Fidelity vs. Musicality...........Is there a tug of War?

So now

douglas_schroder found the Benchmark amplifier to occupy the "clean/sterile" (White sounding?) end of the sonic spectrum.

but in his review he says:

The sound is indeed neutral and exact without being sterile or clinical. Colorless? Not really. The amp will send through the sound palette of the source component and disc/file without stripping any color away.

Absolute Sound reviewer was condescending?  Perhaps, but I feel the same way when people tell me, that odd harmonics are unnatural, that amount of details should be limited and imaging shouldn't be exact - just because neither is perfect in live performance.   So, If venue has bad acoustics I should look for bad sounding dull CD to replicate it?  In addition it was stated that high resolution is only good for classical music.

Amount of detail is usually increased with pronounced high frequencies, that also reveal harshness/brightness caused by noise or distortion.  Instead of fixing the problem many audiophiles cover it with "warm" sounding gear, producing even harmonics - a distortion that alters real sound of instruments.  "Warmth" is considered a virtue by many who constantly praise it.  Hard to argue with that - after all it is a matter of taste and what sounds right is OK, but it is not what I'm looking for.  I'm looking for accurate uncolored reproduction of music and the ways to achieve it.  It appears I will not find it here and this forum is not for me.

patrickdowns, Harley is correct; one can never have too much resolution/detail. If you suspect you have too much resolution, you have made an error in system establishment elsewhere, typically in the tonal balance. 

The most challenging thing about a short list is that it tends not to stay short. But, the absolute worst is when it is down to two! Solution? Buy both! Then, find out in comparison that you really want a blend of both components' characteristics. Now, that's fun!   ;) 

charles1dad, the performance spectrum is VERY large, and some audiophiles either are only vaguely aware of superb sound at the other end of the spectrum, or simply do not care and declare. It is a sideshow around here watching people argue preference. We see declarations in regard to vinyl/digital, genres of speakers, amp classes, etc. 

Thanks, I think, @ douglas_schroeder  :) LOL

Musicality is linked to fidelity and fidelity to musicality...In music it is called "timbre perceptive experience"...


Choosing make no sense for me...

But there is a relative hierarchy between these 2 in the audio world not in music...

Because no gear system is perfect i could prefer one which will be musical to another one who would be characterised with more fidelity...

But it is possible with ACOUSTICAL science to improve optimally any system , musical one or more fidelity one....

Then even if there is no theoretical limit for the scale of high end quality product, these products must be EMBEDDED in an optimal acoustical environment to give the most of their potential...

I am surprized like usual, (then at the end not so much surprized 😁😉 ) that in audio thread people vouch most of the times for their favorite branded name high end product ignoring the powerful role of acoustic to reach musicality +fidelity qualities in the same perceptive experience which is called "timbre perception"....

Dont read reviewers of possible high end gear product first, buy first one acoustic book and listen and experiment....It cost me almost nothing....

And i have both musicality and fidelity....Not the best in the world among all system here.... But my system is one of the best for his ratio S.Q./price....my system cost is under 500 bucks...

All that thanks to acoustical, mechanical and electrical embeddings controls...

Dont spend money but think and experiment especially with acoustic....

kijanki, lets look at what you said I said  😕

You don't like very detailed sound .. I don't think I said that, I said I don't like the result of combining components that major in detail.

You don't like perfect imaging .. I did not say that either, just that pin-point imaging does not occur at a live event.

You like coloring of the sound by overly warm 300B .. yes, guilty as charged but again not quite what I said. I think anybody present when we swapped amps would have not only preferred the valve amp but thoroughly enjoyed it.

I played one of my favourite and best recorded albums which I recommend to all. It's Christina Pluhar's Los Impossibles where we could clearly hear the size of the recording venue, where the baritone voice was cleanly separate from the other voices in the choir. Another acid test is 10CC's I'm not in love. This is poorly recorded and what was heard that day was not a magical transformation but it was rendered in a way that brought back some strong nostalgia. I was able to listen and enjoy and this to me is all that matters.

For a system to provide a sense of space fine detail is required. For a piano to sound like a piano the fundamental and all the harmonics need to be cleanly produced demanding detail. When harmonics are missing the ear/brain relationship has to work much harder leading to fatigue. Taken to the extreme, if we deliberately remove all harmonics we are left with just the fundamental frequency and if middle C was struck all that would be heard is a 261.6 Hz sine wave. We heard piano sound beautiful and I grew up with piano being played and though I don't play do know what a piano sounds like. For that piano sound we enjoyed that day I did not analyse, did not need to, it sounded glorious. The detail was there but just presented in a civilised manner.  😁