record and then playback a truly accurate symphony experience. Doing that would be the absolute sound.

 

No harm in trying. There are a few around the world whose object is to recreate the concert hall at home. Certainly more realistic than what the best stereo could do. The starting point would be 5.1. 

[Ralf11]

I would never buy a piece of equipment without listening to acoustic instruments and voice using it. 

 

Like Plato, I don't care if that is an absolute reference or not, but I regard it as a necessary reference (despite being most interested in jazz, rock and acoustic blues so old they were likely captured on wire recorders...).

[jabbr]

7 hours ago, STC said:

The true stereo recording that I use sounds great but it lacks a little bite.  Technically, I prefer multi mic’d. They are much more accurate and the playback can be manipulated to sound ‘correct’.

 

The "much more accurate" is entirely subjective and not absolute, again in the context of this discussion I'm not so sure.

[gmgraves]

13 hours ago, Blackmorec said:

That's not my reality at all. Whenever I upgrade my system almost all recordings sound better. Typically poor recordings work together with system shortcomings to make the sound poor. You can't change the recording but improving the accuracy, resolution and neutrality of the playback and poor recordings should be enhanced as you've removed playback system shortcomings. If it goes the other way it means that you haven't resolved the playback issues but have rather increased them, or left them undressed while emphasising another aspect in the replay that highlights those shortcomings 

Since, ostensibly, the better the system, the more resolving power it has, it stands to reason that a really good system would recover more from any recording than a poor system. That means that if you play a lousy recording, the higher the Fi of the stereo playing that recording, the more awfulness that system is going elicit from that bad recording. One thing that needs to be made clear, here, I think, is that commercial recordings aren’t made for audiophiles with megabuck systems. They are made to sound decent on the lowest common denominator in playback. Before the advent of the CD, that was the kind of “portable” record player one would find in the bedroom of your average teen-aged girl. It consisted of a cheap record changer, in a vinyl covered wooden box with a luggage handle on one side, a 4-inch speaker, a flea-powered 1-Watt, 2-tube amplifier, a $1 crystal phono cartridge, and they sounded wretched! But most girl children had one, nontheless.

I don’t know what today’s equivalent is (the garden-variety built-in factory car stereo, perhaps?), but you can count on the fact that it’s not a dCS Vivaldi front-end playing through a Pass  pre-amp and power amp driving a pair of Wilson Alexandria XLFs!

[semente]

7 hours ago, STC said:

The true stereo recording that I use sounds great but it lacks a little bite.  Technically, I prefer multi mic’d. They are much more accurate and the playback can be manipulated to sound ‘correct’.

 

How are multi-mic’ed recordings more accurate?

The mixing of several mic tracks will ruin the soundscape/perspective, the closer mic'ing will change the "typical" or "natural" balance between the different groups and will pick up mechanical noises and will lift the treble a bit.

It's a collage, not a photograph...

 

I think that the Audio Tekne guy nailed it when he said that many people got so used to listening to processed recordings that they can no longer "enjoy" or "judge" a documental approach which attempts to sound like something you'd hear from the audience.

[gmgraves]

23 minutes ago, semente said:

 

How are multi-mic’ed recordings more accurate?

The mixing of several mic tracks will ruin the soundscape/perspective, the closer mic'ing will change the "typical" or "natural" balance between the different groups and will pick up mechanical noises and will lift the treble a bit.

It's a collage, not a photograph...

 

I think that the Audio Tekne guy nailed it when he said that many people got so used to listening to processed recordings that they can no longer "enjoy" or "judge" a documental approach which attempts to sound like something you'd hear from the audience.

There is little that sounds less like music than a multi-miked classical recording. They have no soundstage that resembles any real performance. The musicians sound like they are lined up across the stage in single file. There is no image height, no depth, and massed strings sound like 12 or so individual violins playing at the same time rather than a string “section” of symphony orchestra. Also, and this is something one rarely hears being voiced: the more microphones used, the more mixer channels need to be employed (one for each mike). Each amplifier in each mike circuit adds distortion and noise. An 80 piece orchestra with 60 - 80 mikes, sounds thick and congested when compared to a similar orchestral recording captured with a stereo pair. That’s just inescapable reality. Distortion is additive.

