@fleschler
Realistic to what? A live performance or a recording stage/studio recording?
Neither, specifically. I was more interested in if you, as a listener, felt like a recording sounded quite similar to a live instrument/voice. Venue certainly influences the reverberation, but if you have been to a live event of any kind, you know what a real instrument/voice sounds like regardless of reverberation. So, that's what I'm soliciting: recordings that you believe (based on your hearing) very similar sonic characteristics to what you would expect from listening to a real instrument/person. I would like to try these on my system to see if I experience the same.
Hope that makes mores sense.
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@lrlacosse
As I've thought about it more, another reason I'm avoiding the equipment in the conversation is because I want folks who might not have the most amazing equipment to have a say in this. If they've had a great experience and have something to share, I respect that! A real (enough) experience does not equate to dollars spent on a high-end system and I don't want folks debating over that.
And I take back what I said above by implying that you have to "have gear I could only dream of [to] make music reproduction simply amazing". I can't say this is a necessity, or rather, I hope it's not ;-)
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Thank you, @achipo! I will look into those.
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Realistic recordings seem to be few and far between. I think that in my collection there are examples of overall realistic sounding recordings, and sometimes an example of a recording where one instrument seems very realistic.
Very grateful for the response, @roxy54 ! This was my suspicion as well. So, I'm grateful for some examples of what to look at.
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I will dig into that more, @bdp24 ! Thank you!
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@fatdaddy2
To start, audiophile < > music lover, although there is an intersection on the Venn diagram
You're right that "audiophile" tends to have a different, more extreme connotation nowadays (we're all crazy in our own ways lol). We can certainly argue all the different ways this word can be applied, but technically speaking, we have audio+phile. The suffix "-phile", as we know, means "lover of" or "someone who likes something very much". So, say what you will, but I prefer the simplest meaning of the word: "Lover of audio". I love great sounding, well recorded music and if there's something in the recording that's supposed to be there, I hope my system will reproduce it well. I certainly hope the same for you. Enjoy the music!
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@edcyn, exactly. That seems to be a common challenge. And I don't mean this to be just about piano recordings. I'm interested in all kinds of live recordings, vocal, instrumental, solo, ensemble, etc.
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@simonmoon, I appreciate you sharing this, because it certainly does make a difference. I guess I'd say I'm not asking for either one specifically, but all of it. If, they sound real to you (i.e., if you were in the room with Art Land and Rubisa Patrol), then I'd hope the recording gave you that accurate sonic impression. I'd expect you could hear more overtones, sympathetic vibrations, and more distinct imaging in a smaller venue. For the larger venue, the sonic experience is going to be different where it feels more like a wave of sound because of all the reflections & reverb. I wouldn't really expect any recording to sound like you are the one playing the instrument.
I'm good with both kinds of suggestions. So, thank you! Any specific recommendations are appreciated which, to you, sound like the recording engineers did a great job at accurately capturing the experience.
It's also interesting that you explicitly call out Deutsche Gramophone because it came up in another thread about a real sounding piano as a good example. I appreciate both perspectives.
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Thanks, @twoleftears ! Will check it out!
@simonmoon
Maybe they were referring to tone, timbre, dynamics, detail and such.
Could be. I haven't had a chance to hear it yet, but I'm looking into it as well.
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Thank you, @mceljo , @georgeab , and @mrdecibel ! Will definitely look into all those!
I love all the input I’m seeing so far!
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@tom8999, I'm with you there. This is great to hear so many ideas for well-captured recordings. I'm excited to add all of these to my collection.
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@twoleftears
One other thing to consider: most people don't listen at home to piano recordings at the same volume as if they were sitting ten feet away from a grand piano. So try this: establish a "comfortable" listening level, then inch the volume up slightly.
I completely agree with you. Finding the right volume level helps tremendously, I've noticed.
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Thanks @herbreichert, @dekay, @bdp24, @tkhill, and @gg107! (apologies if I've missed someone so far, I'm struggling to keep up with all the great suggestions! ;-)
As folks share, if you have a link to some site that at least shows what the album looks like, that would really help me out a lot. Thank you!
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@fstein
It's not the recording. It's the speakers.
