|
Audio Asylum Thread Printer Get a view of an entire thread on one page |
For Sale Ads |
207.211.152.131
In Reply to: Water Lily Russian Recordings and turning the other cheek.... posted by music@waterlilyacoustics.com on July 23, 2005 at 11:41:12:
The seating arrangment of the Saint Petersburg Philharmonic was arrived at by the legendary Yevgeny Mravinsky, who for over 50 years "ruled" this great orchestra. Now, it would be the height of folly for someone like me to question a man of his knowledge and experience when it comes to matters of orchestal balance. What the mikes captured is what happens in the Great Hall during a performence. The mikes were placed 15 feet from the stage and 15 feet up. In reality the mikes were 10 feet above the orchestra. Any further back would have put the orchestral image "out of focus" and any further forward would have produced a sound that would be "in your face". Any further up would have, amoung other things, made the highs out of balance. Considering the 90 degree mike angle which had to encompass the whole orchestra, the stage dimention and hall reverbaration time, the mike placement was optimum as per my ears. KAVI.
Follow Ups:
Kavi,Thanks again for posting the additional information and philosophy.
I guess I need to reply point-by-point. I hope this is still interesting to other readers. At least there’s a lot of good information being exchanged! (The text of your post is in quotation marks.)
“The seating arrangment of the Saint Petersburg Philharmonic was arrived at by the legendary Yevgeny Mravinsky, who for over 50 years "ruled" this great orchestra. Now, it would be the height of folly for someone like me to question a man of his knowledge and experience when it comes to matters of orchestal balance.”
Gee, Kavi, I don’t know – seems to me you’re conflating seating arrangements and orchestral balance. And while seating arrangement does of course have some effect on orchestral balance, that particular seating arrangement does not seem to have been cast in cement, during Mravinsky’s tenure or afterwards. Look at the Rozhdestvensky/Leningrad Phil video of the Tchaikovsky Fourth from 1971. Mravinsky was still in charge then, yet Rozhdestvensky has both violin sections to the left, cellos on the right, and the brass straight back. Sure, I know what you’re thinking – that concert was given in London, not Leningrad. OK, fine. What about the Jansons / St. Petersburg recordings of the Rachmaninoff symphonies, c. 1994? Those were recorded in St. Petersburg and again, both violin sections are clearly to the left. (Any listener can hear this quite reliably in the Rachmaninoff Second Symphony, nine measures after figure one in the first movement, where the violas, second violins, and first violins successively ascend to those wonderful high C’s – an incredible inspiration on Rachmaninoff’s part!)
“What the mikes captured is what happens in the Great Hall during a performence.”
Actually, what the mikes captured is what happened in the Great Hall FROM THE VANTAGE POINT OF THE MIKES during this performance. Why is this concept so hard to understand?
“The mikes were placed 15 feet from the stage and 15 feet up. In reality the mikes were 10 feet above the orchestra.”
This is good information. May I suggest that you include such information in the booklet notes to your subsequent recording projects?
“Any further back would have put the orchestral image "out of focus" and any further forward would have produced a sound that would be "in your face". Any further up would have, amoung other things, made the highs out of balance.”
You must be aware that different listeners have differing notions of where the focal point for the microphones is. I understand why you would not want to place the microphones too closely. (You start capturing too much of the sound of individual stands rather than the whole section.) But speaking personally, I would have liked the sound to be a bit more “in your face”, and, no, I’m not trying to second-guess Mravinsky. In fact, if the microphones were closer, I suspect we would be hearing more the type of sound HE actually would have heard as he conducted.
“Considering the 90 degree mike angle which had to encompass the whole orchestra, the stage dimention and hall reverbaration time, the mike placement was optimum as per my ears.”
This is also an interesting question. Given all the constraints you were working under, is it possible that this hall is not optimal for recording? Even if it were a good hall, in the sense that it would be more forgiving of a wider range of minimalist microphone placements, people would still differ in their reaction to the final outcome on the finished recording. That’s the way people are. Why do you seem to be so offended by that?
If I may indulge myself a bit here, I’m sometimes asked by listeners who are just getting into classical music, “So what’s the best recording of [say] Mahler’s Fifth Symphony?” When I reply that there really is no one best recording of this work, and that different critics have different ideas as to which recording is superior, these listeners are shocked, and they start reacting as if I’m intentionally withholding information: “Oh come on! – There’s GOT to be a consensus!” So I give in, and reply, “Well, OK – a lot of critics seem to recommend Bernstein. But speaking for myself, I’d never recommend Bernstein as a first choice.” So there you go. The Romans knew all about this aspect of human nature:
De gustibus non est disputandem
-Chris Salocks
(Take my opinions with a grain of salt – everything else being equal, I prefer DVD-Audio!)
I do happen to know something about orchestral balance and human nature. Orchestral balance in a given hall, is a combination of the seating arrangment, hall acoustics, the dictates of the composer and the artistic disposition of the conductor. Those of us who make one point stereo recordings that entail no gimmickry, wherein we strive to capture the reality in a "documentary" style and do not impose our idea of balance via miking, panning and EQ, as all the majors invariably do, consider perserving the original balance in the given hall, at the time of recording, the Holy Grail.
Human nature being what it is, you are couching the obvious in such a manner so as to make look silly. Of course I know that what the mikes picked up would have been different in a different place! But I had made it clear as to WHY I had picked the chosen spot. And had you paid a little more attention you would notice that the CD comes with a 16 page booklet with excellent notes, including 3 pages on the recording.
You can certainly "do" a Lord Nelson by putting the telescope to the blind eye. That too is numan nature but hardly a balanced view!
Kavi,I think your last post did not have as much useful information in it as your previous posts did. Be that as it may, please allow me to respond. As usual, the excerpts from your posts are in quotation marks:
“I do happen to know something about orchestral balance and human nature. Orchestral balance in a given hall, is a combination of the seating arrangment, hall acoustics, the dictates of the composer and the artistic disposition of the conductor.”
. . . and, you might have added (if you’re recording the performance), the placement of the microphones!
“Those of us who make one point stereo recordings that entail no gimmickry, wherein we strive to capture the reality in a "documentary" style and do not impose our idea of balance via miking, panning and EQ, as all the majors invariably do, consider perserving the original balance in the given hall, at the time of recording, the Holy Grail.”
Please don’t take offense, but I’m going to use a reductio ad absurdum to get my point across. You say you do not impose your idea of balance via miking. But the very position at which you choose to place the microphones is an imposition of your idea of the balance! It’s a subjective judgement of where YOU think the most realistic balance is achieved – even if you have Russian acousticians to support your judgement. Now for the reductio ad absurdum: Suppose a producer got it into his head that the perfect place for his microphones was directly in front of the brass section, and that this placement was best at “preserving the original balance in the given hall”. Although the resulting recording would achieve a certain reality (yes, that’s how it sounded right in front of the brass section!), I’m sure that most listeners would not applaud that producer’s efforts. Some listeners might even have a PRECONCEIVED IDEA (based on their attendance at any number of orchestral concerts) that the strings ought to be more prominent in that recording, even though they did not attend the actual recording session.
OK, this crazy example is far from what we hear on your recording, but I hope you take my point. You can’t just go around proclaiming that you’re “preserving the original balance in the given hall”. What you’re really preserving is a certain balance from the vantage point of where you place the microphones.