 

You can have it! Multi-miking is one of the things that got me started rolling my own. I got tired of buying a new record of Ormandy and the Philadelphians, only to be presented with this distorted mass of instruments that only superficially resembled the music indicated on the cover (try Ormandy’s recording of Respighi’s “Church Windows”. Great performance, unlistenable multi-miked sound!). I’m reminded of Gordon Holt’s “law”: ”The better the performance the worse the sound and the better the sound, the worse the performance.”

[fas42]

11 hours ago, semente said:

Some people like "dull and muddy" realism, others prefer "glossy and hyper-detailed" artificiality. You can't please everyone.

 

The "TAS" is neither one nor the other - there's no necessity about having to "choose". What presents is an immersive, rich tapestry of sound - which you can either, mentally, let flow over you like a blanket, a rolling sea, a texture of sound; or, decide to focus in on some aspect - follow the thread of what that one part is doing. With adequate clarity of the playback the latter is perfectly straightforward to do - like just it is if one is in an excellent listening spot, in the presence of the "real thing".

 

I find the brain adjusts very nicely, adapts to what it hears - but it 'hates' having to fight its way through too much irrelevant muck - distortion; listening fatigue, etc, etc, will always be the outcome if the 'battle' is too hard ...

[semente]

2 minutes ago, fas42 said:

 

The "TAS" is neither one nor the other - there's no necessity about having to "choose". What presents is an immersive, rich tapestry of sound - which you can either, mentally, let flow over you like a blanket, a rolling sea, a texture of sound; or, decide to focus in on some aspect - follow the thread of what that one part is doing. With adequate clarity of the playback the latter is perfectly straightforward to do - like just it is if one is in an excellent listening spot, in the presence of the "real thing".

 

I find the brain adjusts very nicely, adapts to what it hears - but it 'hates' having to fight its way through too much irrelevant muck - distortion; listening fatigue, etc, etc, will always be the outcome if the 'battle' is too hard ...

That's the kindergarten way to put it.

[fas42]

1 hour ago, gmgraves said:

Since, ostensibly, the better the system, the more resolving power it has, it stands to reason that a really good system would recover more from any recording than a poor system. That means that if you play a lousy recording, the higher the Fi of the stereo playing that recording, the more awfulness that system is going elicit from that bad recording.

 

The, typical, mistake made here is that you decide that a recording is lousy - what my years of dabbling in this game has well and truly taught me is that such a decision is merely an expression of ego - the "lousy" are very frequently the richest, most satisfying ones; in the end - that get played over and over again, and often something different is appreciated, each time.

 

1 hour ago, gmgraves said:

 

One thing that needs to be made clear, here, I think, is that commercial recordings aren’t made for audiophiles with megabuck systems. They are made to sound decent on the lowest common denominator in playback. Before the advent of the CD, that was the kind of “portable” record player one would find in the bedroom of your average teen-aged girl. It consisted of a cheap record changer, in a vinyl covered wooden box with a luggage handle on one side, a 4-inch speaker, a flea-powered 1-Watt, 2-tube amplifier, a $1 crystal phono cartridge, and they sounded wretched! But most girl children had one, nontheless.

I don’t know what today’s equivalent is (the garden-variety built-in factory car stereo, perhaps?), but you can count on the fact that it’s not a dCS Vivaldi front-end playing through a Pass  pre-amp and power amp driving a pair of Wilson Alexandria XLFs!

 

That doesn't matter one iota ... it's almost completely irrelevant as to what the audience is perceived to be - the exceptions are the current absurd desire to squash all the sound hard against the bump stops - and, audiophiles ... 😈.

[fas42]

23 minutes ago, semente said:

That's the kindergarten way to put it.

 

 Meaning ... ?

[fas42]

1 hour ago, semente said:

I think that the Audio Tekne guy nailed it when he said that many people got so used to listening to processed recordings that they can no longer "enjoy" or "judge" a documental approach which attempts to sound like something you'd hear from the audience.

 

A completely 'natural' capture is one reality; an extremely processed variant is another reality - if both are done reasonably well then they both have full validity - and can be fully enjoyed as a "performance", equally.

 

What comes through is a sense of 'rightness' - where the creative "juices" have failed, or the capturing process was overthought, or far too sloppy; that's when audible discomfort at what one is hearing is felt.

