Forgive me Father.. aka confession of audio heretic..

[sphinxsix]

Here's the thing, Father..

For decades the live sound has been kind of Holy Grail of the audiophile world.

Let's put it straight - it's the biggest BS in the history of audiophilia. Period.

Let's take what is by many, including me regarded as the most difficult music material to reproduce at home - classical music, in particular orchestral one (many instruments, room acoustics, dynamics, etc all make it difficult for the audio gear). I've been more seriously interested in classical for a relatively short period of time - 6 or 7 years - in comparison with many here. Since I came to live in the Netherlands 4 years ago I have managed to attend a gloriously high number of concerts, mainly classical and jazz music and I've been a regular guest in the Amsterdam Concertgebouw which is widely regarded as a concert hall with very good acoustics. I always try to get a good sitting place in the hall and usually succeed with that (BTW that's also what I do in case of rock and jazz concerts), center, usually 10-15m from the stage. 

And so we have a good concert hall, good orchestra (not necessarily from here, my next concert will be Ivan Fischer with Budapest SO performing Mahler) and theoretically everything that should make every music lover and at the same time audiophile feel like in heaven. And during great concerts that take place here, I do feel like in heaven!

There is only one problem, Father...

I prefer the sound of my home system..

First of all, my ears get a bigger portion of detail in this case. It's as if someone turned on more light in a dim room. I get a better more clear insight into what has been written on paper by the composer. I'm closer, more intimate with his intentions and with the composition. Yes, it sounds more 'together' more coherent, more as 'one' in the hall but frankly lots of nuance is lost.

Of course as a stereo gear, my system cannot compete with the live sound in the room acoustics department. The room is mostly behind the speakers only. But it spreads quite wide and far (I sometimes localize some instruments 15-20m behind the speakers). I  also believe the reflected sound coming to one's ears from all directions in a concert hall tends to muddle, obscure lots of fine detail.. That's actually the reason that in the times when I also used a multichannel amp I tended to watch music material in stereo.

In case of jazz and rock the whole thing is even more obvious, Father.

Have you ever witnessed an unamplified jazz concert during which, already in a middle size hall bass is hardly audible and OTOH the sound of the band is unbalanced and the trumpet screams into your ears in a way that makes you wanna leave ASAP.? 

I happened to witness some concerts like that in small jazz clubs, usually the sound is just...

 

 

The Father:

-What about amplified jazz and rock concerts.?

Let me be mercilessly frank or ever blunt Father - the sound of the most PA systems, although some of them are quite good don't even come close to my gear, I'm sorry..

Of course hearing music live with a group of people, being able to react to it and see the interaction between the musicians and the audience is magical in a way.

Yet on the pure audiophile level live music mostly sucks!

 

One more thing, Father..

-Yes.?

I don't believe in so called audio truth.

That is beside these:

 

 

AUDIO TRUTH (AUDIOQUEST) EMERALD X3 RCA cable 1.0m

 

Which BTW also don't tell the truth..

-Explain please, son..

Doing it right now, Father. It's very simple. Have you ever had a chance to compare the sound of different microphones, Father.? Every and each of them has its own sound signature, just check out eg the Stereophile's

Test CD (I think the first one) and you will see.. I mean hear..

The sound of a real instrument is treated by many like kind of paradise but the moment it's captured by the chosen recording mike is then the moment of leaving the 'paradise'. Here comes the first distortion or if you prefer - lie and the next elements of the audio chain only add to it. End of story.

But guess what, Father.. I prefer it that way. It sounds nice, good, beautiful.

The smooth, velvety highs the cymbals from the ECM recordings are a lie.. a beautiful lie.. I just love them..

Have you ever stood 2 or 3m from a real drum set.? Its sound is merciless, the bass drum seems to punch your stomach with its heavy fist and cymbals' piercing sound makes you wanna vomit...

Same goes for many other instruments - trumpets, saxes etc.

The recording engineers choose a given microphone usually simply to make the sound pleasant to our ears. 

And if they succeed - we love the recording. The fact that it's very far from the truth is meaningless. It's better that way!

ECM sound - a lie, same goes for the all audiophile labels - lies, lies, lies.. beautiful lies.

Old Living Stereo recordings, tons of tube and analogue distortion of the analogue and tube gear from the 50's! 

I love them! They sound great! Beautiful, beautiful lies! 

 

BTW some attack snake oil products which do not influence the sound in any way but they don't mind products which cost tens of thousands $$$ and ..very distinctly.. change the original sound.. Isn't that weird, Father.? 