At this point, let me stop and say, believe it or not, I’M ON YOUR SIDE (at least partially) – I don’t like tons of microphones sprouting up all over the place, with the balance reconstituted by (as I mentioned in another post) some dweeb in the control room. I think the difference between us is that I’m less doctrinaire about one point stereo recordings. When you have your minions implying that any other recording technique, even a relatively purist technique such as spaced omnis, doesn’t even sound like music, I think, in your heart, you know that’s not true. (Not that the other techniques don’t have limitations, but they can certainly be effective vehicles for the honest capture of a given performance.)
OK, back to your post. . .
“Human nature being what it is, you are couching the obvious in such a manner so as to make look silly.”
Believe me, this is not true. I’m just trying to get my points across. I’m actually frustrated with myself that I can’t be clearer sometimes.
“Of course I know that what the mikes picked up would have been different in a different place! But I had made it clear as to WHY I had picked the chosen spot. And had you paid a little more attention you would notice that the CD comes with a 16 page booklet with excellent notes, including 3 pages on the recording.”
After I read this part of your post, I scoured the Mahler Fifth program booklet once again. I may be overlooking the obvious, but I sure can’t find any section where the microphone placements (as you so kindly provided in your previous post) were stated. Since you brought up the subject of the program booklet, I agree there’s lots of excellent information therein. But I think you could have used a better graphic design and a more judicious choice of fonts. That’s just my opinion – I’m not pontificating, just offering some friendly advice.
“You can certainly "do" a Lord Nelson by putting the telescope to the blind eye. That too is numan nature but hardly a balanced view!”
Great quotation! I’d like to toss one back at you, and I’m on kind of a Latin kick today, so see if you think this quote from Varro will do:
Non omnes qui habent citharam sunt citharoedi [Not all who have a lyre are lyre players]
(Please don’t construe that as applying to you!)
-Chris Salocks
(Take my opinions with a grain of salt – everything else being equal, I prefer DVD-Audio!)
If we follow this logic then there should be no recording made at all, since the choice of mikes, mikes pre amps, cables and the recording medium will all impose their own color and character unto the original sound and will reflect the personal "taste" of the one who picked them! A recording is always the result of technical and artistic decisions made by the one who makes it. Yes, a very personal choice based on that persons priorities and the credence he gives to such matters as tonal purity, spatial cues/stereo image/instrument localization, overall sonic balance and dynamics. The original balance in the hall as perceived by the one who made the recording, how else could it be? Thus there is a Decca sound, an EMI sound, a Mercury sound and an RCA sound. It is my opinion that though entertaining, the "house sound" of these forementioned labels, are highly colored and in no way represent the real sound of an orchestra. Nevertheless, what needs to be kept in mind is that the difference between these "house sounds", that were deliberatly derived through a combination of mikes/miking technique and EQ/compression and the "purist" approch of say Water Lily, which has no "house sound" in that it is deliberatly arrived at as through a formula, but is rather the result of an attempt to capture the sound of an acoustical event as "accurately" as we know how. Now, our version of "accuracy" may not sit well with you, for this or that reason, but it can not be denied that the Water Lily approch is free of ornamentation, embelishment and artifice.
"My minions"? I find that utterly insulting and take offence.
Dr. Robert Greene is a professor of math and acoustics at UCLA and a dear and respcted friend and certainly no "minion" of mine. He is also a very accomplised violinist, with a vast amount of knowledge in matters audio and music.
And yes, me and my "minions" do by far prefer single point stereo recordings for the simple reason, that to our ears they tend to be much more realistic. Spaced omni recordings, even with just two mikes, just do not produce the precise stereo image that we prefer and they do also introduce colorations due to comb filter effects that single point stereo pairs are free of. If you and others like you prefer the sound of spaced omni recordings, that is your choice. But certainly not mine. I find ALL spaced omni recordings, old and new, employing two or more mikes, to be utterly confusing. Since the ability to spatialy localize sounds varies with individuals and is partly based on their pinna structure, with some people utterly incapable of preceving stereo at all, it is very likly that some of us are more accutly sensitive to the spatial "deformation" caused by spaced omni mike techniques.
So now we have come around to even commenting on the layout/art work?! Let me just put it to you bluntly, in case you forgot to read the credits, the cover has a reproduction of a Wassily Kandinsky painting courtesy of the Hermitage.
I never mastered my Latin in boarding school, but I do love the Persian Sufi poest Rumi who once said "Counterfiet exists because there is such a thing as real Gold". How appropriate!
Kavi,I fear this discussion is becoming less and less interesting and informative for other readers. By now, everyone who’s followed so far knows the routine: the parts from your post are in quotation marks.
“If we follow this logic then there should be no recording made at all, since the choice of mikes, mikes pre amps, cables and the recording medium will all impose their own color and character unto the original sound and will reflect the personal "taste" of the one who picked them! A recording is always the result of technical and artistic decisions made by the one who makes it. Yes, a very personal choice based on that persons priorities and the credence he gives to such matters as tonal purity, spatial cues/stereo image/instrument localization, overall sonic balance and dynamics. The original balance in the hall as perceived by the one who made the recording, how else could it be?”
Wait a minute – You’re agreeing with ME now! I was the one who argued that microphone placements, etc., were subjective judgements. I thought you and your minions : - ) were arguing that you were capturing THE reality with your documentary approach, as if it could only be done your way. (Go back and look at the previous posts.)
“Thus there is a Decca sound, an EMI sound, a Mercury sound and an RCA sound. It is my opinion that though entertaining, the "house sound" of these forementioned labels, are highly colored and in no way represent the real sound of an orchestra.”
As I mentioned before, you and your minions : - ) are a bit doctrinaire in this regard. I’m just guessing, but I’d say that most readers of this board would not agree with you that the sound on the labels you mention “in no way represent[s] the real sound of an orchestra”. (I assume we’re talking about the golden age of the Deccas, EMI’s, and RCA’s.) By the way, and here’s where my memory is a little foggy, I think I remember reading that SOME EMI recordings were actually made with the Blumlein technique. (Perhaps another reader could nail this bit of information down?)
“Nevertheless, what needs to be kept in mind is that the difference between these "house sounds", that were deliberatly derived through a combination of mikes/miking technique and EQ/compression and the "purist" approch of say Water Lily, which has no "house sound" in that it is deliberatly arrived at as through a formula, but is rather the result of an attempt to capture the sound of an acoustical event as "accurately" as we know how.”
So . . . when I read in any number of booklets with the Mercury CD’s (I’m looking at the Richard Strauss / Dorati booklet right now) quotes such as “. . . the recording session began in earnest, and from that time on there was no tampering with the controls of the recording machines which were putting the sound on tape – no boosting of pianissimos, no compressing of fortissimos, no disturbing of balances”, we have it on your authority that Mercury is lying? Actually, for someone who takes offense so easily, you’re pretty free with your dismissals of other companies’ efforts.
“Now, our version of "accuracy" may not sit well with you, for this or that reason, but it can not be denied that the Water Lily approch is free of ornamentation, embelishment and artifice.”
-But not free of subjective decision making – just like any other recording company!
“"My minions"? I find that utterly insulting and take offence.
Dr. Robert Greene is a professor of math and acoustics at UCLA and a dear and respcted friend and certainly no "minion" of mine. He is also a very accomplised violinist, with a vast amount of knowledge in matters audio and music.”Use of that term was meant to be humorous. You’ll notice that I used happy faces earlier in this post to avoid misunderstanding. (Dr. Greene – This is Dr. Salocks. I hope you were not insulted!)
