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What is the standard for judging a systems sound?

It is often said in these threads that this hobby is all about the music. That live music is the only meaningful standard for comparison when determining the quality of a stereo system. While these words sound good, are they really true?

A violin should sound like a violin, a flute should sound like a flute, and a guitar should sound like a guitar. Many purists will immediately say that amplified/electronic music cannot be used as a standard since a listener can never really know what the intention of the musician was when he/she recorded it, and what that sound should be.

Even something as simple as an electric guitar has multiple settings from which to choose. Electronic keyboards have hundreds of possible voices, so how does the poor audiophile know how the tone was supposed to sound?

These are valid concerns. Back to the purists!
“That’s why only unamplified classical music can be used as a standard!!!” On face value that looks like an acceptable statement. Consider some facts though. In my immediate family we a have several musicians who play a few different instruments. We have an electric piano (due to a distinct lack of room for a baby grand), acoustic guitar, Fender Stratocaster electric guitar, a nickel plated closed hole flute, a silver plated open hole flute, a viola, and a cello.

I have a fairly good idea how each of these instruments sound. One comment I must make immediately is that they sound a little different in different rooms. Another comment, which demands attention: when I bought my first flute I knew nothing about flutes. I began fooling around with it and enjoyed the sound. I liked it so much a bought a better, as mentioned silver open-hole flute. This flute sounded much better than the first flute. The tone was richer (the only words I can think of to describe the difference).

The reason for that background information is to show that the same instruments in different room’s sound different, AND different models of the same instrument have a much different sound!

If we audiophiles are using live unamplified music as a standard there are still several important issues, which must be addressed. How do we really know what we are hearing? What instrument is the musician playing? Was that a Gemeinhardt or Armstrong Flute. What are the sonic characteristics of the specific instrument. Stradivarius violins sound different than other violins, if they didn’t people would not be willing to pursue them so aggressively. Better instruments (theoretically anyway) sound better than lesser instruments. The point here is that different versions of the same instrument sound different.

I have seen the same music reproduced in different settings. I have heard string quartets play in a garden in Vienna. I have heard the Pipe Organ in Stephan’s Dom. I have heard Rock and Roll in arenas and Performing Arts Centers. I have heard jazz played in small one room clubs, not to mention the above listed instruments played in the house.

Each one of these venues sounds different from the other.

When I am listening to a selection of music at home, how do I know how it is supposed to sound? None of the LPs sounds like any of the particular places I have heard live music, while none of those places sounded like any other either.

There is no standard by which to judge the quality of live music since no two venues sound alike. If everyone were to go to the Royal Opera House in Covent Garden and hear Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 6 would everyone hear the same thing? Even if they did, and that one concert became the standard by which all other recorded music was judged, would that be translatable to allow the judging of all other music?

I have never heard a cello reproduced as well as my sons playing in the living room. I have never heard better flute players sound better than my own terrible playing at home.

So what do we audiophiles really use as the standard by which recorded music can be judged?
128x128nrchy
frogman
7,463 posts
 
The last thing that I thought I would ever do is feel like I have to come to the defense of audio reviewers. The truth of the matter is that although audio reviewers are oftentimes easy targets for criticism/ridicule, wether we want to admit it or not, there are in fact a few truly talented ones. Have you guys read the work of people like Jon Nork, Harry Pearson and others, over the years? I don't know about you guys, but I have found their commentary extremely useful. They helped develop a language to describe what they hear that has changed the way that we all talk about the hobby. I frankly don't find it all that difficult to get a sense of what the best reviewers are trying to say about certain components, eventhough their systems are in constant state of flux, since they (the best ones) usually make reference to the sound of the real thing in a way that to me, makes sense. The same way that we need to attend a lot of live music performances to really be able to build a good personal reference, by familiarizing ourselves with the language and yes, biases of these guys, we can get some really useful info about components. I find the across-the-board cynicism directed at reviewers unjustified and counterproductive. Are there a lot of hacks out there? You bet! So what? Ignore them.

I disagree that all reviewers use other equipment as a reference. Yes, a comparison, even if not stated in the review, to other equipment is probably inevitable. So what? As long as the focus is on how it measures up to the sound of the real thing.

I'll say it again: There are many "generic" qualities in the sound of the real thing, that makes concentrating on issues such as the effect of the sound of different venues, mics, mixing boards etc., while certainly not irrelevant, almost pointless. We just need to familiarize ourselves with these sonic qualities enough. Perhaps spend less time and energy on feeding the neurosis of the hobby, and more time attending live events. Not an essential pursuit in order to enjoy music and the hobby, but certainly essential if we want to bother with comparisons using any kind of meaningful standard.
pubul57
3,712 posts
 
It seems to me that the recording itself sets the absolute limit by which we can evaluate the reproduction capability of our equipment. As has been said before, our equipment cannot transcend the recording itself, reaching beyond to a "more true" or "real" version of the actual musical perfomance recorded by the engineer and the processed into CD, Vinyl, etc.

