Speakers The single most critical component

Try my test with Kurt Weill and listen the singers ....If they comes from your back where there is no speakers then the room is not only good BUT under controls.

I'm done with the "most critical component" discussion.

But I'm curious how you determined that this test proves your point? The recording you reference is not live. It is a studio recording so there is no  "back of the room" as far as the recording is concerned. Any effect of depth and width of soundstage is artificially mixed into the recording  so it seems to me you really can't have any confidence what  you are using as your reference is accurate or what was intended. Maybe they wanted it to sound like the singers are out in front of the orchestra?

I listen to the singers walking on the scene in the studio and even turning their head while singing then their voice increasing or decreasing in loudness......

Any effect of depth and width of soundstage is artificially mixed into the recording so it seems to me you really can’t have any confidence what you are using as your reference is accurate or what was intended. Maybe they wanted it to sound like the singers are out in front of the orchestra?

The singers voices are around me, in front of me, and many times comes from behind my head in songs number 15-16-17...


In a non controlled room you will always listen to them in front of you not coming from behind your head...

Here i discover on the net what someone with a bad system or a bad room says of this very good recording:

« Don’t bother at this stage with the 1958 German language STEREO version with Lotte Lenya conducted by Wilhelm Brückner-Ruggeberg. It was weakly recorded, too much echo,»

What he confuse with "echo" is the walking speed and changes of position while singing of the singers...They move constantly on the stage or in the studio and their head is never fixed but turn right or left singing or speaking... It is easy to hear...In a good room we SEE the singers...

It is one of my best recording....

Anyway i wish you the best and your speakers by the way seems marvellous....

My deepest respect....

Frankly, all components are important; in a system, a stereo system, it is the system that brings sonic enjoyment.  Have a weak part even in a top notch system, and the system is only as good as the less than stellar component.  

Here is my story...  some years ago, I settled on Pass Aleph 1.2 mono's for my amp, then I got Von Schweikert VR-6 speakers.  My source was a Nakamichi Dragon CD player, and my line stage was first a Adcom something, then a Sonic Frontiers SF-2.  I still couldn't understand why my system wasn't singing like it should.  Finally, my stereo guy said, ditch the SF-2 and get a Pass X0.2, a three box line stage, which was just introduced.  I did, and once that was in, the heavens opened up and my system was, at least in my opinion, making some very fine music!  My past line stage choices were not up to snuff; at the time, I didn't think a line stage would be such an influencing piece to the puzzle, but it is.  Frankly, in a system, it ALL is.  

Just get the best stuff you can afford, and work with a stereo guy who'll work with you, meaning let you listen to it because listening to it is where the proof in the pudding is.  Anyways, happy hunting in your quest to assemble your ultimate two channel system.  

What he confuse with "echo" is the walking speed and changes of position while singing of the singers...They move constantly on the stage or in the studio and their head is never fixed but turn right or left singing or speaking... It is easy to hear...In a good room we SEE the singers...

I’m glad you enjoy this recording so much, but your conclusions about what is correct are nothing more than guesses. By manipulating the phase of the signal from various microphones while panning them left - right - left the person mastering the recording can create the illusion of movement when the singer is standing in one spot behind the microphone. I’m not saying this happened, I have no idea how it was recorded, but given it is a studio recording it is unlikely the singers were moving about the room, but perhaps they were. It is also impossible to create a 3 dimensional soundstage (sounds from behind or outside the speakers) without manipulating the signal.

Listen to a recording by Steve Swallow called "Running in the Family" on his album Deconstructed. His bass is waaaaay off to the side completely disengaged from the rest of the music. It is so pronounced I find it difficult to listen to. This effect is created by shifting the phase of the signals in the left and right channels after it is recorded.. Note the word "created." If the same sound arrives at one ear later than the other, (phase shifted) our brain interprets this as the signal coming from the direction of the ear where it first arrives. By manipulating the phase and amplitude of the bass in the 2 channels it can be "pushed" off to the side.

So I agree that if your system/room has issues with phase shifts it will change how the sound is produced, but we have no way to know if what we are hearing is an accurate representation of what happened unless we were there. It seldom is and definitely is not if you hear sounds from behind you. How do you know your system isn't phase shifting some frequencies more than others and exaggerating these effects?

Frankly, all components are important;

duh

Of course a system is a sum of its parts. That’s not the point of the thread.

I settled on Pass Aleph 1.2 mono’s for my amp, then I got Von Schweikert VR-6 speakers.

so you did it backwards. . The point is, various electronics are much more alike than different while speakers vary widely. So find speakers you like then optimize the rest. Matching speakers to amps is a fools game.. sorry to be blunt but can’t come up with a nicer word than fools at the moment

How do you know your system isn’t phase shifting some frequencies more than others and exaggerating these effects?

It is easy to use a test to verify...

https://www.audiocheck.net/audiotests_polaritycheck.php

It is also impossible to create a 3 dimensional soundstage (sounds from behind or outside the speakers) without manipulating the signal.

It is possible when someone use simple acoustic laws..

For example tresholds of timing linked to the first wavefront law

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/223804282_The_relation_between_spatial_impression_and_the_law_of_the_first_wavefront

I use my homemade mechanical equalizer to do it and my Schumann generators grid with the appropriate passive room treatment... But passive material room treatment is ONLY half of my acoustical settings... The more important half is the mechanical 32 tubes and pipes Helmholtz equalizer tuned for the room... I use it in a way to reinforce the first frontwave law for each speaker....And the Schumann generators grid is a complementary help to create this holographic effect... Some company sell costly device to do it with radio frequencies like the shumann generator frequencies... But i never bought any tweaks i prefer to replicate them at no cost...I called this the three controls over the working three embeddings dimension for any audio system: mechanical : ( i use an original method of my own to tune my speakers with springs) electrical: ( i use my own homemade device all along the electrical grid of my house the "golden plates") and for acoustic:( many devices but the most important being a couple of cheap ionizers, S.G. grid, and H. M. equalizer + regular passive teatment balanced between reflective,absorbing and diffusive effects)..
My system value is 500 bucks and all my device controls cost me peanuts...

You forget also that owning near 10,000 files if these artificial effects were only artefacts regularly used i will listen to them on many other files....(Like in some electronic music....I dont like electronic music and listen mainly jazz and especially classical....)

They really walked and turned their heads singing in the studio and the final impression is like a real event...

I feel this impression of 3-d with others classical very good recordings....For example i can " see" the hands of an harpsichordist on his instrument 3-d like if the instrument were in the room...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_R0eCGPhXko

But the sound of this youtube file is horrible....I own ALL the cd she played with his marvellous instrument very well recorded all his Bach recordings...I know this file from the time i was 20 years old to this day70 years old.... This cd was never 3-d holographic 50 years ago even coming from better speakers my Tannoy dual Gold compared to my actual Mission Cyrus 781....but acoustic is more powerful than speakers specs differences between 2 good speakers .... Now I listen all the pedals strokes and slidings,frictions, of the feet and of the mechanical inside the instrument...The instrument is spread our like a 3-d object in front of me out of the speakers not between it, but in front of it and spread it slightly behind the speakers with the keyboard where his hands walk and plays in some "diagonal" spread, the head part of the wood keyboard in front and the end tail behind the speakers...

Same thing with Vladimir Feltsman well tempered Klavier where the piano is in the room completely and fill it wall to wall...

Samething with Chopin piano Nocturnes recording by Ivan Moravec ....

I will stop here....


Regards and best wishes...