“And yes, me and my "minions" do by far prefer single point stereo recordings for the simple reason, that to our ears they tend to be much more realistic. Spaced omni recordings, even with just two mikes, just do not produce the precise stereo image that we prefer and they do also introduce colorations due to comb filter effects that single point stereo pairs are free of. If you and others like you prefer the sound of spaced omni recordings, that is your choice. But certainly not mine. I find ALL spaced omni recordings, old and new, employing two or more mikes, to be utterly confusing.”
I think we both agree (well, maybe not!) that no recording technique is perfect. Again, I would surmise that most listeners in this forum are not confused by most spaced omni recordings, even though you say you are.
“Since the ability to spatialy localize sounds varies with individuals and is partly based on their pinna structure, with some people utterly incapable of preceving stereo at all, it is very likly that some of us are more accutly sensitive to the spatial "deformation" caused by spaced omni mike techniques.”
Let’s look at this statement from another angle: Is it possible that some listeners, because of their pinna structure and mental wiring, are able to localize sounds even in recordings which may seem “utterly confusing” to others?
“So now we have come around to even commenting on the layout/art work?! Let me just put it to you bluntly, in case you forgot to read the credits, the cover has a reproduction of a Wassily Kandinsky painting courtesy of the Hermitage.”
OK, OK! – I’ll remember: next time I want to ensure impeccable graphic design, I’ll put a reproduction of a Wassily Kandinsky painting on the booklet cover. That certainly simplifies the whole process of graphic design!
“I never mastered my Latin in boarding school, but I do love the Persian Sufi poest Rumi who once said "Counterfiet exists because there is such a thing as real Gold". How appropriate!”
To tell you the truth, I never mastered my Latin in boarding school either. Actually, I never went to boarding school. But I’m still on kind of a Latin kick today, so here’s another one (from Virgil) for you:
Experto credite [Trust the expert]
(Yes, but then we have to decide whether it’s a real expert or a would-be expert!)
-Chris Salocks
(Take my opinions with a grain of salt – everything else being equal, I prefer DVD-Audio!)
Please read what you have written. What is being discribed is that no gain riding (passive compression) was done and that no balance adjustments were made. In the three mike setup that Mercury employed, the center mike feed was attenuated a few db and split into two and fed to the left and right mike feeds. This mix was fed to the two track Ampx 300. Later when they started using the mag film recorders, they recorded onto three individual tracks and at the time of LP mastering, mixed the three tracks to two.
No mention what-so-ever about EQ!!!
For someone who talks so much about recordings you seem to know very little about the art of recording. Had you knowen enough about this subject you would not have said what you did and I would not have to post this. You would have knowen that the discription in the Mercury CD booklet was solely about gain riding (passive EQ) and balance. Perhaps you had no idea what gain riding was untill now! No matter if it is a Mercury LP or CD, they were both made from the same master and thus subject to the same EQ/commpression, if applied at the time of recording. And what makes you think that there was no EQ applied at the time of the CD mastering?! Did Wilma consult with you?
Further, your outright dismissal of a well knowen fact: that the classic tube mikes, yes, the very same models with the far from flat responce usad by Mercury, Decca, RCA and EMI, are still used in the pop/rock studios and often as vocal mikes for the pop "divas", shows that you are the one who is being cavalier. Your statetment "divas do not use omni", again proves what I have said above: you know very little about this subject. These mikes in question are not fixed omnis, but variable pattern mikes! I had mentioned the Coles, just to show that there was a truly flat and transparent mike around at the time Mercury, RCA and Decca made the recordings that are worshiped the faithful. Of course, the Coles being a ribbon mike and thus a true figure-of-eight transducer, perfect for Blumlein and MS recordings, was of no use to the spaced omni gang. And no, I do not use Coles mikes. Had you read the CD booklet throughly you would have noted this fact. Who is being hasty in is comments?
Looks as if Kavi posted this message twice. (I'm losing track of all his postings.) So I'll respond twice. His comments are in quotation marks.“For someone who talks so much about recordings you seem to know very little about the art of recording. Had you knowen enough about this subject you would not have said what you did and I would not have to post this. You would have knowen that the discription in the Mercury CD booklet was solely about gain riding (passive EQ) and balance. Perhaps you had no idea what gain riding was untill now! No matter if it is a Mercury LP or CD, they were both made from the same master and thus subject to the same EQ/commpression, if applied at the time of recording. And what makes you think that there was no EQ applied at the time of the CD mastering?! Did Wilma consult with you?”
Here Kavi is so desperate to make his points that he conveniently overlooks readily available information on the internet, such as the interview with Robert Eberenz, where Eberenz states the following (regarding the Mercury recording process): “between the microphone and the tape machine itself, we had very little of any electronics. We had no equalization [I wonder if this is clear enough for Kavi?], no devices of any kind between the microphone and the tape machine. All we had was a fader, set level; a line amplifier, which was a Pultec MB2 classic amplifier known to every studio in the world.” Well, perhaps that leaves a little bit open to question, so let me refer to a conversation I had with Harold Lawrence. (He was over at my house to make some recordings in my living room – and guess what microphone technique he used? Crossed-pair figure-eights!) Anyway, in our discussion after the recording, HL (as I’ll refer to him from now on) said he was very proud of the fact that no equalization or compression was employed in the Mercury recordings. (No gain riding is of course a given.)
Off the subject, but possibly of general interest to readers: In response to my comment that Antal Dorati seemed like a less interesting conductor once he left Mercury and began his relationship with Decca/London (who had mostly abandoned their classic sound by the time they were recording Dorati, with spot microphones mushrooming up all over the place), HL said that Dorati later confided to him that he was aware of this phenomenon, as more a more of the recorded performance was taken out of his hands and put into the control room, and was distressed by it. Of course this is third-hand information (but only second-hand information to me!).
Back on to the subject: so, if the master is on the tape, and there was no equalization or compression applied, and no devices of any kind between the microphone and the tape machine, that sure doesn’t leave much room for equalization except for LP mastering. Now, I could be wrong about this, but I recall reading that Wilma did make new PCM masters for the series of CD’s that came out. And I know for sure that someone (not Wilma) made new DSD masters for the SACD’s which are now coming out.
On to Kavi’s next desperate point:
“Further, your outright dismissal of a well knowen fact: that the classic tube mikes, yes, the very same models with the far from flat responce usad by Mercury, Decca, RCA and.) EMI, are still used in the pop/rock studios and often as vocal mikes for the pop "divas", shows that you are the one who is being cavalier. Your statetment "divas do not use omni", again proves what I have said above: you know very little about this subject. These mikes in question are not fixed omnis, but variable pattern mikes!”
So now Kavi is claiming that divas do use omnis? As I said, I would be very surprised. (OK, maybe on a rare occasion.) The fact that many tube microphones used today have switchable pick-up patterns isn’t relevant at all. Mercury was using omnidirectionals (or omnidirectional pick-up patterns). And, truth to tell, I have not been able to verify that the Telefunken (actually Schoeps, Telefunken was apparently just the distributor) 201 (the microphone used in the vast majority of Mercury stereo recordings) even has a selectable pick-up pattern. The descriptions I’ve seen refer to it as omnidirectional only. I could be missing some information here, but no matter – it’s not relevant. Mercury used it as an omnidirectional. By the way, the fact that Schoeps microphones were used (even though they’re identified as Telefunkens in the booklet notes) was another piece of info first mentioned to me by HL – I was surprised.