 

But the worst is yet to come, Father...

-WHAT COULD THAT BE, SON?!!!

Father.. as is the case with most sins I've committed in this lifetime, I don't regret. 

They all, including this one make my life more colorful, exciting, beautiful, interesting, not boring and pleasant.

In short, I choose to be a SINNER FOR LIFE. 

AMEN.

 

 

[sphinxsix]

Discuss, I'll join later..

[sphinxsix]

All along the watchtower
Princes kept the view
While all the women came and went
Barefoot servants, too
Well, uh, outside in the cold distance
A wildcat did growl
Two riders were approaching
And the wind began to howl..

Hey!

 

[sphinxsix]

38 minutes ago, fas42 said:

'audiophile' recordings are the ones least often played by myself ... frankly, they're boring - to me 😜.

Same here, fas, been repeating for years that Chesky bros is the most boring label in the world.

OTOH some of classical music on audiophile labels (RR, Telarc) is just fantastic!

 

40 minutes ago, fas42 said:

the raw intensity of that impact is magic, is part of the reason why musicians love what they do.

And sometimes get deaf.

 

42 minutes ago, fas42 said:

A system needs to be able to do that type of stuff, without making you run from the room - if it can, then the "nice stuff" is easy peasy, and shows itself in strong contrast ...

Believe me, my system is much more 'hard hitting' and merciless for the recordings than eg yours and is able to play really loud without distortion or compression (95db sensitivity speakers, my 80W amp is more than enough..).

 

[sphinxsix]

1 hour ago, fas42 said:

Depends what you mean by "merciless"

I mean.. Well, instead of repeating myself I will quote myself  (scroll down if you have time)

All the qualities of the speakers describe also qualities of the whole system.

 

 

[sphinxsix]

11 hours ago, fas42 said:

"on the bright side of reality", though, is what I pause at; IME rigs sounding too "bright" is a clue, to me, that that there is possible room for improvement; that's the circumstances where I start to investigate finer areas of a system, to see where further opimisations can be made, 😉.

Judging by a review of a journalist who knows them well, they are not brighter than eg contemporary Wilsons, actually have extremely similar balance (I didn't have a chance to directly compare the two). Careful amp (mainly) and source matching (they cannot be shrill or grainy, better not bright or the speakers will mercilessly show that) plus either a big room (35sq.m+) or slightly more dumped acoustically than usual. Eventually subtly EQing curve (JRiver in my case) for some shrill/bright recordings (I actually rarely use it). 

 

7 hours ago, hopkins said:

Says who?

It would be easier to say who doesn't, and it includes this site.

 

7 hours ago, hopkins said:

But I don't think anyone is under the illusion that they will recreate live sounds in their living room.if they claim the contrary, it's probably a figure of speech. 

I don't think it's only a poetical figure in the mouth of many, rather, like I said a Holy Grail of audio 

 

7 hours ago, hopkins said:

How can one tell? This has already been debated at length... 

That's right.

 

7 hours ago, GregWormald said:

 

🤣🤣🤣

 

6 hours ago, Rexp said:

You didn't need to add the emojis...

I (un?) fortunately can only see square shapes, I guess Chris censored them.

 

20 minutes ago, mfsoa said:

I always wondered why live, unamplified music is considered the ultimate reference when we can do so much better.

That is exactly the question I'm asking. We have at our disposal every possible microphone(s) placement, mix, all the possibilities of DSP and even the possibility of injecting tubes (forgive me Objectivist Father) into a studio gear chain, which eg Analogue Productions do and IMO the result is (probably not of the tubes alone) they make the best sounding remasters on the market. BTW I obviously understand that all those things can also add nasty stuff to the original sound or recording..

 

[sphinxsix]

47 minutes ago, hopkins said:

Even with the best recording and best equipment it is not physically possible to reproduce the sound waves of a live orchestra through a couple of speakers in your living room.

Luckily in most cases.

 

[sphinxsix]

5 hours ago, hopkins said:

I'm sorry you have such a bad experience of concert halls and clubs.

I don't, I love live music, it's just that at home it sounds better on a regular basis.

 

5 hours ago, hopkins said:

I really think you are in a minority here.

I have never minded being in minority 

 

5 hours ago, hopkins said:

There is also more to seing an artist perform live than just audio quality

Definitely but I can hear more at home than even in the hall regarded as one with very good acoustics.

