What is critical music listening from critical music recordings...the masters?

[Phelonious Ponk]

In most cases, I think critical listening lies somewhere between a waste of time and a strategic error. If you're trying to ID differences between components, file formats, etc., it is, well, critical. Though you should probably start with a simple blind comparison to make sure you can actually hear a difference before you start an aesthetic evaluation of its quality. But for those of us who are untrained, not in the business, simply in the business of the joy of music? Critical listening has nothing to do with music.

Tim

 

[NorthSky]

I agree with you Tim.

Critical listening is for audio product designers; loudspeakers, amplifiers, DACs, turntables, phono preamps, cables, power cords, etc.
Critical listening is also for pro record music producers and recording/mixing engineers.

Critical listening is also for audiophiles in search of improving their sound systems, so they befriend the two groups above.

Critical listening is also for audio scientists with measuring tools.
Critical listening is also for trained listeners.

Critical music listening is NOT for most people (the vast majority, say 97%) who enjoy listening to music. ...It is casual regular passive music listening for the simplicity of enjoying the music playing. iPods would do, turntables would also do, cassette tapes, open-reel tapes, CDs, music downloads, ghetto blasters @ the beach, headphones music listening...@ home and on the go, iPhones, iPads, youtube music videos, ...anything that play music and @ all price points...it just don't matter...it's the music that does. In that large group of music lovers (97% +), there are many variations...from passive to active...from nearfield to farfield and between. ....From live rock concerts to live classical ballets and operas and orchestras from the maestro composers of today composing their own or interpreting the other'smusic masterpieces.

Music that was written 500 years ago and played today has a different dimensional attraction, enjoyable during all 500 years, but just a different state of mind from when the composer wrote it down. And the fresh new music composed today is the one of the music composers of our time, with their own influence by the old master music composers...Scarlatti, Beethoven, Back, Stravinsky, Mozart, Tchaikovsky, Debussy, Ravel, Berlioz, etc.

Are the famous classical music composers into critical listening? ...Or is it the rappers and the punks who are into critical music listening?

If we look from a realistic perspective; the most beautiful and powerful music through history was composed with love, dedication, and some critical aspects of composition and performance and sounds delivery. The margin of errors (false notes) is not an option in classical music of grandeur and class chamber.

Electronica music from repetitive beats stored inside a computer chip, and dubbed with plexiglass tempo and synthesized generated effects demands a lot of effort and time and concentration; the pro musicians using those tools have to be critical in the final music delivery...the kids are counting on that from their MP3 players and iPods. ...Hey, all type of music for all genre of people and from all ages and countries in the world.

The high society (music concert goers; rock-and-roll live music concerts...Pink Floyd, the Stones, Zeppelin, ... and the classical concert halls with grandiose orchestras with 120 musicians on stage plus tenor and soprano opera singers from both genders, ...jazz alleys blues rap punk funk heavy metal meditation world country reggae soul motown church chorals organs calypso tango bossa nova Cuba Hawaiian Chinese Japanese folk singers drum beats from all over the world easy listening popular blue grass .... etc., etc., etc.) they all listen to music with more or less critical concentration from their brain and ears.

This music ocean is as vast as there are people in the world who listen to music.
...From the lowest end...people in poor neighborhoods of Brazil making their own music with empty bottles, wood sticks and plastic containers and metal cans ... to the highest end...people playing from the most prodigious world's classical orchestras and listening from the most prestigious designed pairs of loudspeakers through systems built by the best audio designers/engineers and without any financial limit but the sky high above our heads.

And from the low to the high, critical listening is there more or less. ...Critical as magical adrenaline that makes you get up and dance in a trance, and as hypnotic/euphoric/transforming/revitalizing/addicting all over the bones of your body and through all the blood vessels pumping out from the heart and brain.
Critical listening can do that, or not @ all...it depends...of each one individual person on the planet who listen to music from the temple of his own musical cultural social personal world.

How critical are you when listening to the music?

 

[Phelonious Ponk]

I can be overcome by emotion listening on my car radio, so not all that critical.

Tim

 

[Dynamix]

The concept of "critical listening" just makes me sad. It's not something I would want to do.

And on another note: I'd like to see the microphone (and mic preamp) that's capable of recording an exact copy of the actual event. I'd also like to pet a unicorn.