“I had mentioned the Coles, just to show that there was a truly flat and transparent mike around at the time Mercury, RCA and Decca made the recordings that are worshiped the faithful. Of course, the Coles being a ribbon mike and thus a true figure-of-eight transducer, perfect for Blumlein and MS recordings, was of no use to the spaced omni gang. And no, I do not use Coles mikes. Had you read the CD booklet throughly you would have noted this fact. Who is being hasty in is comments?”
Yup – here, I say mea culpa! I plead guilty. Kavi pulled a fast one on me – I thought he was referring to the microphones he used on his latest recordings and I didn’t re-check the booklet. Of course, when Kavi got the position of the first and second violins on his own recording backwards, I suppose I could have admonished him to read his own booklet (thoroughly!), but I didn’t.
Here’s what it all comes down to: Kavi made an extravagant statement to the effect that the natural variations in microphone frequency response amount to a deliberate form of equalization in the case of Mercury, Decca, EMI, and RCA recordings. But these variations are the natural by-products of ANY recording, even (gasp!) Water Lily’s, and are not what most listeners commonly understand when they hear that a company has deliberately employed equalization. So perhaps Kavi should define his terms.
You know, I’m liking that quote from Virgil more and more now!
-Chris Salocks
(Take my opinions with a grain of salt – everything else being equal, I prefer DVD-Audio!)
For someone who talks so much about recordings you seem to know very little about the art of recording. Had you known enough about this subject you would not have said what you did and I would not have to post this. You would have known that the discription in the Mercury CD booklet was solely about gain riding (passive EQ) and balance. Perhaps you had no idea what gain riding was untill now! No matter if it is a Mercury LP or CD, they were both made from the same analog master and thus subject to the same EQ/commpression, if applied at the time of recording. And what makes you think that there was no EQ applied at the time of the CD mastering?! Did Wilma consult with you?
Further, your outright dismissal of a well known fact: that the classic tube mikes, yes, the very same models with the far from flat responce usad by Mercury, Decca, RCA and EMI, are still used in the pop/rock studios and often as vocal mikes for the pop "divas", shows that you are the one who is being cavalier. These mikes are sought out today for the very reason that they ARE colored, it is this very aspect that makes them great vocal mikes, as the pop "divas" need all the help they can get to sound half way decent. The inherent tube "warmth" and boosted mid/high responce of these mikes, coupled with the resulting proximity effect (more mid band boost!) stemming from the close miking will make even you sound sweet! Your statetment "divas do not use omni", again proves what I have said above: you know very little about this subject. These mikes in question are not fixed omnis, but variable pattern mikes! I had mentioned the Coles, just to show that there was a truly flat and transparent mike around at the time Mercury, RCA and Decca made the recordings that are worshiped by the faithful. Of course, the Coles being a ribbon mike and thus a true figure-of-eight transducer, perfect for Blumlein and MS recordings, was of no use to the spaced omni gang. And no, I do not use Coles mikes. Had you read the CD booklet throughly you would have noted this fact. Who is being hasty in is comments?
So I get home a little late from work (busy day!). . . and here’s yet another post from Kavi waiting for me. I guess I have to slog through these things. (Excerpts from his post(s) are in quotation marks.)“For someone who talks so much about recordings you seem to know very little about the art of recording. Had you knowen enough about this subject you would not have said what you did and I would not have to post this. You would have knowen that the discription in the Mercury CD booklet was solely about gain riding (passive EQ) and balance. Perhaps you had no idea what gain riding was untill now! No matter if it is a Mercury LP or CD, they were both made from the same master and thus subject to the same EQ/commpression, if applied at the time of recording. And what makes you think that there was no EQ applied at the time of the CD mastering?! Did Wilma consult with you?”
Here Kavi is so desperate to make his points that he conveniently overlooks readily available information on the internet, such as the interview with Robert Eberenz, where Eberenz states the following (regarding the Mercury recording process): “between the microphone and the tape machine itself, we had very little of any electronics. We had no equalization [I wonder if this is clear enough for Kavi?], no devices of any kind between the microphone and the tape machine. All we had was a fader, set level; a line amplifier, which was a Pultec MB2 classic amplifier known to every studio in the world.” Well, perhaps that leaves a little bit open to question, so let me refer to a conversation I had with Harold Lawrence. (He was over at my house to make some recordings in my living room – and guess what microphone technique he used? Crossed-pair figure-eights!) Anyway, in our discussion after the recording, HL (as I’ll refer to him from now on) said he was very proud of the fact that no equalization or compression was employed in the Mercury recordings. (No gain riding is of course a given.)
Off the subject, but possibly of general interest to readers: In response to my comment that Antal Dorati seemed like a less interesting conductor once he left Mercury and began his relationship with Decca/London (who had mostly abandoned their classic sound by the time they were recording Dorati, with spot microphones mushrooming up all over the place), HL said that Dorati later confided to him that he was aware of this phenomenon, as more a more of the recorded performance was taken out of his hands and put into the control room, and was distressed by it. Of course this is third-hand information (but only second-hand information to me!).
Back on to the subject: so, if the master is on the tape, and there was no equalization or compression applied, and no devices of any kind between the microphone and the tape machine, that sure doesn’t leave much room for equalization except for LP mastering. Now, I could be wrong about this, but I recall reading that Wilma did make new PCM masters for the series of CD’s that came out. And I know for sure that someone (not Wilma) made new DSD masters for the SACD’s which are now coming out.
On to Kavi’s next desperate point:
“Further, your outright dismissal of a well knowen fact: that the classic tube mikes, yes, the very same models with the far from flat responce usad by Mercury, Decca, RCA and.) EMI, are still used in the pop/rock studios and often as vocal mikes for the pop "divas", shows that you are the one who is being cavalier. Your statetment "divas do not use omni", again proves what I have said above: you know very little about this subject. These mikes in question are not fixed omnis, but variable pattern mikes!”
So now Kavi is claiming that divas do use omnis? As I said, I would be very surprised. (OK, maybe on a rare occasion.) The fact that many tube microphones used today have switchable pick-up patterns isn’t relevant at all. Mercury was using omnidirectionals (or omnidirectional pick-up patterns). And, truth to tell, I have not been able to verify that the Telefunken (actually Schoeps, Telefunken was apparently just the distributor) 201 (the microphone used in the vast majority of Mercury stereo recordings) even has a selectable pick-up pattern. The descriptions I’ve seen refer to it as omnidirectional only. I could be missing some information here, but no matter – it’s not relevant. Mercury used it as an omnidirectional. By the way, the fact that Schoeps microphones were used (even though they’re identified as Telefunkens in the booklet notes) was another piece of info first mentioned to me by HL – I was surprised.
“I had mentioned the Coles, just to show that there was a truly flat and transparent mike around at the time Mercury, RCA and Decca made the recordings that are worshiped the faithful. Of course, the Coles being a ribbon mike and thus a true figure-of-eight transducer, perfect for Blumlein and MS recordings, was of no use to the spaced omni gang. And no, I do not use Coles mikes. Had you read the CD booklet throughly you would have noted this fact. Who is being hasty in is comments?”
Yup – here, I say mea culpa! I plead guilty. Kavi pulled a fast one on me – I thought he was referring to the microphones he used on his latest recordings and I didn’t re-check the booklet. Of course, when Kavi got the position of the first and second violins on his own recording backwards, I suppose I could have admonished him to read his own booklet (thoroughly!), but I didn’t.
Here’s what it all comes down to: Kavi made an extravagant statement to the effect that the natural variations in microphone frequency response amount to a deliberate form of equalization in the case of Mercury, Decca, EMI, and RCA recordings. But these variations are the natural by-products of ANY recording, even (gasp!) Water Lily’s, and are not what most listeners commonly understand when they hear that a company has deliberately employed equalization. So perhaps Kavi should define his terms.
