Raul with regards to your comments re: the composers and direct/reflected sound - I totally disagree!
Taking a look at auditoria from the periods of the various composers, the auditoria acoustics were specifically designed for a particular type of music.
In other words, the music and the auditoriums went together... ie: the proportion of direct to reflected sound was taken into account and planned for in the composition of the music.
Music from the earlier Mozart/Haydn period was made for halls with a short reverb time (circa 1.2s) - the halls that then and now are known for excellence with this type of music have proportions that result in this type of reverb. This also results in a dry clean clear sound - and much more precise spatial positioning...
Romantic period halls tend towards reverb times of 2s, with reverb time being greatest in the lower frequencies and least in the higher ones, emphasizing the lower frequencies and depressing the highs... a very warm, full, romantic sound.
In a concert hall, reflections take around 15ms longer to arrive at the ear than direct sound... this hugely affects the sound - short sharp dynamics (percussion) are clearly located - but any lengthy section/notes, those that focus on tone, the direct sound will be completely swamped by the reflected sound, and due to the nature of the type of sound involved, localisation is likely to be difficult if not impossible. More than 50% of the sound amplitude reaching the listener is reflected! So the "frequency response" of the reflections completely alters the performance.
Good article on that topic here:http://www.regonaudio.com/HighRomanticism.html
We do not know what the composers did or did not intend, with the exception of the occasional letters/notes left by them.
But we do know what halls they performed in, and which halls were considered "good" as opposed to "bad".
Looking at the type of halls, you can clearly seperate venues designed for baroque music from those intended for romantic - and the composers who were no dumbo's wrote music to be played in a specific environment.
With Wagner (most opera really) - any localisation / imaging is in fact coincidental - the orchestra is (or should be) in a pit - all sound reaching the audience is (or should be) indirect! - and the hall by design boosts the lower frequencies, and by comparison, depresses the highs.
The effect is one of being engulfed by waves of sound.... it is all tone and timbre with no imaging/staging. (except the vocal performers on stage - they are not in the pit...)
It seems to me that the great romantic composers were well aware of the halls and the acoustics that they were playing with, and they used it as a part of their composition.
When the music is then played differently, in a different type of space, or recorded and played back using multimike methods, the result may be pleasant, but it is not the original composition.
The only effective way of capturing a reasonable facsimile of the original composition played in one of the halls it is intended for, is a two mike setup, positioned at the listener location/seat - where it can capture the mix of reflections and direct sound in the correct proportions.
This captured sonic information can then be used to provide a reasonable facsimile of the performance in the home.
Potentially with technologies like ambisonics, and specialised ambisonics microphones, the entire acoustic event can be recorded and recreated - but as long as the capture is done in a known controlled manner at the listener location - then it becomes a matter of intelligently decoding it at the replay end. This, depending on the recording system used could involve something as simple as speaker locations, or something as complex as digital decoding with spectrum variable timing delays, head related Transfer functions etc...
Timeltel - thanks for the link to the sound processing book by the way!
Is there software that can take a sound, and by digitally processing it, position it within a virtual space - yes there is. And it is getting better every day. (some of the stuff that is possible today with relatively economical software is truly astounding!)
But will that be a reproduction of a performance - no it won't be .... instead it is a creation of a performance.
In other words, any recording that does not make the "purist" attempt to record the event at the listener location, (which may involve more than two mikes, depending on the system) is in fact engaging the recording engineer as a secondary composer/conductor.
So really we are listening to Beethoven not by Bernstein or Stokowski - but by John Doe recording engineer.
(slightly unfair, at least in Stokowski's case, he got directly involved in the engineering of his recordings, and made sure they sounded the way he wanted... but I believe this to be the exception rather than the rule)
Does and can a multimiked performance sound good? - Sure!
Is what we hear through our systems on such a recording a reasonable approximation of what the composer had in mind? I doubt it.
Is it any less valid as music - probably not - just as valid - but it is not valid to attempt to claim that it is a reflection/recording of an audio event. That is the one thing it is NOT - it is an independent composition and the composer is the recording engineer.
Much like various artists make mash-ups of previously existing pieces of art thereby creating a new piece of art in the process, so the recording engineer takes the multimiked inputs (which themselves involve a lot of art, and are offcuts / windows onto the original piece of art which is the whole composition), and builds a collage - this collage is in reality a completely new piece of art.
If what the listener is seeking is a reasonable facsimile of the original piece of art, then this method is fundamentally flawed.
But if the listener is looking for a differing art form, based on but not the same as the original piece of art, then it may have a high value.
So I posit the theory that in actual fact, many audiophiles who prefer their system/recordings to the live events, are doing this because in reality they prefer the "collage" artform over the live performance artform.
Multimiked recordings with that type of pinpoint imaging of a full blown romantic period wagnerian orchestra are in no way a reflection of Wagners art.
But as a derivative artform some of them are in fact superb.
