My vote would be the lack of funding for arts education in today's schools. First you need to hear great music in order to want to hear more great music. I went to my first professional concert after passing the Music Memory test ( all classical music BTW) in my public school music class--a required course for every sixth grade student. A bunch of us, all relatively poor kids from the country, climbed on a school bus and headed into the big city to listen to a symphony orchestra as our reward for passing the test. I still remember that night vividly. I heard beautiful live music for the first time. I bought my first vinyl rig a few years later--working summers on an Arizona cotton farm making $2.05 an hour and saving money. Never walked into a "hi-end" audio shop until I was in my 40s. I forced all my kids to study classical piano. They all wanted to quit. I didn't let them. I told them it was a gift I was giving them; they just didn't realize it yet. I also went to live concerts with my kids so they could catch the magic. These investments in my kids' musical education worked. Now, they all are music lovers with their own music collections. Their audio equipment is consistent with their current economic stations in life. I doubt hi-end audio will ever get their money but I bet mid-fi will.
What’s really hurting the audio hobby?
Maybe it’s the audio dealer experience? Where else can newbies go to get started in this hobby. Isn't that where most of you got hooked? Let me describe my latest visit to an audio store nearby. I won’t use the store name here, as that’s not the point. Where I live there is really only one audio store left. That’s strange because I live in a very wealthy community. The Friday after Independence day, me and a friend went to this local audio store. First time back there in years. We are both looking to upgrade. They have 3 audio rooms and two home theater rooms. The hi-end audio room (the store’s term) was an impressive room with extensive acoustic treatments. Mostly McIntosh gear. Sitting in the listening chair, you are looking at 600 watt Mac monoblocks running some nice tower speakers. A massive JL Audio Gotham subwoofer unit sat front and center facing the only listening chair. The McIntosh turntable was spun first. Sloooowww. It took my friend less than five seconds to point out the TT was running slow. The salesman had started to play Pink Floyd-Wish You Were Here, and it was noticeably slow. So the salesman flipped the switch to 45 rpm. Yes, that happened. He figured out it was too fast all on his own. Fiddle and poke at the TT for a bit and then the salesman said- "I’ll let them know it’s broke". Then he said he would just stream some music from a server. Bass! All you could hear was bass, and NOT good bass. He turned the subs down a little when asked, but all you could hear was tubby, muddy bass. The big tower speakers were overpowered by the sub. I really wanted to hear what the main speakers alone sounded like, but could not get the salesman to shut off the subs. On to the mid-fi room (the store’s term). The salesman tried to play us two different turntables. Neither turntable worked. One would not power up, and one was not hooked up to a system at all. Let me point out we didn’t care what source they used. I did say we both run analog and digital sources. Nothing interesting in the mid-fi room the first time through. Next room (no name) was a wall of bookshelf and small towers run by a wide selection of integrated amps. Not bad sound from some. Again, we were told this is “streaming quality audio”. This was the third time he mentioned we were listening to streaming quality audio. I took a guess at what that meant and asked if we could hear higher quality audio. So he took us back to the mid-fi room. He popped in a CD.I could not tell what CD equipment was being used. I think a Rotel integrated was selected. Everything in the cabinet was black faced behind dark glass. Not sure what CD it was either, but since he only had one, I let it go.
Big change! The Paradigm towers were now making good sounds. A big difference from his “streaming quality” demo. Next we switched to a pair of GE Triton 1s. I seriously might get a pair! They make nice sounds. By far the best thing we heard. There was more that happened that contributed to a poor experience, but I will move on.
Here is my point- What would anyone new to the hobby think of that experience? It took two seasoned audio guys pushing the salesman for over an hour before he played anything worth listening to. Would you buy anything from this place. Would you send a newbie in there? Let me know if I'm off base in thinking these audio stores are killing themselves off by the way they do business. Or is it just my misfortune that I have not been in a good dealer showroom in years?
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- 150 posts total
- 150 posts total