I'm not sure why the "Objectivist" approach to evalauting equipment would not be the prefered approach to judging a piece of equipment's ability as a reproducer of a muscial signal. The less damage (distortion?) between source and "reproduction" (electronically and acoustically) the "better".

Now it may be that there are some aspects of music reproduction that we are not able to objectively measure, and some aspects that we do not know we should measure that are relevant to sound quality (psychoacoustically). I suspect that there many measurables that relate to the accuaracy of reproduction and that are psychoacoustically relevant.

If true, all we can ask a designer to do is to engineer equipment that "measures right" (reproduces the source with minimal damage). If they do that, we can say the equipment is good to the extent is accuratly reproduces the source and passes that information to the next string on the audio chain.

With equipment that can accomplish that, our critique of the "sound" coming from our stereo might be better directed towards the recording engineers that produce sound that is accurate to the orginal perfomance.

Whether this "accurate" sound is pleasant or unpleasant is up to the listener. It would not suprise me if many people prefer sound that in some way is a distortion from the original or add artifacts that were not part of the sound of original performance in real space.
nrchy's avatar
nrchy OP
2,124 posts
 
Zaikesman, consensus does have value, as do the opinions of everyone who reviews a piece of gear, as long as it is done with integrity. If you tell me the Mc Cormack amp sounds good I believe it does. Based on your comments I would tell someone else that the DNA amp you mentioned is considered to be a good amp. The issue is what have I really learned. I consider you to be a credible source for information, but ultimately what has your comment done for me?

This is certainly not to say your comments are worthless, but it does call into question the value of your comments. I’m not trying to be rude, I’m just looking at the way we think about our systems. Is your determination of ‘good enough’ going to agree with mine, or anyone else’s?

Each instrument has a specific sound. That instrument will have a specific, but different sound when it arrives at the soundboard. It will have a slightly altered sound again as it is put onto a CD or LP. Which version of that sound are we willing to accept as being good enough, or as a standard which any or all of us can accept for judging the quality of our system? Or is it even worth it to try to have a standard?

The whole issue from the outset is my own wondering whether there was a standard that everyone can use to judge quality of gear. Other than anyone’s opinion it doesn’t seem that there is a standard. I believe everyone (almost) who’s posts and ideas I am familiar with on AudiogoN when they say something sounds good. I’m sure they think it sounds good, so in their mind it does sound good. Some people are less likely to have enough credibility to have their statements accepted by me as being reliable. But none of these comments are based on an absolute standard.
zaikesman
3,017 posts
 
Of course. It's like asking to be able to depend on some sort of standard for how good food tastes, or which people are the most physically attractive. The only difference is that in audio, we are presumably trying to *recreate something* (more so in the case of live acoustic music), which by definition implies an original creation, a standard if you will. But since we can never be certain what that original was - only that we won't be able to perfectly capture and recreate it - things become, as we see in the high end, to a large degree simply a matter of taste. Still, the concept of standards does apply, for if we stray too far from a seemingly plausible attempt at faithful recreation in the pursuit of imposing idiosyncratic qualities, the majority of us will recognize this as no longer being high in fidelity - which gets us back to the question of fidelity to what? That's where the cognitive dissonance lies - the relatively peaceful acceptance of which is something essential to achieving, if not really the suspension of disbelief, at least the blissful ignoring of it. Which is to say, Don't sweat the whole concept so much that you can't hear around it, just enjoy as best you can! Some of my favorite 'lo-fi' recordings capture primarily a feeling, not the literal sound of a performance, and maybe not even the exact feeling I would have gotten had I been there in the room with the performers. Nevertheless, I have received the artistic feeling of that document listening over a high end system and over a table radio or a car radio. The most important part of the music can easily transcend fidelity for some mysterious and wonderful reason.
frogman
7,463 posts
 
Bingo, Zaikesman; the feeling "can easily transcend fidelity for some mysterious and wonderful reason". Brilliantly stated. My only qualification would be concerning the use of the word "fidelity". I would instead say: "...fidelity in the usual sense..." In other words, fidelity as usually defined by audiophiles; not necessarily the most relevant concern.

This is precisely the point. This feeling is the most important part of music making and likewise, the most important part of music reproduction. Can a component reproduce the feeling of the performance? This is in part what I mean when I refer to the "generic" sounds of live music. Although we tend to not think of the "feeling" in terms of "sound", the feeling has much to do with issues of microdynamics. The next obvious question will be: How do we know if that "feeling" was actually there at the original event, and not some sort of distortion caused by the record/playback process? Because just as with more usual concerns such as timbral accuracy and soundstage recreation, with enough exposure to the real thing, we can learn to recognize what is truth and what is a distortion.

The feeling of a good performance is a pretty powerful thing; the reason that it can transcend the LACK of fidelity of a table radio. It's not that the table radio somehow manages to reproduce the feeling because of some subtle electronic attribute, it's simply that the feeling of a good performance is difficult to destroy completely; it is that powerful. And this is what hangs up a lot of audiophiles IMO. We tend to focus on subtle differences in timbre and soundstaging, and overlook the magic. And where can we experience the most magic? At a live event.
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