Incredible Audiophile Imaging -- at a Concert!

Thank you all for the responses!

@g2the2nd Thanks for the link. Yes, a very similar effect. It’s not "real sounding", much in the same way that many producers / sound engineers are fond of panning the drum kit all the way across the sound stage. But nonetheless interesting.

@sns I realize that the way I described it, it sounds like it was very in-your-face. But it was more subtle than that. It was a very gestalt-like thing. It was in part why it took a couple of songs to perceive it. You could listen to the concert as a whole and not notice it (and in fact none of the 9 other people I was with -- of which one other was a musician -- noticed it). But once you shifted into hearing it (much like those 1980’s-era stereogram photos where you cross your eyes to see the 3D image), then you could bask in this virtual keyboard.

@corelli Yes I like the SET / full range driver analogy. I think the sheer simplicity of this sound system, the absence of the complications of reflection, and the sound engineers’ maniacal attention to detail all combined in this uber-cool way...

@ghdprentice  Incredible story!  Dumfounds me that these so called sound engineers can be so deaf and clueless as to their destruction of the music.  Hard to believe you can make a living destroying the very essence of the product you are bringing to the public.  But then, if you look around, that kind of thing is all too common now a days.  So, on second thought, sadly maybe I am not so surprised.

I have attended broadway productions locally where sound engineers totally destroyed the event.  Don’t you just love it when they jack things between 2-3khz to the point where your ears bleed!  Couldn’t wait to get home.  Sounded SO much better on my home system.

@corelli

+1

Sad, but often true.

@ghdprentice 

Profoundly sad to eliminate the natural sounds.  Have you been to Lincoln Center?

While the piano may sound 70 feet wide and therefore unrealistic, is the "listening arc" really any wider than that sitting in your living room?

I’ve heard plenty of piano recordings where the sound appears to go well beyond the speakers and certainly much wider than an actual piano in the room unless maybe I was sitting at the keyboard.