Hmm I'm starting to meander, and repeat myself... I might stop writing now.... (probably shouldn't write too much after midnight....)
bye for now
David
Taking a look at auditoria from the periods of the various composers, the auditoria acoustics were specifically designed for a particular type of music.
In other words, the music and the auditoriums went together... ie: the proportion of direct to reflected sound was taken into account and planned for in the composition of the music.
Music from the earlier Mozart/Haydn period was made for halls with a short reverb time (circa 1.2s) - the halls that then and now are known for excellence with this type of music have proportions that result in this type of reverb. This also results in a dry clean clear sound - and much more precise spatial positioning...
Romantic period halls tend towards reverb times of 2s, with reverb time being greatest in the lower frequencies and least in the higher ones, emphasizing the lower frequencies and depressing the highs... a very warm, full, romantic sound.
In a concert hall, reflections take around 15ms longer to arrive at the ear than direct sound... this hugely affects the sound - short sharp dynamics (percussion) are clearly located - but any lengthy section/notes, those that focus on tone, the direct sound will be completely swamped by the reflected sound, and due to the nature of the type of sound involved, localisation is likely to be difficult if not impossible. More than 50% of the sound amplitude reaching the listener is reflected! So the "frequency response" of the reflections completely alters the performance.
Good article on that topic here:http://www.regonaudio.com/HighRomanticism.html
We do not know what the composers did or did not intend, with the exception of the occasional letters/notes left by them.
But we do know what halls they performed in, and which halls were considered "good" as opposed to "bad".
Looking at the type of halls, you can clearly seperate venues designed for baroque music from those intended for romantic - and the composers who were no dumbo's wrote music to be played in a specific environment.
With Wagner (most opera really) - any localisation / imaging is in fact coincidental - the orchestra is (or should be) in a pit - all sound reaching the audience is (or should be) indirect! - and the hall by design boosts the lower frequencies, and by comparison, depresses the highs.
The effect is one of being engulfed by waves of sound.... it is all tone and timbre with no imaging/staging. (except the vocal performers on stage - they are not in the pit...)
It seems to me that the great romantic composers were well aware of the halls and the acoustics that they were playing with, and they used it as a part of their composition.
When the music is then played differently, in a different type of space, or recorded and played back using multimike methods, the result may be pleasant, but it is not the original composition.
The only effective way of capturing a reasonable facsimile of the original composition played in one of the halls it is intended for, is a two mike setup, positioned at the listener location/seat - where it can capture the mix of reflections and direct sound in the correct proportions.
This captured sonic information can then be used to provide a reasonable facsimile of the performance in the home.
Potentially with technologies like ambisonics, and specialised ambisonics microphones, the entire acoustic event can be recorded and recreated - but as long as the capture is done in a known controlled manner at the listener location - then it becomes a matter of intelligently decoding it at the replay end. This, depending on the recording system used could involve something as simple as speaker locations, or something as complex as digital decoding with spectrum variable timing delays, head related Transfer functions etc...
Timeltel - thanks for the link to the sound processing book by the way!
Is there software that can take a sound, and by digitally processing it, position it within a virtual space - yes there is. And it is getting better every day. (some of the stuff that is possible today with relatively economical software is truly astounding!)
But will that be a reproduction of a performance - no it won't be .... instead it is a creation of a performance.
In other words, any recording that does not make the "purist" attempt to record the event at the listener location, (which may involve more than two mikes, depending on the system) is in fact engaging the recording engineer as a secondary composer/conductor.
So really we are listening to Beethoven not by Bernstein or Stokowski - but by John Doe recording engineer.
(slightly unfair, at least in Stokowski's case, he got directly involved in the engineering of his recordings, and made sure they sounded the way he wanted... but I believe this to be the exception rather than the rule)
Does and can a multimiked performance sound good? - Sure!
Is what we hear through our systems on such a recording a reasonable approximation of what the composer had in mind? I doubt it.
Is it any less valid as music - probably not - just as valid - but it is not valid to attempt to claim that it is a reflection/recording of an audio event. That is the one thing it is NOT - it is an independent composition and the composer is the recording engineer.
Much like various artists make mash-ups of previously existing pieces of art thereby creating a new piece of art in the process, so the recording engineer takes the multimiked inputs (which themselves involve a lot of art, and are offcuts / windows onto the original piece of art which is the whole composition), and builds a collage - this collage is in reality a completely new piece of art.
If what the listener is seeking is a reasonable facsimile of the original piece of art, then this method is fundamentally flawed.
But if the listener is looking for a differing art form, based on but not the same as the original piece of art, then it may have a high value.
So I posit the theory that in actual fact, many audiophiles who prefer their system/recordings to the live events, are doing this because in reality they prefer the "collage" artform over the live performance artform.
Multimiked recordings with that type of pinpoint imaging of a full blown romantic period wagnerian orchestra are in no way a reflection of Wagners art.
But as a derivative artform some of them are in fact superb.
Hmm I'm starting to meander, and repeat myself... I might stop writing now.... (probably shouldn't write too much after midnight....)
bye for now
David