AudioCircle
Industry Circles => Bryston Limited => Topic started by: James Tanner on 22 Nov 2008, 01:26 pm
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Hi All,
"Everyones ears are different" - I hear (no pun intended) this all the time and I thought it might make a great topic for discussion.
Lets say 3 of us go to listen to an unamplified trio with a set of drums, a saxophone and a piano. We then go to each persons home and listen to a CD of that very same recording on each of our own audio systems. Would there be a consensus among the 3 of us as to which system sounded the closest to the original live recording we just heard?
Is it not really more a matter of 'we all have different preferences' rather than 'everyones ears are different'?
james
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It would be easier to determine using the live performannce as a reference. If one to use the CD as the reference it would be then be subjective to the listeners preference. IMO preferences will come into play more when live unamplified music is used as the reference.
Every time we have conducted this we ALL were so disappointed in the reproduction it hurts, nothing like the real deal.
As far as the ears being different probably falls into th equation. How much ? Not qualified to answer that.
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I think the question is if 3 buddies have been exposed to the sound of live, unamplified and unprocessed acoustic instruments sufficiently in their lives for their brains to establish reference and be able to recognize such sound. If this is the case then without any question there would be consensus among the 3 what system sounds closest to live event.
If on the other hand they had their brains wired based on reproduced sound with very little exposure to live sound then inevitably there would be disagreements.
They will base their judgment on specific colorations and distortions they find pleasing.
Take wine for example, how many people, especially in North America, have appreciation for wines, and can differentiate wines with low margin of error based on grape, area, etc.
How can a person that never tasted east coast ocean water say if bottled salted ionized water tastes like that ocean?
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James,
I think there are a couple of factors here:
1. People have different levels of experience and different reference points. Even if each person heard the same thing (see point 2), I don't think they would always describe what they heard in the same way.
2. I believe (I am certainly no expert on this topic) that we do hear differently. Some people hear "better" than others in general. Most of us lose our ability to hear higher frequencies as we get older or if we damage our ears. I don't believe these differences are extremely large, but they are significant enough for us to hear the same music and process it differently.
When you add up the physical aspects of hearing things differently, with people's personal experiences and preferences, we get into a situation where there is very varied comments and opinions.
At least that's what I think. aa
BTW, this is a great topic for discussion and it might get more views and posts if it was over in Audio Central instead of the Bryston Circle.
George
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OK lets try this. Given that we all have different experiences with listening to music or better or worst hearing abilities as stated above.
The same 3 guys stand in front of a household FAN and we stick a piece of cardboard through that fan while it's rotating? The cardboard gets shredded and we record the sound onto a CD.
We then take that CD and play it on 3 different audio systems. Would not the system that was the 'most accurate' reproduce that shedding sound of cardboard through a fan more accurately and everyone would agree? Even if our hearing mechanisms were different regarding frequency response etc. the reproduced sound would be relevant to our own specific hearing acuity's. So in other words the more accurate system would be more accurate to each of us?
james
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OK lets try this. Given that we all have different experiences with listening to music as stated above.
The same 3 guys stand in front of a household FAN and we stick a piece of cardboard through that fan while it's rotating? The cardboard gets shredded and we record the sound onto a CD.
We then take that CD and play it on 3 different audio systems. Would not the system that was the 'most accurate' reproduce that shedding sound of cardboard through a fan more accurately and everyone would agree? Even if our hearing mechanisms were different regarding frequency response etc. the reproduced sound would be relevant to our own specific hearing acuity's. So in other words the more accurate system would be more accurate to each of us?
james
James,
I would hope that the most accurate system would be apparent to all people, but my experience has shown that not to be the case. You have lots of experience, what are your observations?
George
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Mitch Albom's ears are different....
(http://cache.daylife.com/imageserve/01Wg6193K52FD/610x.jpg)
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OK lets try this. Given that we all have different experiences with listening to music or better or worst hearing abilities as stated above.
The same 3 guys stand in front of a household FAN and we stick a piece of cardboard through that fan while it's rotating? The cardboard gets shredded and we record the sound onto a CD.
We then take that CD and play it on 3 different audio systems. Would not the system that was the 'most accurate' reproduce that shedding sound of cardboard through a fan more accurately and everyone would agree? Even if our hearing mechanisms were different regarding frequency response etc. the reproduced sound would be relevant to our own specific hearing acuity's. So in other words the more accurate system would be more accurate to each of us?
james
Very good example, we are dealing here with sound were mentioned HF hearing differences play no role.
