2. analog
  3. 1108263461

What's wrong with classical music on vinyl?

As I go through my collection of classical music on vinyl, and get new ones from record stores and eBay, I notice that I am not impressed with the sound quality. Most of my pop music albums sound fine. The classical (even sealed), on the other hand, sounds full of static, noise, and pops that completely drown out the music. The rubber surrounds on my woofers ripple visibly, and the more intense passages become distorted (particulary the brass instruments). (And yes, I've tried it with minimal volume, to test the feedback theory, and with the same results.) I've tried extensive record cleaning with some of the most recommended products. On the other hand, my non-classical music sounds fine. Madonna, Yes, and Simon and Garfunkel play fine. So do Crosby Stills + Nash, REM, and Nickelback.

The only thing I can think of is that the classical music tends to be recorded at a much lower volume, thereby causing a low signal to noise ratio, whereas the pop music is inherently recorded at a higher volume, and this helps to drown out the noise.

I'm beginning to think that I should stick to CD's or brand-new 200g LP's for classical music from here on.

Any comments/suggestions?
sufentanil
rushton's avatar
rushton
2,445 posts
 
Eldartford and Psychicanimal, please let us not hijack this thread into a CD versus LP debate; there is no constructive benefit. Sufentanil is enjoying both media. His experience with pop vinyl is very satisfying. His experience with used classical vinyl is not matching up to the experience of some others. If you can contribute something as to why his system may not be playing classical vinyl as well as many others with moderately priced vinyl playback systems, then please chime in.

Psychicanimal, I appreciate your comment that you too find more surface noise in classical music vinyl on your system than you're willing to listen through. That's somewhat consistent with comments Raquel shared, and this may ultimately mark the direction Sufentail needs to pursue to meet his needs. It is not my experience.
.
newbee
4,798 posts
 
This will not resolve the (again) growing format dispute on this thread, however FWIW, IMHO, there are great silient LP's out there, new and old, and a lot of noisy LP's, of revered musical performances and audiophile junk. Ditto on CD's. The only truly significant difference, other than musical content, is in the warts that each system brings to the table.

What counts, to me at least, is being able to listen thru the "warts" and hear the music in any format. For example, if you can't hear Carlos Kleiber's performance of B5 because its on DG, or its on vinyl, or its on digital, my heart goes out to you!

I appoligize for the rant, but this type of endless format abuse kinda gets my goat a bit. :-)
cello
645 posts
 
.
Styx,
.
Which ZYX cartridge do you get ?
.
Rgds,
Larry
.
styx
37 posts
 
Cello,

I have the R-100FXH.
logenn
91 posts
 
I have a classical library of appx 2000 LP's mostly recorded in the 60's anf 70's and carefully selected for the artistic performance, not the sound quality of the recording.
Although I am using a top notch turntable, I have used lesser vinyl rigs and never experienced your problems. While listening to an LP has its limitations, I have never been able to connect to the music with digital to the same degree as vinyl, and my current digital isn't bad-Audio Note/CEC.
If your vinyl rig is properly set up, which can't be emphasised enough, you would be singing a different tune (no pun intented). Also you need to adopt a diciplined proceedure for cleaning, storing and preping LP's.
Your comments indicated that you haven't been properly schooled in using a turntable.
Does anyone know of a vinyl 101 course? All kidding aside, someone needs to mentor you in the process.
More to discover