 

5 hours ago, hopkins said:

In conclusion, I don't really understand your problem... 

Do I sound as if I had a problem.? If so I must have expressed myself in a wrong way 

Cheers!

 

[sphinxsix]

4 hours ago, christopher3393 said:

Leonard Cohen

One of few poets whose poems I happened to read in recent years.

Old Jikan is really silent now..

 

 

[sphinxsix]

14 minutes ago, fas42 said:

If this doesn't happen for a recording you play, then it's because the accuracy of the playback chain you're hearing it through is not high enough - it's as simple as that ...

The room acoustics are important factor too.

 

[sphinxsix]

1 hour ago, fas42 said:

Not IME ... when the system gets it right, then what emerges from the speaker driver surfaces has such a high integrity that what the room is like doesn't matter any more - hard surfaces, soft surfaces, windows, etc, become irrelevant; the illusion projected by the playback is so 'powerful', that it dominates the environment you're in.

Not IME.

[sphinxsix]

56 minutes ago, botrytis said:

I have seen very expensive system sound like garbage in an untreated room.

True!

[sphinxsix]

9 minutes ago, fas42 said:

 

Think of this situation: your home is literally attached to a concert hall, such that the room you're in is facing the musical action - and a wall is put in that room which aligns with the front of the speakers. On the other side of that wall the parts of the room there are completely removed, so it's now fully open to that performance space. Now, discard your speakers, and put two smallish, open doors in the just installed wall, which are in the same positions as those just removed speakers .

 

What do you think you would hear?

The sound of the concert hall event plus what the room (you're in) would add to that. With a gaping hole in the middle of the soundstage most probably.

In short, I'd bet it would sound like..

 

 

[sphinxsix]

15 hours ago, fas42 said:

To put this in some perspective, consider walking into a concert space, through one of the many open doorways of a real one, and pause just before going actually through it - would what he hears at that point also be, ummm, a horror? 🙂

A little smaller horror.

 

7 hours ago, GregWormald said:

While I was over-emphasising the down sides of live music

Thank you for this! 

 

7 hours ago, GregWormald said:

I don't want to discard the whole live music experience—and it is an experience different to listening to music from my own chair.

Agree!

 

7 hours ago, GregWormald said:

Some live music experiences changed my life.

Same here but..

some albums also changed my life.

 

 

[sphinxsix]

15 hours ago, botrytis said:

The volume yes, the scale, the dynamics NO.

True!

No way!

In particular live music heard from a small distance.

If only live sound was better more often..

 

[sphinxsix]

13 hours ago, fas42 said:

Curious that you find the real thing disturbing ... the raw power of a single instrument experienced up close is something else - if it is something so terrible, then we should be immensely grateful to all the musicians who sacrifice themselves,

You're absolutely right! I am personally immensely grateful to all the musicians who sacrifice themselves (actually simply to all good musicians)! Without them my life would be very different. Definitely not better 

Have you ever played a loud note on eg tenor sax in a small or medium size room.? I did. I'm pretty sure it reaches the sound level of about 120db. I do have a 300W electric bass combo and a bass with both active and passive mode. I'm pretty sure, in particular in the former one it's even louder.

Have ever measured the maximum sound level of your listening session? I'm pretty sure it's less than that! So maybe you also should be 'immensely grateful' to them  not only for the music but also for their countless hours spent practicing and playing in what sometimes is very loud environment.

The law protects us, ordinary people from something like that but not them..

Here is SPL chart for some instruments.

 

https://www.gcaudio.com/tips-tricks/decibel-loudness-comparison-chart/

Some quotes: 

Piano Fortissimo

84 - 103dB

Clarinet

85 - 114dB

Trombone

85 - 114dB

Symphonic music peak

120 - 137dB

Rock music peak

150dB

From the 'Notes' of the above article:

"The incidence of hearing loss in classical musicians has been estimated at 4  - 43%, in rock musicians 13 - 30%."

I was actually thinking about the well known fact that musicians usually don't care about the sound reproduction quality. I have friends who are musicians, I know they hear music in a different way than non-musicians but I really wonder how many of them have some level of hearing damage due to their professional activity..

A very quick google search:

"Professional musicians are almost four times as likely to develop noise-induced hearing loss (NIHL) as the general public, reveals research. And they are 57% more likely to develop tinnitus—incessant ringing in the ears—as a result of their job, the findings show."

