Question on FR 66s

This is likely to elicit another novella from Raul, but I think Suteetat hit upon something that I too think is very significant with respect to the question, "What makes the music sound real", in my listening room. When music is produced directly from an instrument or a vocalist, there are harmonics generated, both up and down the audio frequency spectrum. These come from resonances in the body of the instrument or of the singer, from room surfaces, the floor, etc. (Yes, real live music is partially composed of resonant frequencies produced en passant. Killing all resonance is not necessarily "good".) My thesis is that because microphones are not linear in their response with respect to sound pressure and with respect to bandwidth, much of this natural wide bandwidth energy is lost from the signal that gets to the tape or to the digital recorder. Thus downstream components of the reproductive chain that add benign harmonic distortion are not necessarily bad but can in fact serve to restore some of the "body" of the original performance. Thus very low THD solid state devices can indeed sound sterile. It's not that they have a sterile coloration necessarily, altho some do; it's more that they can be "too perfect". It seems to me we all know this, and it's what we are discussing. Why the best tube gear portrays a sense of depth and 3D that I don't hear with solid state is still a mystery to me, however. Perhaps that's another "distortion" I prefer. Then too, I have not auditioned everything available. Wasn't this thread about tonearms? Sorry.

Lewm, This thread is representative of life.
You never know what is around the corner.

Nandric, In order to repeat oneself, it is absolutely necessary to write or say the same thing twice. Otherwise, one is not repeating oneself. We have no choice. Three times is inexcusable, I agree.

Lewn, that's exactly what I am thinking as well.
There was a thread awhile ago I think on audio asylum regarding professional gear and recording studio. Supposedly someone talked to Bob Ludwig (I think it was him or may be another major recording engineer) who said that he had compared live mike feed, DSD recording and analogue tape recording from the same mike feed and found that DSD is the closest to live mike feed but analogue tape sounded better. However, he did not say which sounded closest to the actual event nor did he say how it was better.

I found some digital recording that was then made into LPs sounded slightly different from its CD counter part but did not add anything much more and I generally prefer CD just for the ease of use. Some digital recordings such as DG Zimermann's Chopin ballades sounded quite dreadful on CD but rather good on LP. The more recent SFO Mahler Cycle with Michael Tilson Thomas and Paavo Jarvi Beethoven symphonies cycle were recorded in DSD but I found the LPs more enjoyable eventhough the SACDs are already very good. I think Jarvi's recording was remastered again specially for LP so it is not exactly the same as SACD but not sure about SFO Mahler's one.

Or express a point on a 'reference', rather than keep talking about the virtue of a component several times.