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Placing Lamps Behind Speakers

I have my Vandersteen 1Cs just a touch under 2 feet away from the wall. Between them there is a very low & long media shelf upon which my various audio equipment is placed, and where I store my LPs. Mounted on the wall above that is a 50" TV.

That wall has no lighting at the moment and I'd like to place a couple of lamps on that wall. Because of how the room is set up the only viable places to put the lamps are directly behind the speakers. I figure I can place torchiere style lamps there without much impact as that the thin tubular metal shaft is relatively small up until the shade around 70" off the ground

Like this
or
like this.

I'm not terribly fond of these types of lamps and would much prefer something like a thin paper shaded lamp that produces a more diffuse light that is lower to the ground... however I'm worried about the impact upon the sound.

I'm thinking something like
this
or like
this

What do you guys think? What will the effect of these lamps be when placed behind the speakers?
greatwhitebat
johnnyb53
3,510 posts
 
None of those lamps will disrupt the sound. Longer wavelengths (bass notes) will go right through them and treble wavelengths aren't long enough to make the trip around the speaker to the back. If you're worried that they might attenuate the treble a bit, pick one of the torchieres. Torchieres *do* produce diffuse light because they bounce most of it off the ceiling in a soft spread, but the ones you linked to have so little mass I can't see them disrupting *anything.*
zd542
5,339 posts
 
"If you're worried that they might attenuate the treble a bit, pick one of the torchieres."

Don't forget that the 1C's have a gain control for the tweeter on the back of the crossover. Its a good feature to have is you don't have good placement options.

As far as the lamps go, you're probably better off using track lights instead.
greatwhitebat OP
35 posts
 
Thank you all for your info.

I would totally mount lights in the ceiling, but it's an apartment and though I've gotten away rewiring for ethernet and coaxial in the walls, as well as behind the wall wiring for the TV... I'm reluctant to start putting holes in the ceiling as well.

And I guess I'd like some light closer to the ground since that's where all the equipment is.

Thanks again everyone.
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