You know, I’m liking that quote from Virgil more and more now!
-Chris Salocks
(Take my opinions with a grain of salt – everything else being equal, I prefer DVD-Audio!)
Since the dog is still barking let me start by quoting from the Sufi tradition again: " The dog that ran between two wells, unable to decide which one to drink from, finaly died not of thirst but of exhaustion!".
In the very fine article publised in TAS by Michael Gray (issue 60, vol 14) on the Mercury sound, it is stated that when Mercury switched to stereo, Bob Fine used three Neumann U 47 tubes mikes. The very same mikes that today (though no longer made) are highly sought after by the Pop/rock studios for use as (mostly) vocal mikes. This is a fact, even though you do not get what I am trying to say. These mikes could be used either as cardioids or omnis (switchable!). The fact that Mercury used these mikes in the omni setting and current studio practice is to use it in the cardioid setting (not the case) dose in no way make what I have maintained incorrect. The very same model (U 47) mikes used by Mercury are also used today as a vocal mikes in the pop/rock studios, no matter what your stance.
Now, that very informative artical in TAS also gives the frequency responce of the U 47. They are 5db down at 50Hz, have a 5db dip between 2 and 4kHz and a 9db peak at 10kHz!!! THIS IS NOT A FLAT RESPONCE MIKE. If Mercury did not EQ, then the resulting recorings employing the U47 mikes will end up being highly colored. They do indeed sound highly colored (in spite of the EQ that I maintain was used) and if you want to belive that thses recordings are realistic, that is your problum. Yes, let us not forget, you are the one who is not bothered by a five foot long image of a violn! And you want to talk about realistic sound?! My objection to these recordings being touted as the holy grail is based on this fact (high degree of coloration) and the fact that they do not have stable imaging, due to the chosen mike technique. I have NEVER said they were BAD. I buy and enjoy them for what they do best: a "spectaculer" persentation of the sound with great dynamics. Unrealistic as hell, but exciting and fun.
At some point, Bob Fine switched from using the U 47 mikes to the Shoeps 201M, which also could be switched. This was used as the center mike and was flanked by a pair of Neumann KM 56s. Now, the responce of the 201M was better than that of a U 47, but still no cigar!. It was flat from 30Hz to 2kHz from whence is rose to a 7db(!) peak at 10kHz. As for the KM 56, no responce is given, but based on my knowledge (though admittedly small) of vintage Neumann tube mikes, I would say that they too had a responce similer to the U 47. So pundit, here is my question: if Mercury did not EQ the mikes which were far from flat, how can you tell me that these recordings are of reference quality? Look at the responce curve, 5db(!) down at 50Hz, a 5db(!) dip in the critical 2 to 4db region and a 9db(!) peak at 10kHZ. Or are you going to agree with me that EQ was indeed used during LP mastering, as I have maintained? The TAS artical says that EQ was indeed employed at the time of LP mastering. Keep in mind what happened to the dog mentioned above.
As for my comments about EMI, I admit that I may have not been clear, so I will state my case again: I prefer the EMI "house sound" to that of Murcury, RCA and Decca as it comes "closer to the real thing", IN COMPARISON to the "house sound" of the other three mentioned and NOT IN ABSOLUTE TERMS.
I need not waste my time doing a web search to find out who you are. Your postings reveal to me all that I need to know about you! Prattling opinions is not contributing to the enrichment and upliftment of the music lover. I mean significant contributions, like that which TAS has made, wherein music lovers can learn things of real value, such as the horrid sound of early digital, the real sonic difference between tubes /transistors and analog/digital, a discriptive language to express sonic colors and sound induced aural experiences, outright donations from add revenues to small record lables to further the art of recording and music, as well as the numerous articals about sound and music, such as the excellent series on Mercry, Decca, RCA and EMI.
Well, folks, time for me to disengage.Kavi and I are now going around in circles, rehashing the same claims and counterclaims. The trouble with engaging in discussion with a blowhard, prone to extravagant, reckless hyperbole, delivered with sneering, barely literate sarcasm, is that one has to be on guard not to descend into the same methods of argument or factual presentation. I admit I haven’t always avoided this descent myself, especially in yesterday’s posts – but I now caution myself to avoid these cheap techniques.
So, if I may summarize the post above:
Kavi presents a description of Mercury’s recording techniques based on information which he evidently read in a TAS article. My information is based on a published interview with Robert Eberenz as well as my conversation with Harold Lawrence – two folks who actually participated in the Mercury recording sessions (in fact, the only two who were present for all the Mercury stereo recording sessions – not Wilma, and not Bob). Some of Kavi’s information and my information are at odds. For another example of this, here’s another Eberenz quote concerning which microphones were actually used at the Mercury recording sessions: “. . . when we went to stereo, the U47 was the center mike and they filled on the left and right with the Telefunken 201 microphone. . . We used those and the Telefunken KM 56s. We tried those for awhile. Then, when we finally we got enough 201s, we used nothing but 201s thereafter.” So what I’d like to know is, where did TAS get its information? Where did Kavi get his information (if it was anything beyond the TAS article)? Can Kavi name just one pop diva who uses a 201 microphone? (And remember that I never said this was impossible, just that I’d be surprised.)
As for equalization, Kavi’s initial assertion that equalization was employed in Mercury recordings is clearly refuted by the Eberenz interview excerpt I posted yesterday. As for equalization for LP mastering, yes, I’ve never disputed that assertion since Kavi first proclaimed it. And of course, LP equalization has always been irrelevant to the subject at hand. (Remember, I was originally quoting from the CD booklet – I got rid of all my LP’s when the horrid sound of early digital first burst upon the scene.) Anyone, even would-be pundits, can check previous posts on these points.
I’ll skip the last two points in Kavi’s note.
So, Kavi, as the hippies say, it’s been real!
-Chris Salocks
(Take my opinions with a grain of salt – everything else being equal, I prefer DVD-Audio!)
In the midst of all the discussion, somehow an essential point made by Kavi A. seems to have been a bit glossed over later on. The mikes used in the "Golden Age" recordings by RCA and Mercury were VERY FAR FROM FLAT. RCA played with EQ to try to fix this. AS I understand it, Mercury at least claimed not to do any EQ. But without EQ, an accurate recording using a far from flat microphone is NOT POSSIBLE. And indeed the Mercuries sound very colored to anyone who has an ear for such things. Actually the RCAs sound colored,too--whatever EQ they did did not work out all that well. There is really no doubt about this(actually, I wrote about the treble peak in my very first TAS article, more than 20 years ago--long ago if not far away.) You may like the Mercuries, but thye are most definitely no truthful to any reality anywhere in the hall where they were made--or anywhere else for that matter. (Nine and ten dB peaks at 10 k are not a feature of natural sound in any listening position whatever.)
I forgot to add that you do really think very highly of yourself and your work! What makes you think that the members of this forum are following the the superior logic (the very logic that has me tied in a knot!) of your geart mind? Do you think they care? And further, you assume that by writing the stuff you do, you are contributing to the enrichment of the music lover? All this arrogance from someone that has not done ONE worthwhile thing to enrich and uplift the music loving public. Look at your very listing... once wrote some sleeve notes, once performed at Lincoln Center, once was a reviewer for an audio/music related web site and let us not forget the crowning moment, Harold Lawrence once making a recording in your living room...
