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In Reply to: Do You Listen In Multichannel? posted by Robertc88 on November 4, 2006 at 08:20:38:
Howdy RobertI'm wondering if your rear speakers are too close, or their level is set too high or something.
I've got to say that I don't hear stuff from the rear in most of my jazz recordings nor do my guests. Often they even ask if things are two channel or MC till I explicitly A/B it for them or use the solo buttons to highlight each channel individually...
Perhaps if you listed a few jazz titles you thought were too loud in the back I could explicitly listen to them.
Did you used a meter to set your speaker levels? If your front and back speakers aren't identical a meter can be a problem. I was surprised at the difference when I used the Phonic PAA3 which shows a freq response vs. the Radio Shack level meter. Since my speakers have identical tweeters and mids, but different woofers I set the levels based on 400 Hz and higher.
Follow Ups:
All Telarc.Land Of Giants
Film Music Of Jerry Goldsmith
TrianguloI would not be of the belief one can just set the levels for the speakers and they are good to go for all recordings. I would assume it depends on the specific title.
I believe you will find at least some disparity amongst these.
HowdyWell, The Goldsmith definitely falls in the rears are invisible until proven otherwise category.
"Land of Giants" is fuller and obviously has been mastered to have instruments showing up in a very wide soundstage, i.e. in the first cut the vibraphone is almost directly to the right.
"Triangulo" is more like the Goldsmith, a traditional presentation, I don't hear the rears unless I mute the fronts or turn my head quite a bit, tho they really do make for a immersive soundstage.
These three would only cause me to reinforce what I was saying. They all sound "correct" with no changes in level. I.e. to me they sound like I believe the masterer built them to sound with no fooling around on my part.
If you don't like aggressive mixes you'll be missing a lot of the music if you attempt to transform them into traditional mixes by lowering the volume of your rears. Take Hiromi for example, her stuff has a lot of full range material coming exclusively from the rears.
The only time I'm ever tempted to mess with levels is when the sub (6th SACD channel) is a little too loud for my tastes on some discs.
HowdyI just got to track 5 of "Triangulo" and the front to backness of the percussion is more ambiguous in that it seems to have been mixed to just over my head :) Still it seems to have been a mastering choice, not just hot rears.
I just don't hear the same subtle ambience as I do on classical recordings. Perhaps it is my Denon 3803 AVR and I'll check my settings but haven't felt the need to do so with classical music.
HowdyI think your system is probably showing you whats really there, for better or worse. There are some other great recordings which I suspect are more to your taste, e.g. DMP.
I have had the exact experience that you have had with respective to not hearing intrusive sounds from the rear channels of most (not all) multi-channel jazz recordings. Just recently, a friend of mine, Richard, came over to listen to jazz. My friend is a jazz hound as I have never known. He lives in jazz houses; I would rank him among the top 5 people that I know whom I would trust as knowing what live jazz sound like (not to mention recorded jazz). Further, Richard had never experienced multi-channel music, except for the movie theater.I played some SACD multi-channel jazz selections, most of which Richard was intimately familiar with as two channel CDs. It was only toward the conclusion of the first couple of multi-channel selections that I mentioned that we were, in fact, listening to multi-channel music. (Although Richard was suspicious of the center speaker, particularly since he thought it was active during the playing of the two channel CD that we initially listened to).
After we played a couple CDs I slipped in Art Blakey/Jazz Messengers
multi-channel "Keystone 3". I was specifically watching to see if Richard was at all "distracted" by the multi-channel presentation. He was not in the least. In "Keystone 3" the only real give away that this is multi-channel is the applause from the audience, which, in part, clearly comes from all around. But by that time occurred Richard was comfortably ensconced/transported in the music, have already determined that he was at a live (near live?) venue. So, the applause from all around was *expected* and not a surprise.By the way, Bill Pierce on tenor sax, is the bomb in this recording, particularly, "In a Sentimental Mood".
Richard pretty much had the same reactions with McCoy Tyner's "Illuminations". Although on this one I did specifically avoid some tracks that are a bit agressively mixed.
I have found that rear channel intrusion, that is found in a few jazz multi-channel recordings jazz is simply because the artist or the engineers or both want it that way. An aggressive mix found in some jazz releases, such as Telarc’s “Monte Meets Sly and Robbie (see my comments at http://www.sa-cd.net/showreviews/449#3198) is an artistic choice, not an insoluble mix of the genre and the technology.
And over the past three years or so it is clear to me that sound engineers are learning (and it is a learning process) to better exploit the virtues of multi-channel. I believe Joe McQueen’s “Ten at 86”, is the quintessential utilization of multi-channel in jazz. There is no center channel utilized here, although you would never suspect it by listening. And the surround channels are utilized to an effective perfection. As with the best multi-channel SACDs in my collection, to the listener who is not aware that a multi-channel source is being played (such as was Richard) it simply sounds like the very best “stereo” presentation that a two-channel system could possibly muster. That is, until you switch to stereo and the acoustic space significantly flattens.
In most of my SACD jazz recordings I am generally unaware of the rear channels unless I was intent on making a two-channel/multi-channel comparison (which I rarely do anymore because it’s rudely disruptive and almost always a waste of time).
Robert C. Lang
IME the best way to set the levels is subjectively from the sweet spot, using white noise. Many players allow you to do this in setup. If not, some early Telarc's and some DVD-A's include such test bands on the CD.
Harry
HowdyYep the Telarc 1812 SACD has pink noise tracks and some meters come with CDs with pink noise on them as well as many AV receivers/processors...
I find that the PAA3 gives a result that works for more people than just my ears :)
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