dasdoing
Major Contributor
this is a very nice pure stereo micing recording of the piece with a nice depth, too
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Sound stage depth?
- Thread starter Wowarning
- Start date
Deutsche Grammophon seldom lets you down, and Karajan was a recording quality enthusiast. His input and approval of the CD format is integral part of audio quality history. No one did Debussy like him, imo.
I much prefer Munchinger's arrangement for Pachelbel's Canon, though. Karajan uncharacteristically rushes through it some like a Wagner Overture.
I have the whole set of Dvorak Symphonies this is from on 3 CD boxes. I don't know about current availability, but you can stream or download it.
Open Qobuz
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Depth is a very unusual sound stage cue, and in 2 channel its tricky (due to interaction of 2 channels with the head, from speakers) it's very hard to get proper distance cues.
They certainly SHOULD exist in 3-channel. Steinburg and Snow, 1933.
They certainly SHOULD exist in 3-channel. Steinburg and Snow, 1933.
Actually, the interference between a mono signal into two speakers overwrites one of the primary depth cues for middle distances. So while they can be done, it is neither simple or trivial to do so, and 3 channels work enormously better. In particular, it just happens, you don't have to listen for it.
Again, look it up. Steinburg and Snow, 1933, "Auditory Perspective". It's one of those one-of-a-kind tests that show something as true now as it was then. You can also find "Auditory Perspective" in the "Speech and Hearing in Communications" reprint of Harvey Fletcher's work (with associated authors) edited by Jont Allen, as, fittingly, Chapter 13. So there you go. There's a lot in that one little paper.
A signal from center soundstage is mono. And "primary depth cue" is what your ear and brain use to tell how far things are away. These are standard terms.
How about you read the paper, and then we can talk? There are 3 cues, and floor/ceiling/etc reflection is the middle distance one, which gets confounded by the delayed arrival of the "far channel" at each ear.
This is not exactly new or rocket science, and was buried in a snowstorm of "You only have two ears" ranting in the 1930's and 1940's by competing advertisers. But it's still measurable, demonstrable, and tested.
So the information is out there. Rather than take a hostile approach, look into the science, ok? Why so angry at 90 year old science?
You've got as simple an answer is there is. The time delay cross-head overwrite (in frequency) the floor bounce cues.
If you're not angry, then why are you arguing "CAN SO" when I said "it's difficult". I didn't say impossible.
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Don't forget floor bounce.
Very interesting read (I have not read it in its entirety yet). But what gives a little pause is that, right away, it states: ".. This symposium describes principles and apparatus involved in the reproduction of music in large halls ..". I most certainly don't play my system in a large hall -especially post-divorce downsizing :-D-, although of course as I continue to read the paper, I am super curious to learn far more on the subject in general. Thanks for the pointer to the paper! Clearly a topic I am very interested in. I completely agree our brain is a very active component in the chain - in this very thread we saw how people can perceive depth and staging in different ways.
PS: For those interested, you can read it here: https://www.aes.org/aeshc/docs/bell.labs/auditoryperspective.pdf
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Indeed the original test was to reproduce the sound of a concert hall. It seems to me that distance cues from a live space are exactly what we're talking about here. The size of the venue is more important from the point of view of course, rather than listening situation.
The Figure 1 tells it all. The understanding of why came later. I had forgotten about that archive, by the way, thank you for reminding me. My copy is in a book to my left.
The paper is excellent, I totally get the fact that, in a hall or very large room, there must be a benefit to go multi-channel. The paper proves the advantage of 3 channels (although large venues seemed to have moved to even more channels than that, sometimes much to my chagrin, because I like to hear stuff in front of me, which is what my eyes reveal), but then again it seems the paper (caveat: haven't finished reading it yet) also states the recording itself should happen with 3 microphones. Over-simplifying some here.
I would be very curious about a 3-channel setup, especially one that allows me to very easily dial in the volume of the center channel on the fly. However, the music I own is all stereo. How would I take advantage of a center channel? Even this paper states that the center channel may reduce stage width if inappropriately calibrated. Is Atmos or THX stuff the logical evolution of the setup the paper suggests? (Note: I have no experience with either).
I know multichannel music exists. MP3 has an extension to be multi-channel (not sure when it was introduced, I know originally it only supported mono and stereo). Can any system add artificial depth to a stereo recording? I find myself thinking whether my huge established preference for stereo (well, 2.1 these days: stereo + sub) is driven by intellectual laziness, force of habit, or the lack of media that let me test it out. :-D
Sorry for the stream of consciousness, my brain hasn't yet been able to process all the stuff I learned.
Thanks for a very eye-opening thread!
I would be very curious about a 3-channel setup, especially one that allows me to very easily dial in the volume of the center channel on the fly. However, the music I own is all stereo. How would I take advantage of a center channel? Even this paper states that the center channel may reduce stage width if inappropriately calibrated. Is Atmos or THX stuff the logical evolution of the setup the paper suggests? (Note: I have no experience with either).
I know multichannel music exists. MP3 has an extension to be multi-channel (not sure when it was introduced, I know originally it only supported mono and stereo). Can any system add artificial depth to a stereo recording? I find myself thinking whether my huge established preference for stereo (well, 2.1 these days: stereo + sub) is driven by intellectual laziness, force of habit, or the lack of media that let me test it out. :-D
Sorry for the stream of consciousness, my brain hasn't yet been able to process all the stuff I learned.
Thanks for a very eye-opening thread!
Yes, that is what we are talking about. That is what the paper is talking about, if you read a bit more carefully. Yes, the playback was in a larger venue, but the speaker positions were and are specified exactly as was the listener position, and therein lies the message. You seem to be determined to resist the actual facts. Why is that?
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