Oh, and we must not forget the bay area news papers either for which you write... or was that wrote?
Sounds pretty desperate to me.
So Kavi made the effort to click on my moniker. Yet, as in so many of his previous posts, he can’t even get the basic facts right. Click again, Kavi!-Chris Salocks
(Take my opinions with a grain of salt – everything else being equal, I prefer DVD-Audio!)
As one who knows not his left from his right, nothing of ochestral balance, literate discourse, logic, Latin, pitch and Lincoln from Kennady, it is very possible that I could not tell the difference between the Neumann U 47s and the Pearl ELM 30s and inadvertently used the U 47s in Saint Petersburg! This would of course explain the lack of bass Teresa is complaining about!
I must say your listing is pathetic to say the least.
Not only are you apperently deaf, since you can not hear the colorations inherent in the Mercury recordings, you seem to be blind as well. READ AGAIN. I said Neumann U 47. The mike used by Mercury and that which today is favoured in the pop/rock world as a vocal mike. No matter what you say, Murcury DID use the U 47 for a long while, as did RCA. When they switched to the Schoeps 201M, Fine did not have three of these at that time and used the Neumann KM 56s on the sides. It is very possible that at a later date they obtained two more and used only 201Ms. Nevertheless, my original question to you remains valid, all Neumann or all Schoeps, or a combination thereof, how dose one make natural sounding recordings with mikes that have no flat responce?
The editor of TAS, Harry Pearson is a close friend of Wilma Cozart and she did read the TAS. Had there been errors, she would have certainly pointed them out to her friend the editor. And Wilma Cozart was the boss of the two you mention and had a far more importent role in record making process.
"I would not give you to my dog for its dinner." Lord Hastings to a subordinte in the army.
YOU started all this nonsense, not I. You in effect attacked my credibility in a public forum on an issue on which many others, including some experts, have a contrary view/opinion. You have the right to criticise and I have the right to defend myself. I do not agree with you but will simply state my case.
What I have stated from the begining and made very clear, is that the "reality" that Water Lily captures is determined by me and thus my "view". I do hold however, that our view is valid as it is based on a theoratical model that is very sound.
You may know all this, but I am sure that there are some readers who will benefit from the information to be outlined below. The spaced omni mike technique was born out of the research done at Bell Labs in the 20s. Their experiments with Stoky and The Philadelphia Orchestra, wherin rows of mikes placed before the orchesta were in turn linked to corresponding speakers, showed that in effect the same resuls could be achived with just three spaced omni mikes. This "wall of sound" technique was then pioneered by Bert at Everst and addopted by Mercury, Command and much later Telarc. The Bell Labs model was to place the three mikes very close to the orchestra, thus avoiding much reflected sound pick up and then play back the recording in a large, live room, allowing the speaker/room acoustical interaction to provide the "ambiance". The physical nature of this mike placement entails that sounds on the right will reach the right mike before the center and left mikes. So it will be for sound sources on the left. It is this time delay that prevents this mike technique from being able to create a stable stereo image with precise instumental localisation. These time delays also cause a phenomeon knowen as comb filer effects that will further color the sound. There are those who argue that since onmi mikes are in effect directional in the high frequancies (a fact) that the three spaced omni technique can yeild stable, precise images. I have yet to hear this miracle!
The genius of Blumlein is that he realised that the recordeing should capture and presrve the spatial/ambiant information as well. Further, in his mike arrangment, wherein two figure-of-eight mikes are placed coincidentaly, both mikes sample all sounds at the same point in space and thus are phase and amplitude coherent, yeilding precise stereo images and accurate instumantal localisation.
Mercury may not have EQed nor compressed (except for the medium itself doing it) while recording, but they certainly EQed and compressed while mastering the LP. And I am not reffering to the mandatory RIAA EQ required for LP mastering. Also keep in mind that the German tube mikes they (RCA, Decca and EMI as well) used were far from being flat. Thus, this would have to be considerd a form of EQ as well. To this day some of these tube mikes are highly sought after by the pop studios, as they produce a "fat" warm sound that "enhances" the vocals of the popular "divas". The BBC designed Coles ribbon mikes on the other hand are far more nutral and flatter than any of these tube mikes.
Yes, EMI did use the classic Blumlein technique for a very, very short time. (There is an interview forthcoming in TAS wherein I go into all this in great depth and detail.) I have always preferred the EMI "house sound", even after they had abandoned the Blumlein technique. To me the EMI sound was closer to the real thing than that on any Mercury, RCA or Decca recording.
And yes, I will be the first to admit that no recording is "perfect" (limits of technology) and is an exact replica of the musical reality, but some recorings do come convinsingly close. To my ears those recordings are the ones done with coincident and near coincident mike techniques.
As for listeners who have extraordinary pinna structures and are "wired" in such a way, so as to hear "pin point" stereo images from spaced omni recordings, I can only say that not having mastered hyper dimentional physics, this rarefied subject is way out of my league and will have to be reffered to the experts at Area 51. Please drive out into the Nevada desert with Teresa... who knows, you just might hear the sound of "one hand slapping"!
I refuse to comment further on the layout/artwork issue as it is not really germane to the subject at hand.
Again, not having mastered Latin I must revert to the Sufi tradition that I am familer with for my quote: "The dog may bark, but the caravan moves on..." KAVI.
Kavi,Now we’re back to getting some useful information from you. Thanks! Once again, the excerpts from your latest post are in quotation marks:
“YOU started all this nonsense, not I. You in effect attacked my credibility in a public forum on an issue on which many others, including some experts, have a contrary view/opinion. You have the right to criticise and I have the right to defend myself. I do not agree with you but will simply state my case.”
That’s the great thing about a public forum such as this one – People can to back and check the whole history! I originally posted that, in my opinion, something was not right with the Mahler Fifth. Somehow along the way, you started to construe my criticisms of the recording as personal attacks and insults, even though I bent over backwards to be humorous and civilized. Oh well . . .
“What I have stated from the begining and made very clear, is that the "reality" that Water Lily captures is determined by me and thus my "view".”
This seems to me a bit changed from what you (and Robert Greene) stated originally, that there is only one objective reality and that only Water Lily’s recording technique can capture it. I was the one, who, with considerable verbiage, examples, and explanations, steered you to your present position: that what you’re capturing is YOUR view of reality from the vantage point of where you place the microphones. (Anyone can go back and check this.)
“I do hold however, that our view is valid as it is based on a theoratical model that is very sound. You may know all this, but I am sure that there are some readers who will benefit from the information to be outlined below. The spaced omni mike technique was born out of the research done at Bell Labs in the 20s. Their experiments with Stoky and The Philadelphia Orchestra, wherin rows of mikes placed before the orchesta were in turn linked to corresponding speakers, showed that in effect the same resuls could be achived with just three spaced omni mikes. This "wall of sound" technique was then pioneered by Bert at Everst and addopted by Mercury, Command and much later Telarc. The Bell Labs model was to place the three mikes very close to the orchestra, thus avoiding much reflected sound pick up and then play back the recording in a large, live room, allowing the speaker/room acoustical interaction to provide the "ambiance". The physical nature of this mike placement entails that sounds on the right will reach the right mike before the center and left mikes. So it will be for sound sources on the left. It is this time delay that prevents this mike technique from being able to create a stable stereo image with precise instumental localisation. These time delays also cause a phenomeon knowen as comb filer effects that will further color the sound. There are those who argue that since onmi mikes are in effect directional in the high frequancies (a fact) that the three spaced omni technique can yeild stable, precise images. I have yet to hear this miracle!