 

[NorthSky]

Hi Dynamix,

I think the critical point of music listening is achieved when the illusion is more total than the event itself.
Sound wise yes, but reality wise with the musicians playing right there in the jazz cabaret with the drinks, the smoke, the moving floor, the decors, the pretty ladies in mini skirts, the cruising, the lusting, the tables, the bar, ... no way. In imagination perhaps...but @ the end of the evening the one laying beside you in your bed is the same one the night before and the week before.

 

[Thomas savage]

The concept of "critical listening" just makes me sad. It's not something I would want to do.

And on another note: I'd like to see the microphone (and mic preamp) that's capable of recording an exact copy of the actual event. I'd also like to pet a unicorn.

Michael got a unikitty if that helps...

 

[Thomas savage]

I can be overcome by emotion listening on my car radio, so not all that critical.

Tim

What were you thinking about?.. The last time you were wrong

 

[FrantzM]

I can be overcome by emotion listening on my car radio, so not all that critical.

Tim

You're not alone.

 

[Purité Audio]

I can be overcome by emotion at any time, but it's probably to do with my age.
Keith

 

[Phelonious Ponk]

What were you thinking about?.. The last time you were wrong

I was trying to remember it.

 

[NorthSky]

I can be overcome by emotion listening on my car radio, so not all that critical.

Tim

Yep, I can get that too. Then, how critical our emotions become influential to our music listening experiences?

 

[NorthSky]

• http://www.audiosciencereview.com/f...sic-tracks-for-speaker-and-room-eq-testing.6/

In the past I listened to those albums (LPs), critically (active listening). Nothing was lost, all the luster remained...emotionally and musical pleasantness speaking.
The details, the chain of the events in that dimensional space transferred well into my room and into my brain (ears receptivity, sensitive neurological membranes).
The canals were complete.

Then I did the same from the CD recordings. There was more of less. ...Most likely from different masters...incomparable...the difference impossible to measure without the absolute source.

The quality of the rig (DACs) will account. ...The critical clock, the interpolation, the reconstruction and the digital rejection of harmonies.
I wish that I pursued my dream...higher analog music fidelity...for a smoother more agreeable lifestyle in a peaceful environment...my brain.
The subconscious works in mysterious ways, and we are not comprehending yet the positive and beneficial effects that an all analog chain have on our mental musical emotional world of comfort zone. ...The great numbness of it all.

It is critical to understand the implications of our music listening habits, and their sources plus all the journey that went into the final delivery.
Not everything in audio impact is measurable from an emotional brain standpoint. ...Including the process before, during and after.

Brief, this is only a theory; what are the true consequences from both active and passive music listening in both extreme worlds; the analog one and the digital ones?
I don't believe that there are studies that were performed on humans in trying to determine their long lasting effects on the human psyche.
We have so much more to learn...

My most memorable moments in music listening were the lived ones; from when I was a teenager, and all analog.
Those lasting moments in time are the ones that are the most pleasurable in my heart and soul. They are the most soothing and liberating.

How critical was it to set the mics properly and the level appropriately? ...Very. Then it was all about the artist doing the rest (50/50), but the true emotional impact 90% plus from the artist on stage. The rest from the listener's perspective in his/her own dimensional space/position...in time.

Speaking of timing...very critical...like it gives you the right timbre. ...And with it the proper tonality of the harmonies....the room's reflections.
A music concert hall is critical in the amount of delayed reflections. ...And everywhere where there is a set of ears listening.
So yes, some high end music venues like that are critical for all the listeners.
In a car driving the countryside roads, or intercontinental highways up 40,000 feet above the ground with a pair of headphones, equally less so.

This, an essay, a tentative in critical subjective music listening practice. ...An experiment on open discussions towards a happier life.
How critical money is in providing the ulterior experience? It depends...on where it is invested. ...Higher knowledge, experience and rehabilitation.

 

[sofrep811]

I try my best, but ADD kicks in and I start thinking. But I love to hear the extensions on percussion and that's where I try to start. It helps me understand their high and low cut-off points within the wall of sound. Hopefully that described my approach correctly? I can load anything digital on to Logic Pro X and really analyze with various plugins--but only if something doesn't seem right and I can capture in 16/44 WAV or higher bit/sample rate if sold as 24/96.