How do you judge your system's neutrality?

Wow - I have been unable to read/post here for a while now due to the busy holiday season, and I see that I have missed quite a bit! I would like to comment on a couple of different things here.

Mrtennis - I would like to give you an example of a different sort of analysis that can greatly increase your enjoyment of music, and this would be the study of music theory, particularly the study of different musical forms. Your appreciation and enjoyment of the genius behind say a Bach fugue, or a Mozart symphony will be greatly enhanced by the study of these forms. Or say you prefer jazz - there are several basic forms one can study here that will yield much greater appreciation for the art of Charlie Parker, Miles Davis, Wynton Marsalis, or whoever your favorites are. A great book I like to recommend, which is written in terms a "layman" can understand, is the composer Aaron Copland's book What To Listen For In Music. I do not know of a better introduction to these sorts of topics for the listener than this excellent work. Many audiophiles devote an amazing amount of time studying electronics, etc.; musical forms are a much less complex and easier to understand subject, and this sort of study is much more directly beneficial to your enjoyment of whatever you are listening to.

Bryon, your preference/perception discussion is interesting. I would go a little farther than dgarretson's response and say that perception is always going to be hugely influenced by preference for each individual listener. This is what my brother was driving at in his taste/quality comment. It is all too easy, no matter how experienced the listener is, for taste to influence the judgement of quality - perception cannot be totally separated from preference, even if one is trying to be as objective as possible. The main thing I would disagree with in your argument would be where you state that the more listener expertise increases, the more preference will decrease. I would go so far as to state the opposite. The more one's listening skills improve, the more this will help determine and reinforce what one's preferences are. This has been the case with my own explorations of the different options in high end audio. The more I learn, the clearer and stronger my preferences become. You seem to be arguing that the more experienced listeners will gravitate towards the same idea of "neutrality," whereas I would argue that the opposite would be the case. I think the recent discussion between dgarretson and muralman and kijanki on preferences bears this out. Ultimately, your "neutrality" is a subjective, personal judgement, no matter how well we can objectively identify different types of colorations.

Learsfool, as one progressively raises the bar in the hobby through a process of acquiring or hearing successively improved components, what is the nature of the "reinforcement of preference" that you propose is occuring? Assuming that break-throughs in technology and improvements in price/performance ratio are actually obtainable and that one welcomes this process, is the result of change merely to cement the listener to a prior preference of coloration, or to liberate him to reassess and refine preference in the context of a newly available perceptions? Seems to me that the very notion of progress implies change in the latter sense.

…perception cannot be totally separated from preference, even if one is trying to be as objective as possible.

Learsfool – I agree with this. My view is that, although perception and preference are always commingled to some extent, they can nevertheless be distinguished by expert listeners. There may be no such thing as "preference-less" perception, but I believe that it is possible, and often useful, to form judgments about perception that are MINIMALLY INFLUENCED by preference. I know that you are a professional musician. I would imagine that, if you play in an orchestra, you must have had experiences that require you form judgments about perception while ignoring your own preferences, as for example, when you disagree with the preferences of the conductor.

The main thing I would disagree with in your argument would be where you state that the more listener expertise increases, the more [variability in] preference will decrease. I would go so far as to state the opposite. The more one's listening skills improve, the more this will help determine and reinforce what one's preferences are.

I agree with this, if “preferences” is interpreted as “priorities.” In other words, I believe that, although audiophiles have largely similar PREFERENCES, they have largely different PRIORITIES. This is not merely a semantic difference, as I hope the following will show...

Here is a list of playback system characteristics, in no particular order:

-Resolution
-Realistic dynamics (macro- and micro-)
-Tonal balance
-Low Noise
-Realistic transients (attack, sustain, decay)
-Neutrality
-Transparency (to the music)
-Accuracy (to the software)
-Scale
-Coherence
-Warmth
-Realistic instrument timbres
-Extension at the frequency extremes (high and low)

It seems to me that the vast majority of audiophiles would PREFER to have as many of the characteristics on this list as possible, with one or two possible exceptions, like neutrality. But budgets are limited, and no system at any budget can do everything, so audiophiles are forced to PRIORITZE the value of these characteristics for themselves. And differences in audiophile priorities results in different approaches to system building.

It is important to point out that very few of the characteristics on the list above are mutually exclusive, in theory. Perhaps neutrality and warmth are mutually exclusive in theory, but even this is arguable, particularly if we think of warmth the way Dgarretson suggested, namely, as embodiment. The characteristics above are mutually exclusive only in practice, because of limitations of design and budget. But the fact that so few (or possibly none) of the characteristics that audiophiles value are mutually exclusive, in theory, highlights the fact that different approaches to system building among audiophiles is more attributable to different PRIORITIES than to different PREFERENCES.

