Soundstage - when wide is too wide


Although I'm often not confident in my understanding of the meaning of audio terminology as used in many posts, I do have some feeling for what the term "soundstage" implies, at least to me. When listening to orchestral presentations I appreciate a "wide soundstage" with some sense of where the strings, brass, kettle drums, etc are located across a real stage. In some recordings of small jazz ensembles postioning of drums, say, are at stage right, especially in older recordings where stereophonic effect is often somewhat exaggerated.

Here's the issue. A lot of what I listen to is solo guitar so the way I'd rather hear it is as if the guitar was played directly across the room from my listening position with a soundstage, then, centered and only a couple of feet wide. That, however, is not the way I hear it especially since I recently made some significant changes to my system.

To set the scene, the two changes that I made include replacing my Martin Logan Odyssey speakers with The ML Ethos. The other is the inclusion of an Equalizer to compensate for personal hearing and room acoustics issues. I know from over 25 years of using curvilinear electrostatic speakers that postioning is a significant issue so I've paid attention to this factor. I'm still working on that and believe that it still may be a big part of the problem.
128x128broadstone
"I've seen several pairs of speakers that were mislabeled from the factory."

Sorry. It should be:

"I've seen several pairs of speaker cables that were mislabeled from the factory."
Definitely check your speaker cable polarity on both speakers and the amp end. I know it's "basic" suggestion but when swapping speakers, it's something that can easily happen.

I know because I nearly drove myself insane trying to fix an imaging problem only to discover that I had misconnected one speaker out of phase. Yes, I felt like an idiot. . .but got over it quickly when I realized I hadn't made a major purchase error and how good everything sounded properly connected.
What? You don't want a six foot wide guitar? ;)

Significant changes to the system, including speakers, call for significant reproaching system setup, including speaker placement.
Yes, this is all good advice and I will use it in the continuing pursuit for a better setup of my "new" system. To answer the question of which EQ I'm using, I have one DBX 1531 set in mono for each speaker providing 31 band per channel control.

The advice given to pay attention to phase issues was high on my list especially since the addition of the pro type EQ where there is no polarity designation on the xLR to RCA adapter cables and the preamp and EQ are on different shelves. I have that issue in hand, though, but I've read that the equalizer itself can introduce phase problems. I don't understand why that would occur but it remains a question.

The suggestion that using a preamp with a mono/stereo selector would make troubleshooting easier but I'm pretty happy with my current preamp/ amp setup (Peachtree Audio) and would be reluctant to consider that significant a modification at this point. Besides, I've never even seen such a thing. As far as buying music recorded in mono is concerned, wouldn't it depend on how it was recorded? For example, one of the guitarists that I listen to, Adrian Legg, does much of his recordings in concert and it sounds good but with no sense of a centered stage.

Anyway, I'm taking a short vacation from this quest because there is a Christmas tree partly in front of my right speaker.