On Assessing Sonic Illusions

[Analogous]

I went to sleep at 7pm (because I felt sleepy) and woke up at 3am. Respecting others’ right to a peaceful slumber, I am online instead of playing music and I found this article. It mildly rocked the very foundations of my presumptions on HiFi and “live sounding” recordings.
I think many here would like to read it even as it may raise uncomfortable questions within…
Almost makes me wish for a comforting distraction from the topic ( a Bollywood scandal or a cricket match or worse)
The fix is in (brain worm) I can not unread this. Nor can I go back to sleep.

On Assessing Sonic Illusions

Recently, I found myself in an email conversation with two colleagues on the nature of reproduced audio. How should we think about it? The conversation was provoked by a "hybrid" (live and online) presentation of the Pacific Northwest section of the Audio Engineering Society called "What Does...

www.stereophile.com

 

[reignofchaos]

This is how it has always been. What you hear is the recording engineer's version of the musical event and that is what you strive to reproduce. The real event sound is not something we should even bother ourselves with in most cases. There is so much masala added over in a studio recording, it is not even funny.

The only exceptions are direct cut records where there is a machine directly cutting the output of stereo mics onto vinyl. This is why these are very sought after in the audio world.

 

[Analogous]

Here is an interesting quote from the article:
“…
So this synthetic, whole-cloth creation is what we audiophiles are supposed to compare to "live" sound. Sounds hopeless, doesn't it?

On the contrary. The notion of a (re) produced recording as a performance is, to me, liberating. The irony is striking, but the argument is compelling: Once we've embraced the notion that a recording is a complete fabrication, we get to decide for ourselves how convincing that illusion is without worrying much about whether the connection to live music is real, whatever that might mean.”…

 

[Analogous]

And this: “What about engineers who strive to stay out of the way as much as possible, with so-called minimalist recording methods? Such recordings"are dull and don't hold up in the commercial world."

 

[reignofchaos]

And this: “What about engineers who strive to stay out of the way as much as possible, with so-called minimalist recording methods? Such recordings"are dull and don't hold up in the commercial world."

Yep when you are used to a lot of masala, food with only fresh ingredients and no masala sounds dull. I guess it is the same analogy.

However in my experience, direct cut records are anything but dull!

 

[arj]

And this: “What about engineers who strive to stay out of the way as much as possible, with so-called minimalist recording methods? Such recordings"are dull and don't hold up in the commercial world."

Direct cut recordings are great, problem is the music itself is not Fun and thats where the problem is ! i have a direct Vinyl by Yamaha the driums. trumpets are startlingly real but I simply dont like that music

But overall a wonderful read and thanks for sharing that !!

 

[Analogous]

recordings are great, problem is the music itself is not Fun

So true….Now that deserves a separate discussion!!!!