This brings me to the question of “taste.” I think that, if “taste” is interpreted as A SET OF IDEAL PLAYBACK CHARACTERISTICS like the list above, then audiophiles can, and do, often agree. But if “taste” is interpreted as A SET OF JUDGMENTS ABOUT WHAT IS MOST VALUABLE when having to choose among those characteristics, you are quite right that audiophiles will never agree.

Dgarretson, I was speaking more of improvement in listener ability than improvement in technology. It would be the former, not the latter, that would "liberate him to reassess and refine preference," no matter what the context. As I think I may have said some time back in this thread, one should learn something anytime one listens critically, even if it is one more way not to do it. As different audiophiles refine their own preferences in this way, these preferences should become more and more unique to each individual.

As far as technology is concerned, I think a great many audiophiles would argue that there haven't necessarily been any huge advances in basic audio technology in a long time now. Many people on this and other boards lament the trend towards more and more compression, etc. Certainly the "golden age" of orchestral recording was decades ago now. My point is not to start an argument over different types/advances in technology, but merely to point out that a new technology is not necessarily better. Also, as you implied in your last post, no matter what type of technology one prefers for the various system components, building a system with the best possible components is simply out of reach of most of our budgets. We all make choices based on what we can afford, refining these as we go along in this hobby. I have a few different ideas about the directions I would like to go with my system in the future, but they are on hold, probably for some time.

Bryon, I understand how you are differentiating priorities from preferences. However, I think that the latter should always determine the former, not the other way around. As far as "taste" goes, the interpretation my brother and I are using is the set of judgements about what is most valuable when choosing among characteristics, as you put it. Quality would have more to do with how close a component or system comes to matching the ideal playback characteristics in this context, though again this would ultimately be a subjective judgement as well.

I guess my feeling is that too many audiophiles lose the forest for the trees by getting bogged down in trying to eliminate various types of colorations, etc. This is ultimately a negative approach, and as several have pointed out, the search for "neutrality" usually ends up with a very lifeless, unmusical presentation. A better approach, for me, is to keep the concentration on the forest by choosing components that come the closest to how you want the music to sound overall. Analysis of different types of colorations can help this, but too much focus on it is detrimental in the end. The same goes for a performer that gets too bogged down in certain aspects of technique, losing the focus on the phrasing, for example. One of the most famous horn players and teachers in the country likes to say "analysis is paralysis." Some is very necessary, but too much is fatal. He also says that "technique should serve the music, never the other way around." Similarly, the overall sound of the system is most important, not any one particular detail of it. Put another way, one's system choices IMO should be much more artistic than scientific, the science being used in the service of the music, not indulged in for it's own sake.

I guess my feeling is that too many audiophiles lose the forest for the trees by getting bogged down in trying to eliminate various types of colorations, etc.

What is the evidence for this belief? Why is the effort to reduce colorations any more likely to “bog down” the audiophile or make him “lose the forest for the trees” than any other audiophile pursuit?

…the search for "neutrality" usually ends up with a very lifeless, unmusical presentation.

My experience is exactly the opposite. That is to say, as I have reduced the colorations in my system, its presentation has become more musical. There is nothing musical about intermodulation distortion. There is nothing musical about speaker cabinet resonance. There is nothing musical about room modes. And these are just a few examples of colorations.

A better approach, for me, is to keep the concentration on the forest by choosing components that come the closest to how you want the music to sound overall. Analysis of different types of colorations can help this, but too much focus on it is detrimental in the end. The same goes for a performer that gets too bogged down in certain aspects of technique, losing the focus on the phrasing, for example. One of the most famous horn players and teachers in the country likes to say "analysis is paralysis." Some is very necessary, but too much is fatal.

The value of analysis for successful music playback cannot be validly inferred from the value of analysis for a successful musical performance. Creating a system is not like creating a performance, except that both result in music. Analysis interferes with a musical performance because the centers of the brain that mediate sensorimotor functioning are distinct from those that mediate conceptual functioning, and simultaneously activating both centers disrupts the functioning of both. It is the problem of split attention, and the impaired functioning that inevitably results from it.

This fact has no analogue in creating a playback system. The only context that resembles the mutually antagonistic relationship between analysis and performance is analysis and listening to a playback system. That is to say, successful listening can be frustrated by too much real-time analysis. But listening is not the only source of valuable information when assembling a playback system. There is also learning and reflection. And analysis does not frustrate successful learning and reflection. On the contrary, it promotes them. Which brings me to…

…one's system choices IMO should be much more artistic than scientific, the science being used in the service of the music, not indulged in for it's own sake.

I think the implied contrast here between art and science, and hence between things subjective and things objective, is a misconception both of art and science. Having spent the better part of a decade devoted to the study of one, and an equal number of years devoted to the study and practice of the other, I can say from personal experience that both art and science require their practitioners to be both subjective and objective. Put another way, the analysis of science would be impossible without a large amount of creativity, and the creativity of art would be impossible without a large amount of analysis.