2-channel playback at home is only an illusion of the recorded event, or ?

[Tangband]

Paul McGowan from PS audio explain in a very good way how a 2-channel hifi system and recording works. What do YOU think ?

 

[Tangband]

If Paul McGowan is right about this, ( I think he is ) , what consequences does that have on your own building and optimizing of a good hifi system ?

 

[Galliardist]

This sits right in the core of the stereo/surround debate that turns up frequently here. If you want to be immersed in the audience sound, simply put you have to either cheat with perspective in stereo - which won't work for all systems or listeners - or use surround and rely on the recording engineers to get that bit right.

Even then, though, it is still an illusion.

Let's think of this through an analogy with TV or home theatre. Nobody really expects "realism" when watching, say. an action movie. I don't see people complaining that there aren't bullets flying around their room. Nobody expects to feel like they are actually in the audience when watching, say, a talk show.

It seems that when it comes to music, though, there is a group of us that can't accept that we are dealing with an illusion or a representation. Accept that, and audiophile life becomes a lot easier.

 

[Tangband]

This sits right in the core of the stereo/surround debate that turns up frequently here. If you want to be immersed in the audience sound, simply put you have to either cheat with perspective in stereo - which won't work for all systems or listeners - or use surround and rely on the recording engineers to get that bit right.

Even then, though, it is still an illusion.

Let's think of this through an analogy with TV or home theatre. Nobody really expects "realism" when watching, say. an action movie. I don't see people complaining that there aren't bullets flying around their room. Nobody expects to feel like they are actually in the audience when watching, say, a talk show.

It seems that when it comes to music, though, there is a group of us that can't accept that we are dealing with an illusion or a representation. Accept that, and audiophile life becomes a lot easier.

You wrote a very true thing here.
It was when I started doing my own recordings of real instruments in real concert halls or churches, that I reckognized that the live event and the recordings didnt sound at all the same.
Being an audiophile, I was troubled by that , and started experimenting with placement of my two microphones.

When reading about ”the critical distance” and ” the precedence effect”, and learning from experienced sound engineers, I started to understand that the microphones and my ears were functioning very different.

I managed to do really good 2 channel recordings of grand pianos with a flute player ( my wife ) , - when listening at home it felt like I was sitting on the third row listening, about 8 metres away from the musicians. But the microphones were only 80 cm from the flute !

So its all an illusion, and the goal must be to be entertained at home listening. There is no such thing as a footprint of a real music event when listening with only two loudspeakers. Its an illusion and the trick in home listening is to make most of your records enjoyable.
Can one accept some ”coloration” from the hifigear one uses ? Can one use the walls in the listening room to , with the help of reflections, make the illusion bigger, even if its a coloration of the recorded sound ?