The genius of Blumlein is that he realised that the recordeing should capture and presrve the spatial/ambiant information as well. Further, in his mike arrangment, wherein two figure-of-eight mikes are placed coincidentaly, both mikes sample all sounds at the same point in space and thus are phase and amplitude coherent, yeilding precise stereo images and accurate instumantal localisation.”Excellent information! – although as you say, many of us are aware of this already.
“Mercury may not have EQed nor compressed (except for the medium itself doing it) while recording, but they certainly EQed and compressed while mastering the LP. And I am not reffering to the mandatory RIAA EQ required for LP mastering. Also keep in mind that the German tube mikes they (RCA, Decca and EMI as well) used were far from being flat. Thus, this would have to be considerd a form of EQ as well.”
OK, I stated that I was reading from the Mercury CD booklet, and here you start quoting LP mastering information to support your original assertion. Really, that’s just an attempt to weasel out of your original reckless statement. (Remember: [these recordings] “were deliberatly derived through a combination of mikes/miking technique and EQ/compression”.) I think when most folks read a phrase like that, they have visions of someone applying equalization to compensate for irregularities in the microphones’ frequency response, or, worse yet, applying equalization to suit the whims of the producer or engineer. Clearly, this was not the case in the Mercury recordings.
“To this day some of these tube mikes are highly sought after by the pop studios, as they produce a "fat" warm sound that "enhances" the vocals of the popular "divas". The BBC designed Coles ribbon mikes on the other hand are far more nutral and flatter than any of these tube mikes.”
Here you admit that your Coles mikes are just more neutral and flatter. So I guess if the Mercury team was applying equalization (because their microphones were not perfectly flat), then Water Lily is too (just not as much)! It’s the same logic. By the way, I’d be very surprised if the microphones used by pop divas are the same models which Mercury used for symphonic recording. They might be tube mikes, but that’s about the end of the similarity. (Do you really think divas use omnidirectional mikes? I don’t.)
“Yes, EMI did use the classic Blumlein technique for a very, very short time. (There is an interview forthcoming in TAS wherein I go into all this in great depth and detail.) I have always preferred the EMI "house sound", even after they had abandoned the Blumlein technique. To me the EMI sound was closer to the real thing than that on any Mercury, RCA or Decca recording.”
Whoah, Kavi! How does this statement square with your previous reckless assertion, “. . . there is a Decca sound, an EMI sound, a Mercury sound and an RCA sound. It is my opinion that though entertaining, the "house sound" of these forementioned labels, are highly colored and in no way represent the real sound of an orchestra.”? So you prefer EMI’s sound (even after they abandoned the Blumlein technique), even though it “in no way represent[s] the real sound of an orchestra”? BTW, I look forward to reading your article in TAS, even though, as one of the Steely Dan folks once said, that is one nutty magazine!
“And yes, I will be the first to admit that no recording is "perfect" (limits of technology) and is an exact replica of the musical reality, but some recorings do come convinsingly close. To my ears those recordings are the ones done with coincident and near coincident mike techniques.”
We’ve been over this before. Although I often like coincident-miked recordings (and I’m glad that you’re producing a new series of them – remember, I bought two copies of just the Mahler Fifth!), my tolerance for other relatively purist approaches, such as spaced omnis, is higher than yours.
“As for listeners who have extraordinary pinna structures and are "wired" in such a way, so as to hear "pin point" stereo images from spaced omni recordings, I can only say that not having mastered hyper dimentional physics, this rarefied subject is way out of my league and will have to be reffered to the experts at Area 51. Please drive out into the Nevada desert with Teresa... who knows, you just might hear the sound of "one hand slapping"!”
You don’t need to put “pin point” in quotation marks – I never used that term. But, Kavi, since you stated above that you prefer EMI’s sound even after they abandoned the Blumlein technique, Teresa and I will be happy to take you with us out to Nevada. I can just see the three of us frolicking around in the desert! Oh, and did you mention “slapping” – sounds kind of kinky!
“I refuse to comment further on the layout/artwork issue as it is not really germane to the subject at hand.”
Fine with me.
“Again, not having mastered Latin I must revert to the Sufi tradition that I am familer with for my quote: "The dog may bark, but the caravan moves on..."”
Yeah, I like that quote too, but you’ve already used it in a separate e-mail to me.
-Chris Salocks
(Take my opinions with a grain of salt – everything else being equal, I prefer DVD-Audio!)
In all my postings where the issue of reality has been raised, I have been very clear that the "view" projected is mine. Read the third posting, wherein I discribe the mike placement, that posting ends with the words "per my ears".
I may have not been clear, so I will delineate: I find the orchestral recordings that the audiophiles venerate for great sound, the offerings from Mercury, RCA and Decca, to be highly unrealistic, yet I do activly seek them out and buy them (used and reissues). Why? because I enjoy great music making. I never said that the recordings from Mercury, RCA and Decca were BAD, only that their sound was nowhere near the real thing. I still love the Brahms violin concerto on RCA and own an original pressing that I enjoy for the sheer brilliance of the artistry and the way that music moves me. But sadly, the image of the violin is five feet wide and the violinist is not well integrated with the orchestra, due in effect to spot miking. In contrast the EMI recordings of the "Lark Asending" portray the violin in realistic size and the violinist better integrated within the orchestra. I find the EMI recordings to be far closer to the real thing, not as bombastic as the Mercurys and Deccas and not as cold and bright as the RCAs. Same thing applies to many of the older jazz LPs I buy, again both used and reissues. Often ping pong stereo with hard right, hard left images, but to hear Prez blow his sax or the Duke lead his big band into a great arrangment is to forget about the mockery that most recordings really are. I am a music lover first and formost. Yes, I am stubborn and doctrinaire, because if you do not passionately belive in what you do, you might as well not do it.
Mercury stared out as a country/pop lable and I am sure Bob Fine had Pultec (some of the best made) EQs. The booklet you quote says that no controls were touched once the recording began. Nowhere dose it say no EQ was applied. And what if the EQ had been set during the mike set up? I listen mainly to LPs and thus have only Mercury LPs. I can only speak about the things I know and have experienced. The Mercury LPs were certainly EQed and compressed during mastering.
Some of the tube mikes used by Mercury, Decca, RCA and EMI are still sought after and daily used in stock form in the pop and rock world for their "rich", "fat" sound. Often as vocal mikes. This is a fact.
The comment "the sound of one had slapping" reffers to Teresa's posting that my Svetlanov recording "was a slap in the face..."
So I get home a little late from work (busy day!). . . and here’s yet another post from Kavi waiting for me. I guess I have to slog through these things. (Excerpts from his post are in quotation marks.)“In all my postings where the issue of reality has been raised, I have been very clear that the "view" projected is mine. Read the third posting, wherein I discribe the mike placement, that posting ends with the words "per my ears".”
Here I’m giving Kavi the benefit of the doubt, and will make a distinction between what he posted (however far down it was) and what his minion : - ) posted in the first post. Again, any reader can see what the sequence of posts was.
“I may have not been clear, so I will delineate: I find the orchestral recordings that the audiophiles venerate for great sound, the offerings from Mercury, RCA and Decca, to be highly unrealistic, yet I do activly seek them out and buy them (used and reissues). Why? because I enjoy great music making. I never said that the recordings from Mercury, RCA and Decca were BAD, only that their sound was nowhere near the real thing.”