[kumakuma]

26 minutes ago, fas42 said:

 

The, typical, mistake made here is that you decide that a recording is lousy - what my years of dabbling in this game has well and truly taught me is that such a decision is merely an expression of ego - the "lousy" are very frequently the richest, most satisfying ones; in the end - that get played over and over again, and often something different is appreciated, each time.

 

 

You and George appear to be talking about different things. 

 

Stereophile reviews recording on the basis of "Performance" and "Sonics".

 

George is talking about the Sonics of a recordings and you are talking about the Performance.

 

[fas42]

1 hour ago, kumakuma said:

 

You and George appear to be talking about different things. 

 

Stereophile reviews recording on the basis of "Performance" and "Sonics".

 

George is talking about the Sonics of a recordings and you are talking about the Performance.

 

 

Not really ... sonics helps, but doesn't get in the way of appreciating the performance. I was sort of spoilt initially, when I started buying CDs - I made a list of the "best CDs", using the reviews at the back of Hi-Fi News - and then the Penguin Guide - and only bought those. So, I had good performances, and sonics, straight off ... later on, I just grabbed whatever I came across - and they still worked as good listening experiences ...

 

Let's take historical recordings, of classical material - these often sound squashed, small, claustrophobic; when the brass comes in, it's flinch time - technically, sonics are pretty marginal ... yet, these can be 'rescued' as a listening experience if the playback is good enough.

 

Problems arise, as I mentioned earlier, when they do 'obvious' things - I'm thinking here of an audiophile 😉 album of where the solo piano is swimming in an OTT acoustic - massive echoing. This is just downright annoying - the deliberate 'effect' is thrust too much into your face.

[gmgraves]

1 hour ago, fas42 said:

 

The, typical, mistake made here is that you decide that a recording is lousy - what my years of dabbling in this game has well and truly taught me is that such a decision is merely an expression of ego - the "lousy" are very frequently the richest, most satisfying ones; in the end - that get played over and over again, and often something different is appreciated, each time.

As a recording engineer with 40 years and hundreds of recordings under my belt, I think that I am in a position to know a lousy recording when I hear one. Like I’ve said many times before, I know what real, live classical music and acoustical jazz sound like, and a recording either sounds like live, acoustical music playing in a real space or it doesn’t. If it doesn’t, it’s a lousy recording. End of story.

 

[kumakuma]

9 minutes ago, fas42 said:

 

Not really ... sonics helps, but doesn't get in the way of appreciating the performance. I was sort of spoilt initially, when I started buying CDs - I made a list of the "best CDs", using the reviews at the back of Hi-Fi News - and then the Penguin Guide - and only bought those. So, I had good performances, and sonics, straight off ... later on, I just grabbed whatever I came across - and they still worked as good listening experiences ...

 

Let's take historical recordings, of classical material - these often sound squashed, small, claustrophobic; when the brass comes in, it's flinch time - technically, sonics are pretty marginal ... yet, these can be 'rescued' as a listening experience if the playback is good enough.

 

Problems arise, as I mentioned earlier, when they do 'obvious' things - I'm thinking here of an audiophile 😉 album of where the solo piano is swimming in an OTT acoustic - massive echoing. This is just downright annoying - the deliberate 'effect' is thrust too much into your face.

 

I am in partial agreement with you. Performance can make up for poor sonics but I don't believe that you can rescue a sonically lousy recording by tweaking the playback chain. You simply have to decide whether that the performance is good enough to make up for the "lousy" recording.

 

An example would be something like the recordings of Robert Johnson. Shite recording quality but the music...

[Teresa]

31 minutes ago, fas42 said:

...I'm thinking here of an audiophile 😉 album of where the solo piano is swimming in an OTT acoustic - massive echoing. This is just downright annoying - the deliberate 'effect' is thrust too much into your face.

 

There you go again. Is it so hard to look on your computer screen or on the case of the physical disc to tell which audiophile recording you are talking about? Just give us the artist, title and recording company so we can check for ourselves if what you are saying is true!!!

 

Most audiophile companies do not use "effects", it is the major label which use them. With audiophile companies you pretty much get what was recorded at the location (concert hall, auditorium, church, etc.) with its natural ambiance. It is major labels who use reverb and artificial ambiance.

