Which speakers are the Classical Music Pros using?

[tuga]

Not all seating in a concert hall is created equal. The best place is on the conductor's podium and very close behind (if the seats are at the same level).

I hate the acoustics of the church with its alterations in timbre ie. the distortions, the long reverberation giving an undefined, muddy sound ....if I have a place a little far from the stage.

Most classical music was composed with the venue in mind, and thus a choral work of sacred music composed to be performed in churches will use the acoustics to its advantage, as a tool to achieve a particular expressive effect. And it has the benefit of making the sound of the singers of each voice more homogeneous.
A piano recital was not composed with the church acoustic characteristics in mind and will not sound good in one unless you sit very close.

But I agree that, just as there are better mic'ing distances and techniques, there are better seats and their location is venue-dependent.

 

[tuga]

There is a lot of research on concert hall acoustics. This one is as good a place to start as any:

Shoe Box - An analysis of the concert hall and its adaption to small-scale music performance space
By John Mauvan

https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/41337425.pdf

 

[aac]

The DBT experiments that back up the clear, unequivocal preference for multi channel were not AFAIK grounded in an audience with a home-cinema background.

Can you show me one?
I remember seeing something back then, but I can't remember which one and 2 channel even managed to win slightly on some music. All I remember they used genelec speakers.

 

[Frgirard]

Most classical music was composed with the venue in mind, and thus a choral work of sacred music composed to be performed in churches will use the acoustics to its advantage, as a tool to achieve a particular expressive effect. And it has the benefit of making the sound of the singers of each voice more homogeneous.
A piano recital was not composed with the church acoustic characteristics in mind and will not sound good in one unless you sit very close.

But I agree that, just as there are better mic'ing distances and techniques, there are better seats and their location is venue-dependent.

Are you sure?
The acoustic of the bastille opera is not the acoustic of the Pharo Palais is not the acoustic of an outside festival.
Lvb or Mozart does not take the acoustic.

 

[orangejello]

There is a lot of research on concert hall acoustics. This one is as good a place to start as any:

Shoe Box - An analysis of the concert hall and its adaption to small-scale music performance space
By John Mauvan

William Wesley Peters from Frank Lloyd Wright‘s Taliesin designed this space at Centre College in Danville Kentucky. Not well known, but a handful of great classical musicians make room in their schedule to play there. Seems Yo-yo Ma has an annual concert there. I saw Gustav Leonhardt there when he came from Amsterdam to dedicate a newly built harpsichord. One of the sweet experiences in my life. Leonhardt is one of my hero musicians and to hear him in an exquisite acoustic environment unmiked and be able to hear every nuance of his art clearly was special. I remember thinking that it was like sitting in the bell of a French horn. Worth checking out if on the off chance you are anywhere near there.

I would be interested to know what acoustical principles are at play in that design. Unfortunately this is the best photo that I could find.

[/url]

 

[orangejello]

Are you sure?
The acoustic of the bastille opera is not the acoustic of the Pharo Palais is not the acoustic of an outside festival.
Lvb or Mozart does not take the acoustic.

Given that LvB was hearing impaired it is fascinating to speculate just what he ”heard” as he created his compositions. But I doubt he was taking the acoustics of any particular hall into account.

 

[ChrisH]

This is an excellent book on concert hall acoustics: Concert Halls and Opera Houses: Music, Acoustics, and Architecture by Leo Baranek

Concert Halls and Opera Houses: Music, Acoustics, and Architecture: Beranek, Leo: 9780387955247: Amazon.com: Books

Concert Halls and Opera Houses: Music, Acoustics, and Architecture [Beranek, Leo] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. Concert Halls and Opera Houses: Music, Acoustics, and Architecture

www.amazon.com

 

[tuga]

Here's a lighter read on the subject by TAS reviewer Robert Everist Greene:

High Romanticism And The Sound Of Recorded Music - Shortchanging Orchestral Sound
https://web.archive.org/web/20170612131954/http://www.regonaudio.com/HighRomanticism.html

 

[Frgirard]

Should the works be performed in the place of creation and not in others venues ?

 

[Frgirard]

This is an excellent book on concert hall acoustics: Concert Halls and Opera Houses: Music, Acoustics, and Architecture by Leo Baranek

Concert Halls and Opera Houses: Music, Acoustics, and Architecture: Beranek, Leo: 9780387955247: Amazon.com: Books

Concert Halls and Opera Houses: Music, Acoustics, and Architecture [Beranek, Leo] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. Concert Halls and Opera Houses: Music, Acoustics, and Architecture

www.amazon.com

It's a shame that acoustics books are expensive in general.

 

[tuga]

Should the works be performed in the place of creation and not in others venues ?

If this question is still about my earlier post then I think that it was misunderstood.

I didn't mean that classical music was written for a particular venue but that different composition types were conceived for a particular kind of venue.
A symphony in a church will sound awful, and a string quartet or a cello suite will not sound particularly good in a large symphony hall.
A good symphony hall will add "quality" to the sound (bass lift, reverb).

Try listening to the Denon CD recording of an orchestra in an anechoic chamber, it's quite interesting. If I remember correctly there's even synthetic simulation the "ambience" of several famous halls.

https://www.stereophile.com/j_gordo...on_anechoic_orchestral_recordingsi/index.html



Edit: I've found an online copy of the booklet -> http://www.angelofarina.it/Public/Denon_CD/denon.htm

 

[GXAlan]

Try listening to the Denon CD recording of an orchestra in an anechoic chamber, it's quite interesting. If I remember correctly there's even synthetic simulation the "ambience" of several famous halls.

I own the CD of this -- any specific questions? It's as you say. The stereophile article does a really good job describing what was done.

