Is A Live Concert Stereo Or Mono

This vaguely reminds me of a test in college way, way back when - about something like "directionally-biased point source emitters" or some such gobbledygook. The level and amount of math expected for the answer probably helped convince me that an exclusively academic regimen is not the only way to put food on the table...

Mono? Since when is the whole world mono? Well, unless your name was van Gogh (but don't start with me on that, 'cause yeah I know and that was only meant as a feeble attempt for a feeble laugh...)? Mono might barely describe a solo artist performing in an anechoic chamber - how the heck does mono do justice to a whole wide stage full of orchestra? Tvad knows the deal, and the equation for real is not solved by being some kind of audio cyclops with a single ear growing out of your forehead.

The equation for real is not solved by being some kind of audio cyclops with a single ear growing out of your forehead.

I love it, that is Great English.

I could be off the mark here but the point your emailer may have been trying to make, and how it differs from Tvad's assessment, is whether the performance is amplified or not. If it is not then Tvad is right on that it is not stereo or mono it's real. If however the performance is amplified and played through speakers around the stage or on either side, I think that "reproduction" is normally done in mono so people sitting outside of exact center will hear the entire performance too. Maybe someone will chime in and correct me, but this is what I have surmised from personal experiences. I don't know why a mono recording would conceivably sound better but I'm sure someone else will chime in on that concept.

Concerts are actually reproduced from stage right and left speaker stacks running in a stereo mix. The engineer (the guy sitting in the audience working from a mixing console) runs the show in stereo but mixes it so that there is directionality from the speaker stacks and on-stage amps but with a view towards mixing the show to make sure even those in far right and left seats can hear everything. Bottom line result is sort-of stereo from the front and sort-of mono from the sides.

Nwext time you are at a show ask the engineer before the show when he at the console waiting for the houselights to go down (but not too close to the start of the show). Having worked many years with them they are generally friendly and will answer simple questions.

G'day all, this is actually a very good and interesting question! I'm always believed, and read that the invention of stereo recording was an attempt to reproduce the sound of an actual live performance!

Yet as a regular attendee of live music performances (unmiked) myself and sitting pretty well in the middle of the venue my own impressions are that 'stereo effect' (left /right directionality) is discernable, but only marginally so which leads me to believe that much 'stereo' on recordings is deliberately exaggerated!

Whilst that sounds great coming over a stereo system, in my opinion it isn't the real thing! Regards Fap.