Nowhere near the real thing? Still seems like an extravagant statement to me. I suppose it depends on what your frame of reference is. In absolute terms, all recordings are nowhere near the real thing.
“I still love the Brahms violin concerto on RCA and own an original pressing that I enjoy for the sheer brilliance of the artistry and the way that music moves me. But sadly, the image of the violin is five feet wide and the violinist is not well integrated with the orchestra, due in effect to spot miking. In contrast the EMI recordings of the "Lark Asending" portray the violin in realistic size and the violinist better integrated within the orchestra. I find the EMI recordings to be far closer to the real thing, not as bombastic as the Mercurys and Deccas and not as cold and bright as the RCAs.”
I’m assuming Kavi is referring to the Heifetz performance. A more loaded example couldn’t be found – not only is the image five feet wide (while not optimal, I can certainly live with that), but the balance is so skewed in favor of the solo violin (apparently to cater to Heifetz’s enormous ego) that you find yourself smiling involuntarily at how absurd the balance gets. So while, in my opinion, this recording could never be a first choice, there’s still some mighty fine fiddle playing to be heard here. I’m also still confused that RCA, Mercury, Decca, and EMI recordings are “nowhere near the real thing”, and yet EMI recordings are “far closer to the real thing”. I guess EMI recordings are “far closer to the real thing” even though they’re still “nowhere near the real thing.”
“Same thing applies to many of the older jazz LPs I buy, again both used and reissues. Often ping pong stereo with hard right, hard left images, but to hear Prez blow his sax or the Duke lead his big band into a great arrangment is to forget about the mockery that most recordings really are. I am a music lover first and formost.”
I like to think we’re all are music lovers too, even though much of our discussion is about audio. I know I like to flatter myself that I’m a music lover.
“Yes, I am stubborn and doctrinaire, because if you do not passionately belive in what you do, you might as well not do it.”
Actually, I agree with Kavi’s statement here, at least as far as one’s own products are concerned. I’m just troubled by his cavalier dismissals in previous posts of the efforts other recording companies – the very ones who advanced the state of the art and deserve criticism the least.
“Mercury stared out as a country/pop lable and I am sure Bob Fine had Pultec (some of the best made) EQs.”
Robert Eberenz says they used a Pultec amplifier, not an equalizer. (See one of my other posts from tonight.)
“The booklet you quote says that no controls were touched once the recording began. Nowhere dose it say no EQ was applied.”
No, but Eberenz says this. (Again, see one of my other posts from tonight.)
“And what if the EQ had been set during the mike set up?”
Yeah, but there wasn’t, according to Eberenz.
“I listen mainly to LPs and thus have only Mercury LPs. I can only speak about the things I know and have experienced. The Mercury LPs were certainly EQed and compressed during mastering.”
OK, fine. But then why are you so certain that EQ was applied during CD and SACD mastering if you haven’t even heard them? BTW, why don’t you give the new SACD’s a try? For one thing, the pitch stability is way better than on LP.
“Some of the tube mikes used by Mercury, Decca, RCA and EMI are still sought after and daily used in stock form in the pop and rock world for their "rich", "fat" sound. Often as vocal mikes. This is a fact.”
See my comments regarding the Telefunken/Schoeps 201, the main mike (often the only mike) used in all Mercury stereo recordings, in another post tonight.
The comment "the sound of one had slapping" reffers to Teresa's posting that my Svetlanov recording "was a slap in the face..."Darn! – And I was looking forward to cavorting around in the desert with you and Teresa!
-Chris Salocks
(Take my opinions with a grain of salt – everything else being equal, I prefer DVD-Audio!)
Since I work for a living - I can't respond until tonight. Post to your heart's content until then.
... and I live off the fat of the land? No, I lived by ripping off the music loving public by offering them abyssmal recordings wherein the orchestral balance is off, there is no bass, the mids pinched and the highs missing. But now you have showen me the light! I shall make spaced omni recordings!
You strike me as the sort that has nothing good to say about anything. You do not like my recording, you dislike my art work and now you have to make a snide remark about TAS as well. Let me tell you, TAS has done far, far more for the music lover than you and Teresa will EVER do.
What really is your contribution to the music lover? In which way do you enlighten or uplift the music lover?
As mentioned yesterday, I work for a living and did not win the lottery today. I will not be able to respond to further posts until late tomorrow evening. Again, post to your heart's content!
So I get home a little late from work (busy day!). . . and here’s yet another post from Kavi waiting for me. I guess I have to slog through these things. (Excerpts from his post are in quotation marks.)
“... and I live off the fat of the land? No, I lived by ripping off the music loving public by offering them abyssmal recordings wherein the orchestral balance is off, there is no bass, the mids pinched and the highs missing. But now you have showen me the light! I shall make spaced omni recordings!”For some of us, our emotional highs spring from a fine performance of a beautiful masterwork, whereas for Kavi, intense emotions arise from imagined slights and insults from listeners who dare criticize this or that aspect of his recordings. Steam gushes from his ears as he conflates what different people said into one miserable criticism of his work. And since his recordings are the ONLY ones which sound like real music, there must be something wrong with these demented souls who denigrate his sonic masterpieces.
But wait! These same demented souls who dare to criticize Kavi’s recordings actually like SOME single-point stereo recordings – but they also like other relatively purist recordings such as spaced omnis made with as many as (gasp!) SIX microphones! But for Kavi, this is blasphemy – spaced omni recordings have no relationship with the sound of real music. How can this be? –especially when Kavi admits he likes (prefers) post-Blumlein EMI recordings. It’s a paradox – Perhaps it’s one of the mysteries of faith! Yes, my children, when Kavi receives something as vicious as a little criticism, he has to “turn the other cheek”.
“You strike me as the sort that has nothing good to say about anything. You do not like my recording, you dislike my art work and now you have to make a snide remark about TAS as well. Let me tell you, TAS has done far, far more for the music lover than you and Teresa will EVER do.
What really is your contribution to the music lover? In which way do you enlighten or uplift the music lover?”Unable to convince others by the logic of his arguments, Kavi now resorts to ad hominem attacks, even though a little effort on his part (maybe a web search?) would have revealed plenty of positive comments about various recordings – like, maybe, the Exton DVD-Audios with the Czech Philharmonic.
Now he demands to know my contribution to the music lover. I think he should put a little effort into it and do a web search. He’ll find enough things, even though I work for a living.
Oh yes, TAS! Perhaps Kavi should gather the other members of the TAS faith and listen to his new recordings – the only ones which sound like real music. By the way, wasn’t TAS on a crusade for a long time to warn listeners of the horrors of digital music. Why then is Kavi releasing his new recordings on CD? I guess it’s just another mystery of faith. And another mystery of faith: HP’s list of records to die for (or whatever it’s called) includes (or included, I haven’t looked at it recently) Mercury Living Presence and RCA Living Stereo recordings. What’s going on here in the temple of the true believers?
-Chris Salocks
(Take my opinions with a grain of salt – everything else being equal, I prefer DVD-Audio!)
Any chance you guys might ever release "Sufi" music? Stuff like Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan's Qawaali music. That would be awesome.
Unique and essential.
- http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B00000GV6I/qid=1122268701/sr=8-1/ref=pd_bbs_sbs_1/103-6385863-1332618?v=glance&s=music&n=507846 (Open in New Window)
Dear Dave, There is a recording of the Mevlavi Emsamble of Turkey on WLA titled "Wherever you turn is the face of God". Sadly it is out of stock at present. All the best. KAVI.
This post is made possible by the generous support of people like you and our sponsors: