Soundstaging and Imaging: The Delusion about The Illusion


Soundstaging in a recording—be it a live performance or studio event—and it’s reproduction in the home has been the topic of many a discussion both in the forums and in the audio press. Yet, is a recording’s soundstage and imaging of individual participants, whether musicians or vocalists, things that one can truly perceive or are they merely illusions that we all are imagining as some sort of delusion?

https://www.stereophile.com/content/clowns-left-me-jokers-right

celander
Here’s an article, on finding out if your system’s at least doing what it’s supposed to, performance wise: https://www.stereophile.com/features/772/index.html And, a link to the LEDR(and other good info links), should you not want to spring for a test CD: https://www.audiocheck.net/audiotests_ledr.php
Odds of survival go way down if you can't tell from which direction the sound of the lion comes. Swap out the lion for a guitar, the ears for a microphone. How does that really change anything? Its as real as real can be.
Thankfully, I listen to my audio system with a double-barreled shotgun in my lap. All good. 

We have two ears, we have two eyes, two legs, two arms. We are creatures of stereo by design. We listen in stereo regardless of what our "audio system" produce. Reading stereo is an illusion is almost weird to me seeing we are wired in stereo.

"we are just imagining things" ?

nope

"we are experiencing things"

Sometimes (many times) in this hobby we attempt to re-write the rule books, instead of playing by them.

"is soundstage important" ?

well

"we live in a sound, visual and other senses, stage"

Fortunately we were born into a life of soundstage. More fortunate is that audio designers early on implemented stereo in playback.

All the rest is us talking about it.

Michael Green