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... just curious.
Follow Ups:
Clarity at the expense of warmth = hi fi.
Warmth at the expense of clarity = "musicality"
Warmth with clarity = de troot
The last is hard to find. Be patient.
It's ALL about emotion for me....
if its not recorded "truthfully", and not much is, then the question is really "how can a make do with the recording i've got". (this is especially important as most recordings which are made with the intent to preserve the event accurately fail musically.) i bought a cd the other day in which the singer is playing a piano - i got a good point sounce on her voice and the piano took up the entire back wall. not even close to real. however, the voice was so good i could'nt just focused on that and ignored the stereo aspect. the same can be said about imaging and other stereo artifacts that are highly prized. you never hear them in concert - the engineers assist in their reproduction by multiple mikes, etc. there is no truth - there is only what you like to hear when you turn on your stereo.
nt
Romy the Cat
If they were, then your phrase "Audio Truth" is an oxymoron.
... so I got curious whether people prefer to hear these blemished recordings as they exactly are (hence a vote for audio truth), or would rather hear them more "palatable" whichever the cost (be it euphonics, etc... hence a vote for musicality as #1 priority).Why I asked this? Because I'm wondering whether to most people the point of this audio hobby is still to get as much enjoyment as possible from their music. Admit it or not, the more your system approaches audio truth (which IMHO no system ever achieves 100%) the more flaws it reveals, and more discs get unlistenable.
I know that audio truth is totally capable of ultimate experience with near-perfect recordings. But I don't know whether you people prefer to limit yourselves to audio nirvana with good recordings, or would rather get reasonably involving sound from ALL your favorite music, including badly recorded ones.
I guess most audiophiles will agree that when a recording is annoyingly bad, listening to it gets much less involving, regardless of whether the music is well-executed. And personally, 80% of my discs belong to this category!
IMHO, listener involvement and enjoyment is possible not only by recreating the sound in a very accurate way, but also by reproducing this sound in a different way that sometimes can even sound better than what's actually in the recording... just like watching a pianist playing a second performance of the same piece in exactly the same execution style, but this time using a better-sounding piano.
So do you care about what the performance sounded like during the recording session (vote: audio truth), or about how good the performance can sound in your listening room (vote: musicality)? Of course if recordings were perfect, these two would be the same thing... and I wouldn't ask this question which to some appears silly.
In your opinion, some audio equipments can make non-musical recording sound musical?Paul Lam
P.L.C.Lam Consulting Inc.
If you take red, you'd prefer audio truth. If blue, musicality.
And my answer is: I would have taken the blue pill. I prefer to live in the dream world where all discs sound great, than in the real world where most of my favorite music sounds so-so at best.But that's me. :)
I strive to accurately reproduce fine recordings which have captured all the glory of a live performance. Faults of lesser recordings are unavoidably revealed when this is acheived, but I've found I can still reasonably enjoy those recordings for the most part.
I don't know what you really mean by musicality though. That word is thrown around a great deal around here, but everyone is not using it the same way.Here are some uses of "musicality" that I've seen on this site:
1. Used arrogantly to indicate that one listens to "real" music while others listen to equipment. (My system is musical. Others listen to hifi.) Enjoyment is not part of the equation.
2. Used arrogantly to indicate that one enjoys "real" music while others don't know what "real" music is. (My system is truly musical. Others think their system is great but they don't know what "real" music is.) Again, enjoyment is not part of the equation.
3. Used broadly to indicate that a piece of music is enjoyable. The enjoyment could be due to an incredible illusion of a live performance or the fact that the music just "sounds good". (That work sounds so musical.) Enjoyment is a major component and is directed towards the music itself.
4. Used to indicate that a piece of equipment is more enjoyable than another. (That speaker is more musical.) The root of the enjoyment runs the gamut like #3. Enjoyment is a major component, but is focused more on the ability of a piece of equipment to bring joy more than another.
I'm sure there are more, but I'm not trying to write a thesis. So, what do you mean by "musicality"?
Sorry for the ambiguous word. What I meant by MUSICAL was: a character of a system that delivers a sound that is capable of involving the listener (most of the time to the extent of an illusion of being in a live performace), regardless of whether the reproduced sound is exactly what is encoded in the source, and regardless of the means by which such a "delicious" sound is achieved (euphonic colorations, shaped tonal balance, etc.)This implies that, to me, a system that makes all my music sound really good, regardless of the quality of the recording itself, is musical. As in your definition #4, enjoyment of the music (and its sound, btw) is what really counts.
And to make it all clear, what I meant by "audio truth" was: hearing what is exactly in the recording, including all its faults that in many cases will distract the listener from the sound's merits... plain accuracy in a studio-monitoring sort of way.
Of course, I'm not saying that these two attributes are mutually exclusive. My question is only out of curiosity how other people PRIORITIZE between these two.
Thanks for the clarifications!It's ironic how people primed on "audio truth" rarely know how close they are to their goal, however, or how far. With every significant upgrade I've made, I'm simply astonished at all the subtleties that emerge. There is just so much information in good recordings that I never knew was there. I've discovered that it's possible to get a very, very compelling illusion of a live performance from a measly CD. In fact, CD playback is more compelling than SACD on my system.
"Musicality" through "Audio truth" on good recordings of great live performances, that's what I'd strive for. I prefer not to have good recordings of great live performances blemished just so overall lesser recordings can sound "better". The downside is I may be aggravated by the faults of the overall lesser recordings. The upside is the overall good recordings are simply amazing!
4a. Wherein the "musicality" of the piece of equipment stems from its ability to assist in reproducing the glory of a live performance, in as far as it can be achieved.4b. Wherein the "musicality" of the piece of equipment stems from its propensity to add things that are (to some) pleasant but could never have been there in the live performance.
I am suspicious of the word "musical" applied to audio equipment because of 4b.
JohnR
I have two stereos. One for each quality.
Rob CThe world was made for people not cursed with self-awareness
I go for musicality EVERY time, which is why I guess my other 'musician' friend can get along with me. I learned long ago never to get into the 'audiophile' discussions about gear when listening to music with anyone other than other audiophiles.I can hold my own with 'gear pigs', the tech talk, the new gear on the block specs, the next 'new thing' tweak. But it doesn't mean a thing to someone who doesn't have (or care!) about the vocabulary, just the tunes!
Getting back to the subject- musicality OR audio truth- I found that the less I discussed 'flavour of the month' issues, I got more into the music- really IGNORED the gear and became indeed a case of 'sit down, shut up and just listen', as my good friend says.
At the risk of sounding mean, I don't give a crap about quality sometimes! If the tunes move me, reagardless of the specs, I'll take the tunes, be it on a Waveradio, or a full blown Krell system!
Remember, don't shoot the messenger!
Dman
If your system is TRUELY hi-end, the two are not mutually-exclusive.
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