Hearing loss among musicians

So have I convinced you.? I am definitely ready to pause for a minute of silence to honor all of them, will you join me.?

 

[sphinxsix]

May I say something on reproduction of the original scale and dynamics.?

How do you guys want to reproduce this with 2x5kg of speakers or even 2x25kg.?

(don't forget that beside this hammer there are a couple of dozens of instruments in the orchestra and that includes a substantial number of basses)

 

 

Not even mentioning this..

 

 

[sphinxsix]

14 hours ago, fas42 said:

 

Yep, been there ... my brother has been a musician since forever - I not at all - and he was into saxophone at one stage; played some big notes in a living room years ago ... amazing stuff! Put it this way - I could have listened to that instrument for hours, compared to the awfulness of sound reinforcement systems at almost all shows, that I put up with for years - end result, completely gave up on going to anything "live", because I was just wasting my money ...

 

 

Yes, peaks - strange thing, most instruments stay way, way below that most of the time; it's only when you have idiots running PA sets, that compress the hell out of the sound that throws everything off; it's the total exposure to SPLs that does the real damage.

 

 

If your job is to be in the middle of an orchestra, playing on a regular basis, then your accumulated exposure to higher sound levels is obviously greater - just about anything that humans do, where there is greater than normal levels of effort or exposure, causes more wear and tear on the body; just think of any sport, for example. So, we should tell, say, all athletes, and musicians, to, "Stop Doing That !!!" ... right? 😉

 

 

Not really ... anything can be to extremes - moderation, as always, is the key....

 

12 hours ago, fas42 said:

The room doesn't matter ... at this very moment I'm playing a no-name label (Bescol ??!), Chuck Berry, 21 Greatest Hits CD - and some of these, say, Maybelline, were done in some huge acoustic space, stretching way back from the speakers; his voice is expanding in all directions. Which works beautifully - has nothing to do with how the speakers are set up in my lounge ...

 

I thing I'd give away one of my spare interconnects for the privilege of being inside your head for 5 minutes.

Not sure I would like to stay there longer, though.. 

  

[sphinxsix]

45 minutes ago, botrytis said:

 

Don't go there. I don't think that is place any audiophile would want to be.

 

Be careful what you wish for.

 

Ok, I'm not 'thinging' bout it anymore 

 

[sphinxsix]

1 hour ago, fas42 said:

Bev

Who is Bev?

 

1 hour ago, fas42 said:

... if you have a recording which one day sounded absolutely magical

Why do you often say something sounded one day .?

 

3 hours ago, botrytis said:

Don't go there. I don't think that is place any audiophile would want to be.

You didn't have the 'room' acoustics on your mind, have you.?

As you can see it seems that I still thing about it a little...

 

[sphinxsix]

22 minutes ago, fas42 said:

Because it often happens that "one day the stars aligned" - that is, the playback system happened to stabilise to a peak quality, for a variety of reasons, and the replay was brilliant - this could disappear an hour later, because a single factor was no longer in the optimum state, to make the playback sound so good.

You have taken into account that this factor may be in a 'room' I asked @botrytis about, which is also the same place I was thinking about getting into for indecently low price of a second hand interconnect, haven't you.?

 

22 minutes ago, fas42 said:

This is something I have been dealing with for decades - working on evolving complete control over everything that matters.

Some say some effort is necessary and it may also take years to master the above mentioned factor 

 

[sphinxsix]

7 minutes ago, kumakuma said:

Have them first play in an anechoic chamber then move into a room which has no sound absorbent materials at all in it.

 

Come back and tell us if you still believe the room doesn't matter.

 

I tend to agree with that.

Quite strongly.

Speakers plus speakers-room interaction equals 85% of the sound in the room.

That's my simplest audio maths.

Put top hi end (and good!) speakers into a wrong room and you can get worse result than with some 10x cheaper ones but carefully placed in a room with a proper acoustics.

I've finished preaching.

Amen.

[sphinxsix]

https://ashidakim.com/zenkoans/1acupoftea.html

[sphinxsix]

11 hours ago, sphinxsix said:

https://ashidakim.com/zenkoans/1acupoftea.html

For those who tend to think that this is not audio related - it's obviously all about headroom! 

 

[sphinxsix]

Room is a part of a system. Egg isn't a part of a chicken..

Beside that, room is usually first.

Although I happened to do things in the opposite way - finding a room with big potential for good acoustics and well suited for particular speakers.

Seriously.

The effects tend to be astonishing. Highly recommended solution!