Yes, how interesting and how true.
Several years ago when I started attending the Rocky Mountain Audio Fest on a regular basis, I made the observation that the majority of exhibitors provided sound that was a bit heavy on the "warm and cuddly" side, to use Nico's terms. One could get a bit less of that if one frequented rooms with speakers that used ceramic or light metal cones, of which there were a few. And one should avoid rooms with tube amplifiers, and frequent rooms with Class D amplifiers or certainly transistor amplifiers of various topologies if one wanted to avoid too much of the "warm and cuddly".
Then again all electronics exhibit harmonic distortions and a harmonic distortion profile of many many orders of distortions. The composition of this profile is in large part the signature of said unit. This is far more pronounced in amplifiers.
It is inherent in electronic playback and is a big reason why electronic playback is never as "natural" sounding as live acoustic music.
I agree, I made almost the same comment, and also I did bring up some of those exact same points.
But there are a lot of posts in this thread, and things quickly get forgotten, or never noticed at all. 🙂
-Gnobuddy
I think it was a later version of BS 5428-2 that I was thinking of. Late 70s or early 80s it was updated to wider bandwidth and tighter specs on distortion than the early releases.
FMRI studies have shown brain activity in response to frequencies above 20kHz. Some people can apparently tell if the frequencies are present without being able to hear them. In other words, the mental experience of the frequencies being present is not the same as the mental experience of hearing lower frequencies, or not the same as what we would normally consider to be "audible."
Probably doesn't have much to do with music enjoyment, but we don't know a whole lot about it quite yet.
And we keep learning other new and unexpected things about brains all the time.
Also, in relation to how existing research may be interpreted, it does happen to turn out that there is a brain bias Kahneman dubbed WYSIATI (What You See Is All There Is). He was talking about the human tendency for System 1 to implicitly assume we have all the information that exists, and to construct coherent explanations of how things work based on the assumption that's all there is to know.
Thus, when we have existing theories, studies, knowledge, etc., it can be hard to imagine and/or accept that there may be significant missing information that we would, in fact, take into consideration to construct somewhat different explanations, if only we knew about it.
Some well known examples of the tendency in action are famous quotes from long ago to the effect that it's physically impossible to build flying machines, or that we no longer need a patent system because everything that can be invented has already been invented. Of course, when we hear about those striking examples, it may seem as though they are odd exceptions to normal human thinking. But they are not unusual at all, according to psychologists who study such things. They are simply particularly vivid examples of WYSIATI.
Also, there is the issue that human subject perceptual research is a notoriously complex area in which to work, and we keep learning how to do it better all the time. A great deal of progress has been made over the past 20 years, not to mention compared to 40 years ago. And there is still plenty of room for more improvement, even now.
In short, I wouldn't toss out the old work, but neither would I conclude we already know everything there is to know, either. Seems to me like there are good reasons to keep an open mind about what ongoing research may reveal.
Yes, your post #891 was about the only post addressing these papers. I liked your comments and they what led me to read the papers.
One thing though, the Philadelphia-Washington experiments were not really live vs. recording as the orchestra sound was transmitted over phone lines to Washington. One of the papers addresses that.
Well that's just my point. I was listening to a live band. "Perfect-Fidelity". Of course a studio performance would have been different.
It is my impression that live sounds generate an 'attack' phase that can only be reproduced by powerful amplifiers (thump on your table or play a tambourine). Once you have the power, it becomes easier to achieve your goals. Hmmn that sounds famliar.😉
A list of DB levels of instruments and noises is found here:
This is also really interesting:
Brit government wants 70 db limit in venues | Dolphin Music
Apparently I will never be able to pump up the volume to Hi-Fi levels.🙄
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That sort of Hi-FI I am really interested in. What sort of chip amp board are you using or would you recommend?
No need to worry about speakers I am assembling them myself so it will be Hi-Fi. 🙄
Thanks, and very interesting to me:
Amplifiers:
Speakers
My only problem is getting the humididty down:
Fidelity doesn't apply to live band performance. It applies to sound reproducing domain.
No, amps don't have to be powerful to reproduce the 'attack' phase of (recorded) sound well. You need good speakers and room acoustics for that.
How much power is needed to acheive the 96 dB at 1 metre? 10 Watts? Any good speakers and FR or other drivers that do that?
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I've listened to speakers that can do that with 1.5 watts.
How Much Amplifier Power Do I Need?
Amplifier Power Required
Lots of speakers have efficiency equal to or greater than 96db/W-M. They will require 1W or less.
With 96db/S-M speakers with a 10W amp at 2M is sufficient for my listening style.
According to the crown calculator, a 100W amplifier would put you at the threshold of pain.
With 96db/S-M speakers with a 10W amp at 2M is sufficient for my listening style.
According to the crown calculator, a 100W amplifier would put you at the threshold of pain.
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115 db is what I had heard previously. Although it seems to vary:
https://www.sfu.ca/sonic-studio/handbook/Threshold_of_Pain.html
https://www.sfu.ca/sonic-studio/handbook/Threshold_of_Pain.html
Very true. I seem to remember, though, reading that it was only revealed to the audience at the end of the concert that they had been listening to loudspeakers, and not a live orchestra - and that wonderment and thunderous applause followed, rather than catcalls and thrown vegetables. 🙂
I also think the "live vs recorded" method was used in the research leading up to the 1934 concert. Some of those papers - for example, the one where they determined that they needed three channels rather than two - used "live vs recorded" to come to that conclusion.
I thought the same "live vs recorded" method was used to develop the speakers and amplifiers, too.
I also remember reading about early loudspeaker manufacturers - I think Wharefdale was one - who used the "live vs recorded" method to assess their loudspeakers before finalizing a design. They didn't use a full symphony orchestra, though, but rather quartets, duos, or solo singers.
From other things I've read, Leopold Stokowski absolutely loved the idea that he could make a "larger than life" orchestra. He wanted to expand the dynamic range beyond the limits of what was possible with actual performers. So as soon as the goal of accurate reproduction was met, his goal shifted to "Let's make it bigger and better than real life!"
He also experimented with using, for example, fewer violinists than usual, but then making them louder electronically, to make them sound like more, rather than fewer. One or two violinists didn't work - the sound wasn't as rich as usual. But he found that eight first violinists could be made to sound like the full complement (up to 16!) using amplification.
The researchers behind that 1934 concert set the goal of perfectly accurate reproduction. But, as is mentioned in the overview paper, the musicians immediately ran away with the idea, and wanted to go beyond just accurate reproduction - they wanted "larger than life"!
Today we've seen just how far that process can be taken. I've watched one lone man in his spare bedroom creating the sounds of a symphony orchestra on his computer, sounds that ended up on TV shows and films.
-Gnobuddy
The germans apparently believe it fits in a museum. I think they are correct.
No, to advance the field, something completely new and system oriented is needed with well defined interfaces and characteristic specifications.
I'm out until a new thread emerges that hint in this direction 😉
//
Yes, I'm sure this is all true. I should probably go back and reread those papers a few times to catch all the little details contained therein.
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