full-scale orchestral music—best test of speakers’ potential?


Here’s a general observation made after visiting many rooms and listening to many loudspeakers at CAF: full-scale orchestral music, i.e. recordings of large symphony orchestras, provide the most demanding test of a speaker’s abilities.  I’d argue this for two reasons.

1. Audio systems attempt to create a simulacrum of an acoustic event in your living room.  That original event may have occurred in a tiny jazz club or a huge arena, and everything in between.  That is to say, the space in which it occurred may be very similar in size to your listening room, or it may be very different.  Given the size, on stage, of a full orchestra, and given the size of the auditoriums where they play, it’s very challenging for a system to reproduce the impression of that size in your living room—none are perfect, but some are better than others in providing the right kinds of cues.

2. Another variable here is that the music played may have been acoustic or electronically amplified.  Recordings of acoustic instruments and voice remove one extra step in the long chain of reproduction: we know pretty much what a violin should sound like, but what should a certain Gibson guitar through a certain Peavey amp sound like?

Massed violins playing fortissimo are the most stringent test of a speaker’s treble range.  In room after room, I heard rock, pop, jazz, blues, folk, etc. etc. reproduced really very beautifully, but often when an orchestral piece came on, it could sound harsh, steely, astringent, nails on chalkboard.  The fault of the recording, you say.  But a few speakers (I’m not naming names, to avoid that kind of argument), didn’t do that, and sailed through the test.

128x128twoleftears
Agree with your observations but as I've delved into the world of hi-fi I often wonder if what we are really after is an exact reproduction of what was heard at the site of the performance or if it is a pleasing reproduction designed to be heard in someone's home.Those are different things and in a way, the latter sounds like a better approach to me.

Agree that a symphonic work is a challenge regardless of what the goal of the engineering/production was. Not to mention the often extreme dynamic range of symphonic music from super quiet to booming and loud in the same symphony.
There are plenty of threads where people talk about the test tracks and test discs they use when auditioning equipment.  I see the kind of music I describe mentioned very rarely.  When I say "I'd argue" I was using the verb in the sense of "propose", "contend".
This test won't do anything for you if you don't listen to this kind of music. Other things will be more important.
Besides, no speakers can reproduce the full orchestra, not even close. It can't even be recorded well. Let's get real, shall we ?