 

For example, audiophile label Chesky Records philosophy is to create the illusion of live musicians in a real three-dimensional space. If you don't like sonic realism that is fine with me. Just quit your BS please!!!

[gmgraves]

5 minutes ago, fas42 said:

 

Not really ... sonics helps, but doesn't get in the way of appreciating the performance. I was sort of spoilt initially, when I started buying CDs - I made a list of the "best CDs", using the reviews at the back of Hi-Fi News - and then the Penguin Guide - and only bought those. So, I had good performances, and sonics, straight off ... later on, I just grabbed whatever I came across - and they still worked as good listening experiences ...

My assumption is, here, is that Frank’s standards for SQ aren’t very high. I base this on his description, over the last couple of years, of his playback “system”, coupled with his comments about music and recordings.

5 minutes ago, fas42 said:

Let's take historical recordings, of classical material - these often sound squashed, small, claustrophobic; when the brass comes in, it's flinch time - technically, sonics are pretty marginal ... yet, these can be 'rescued' as a listening experience if the playback is good enough.

What do you call Historic Recordings? Can we have some titles? If you mean 78s. From the 20’s, 30’s, and 40’s, I agree, but when stereo coupled with condenser microphones from Neumann, Telefunken, AKG, and Sennheiser, came on the scene in the mid 1950’s, the recording scene entered a “golden era” which lasted to the early 1960’s when multimiking took over. Some of these recordings are so good that  they always float to the top with each new advance in playback technology. Recordings from Mercury, RCA Victor, Everest, British Decca, EMI, and DGG are considered among the very best, ever made. To be honest, here, most of these “golden era” recordings have never been bettered, and neither the art or the science of recording have advanced very far from that era. Sure, more modern, digital recordings have POTENTIALLY greater dynamic range, but that rarely gets translated to the commercial release because people don’t really want that kind of dynamic range in their listening rooms. Even there, the result is not much different from the classic recordings from the 1950’s that people still revere.

5 minutes ago, fas42 said:

 

Problems arise, as I mentioned earlier, when they do 'obvious' things - I'm thinking here of an audiophile 😉 album of where the solo piano is swimming in an OTT acoustic - massive echoing. This is just downright annoying - the deliberate 'effect' is thrust too much into your face.

Well, the thing that I hate are pianos that literally spread from wall to wall in a recording. The bass keys come out the extreme left channel the middle notes from the center, and the treble keys from the extreme right - IOW, a 10 to 12 foot wide piano! Yecch!

[Teresa]

2 hours ago, fas42 said:

A completely 'natural' capture is one reality; an extremely processed variant is another reality - if both are done reasonably well then they both have full validity - and can be fully enjoyed as a "performance", equally...

 

The 'natural' capture is from the audiophile record companies you say you don't like and that you can't wait until the music ends because it is so uncomfortable to you. The processed variant are the recordings you like which you foolishly believe are realistic. IMHO they are not.

 

So, if you can enjoy both as a performance, why do you hate naturally realistic sounding audiophile recordings? You make no sense whatsoever! My advise is to get out a listen to live acoustic music in a good performance space. When you do you will discover reality is just the opposite of what you spew.

[fas42]

45 minutes ago, gmgraves said:

As a recording engineer with 40 years and hundreds of recordings under my belt, I think that I am in a position to know a lousy recording when I hear one. Like I’ve said many times before, I know what real, live classical music and acoustical jazz sound like, and a recording either sounds like live, acoustical music playing in a real space or it doesn’t. If it doesn’t, it’s a lousy recording. End of story.

 

 

Depends what you mean by a real space ... if it has been recorded with multiple mics, and 'assembled', then what it will sound like is multiple acoustics, overlaying each other. Each of the sound elements, in their own, recording space will sound "real", but they may not coalesce in a satisfying way - I mentioned a Telarc recording that was a prime offender, earlier, but can't put my hands on it, just like that - sorry, Teresa! 😉

 

As I've said many times, this presentation doesn't faze me ... usually. Works with pop, and other genres - and also with classical, even if the intention wasn't there at all for it to be artificial - I have a Nimbus recording, string quartet with piano, done with their special recording technique - ummm, the piano is totally unconnected to the strings, it's coming from about a mile away - sounds bizarre if such an aspect offends you - but still works because the musicianship is there, and the tonality is in good shape.

