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Philosophy of Recording & Listening

When I go to a live music event and judge the sound quality, I don't just listen to how wide a dynamic range it has. I don't give this aspect primacy, whether its a big symphony orchestra, chamber orchestra, string quartet, or solo piano. I also want to hear correct timbre, inner detail, proper balance, bloom and expansion of the sound (and the reverse too),and how the quietest and loudest moments are suited to the venue. Every recording engineer has his own philosophy for recording and every listener has his own philosophy for listening. The problem is that the two don't always coincide.

This was all brought home to me in the past two weeks. Sunday I heard an all-Chopin piano recital in the local library. It was a Steinway B in a small room. The pianist had a very wide dynamic range, mostly at the loud end, and the audience gave him a rousing standing ovation. I felt he overloaded the room and strained the piano to its limits.

A week earlier I heard the La Jolla Symphony do Stravinsky's Firebird (augmented suite). It was a dress rehearsal, and we got to hear the two big moments twice. At one point the conductor, Steven Schick, a percussionist by training, asked the orchestra not to play so loud, and he repeated portions to get the balance right. The big bass drum didn't swamp the orchestra, as it does on some audiophile recording, because he didn't want it that way. Still the orchestra was spectacularly loud and the hall supported it. I wouldn't be able to listen this loud in my moderate-sized living room.

I believe there is not one right way to record and one right way to listen. A company can choose to make dynamic range the be all and end all, then the customer can choose whether to buy.


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