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Out of Phase?

Has anyone stumbled on a recording they could swear is out of phase - meaning that you need to reverse the connections on ONE speaker to give the recording focus, to create a center image? I have, and I'm stunned when it happens, particularly the latest discovery - RCA LSC 1903 - Brahms Violin Concerto - Heifetz. I've had the CD for a while and I often don't pay attention to CDs, but I recently purchased the Classic Records vinyl reissue. As soon as Heifetz came in it was apparent. The violin sounded like it was coming from all over the place. I couldn’t believe it, but having run into this at least two other times (RCA – Julie Andrews – Sound of Music and a Carpenters album) I thought, well… maybe. So I reversed the connections on the right speaker. It was a little less conclusive than with the other two albums. But the violin had more focus although it was mostly clumped up behind the right speaker.

Just curious if others have run into this?

KLee
kalee

Showing 1 response by kalee

kalee OP
3 posts
 
Eldartford is right - hard to believe because it's so obvious. I've done some checking today, on my memory. Although I still think I heard an out of phase Sound of Music neither my vinyl copy nor the factory made reel-to-reel is out of phase. But, when I checked on the Carpenters I confirmed I wasn't losing my mind. The AM reel-to-reel is out of phase which I confirmed by playing the vinyl (don't know why I happen to have both of these - garage sale finds I'm sure). Anyway, it does happen, once in a great while.

And just to clarify. Newbee, I'm not talking about absolute polarity. My system's set up just fine and in phase - and I adjust absolute polarity on nearly all music I play (thanks to a cheat sheet that lists many popular record labels and whether they recorded in phase or 180 degrees out of phase - and a switch on my Plinius preamp that makes it easy to invert the polarity). Absolute polarity is subtle but you can hear it and it DOES make a difference. Once I learned to identify it I wondered why more preamps don't have the ability to correct inverted phase recordings.

The anomaly I'm talking about is a characteristic of the specific recording - which as I said, can be corrected by reversing the positive and negative on ONE speaker (thus making every other CORRECTLY recorded tape, CD, or album out of phase.)
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