Two Type of sound and listener preference are there more?


In our thirty years of professional audio system design and setup, we keep on running into two distinctly different types of sound and listeners.

Type One: Detail, clarity, soundstage, the high resolution/accuracy camp. People who fall into this camp are trying to reproduce the absolute sound and use live music as their guide.

Type Two: Musicality camp, who favors tone and listenability over the high resolution camp. Dynamics, spl capabilty, soundstaging are less important. The ability for a system to sound real is less important than the overall sound reproduced "sounds good."

Are there more then this as two distincly different camps?

We favor the real is good and not real is not good philosophy.

Some people who talk about Musicaility complain when a sytem sounds bright with bright music.

In our viewpoint if for example you go to a Wedding with a Live band full of brass instruments like horns, trumpts etc it hurts your ears, shouldn’t you want your system to sound like a mirror of what is really there? Isn’t the idea to bring you back to the recording itself?

Please discuss, you can cite examples of products or systems but keep to the topic of sound and nothing else.

Dave and Troy
Audio Doctor NJ
128x128audiotroy
Owning a lot of McIntosh, I am in the musicality camp.  I don't care how accurate it is, I want the music to sound pleasing to me.  If I can listen to hours on end without fatigue, then my goal has been met.
The last thing I want is to wake up the morning, after a late night listening session, and feel like I was at a wedding reception being blasted by a brass band.... Those post-wedding reception mornings are ugly.

No thanks. I vote musicality....
Not sure if the two types are mutually exclusive. For me, the soundstaging and imaging are what draws me first into the music and then I start paying attention to the rest of the factors such as details, etc. I can usually tell within 2 minutes if I'm going to like the system or not, regardless of what music is played. 
I’m definitely now (finally) in the real is good camp, but that may be merely because I’ve now been after it for 45+ yrs and have managed to cough up enough cash over time for what it was I was ultimately shooting for.

IOW, I suspect most folks relatively speaking would be more in the just starting out category than that and that the apparent disparity between the real is good understanding of what is possible and everything else may be more of an experience-vs-financial opportunity thing than anything else...IOW all that may be perfectly normal or predictable to an extent. Many people may be inclined to dabble in the hobby during their first few years or even for decades before the ultimate decision may take hold to up their game and really consider what it may take to get beyond all that.
@audiotroy - you might want to track if the hearing of either camp is omni vs. uni directional - it might explain a lot

Omni Directonal hearing people do not like being in a crowded room

Uni Directonal hearing people can focus on a single conversation across a crowded room

I'm Omni and my wife is Uni.

I like details - she likes musicality

Go figure :-)