How close to the real thing?

My friend, a viola player ("violist") recently tried out for the "Marine Chamber Orchestra" (also known as "the President's own") so I asked him if he had ever heard a high end audio system. He said he once went to the home of a conductor who had a stereo system that "took up the whole wall" - (clearly fitting the description of the impoverished musician who is unable to afford high end audio!).

I asked him how it sounded and he said "Great!".

I then asked him if it sounded "real" and he looked puzzled and wanted to know what I meant by that. I responded that I wanted to know if it sounded like a live performance (knowing that he plays live, unamplified music in an orchestra) and he looked at me smiling and said:

"Are you kidding? Of course not! It can't, its not possible to reproduce those sounds and the sense around you."

Ed

Yup, not even 1000 Class A watts with zero NF is going to do that - "close" in so many ways, but it never really sounds like the real thing - even if the "gap" is small, it is unpassable for whatever reasons from recordings thru source thru electronics thru speakers to the way we hear. Which does not mean our equipment and recordings are not tremendously enjoyable in spite of that, or worth persuing with a spirit of fun.

I try to keep in mind that with recordings, the recording itself and how it was produced is the real thing that matters.

Remember recordings are reproductions. They can approach the real thing but probably never completely equal it. I've heard some come close enough, at least in my listening environment, that I do not care.

Most often, recordings are abstract reproductions conceived by its creators that bear little resemblance to the real thing, assuming it is even possible to ever experience that.

Are we getting somewhere?

Pubul57 states that "the "gap" is small", so I feel secure, now, in inferring that we're likely well beyond Edseas2's and other nay-sayers' 5%.

Let's look at it without prejudice: on an absolute scale, 5 of 100 per cent would produce a recording of a piano that sounded like Linus' toy instrument. We have far better playback than that today and have for many years.

The indisputable fact that we have no way to measure the more far-reaching and seemingly esoteric or obscure aspects of our marvelous minds' response capability does not reduce the joy of listening --or the pleasure of a fine and pointed discourse, for that matter.

'Progress', as Kirkus and Atmasphere describe it, *is* happening, whether Edseas or his violist friend accept it. We're beyond 5%, like it or don't.

Luddites were against technology on a religious basis: in philosophy there is no religion, nor is there, directly, religion in scientific reasoning (at least at our present level of understanding; there may be marvel or regard, but that is different: vis Hocking's "Into the Universe").

Edsea2's objection to the 5% solution appears unscientific, and though some of the more esoteric tweaks in our endeavor appear to revolve around witchcraft, I don't care: if my listening experienced is enhanced toward my goal of playback sounding more like live music, I don't care what kind of "weird sh*t" goes into, is placed upon, or comes out of my transducers.

If you can't quantify it, but it works with concensus or others' verification, that simply means our science lags behind our listening pleasure in the ability to measure what sounds convincingly authentic to the live source.

Is that a bad state of affairs? Not knowing why something works?

I submit that having something work --well beyond 5% efficacy-- is cause for celebration. I'm grateful for the pleasure and solace, not to mention the mood-changing opportunity that my music system offers me.

I've thought about it, been frustrated by it, and exhilarated as I learned to 'tune' it to [something approaching] its potential. I enjoy learning, talking and writing about it. The delight it gives me, however, comes from listening into the music, and out of myself.

Best Wishes for Festivus, whichever flavor you prefer. May there be satisfaction in your listening, and joy in your heart.

David

5%, fwiw, is seemingly extraordinarily generous - at least to the ears of a trained violist and, at least according to him.

In a later part of the same conversation I asked him if he thought that it were possible to reproduce "even 5%" of the musical reality of a live unamplified performance based on what he heard from the conductor's system.

His simple response was "No, not even close to 5% - much less than 1%."

But, then again, he doesn't have CDK84's incredibly in-depth knowledge of today's stereo systems - he's just a trained concert violist so he must not know much, after all.

:)

Ed