assigning terms like "naturalness of timbre" that are factually untrue does not change that.The timbre of an instrument will be recorded in a specific studio room with his peculiarities...And he will be listen to in a specific audiophile room...
The recreation of this event , the timbre of a piano, will be relative not only to the mic but also the the geometry, and to the topology and content of the recording studio...
Digital or analog will transport in their own way these signals, but their recreation in my room will be better or worst, not only because i use digital or analog, nevermind my choices,but because the acoustical embeddings of my room, and the machanical embeddings of my system, and the electrical noise floor of my house will give me better or worst conditions for the CONCRETE experience of listening the piano timbre...
I dont think that there is an absolute superiority between analog or digital, only advantages or inconveniences for the listening Room/brain....
I maybe wrong, but i dont understand how.... 😁
Appendix:
Timbre is complex phenomenon not reducible to frequencies only....
Wikipedia:
- Range between tonal and noiselike character
- Spectral envelope
- Time envelope in terms of rise, duration, and decay (ADSR, which stands for "attack, decay, sustain, release")
- Changes both of spectral envelope (formant-glide) and fundamental frequency (micro-intonation)
- Prefix, or onset of a sound, quite dissimilar to the ensuing lasting vibration
Then when a Company like TACET use analog tubes only recording method it is because the analog recording method will be able to seize or grasp in a DIFFERENT way some aspect of the complex phenomena of timbre... They dont say that analog is absolutely better, they say it is absolutely different to record timbre with or without analog method...
By the way "timbre" is not only a sums of frequencies it is an event in a SPECIFIC room not reducible to a mix of frequencies...Timbre is accurate not only by exact summation of the reproduced frequencies but also with some timing of mutiple events in the recording room... Then using analog recording method or digital one will make some aspect easier to be recorded and other aspect not so easier...."Real-time-timing-events" (point three and five mainly in the wiki definition of timbre) are not recreated in the same way with analog or digital recordings methods, because each one will analyze the timing events by focusing on different characteristics in the complex timbre phenomena.... NONE are superior......I repeat NONE are superior...
My point is the same than you....Digital is in no way inferior.... But i add....Analog is in no way inferior too....