We both know that speakers are the weakest link in the audio reproduction chain. That's kind of why I left speakers (or electronics, or room, or setup, etc.) out of my question, because I don't want the infinite variety of gear to dominate the conversation. Every piece of hardware, from the moment the sound wave hits the microphone's diaphragm, to the time a new soundwave is created by the speaker, changes the signal to some degree so that what we end up hearing is not quite what was originally produced. Some pieces of gear affect it more, others less so. I think we can all agree on that. This is why I left my question more subjective.
I want to hear if you feel like you have heard a recording, whether on your system or elsewhere, that you felt sounded more real than not. Because, if you have heard something like that, then someone else might, too, even on a different system from yours! It might be the clarity and soundstage of the presentation, it might be the ambience was captured particularly well, it could be that the relative dynamics from each "voice" (whether human or instrument) was as balanced as if heard in person, it could be that you felt that "full body" experience you get when you are at an in-person event. It's up to you! If you've had that experience, I'd love to know what you heard so that I can try it out, too.
@lrlacosse
Ahh!! The search for the Holy Grail! That's why we are all here!
It could be. I like great sounding music. Sometimes I'm really in the mood to hear something as if live, but not most of the time. Any suggestions for me of something you heard that had a more realistic feeling?
@larry5729, @snilf, @manogolf, and @bdp24 thank you for all those suggestions!
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@lrlacosse
I have not read every post of this thread and know you did not want this to be a pissing contest for everyones audio gear but a recording could be the best possible in the world. If you do not play back on quality audio gear you will not hear it properly.
I don’t disagree at all, but in a way, that’s my purpose here. I know there are folks here that have gear I could only dream of that make music reproduction simply amazing (i.e., a well-recorded, live event sounds really authentic). I know I’m not there yet in a number of ways, which is why I am soliciting ideas for tracks I can use to check my own system--something to look forward to, if you will. If I only have tracks that have mediocre recording quality, my gear, no matter how good, will only appear to sound mediocre. I certainly won’t only listen to great, live-recorded music, but when I do, I hope to experience it in all its glory.
Hope that makes sense.
And thank you for your suggestion about searching in Discogs!
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Very grateful to everyone for the many new recommendations!
And, yes, it does seem to lend to the idea that if the recording is not directly of instruments or voices (i.e., no singing/playing into microphones that are then reproduced through a PA, which is then captured by a recording mic; no digital synthesizer; etc.), then it would be difficult to produce a "live" sound. Maybe I'm over-constraining the opportunity.
It also seems likely that a direct-to-disc recording would have the least amount of processing involved as well, which could possibly capture the most untainted signal. However, I sincerely appreciate that there are many recommendations here that have made it to the digital form (i.e., CD) and yet still have some of that magic preserved. I'm admittedly a newbie when it comes to vinyl though I've heard the many wonderful characteristics. I've also only started getting into the DSD variety.
Finally, I really am capturing all these recommendations into a spreadsheet that I plan to share with everyone. Given some of the missing pieces of data, it may seem sparse in some places, but hopefully I've captured everyone's recommendations so far clearly enough for one to do find the album/track/label.
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@axeis1
There is no Audio Gear that sounds like live music. There’s no video that looks like being there. There is no resolution that approaches real.
Pretty sure we're all in agreement on this thought.
With everything I've learned, I don't doubt that it is possible to recreate a sound like live music, though. In other words, it gets the listener close enough. That doesn't it mean it is exactly like live music. I get that. That's what prompted my initial question. I was curious to hear from others who have been doing this longer than I if they've ever had an experience that ever resembled a live sound. Our brains are clever enough that we can "suspend disbelief" if we let it and it can feel live.
Will we ever get to the point that a system absolutely fools me into believing that real life musicians playing real instruments and singing are there when they really aren't? I guess we'll see. It feels like we have some ways to go yet. With the feedback I've gotten here, it sounds like some people have nearly had such an experience and that's pretty exciting to me. Live sound is a full-body experience, not just an experience for our ears. I think it would be cool to experience that from a sound system just for the fun of it.
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Thanks everyone for the recent comments. I'm loving the suggestions.
@kefas, thanks for pointing out the one-mic recordings. That sounds very intriguing and I will definitely look into that.
Forgive my ignorance, but I must ask a technology question (and if you don't know, that's ok). How does one mic capture and preserve the left-to-right soundstage/imaging? Does it have something to do with the capsule count/positioning within the one microphone? I can understand how it can capture some amount of depth, but it's unclear to me how it can preserve width. Anyone know how this works?
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