Why does the music played at AXPONA suck so bad?

[Keith_W]

I have Artur Schnabel live recordings from 70 years ago where the recordings are dire but the musical quality shines through like a spotlight (people referring to a "musical" system really are talking bollox the musical bit is the musician not the hardware).

Hear, hear!

Actually Schnabel was closer to 100 years ago, not 70 years ago. Those are my favourite recordings as well. About 1/4 of my music listening is historic recordings, tonight I am enjoying a very scratchy old recording of Sviatoslav Richter playing Schubert piano sonatas. I don't really need my hifi system, the only reason it's there is for me to fully enjoy a good recording if I want to.

 

[Mart68]

I sometimes find it hard to listen to some music that I really like on a good system. I must resort to one of my lesser systems to cope

Specifically what sort of music are you talking about? Have to say I just don't find that myself. Korn sounds fantastic, Sinatra sounds fantastic. I struggle to find recordings that don't at least sound acceptable. Only a few compilation albums that have been remastered with excessive limiting and compression are 'bad'. Even they are listenable at low spl.

 

[Mart68]

Circle of confusion is not the reason, otherwise perfect reproduction would be possible at least with some recordings.

Well, we don't know for a fact that it isn't. I think it is possible to get in the ballpark of the mastering studio experience with more modern (say post mid 1980s) recordings but there's no practical way to really verify that.

 

[Frank Dernie]

Respectfully, this same question can be asked, respectfully, of anyone in your age range, when hearing is substantially and irrevocably degraded and ears are no longer capable of high fidelity sensitivity.

More importantly, the point of trying to achieve high fidelity for non-classical music is to best reproduce the recording. As I'm sure you agree, music composed in the studio can be art too, with no shortage of richness, depth, complexity, and sophistication. What better reason could there be to want to hear it as it was recorded?

Well yes I have a loss of high frequencies with age but last year when I had my hearing checked it was otherwise normal - surprising since I spent most of my working life in the pit land at Grands Prix - but I pay no attention to any frequency plot over 10kHz nowadays.

OTOH I had the same opinion when I was much younger and, whilst I quite agree that simply accurately reproducing the recording is the objective, how can one know if one wasn't present at the mix?
It is also clear that most people for most music have a preference for more bass than is on the recording, which I recognise from playing music to friends and typical car audio.

But that sounds wrong (to me) on orchestral and acoustic music, probably because it is?...

 

[Johnkeizer]

I recall a review some years ago of a piano recital by one of those Chinese wunderkind musicians being pushed out into the west.
One line stayed with me.
Perfect playing, every note in exactly the right place at the right time.
Just a pity he forgot about the music.

 

[Frank Dernie]

Is fidelity not best judged via measurement though?

To an extent, certainly but since, at least IME, the sound in a room depends to a huge extent on the room and where the speakers themselves and the listening position itself are in it measurements need careful interpretation I would say.
Now with DSP room compensation one can get the bass more even at one point in the room unless the listening position is near a node of one of the room modes.

 

[Frank Dernie]

I recall a review some years ago of a piano recital by one of those Chinese wunderkind musicians being pushed out into the west.
One line stayed with me.
Perfect playing, every note in exactly the right place at the right time.
Just a pity he forgot about the music.

One of the reasons I listen to Artur Schnabel.

 

[RexrothPigeon]

how can one know if one wasn't present at the mix?

Well, it's only the entire point of this forum: measurements.

 

[Johnkeizer]

Finally.
To misquote that famous US president I can’t remember:
It’s the room, stupid.

 

[RexrothPigeon]

But then there are all those older recordings mastered on 1960s/1970s Tannoys or JBLs which were not so neutral.

Still better to have flat hi-fi. If the sound doesn't satisfy you, it's easier to adjust for taste from a neutral start than from a perma-colored playing field.

 

[Mart68]

Finally.
To misquote that famous US president I can’t remember:
It’s the room, stupid.

It was James Carville, apparently, talking about the Bush administation.

 

[Robin L]

I have Artur Schnabel live recordings from 70 years ago where the recordings are dire but the musical quality shines through like a spotlight (people referring to a "musical" system really are talking bollox the musical bit is the musician not the hardware).

I've had Arthur Schnabel's recordings since around 1973. I recall reading that the folks at Sheffield Labs were inspired to make direct to disc recordings when they heard Schnabel's Beethoven recordings from his first recorded complete cycle of all 32 piano sonatas from clean original 78s played via "audiophile" gear. I hesitate to call the sound quality of Schnabel's recordings "Dire", though they are pretty much at the far end of what I can comfortably listen to. Some reissues of the material are over-filtered like EMI's first CD box, some, like the Pearl transcriptions, are taken from commercial copies in less-than-ideal condition without any filtering. The current remasters, from Warner Classics, are the best CDs of the material I've heard so far. I still have the Naxos set as well, they're okay but nothing special and a bit noisy. The EMI vinyl transfers from 1980, remastered by Keith Hardwick, are my favorite LP transcriptions of the recordings.

Of course, one doesn't seek the best in sound quality from recordings like these. Historical recordings (and they all are, on one level or another) open up a window to another world.

 

[Robin L]

Hear, hear!

Actually Schnabel was closer to 100 years ago, not 70 years ago. Those are my favourite recordings as well. About 1/4 of my music listening is historic recordings, tonight I am enjoying a very scratchy old recording of Sviatoslav Richter playing Schubert piano sonatas. I don't really need my hifi system, the only reason it's there is for me to fully enjoy a good recording if I want to.

Then get better sounding copies of Sviatoslav Richter playing Schubert. Have to admit I find his trek through the B-flat sonata is just too damned slow. On the other hand, he nails the C minor sonata, D 958. The sound quality of the commercial recording for Europadisc is just hunky-dory.

 

[Robin L]

I recall a review some years ago of a piano recital by one of those Chinese wunderkind musicians being pushed out into the west.
One line stayed with me.
Perfect playing, every note in exactly the right place at the right time.
Just a pity he forgot about the music.

Lang Lang?

 

[mhardy6647]

Earl Scruggs, Steve Martin or Bela Fleck?

Or Rhiannon Giddens, for that matter.

There are some fine, and fine sounding, banjo recordings out there.

 

[Frank Dernie]

Well, it's only the entire point of this forum: measurements.

Well yes.
I have been measuring stuff for 54 years now.
Back in the beginning I sometimes had to design my own transducer first.
Later there were transducers but mind numbingly unaffordable, as were the analysers - and the data came out on a chart recorder on paper.

In the 80s I pioneered the use of digital data recording in my field and, obviously, had to write all my own software for it.

So I am not against measurements at all and realise they are crucial in design and optimisation of any engineering enterprise.
It is best to understand the physics first though, then you can judge the likely efficacy and applicability of the results.

This is an excellent forum with good expert input. The discussions sometimes less so.

 

[Frank Dernie]

Or Rhiannon Giddens, for that matter.

There are some fine, and fine sounding, banjo recordings out there.

Really?
Where did somebody find a fine sounding banjo???? GDR!

 

[mhardy6647]

Really?
Where did somebody find a fine sounding banjo???? GDR!

I'm just shakin' my head...


Was anyone at AXPONA playin' The Harmonicats? Or some good ol' accordion?

 

[mhardy6647]

Oh.
Perhaps the sine qua non for the Boomer generation?

 

[Frank Dernie]

Oh.
Perhaps the sine qua non for the Boomer generation?

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Well I can tip my hat to the skill of some players but can't bear the sound I'm afraid.

I am tempted to bastardise the bagpipes joke thus "the definition of a gentleman is somebody who can play the banjo - but doesn't"