 

[Kal Rubinson]

If this question is still about my earlier post then I think that it was misunderstood.

I didn't mean that classical music was written for a particular venue but that different composition types were conceived for a particular kind of venue.
A symphony in a church will sound awful, and a string quartet or a cello suite will not sound particularly good in a large symphony hall.
A good symphony hall will add "quality" to the sound (bass lift, reverb).

Try listening to the Denon CD recording of an orchestra in an anechoic chamber, it's quite interesting. If I remember correctly there's even synthetic simulation the "ambience" of several famous halls.

https://www.stereophile.com/j_gordo...on_anechoic_orchestral_recordingsi/index.html



Edit: I've found an online copy of the booklet -> http://www.angelofarina.it/Public/Denon_CD/denon.htm

Thanks. I've already ripped this to my server but you have saved me the trouble of scanning the booklet!

 

[Vuki]

Imho this discussion is about hi-fi vs. my-fi.

 

[krabapple]

I'm not sure "extracting" is the entirety of what's going on - I'm under the impression that what is extracted (de-correlated energy) is then processed rather extensively.

Sound On Sound interviewed David Griesinger of Lexicon about twenty years ago, and apparently there was a lot of applied psychoacoustics going into the algorithms he created. Maybe I'm just remembering the past through rose-colored hearing aids, but imo the Lexicon worked as advertised.

If you want to know how the Dolby Pro Logic II upmixer worked, I refer you to this document by Roger Dressler.

 

[krabapple]

Yes indeed. If you have my book - any edition - you will find explanations about how passive combinations of multiple subwoofers can be used to predictably attenuate room resonances in rectangular rooms, and in active solutions for rooms of any shape, can manipulate them, to create regions of similar sounding bass for several listeners. NO traditional acoustical absorption is required. The information is also in the Audio Engineering Society publications, under Todd Welti, the inventor and author, part of my research group at Harman. Four small subs in corners of a rectangular room (two at opposing mid-wall locations can also work, but at lower efficiency) are generally preferable to covering large portions of walls and ceiling with bass traps. It can still be a "normal" visually pleasing room. This is only for the bass - above about 500 Hz in most rooms the loudspeakers themselves are the dominant factors, and for this you need to seek out and buy the right loudspeakers - "room EQ" might help, but in the limit, won't save you.

Rather than use these placements, in my 5.2 system I have been using the room width mode-attenuating subwoofer placement trick you describe on p 14 of your 2002 presentation -- i.e., two subwoofer placed at 1/4 of the width of the room, along the front wall. (I think it's also mentioned in your book, though I haven't got it at hand now to confirm). I wonder why this has not been popularized more?

I use placement of my listening position from front to back to avoid the worst length modes -- the old 'rule of thirds'. Some day I'll get around to in-room measurements to see if any of this worked. ;>

 

[Newman]

Discussing the above-mentioned "Selective Mode Cancellation" technique, in Toole's 2002 presentation, would also be an opportunity to contrast it with Geddes' preference for maximizing modes.

I can see the logic in both approaches, but I don't know if anyone has compared them and determined a winner.

 

[youngho]

Discussing the above-mentioned "Selective Mode Cancellation" technique, in Toole's 2002 presentation, would also be an opportunity to contrast it with Geddes' preference for maximizing modes.

I can see the logic in both approaches, but I don't know if anyone has compared them and determined a winner.

@krabapple I think the problem with using only two subwoofers at quarter width placement along the front wall is that they still maximally excite the other axial modes. The two or four opposing mid-wall subwoofers also use selective mode cancellation. However, in my opinion, the Double Bass Array (or simplified CABS) approach takes selective mode cancellation to its logical extreme on the front wall, then adds the equivalent of active cancellation on the back wall.

I think that the biggest issue would be that Geddes' approach allows for near-infinite variability in implementation, as I understand it. Here's one description, for example, so how could you know whether there might be an issue in the approach itself or the specific implementation thereof? What parameters would be used to compare them, objectively or subjectively, to judge for a winner? Also consider the Fazenda paper or possibly Greisinger's perception of envelopment at low frequencies? After all, subwoofers are usually used for a human listener, not a microphone, so shouldn't subjective measures play some role in the evaluation?

 

[Floyd Toole]

Discussing the above-mentioned "Selective Mode Cancellation" technique, in Toole's 2002 presentation, would also be an opportunity to contrast it with Geddes' preference for maximizing modes.

I can see the logic in both approaches, but I don't know if anyone has compared them and determined a winner.

Actually, I described it inaccurately. The multi-sub technique, as explained in detail in my book, attenuates some modes (odd order 1st & 3rd) while amplifying even order (2nd). All modes are amenable to attenuation by equalization, but normally they are in disarray. The multi-sub arrangements in rectangular rooms create order, so that listeners can find locations where the bass is similar. Once done, the remaining modes - certainly the amplified ones - can be equalized, but in a way that affects several seats similarly. Figure 8.15 from the 3rd edition illustrates the principle quite well. Equalization is still required, but the situation is much more orderly, more predictable. Missing from this is system efficiency: subs in corners win.

Obviously non-rectangular rooms need different approaches. Active sound field optimization works extremely well and has the additional advantage of significantly increasing the system efficiency. See Section 8.2.8.

 

[krabapple]

@krabapple I think the problem with using only two subwoofers at quarter width placement along the front wall is that they still maximally excite the other axial modes.

True, but excited modes are what 'room EQ' correction (below Schroeder) is especially helpful for dealing with. I'm mainly concerned with one LP, so I only have to 'correct' for a single seat.

(Dr. Toole himself noted that these placement tricks can help the bass sound to be more 'even' across a listening space, but not necessarily 'good'. That requires extra measures. )