[fas42]

24 minutes ago, Teresa said:

 

There you go again. Is it so hard to look on your computer screen or on the case of the physical disc to tell which audiophile recording you are talking about? Just give us the artist, title and recording company so we can check for ourselves if what you are saying is true!!!

 

Carol Rosenberger, Water Music of the Impressionists ?? ... I'm not  a neatness freak; this is a burnt CDR, in a stack of cases somewhere - it will be in the last pile I look at ... 😉.

 

 

[Teresa]

22 minutes ago, gmgraves said:

My assumption is, here, is that Frank’s standards for SQ aren’t very high. I base this on his description, over the last couple of years, of his playback “system”, coupled with his comments about music and recordings.

 

I agree.

[STC]

4 hours ago, semente said:

How are multi-mic’ed recordings more accurate?

 

4 hours ago, jabbr said:

The "much more accurate" is entirely subjective and not absolute, again in the context of this discussion I'm not so sure.

The definition of multi miked is wide. While the purist insist that this is will destroy the information in the recording, not many would even do a blind test and show that they could tell the difference between artificial reverbs and real space nor if their stereo system could reproduce all the 3D information captured by the recording. 
 

 

A typical recording session of the Grammy winner for classical recording engineering. 
 

We are often critical of cables believers who refused to backup their claim with DBT but at the same time refuse to admit that it is now possible to make better recordings than the standard ORTF or Decca nowadays. Maybe, buying a recording after reading the reviews is not a good idea. 

[STC]

34 minutes ago, Teresa said:

If you don't like sonic realism that is fine with me. Just quit your BS please!!!

Teresa, never seen this side of you before. 😂 😂 😂 

[Teresa]

2 minutes ago, fas42 said:

Carol Rosenberger, Water Music of the Impressionists ?? ... I'm not  a neatness freak; this is a burnt CDR, in a stack of cases somewhere - it will be in the last pile I look at ... 😉.

 

First that is a Delos recording not a Telarc. Of course Delos is also an audiophile label. I've not heard it myself as I don't care for solo piano music.

 

You seem to be an outer on this one. 

 

Critic’s Choice, Gramophone
All Time Great Recording, Billboard
Best Classical Compact Disc, Stereo Review
“defines the state of the art in piano recordings.”CD Review
“Rosenberger provides the cascading musical flow that effectively brings the music flooding into your listening area.”American Record Guide

 

See Water Music of the Impressionists / Rosenberger

[fas42]

23 minutes ago, gmgraves said:

My assumption is, here, is that Frank’s standards for SQ aren’t very high. I base this on his description, over the last couple of years, of his playback “system”, coupled with his comments about music and recordings.

 

Tsk ... try addressing the points, not "attacking the man" ...

 

23 minutes ago, gmgraves said:

What do you call Historic Recordings? Can we have some titles? If you mean 78s. From the 20’s, 30’s, and 40’s, I agree, but when stereo coupled with condenser microphones from Neumann, Telefunken, AKG, and Sennheiser, came on the scene in the mid 1950’s, the recording scene entered a “golden era” which lasted to the early 1960’s when multimiking took over. Some of these recordings are so good that  they always float to the top with each new advance in playback technology. Recordings from Mercury, RCA Victor, Everest, British Decca, EMI, and DGG are considered among the very best, ever made. To be honest, here, most of these “golden era” recordings have never been bettered, and neither the art or the science of recording have advanced very far from that era. Sure, more modern, digital recordings have POTENTIALLY greater dynamic range, but that rarely gets translated to the commercial release because people don’t really want that kind of dynamic range in their listening rooms. Even there, the result is not much different from the classic recordings from the 1950’s that people still revere.

 

Yes, pre WWII - I haven't actually purchased classical from that era; but occasionally borrow from library, etc. Once you hit the 50's all the technical standards are pretty well in place - and no prob's. Interestingly, I have no Mercurys, but every time I've heard them on another system I wonder what the fuss is about ... there is a generic 'smallness' about them; part rig, part recording - I don't get a sense of expansive music making from them ...

 

I'm very fond of my Sinatra CDs of that era - huge, full sound, big band powering in all its glory - big tick here!