Professional vs. Consumer speakers

The reason I got into high-end audio was because I was looking for speakers for my recording studio and found that the "pro" models sounded vastly inferior to what was available on the better consumer end of the spectrum. The B&Ws/Dynaudios/Dunlavys/etc. had way more detail, less fatigue, tigher bass than the Tannoys/Events/KRK/etc. In other words it was easier to get good mixes that translate to home systems if you are using high quality home speakers.

P.S. I have a friend that works at Westlake Studios that heard my B&W system and was blown away with the more natural sound. He said "This is what they want our rooms to sound like but how do they expect us to do it with their speakers?" No joke.

My brief experience as a "consultant" (supposedly, I knew something about how 19th century English choral music was supposed to sound...) for a small studio/production company introduced me to many of the realities of the recording industry touched upon by jvia in his excellent post, above. I was amazed by the variety of reproducers available even in that small facility and the extent to which the final mix was determined by the company's understanding of the target market for each CD. Critical listening was done on "pro monitors" but final mixes were chosen based on the sound coming out of all sorts of things including $14 Sony headsets and "SuperMegaBassBoost" boomboxes.

"We make it sound as good as we can on the type of equipment our market research shows it's going to be played on."

You know what was missing, of course: Anything in the way of high-end speakers. The owners' attitude: "It's a niche market; we can't afford to mix for it."

Alas, the few "niche market" studios that try hard to produce audiophile recordings so often lack the resources to hire real world-class players resulting in luscious recordings of mediocre performances.

(sigh)

will

I just wanted to add another "professional" opinion to this
post. I have owned a video editing and media duplication
company for nearly 13 years; and have owned a number of
"pro" type monitors for use in our studios, as well as number of well known home speaker brands, such as Thiel, NHT, AR, etc.
Many - if not most - of the smaller and less expensive
(under $2K) speakers seem to be built for near-field listening; with placement on a console or in a control room
environment. This is NOT the way most audiophiles listen to
their music - and when using this type of speaker, the results are sometimes less than rewarding. I will not even
discuss the fact that many of the better known "pro" speakers sound dead and unmusical to my ears. Many of the lower priced "pro" monitors also seem to be built with playback at high levels more of a consideration than any
sort of "musicality".
And while some companies - such as Westlake - do make
audiophile type pro monitors; I feel thay are the exception.
The bottom line for me is that since most of my clients don't record their audio tracks at high levels - we seem to
have more "ear-pleasing" results with monitors from AR, NHT,
etc. than with the "pro" monitors. And at home I listen to
Thiels and NHTs.

Thank you for the varied responses. It looks like this is not as simple as I'd hoped. So the near-field monitors are out. Maybe main monitors would be okay. It is hard to find these kind of speakers to audition.
I have read J. Gordon Holt's reviews of Westlake and ATC and he was really for the "pro" speakers as consumer speakers were overly lush and lacked the harshness that real world music really has.
One thing with pro speakers that I think is more universally agreed on being a good thing are the active designs.