Taking into the consideration the experience of 3 guys as described previously, absolutely yes, there will be agreement on the most accurate system.
Example, I listened to live performance of a large choir supported by a few acoustic instruments, which was at the same time recorded with a pair of mics, digitized at 24/192.
I took that raw recording and played on few systems, so whatever mics picked up was there.
It was very easy to hear shortcoming of each system in reference to live performance , and those shortcomings were universally agreeable.
On the other hand those that did not witness this specific live performance and/or had limited exposure to live sound were of opinions that somewhat differed.
There is no question about it, just consider how many people are convinced there is no difference between redbook and 320kbps compressed files, not to mention higher resolutions, unfortunately majority of consumers fall into that camp.
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All of my systems have fooled my cats to think there are birds in the speakers, people are not fooled so easily. Unfortunately I cant afford a system that might fool me.
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James,
Great topic!
Like others have stated, we all have our own unique hearing signature based on the physical construction of our ears and real life experience/attacks on our inner ear. We then establish individual preferences due to those two factors. This together with the frequency response emitted from speakers and room environment interaction will create different conclusions by the participants involved in providing listening comparison impressions.
How big the differences are depends…on all the above in degrees. I personally like to have other folks, whom I have gotten to know and recognize their preferences, with me when I perform an in-depth evaluation of a new piece of equipment. We have all added to each other’s overall assessment of the listening experience.
So, what may be one person’s accurate system may be another’s way to bright system and another’s dull system.
I wonder what Lester William Polsfuss (aka Less Paul) would comment about this. Afterall, he became not only a legendary guitar player but also a master recording enigeer. He learned how to get just the right sound using different rooms and bed mattresses in a house to produce various acoustic voicings. He started doing this in the late 40’s and then went on to pioneer many of the technological advances being used in studios today.
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I think it is a little bit of both....
If everyone went and got their ears critically measured, I'd bet we all have a db or two
difference at various points. So if my hearing has a 1/2 db boost at 10k and yours has
a 1/2 db dip there, the speaker I think is a little bright would probably sound a little different,
etc, etc.
Also, throwing accuracy out the window, most people usually have a preference of the
way they like their system to sound. Even if your system is bright or whatever if that's your
preference, it's ok.
One of my staff members was hearing my system for the first time and he said,
"your system is way too musical" I like to hear every single wart in the recording
and peel the paint off the walls with detail...
But, once you know what someone else likes, it's a lot easier to make a suggestion
to what they should check out for their system. That's what makes reviewing such an
iffy process. If I knew exactly what you liked, it's easy to suggest more for you to listen
to.
Kind of like when you order a CD on Amazon and they make suggestions based on that....
Definitely a great post!
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Hi Jeff,
Thanks for the input. I realize I am speaking in hypothetical’s here because no speaker or system is perfect and I will exaggerate to make a point but...
Let’s assume that your hearing is dead flat at 10K as you suggest above and mine is 3dB down at 10K.
We both listen to a live singer in a room and record her voice. Then we listen to that voice recording on a playback audio system that is also dead flat at 10K.
Would we not both agree (even though our hearing is different) that the dead flat audio system was in fact more accurate? Conversely if the audio system had a 3dB dip at 10K then it would sound dull to both of use because it would be down 3dB from our personal reference point based on the live voice experience? Down 3dB for you because your hearing is dead flat at 10K and down 3dB for me as well (for me a total of 6dB from flat because my hearing is already down 3dB at 10K)?
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Let's not forget the fairly-easily replicated experiment done by Sennheiser 20-odd years ago where they had a number of engineers listen to a performance of an instrumental ensemble while it was recorded on numerous pairs of tracks, each pair originating from miniature (Sennheiser) microphones worn stethoscope-style within the ears of each engineer. In this binaural mic, which is configured like a stethoscope, the sensing elements are very small, enabling them to be positioned near the ear drums, and not particularly impeding the passage of sound waves down the ear canal in the process.
On auditioning the results, each engineer was very easily able to tell which track pair originated from his ears. Apparently the sounds as influenced by the pinnae were very different from each other.
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I have a theory I don't really believe in and have no evidence for, but here goes:
Do you know those "Magic Eye" kind of pictures where you far-focus your eyes and these amazing, hidden images come off the page in all their 3D glory?
I wonder if people posess different levels of this in their hearing - And maybe experienced audiophiles have the ability to somehow alter or access a different kind of hearing that gives us that eerie brain-visual disconnect when a system really images well.
I think this "super-hearing" or state of extra-enhanced attentiveness uses parts of the brain that, for some reason, just gives us pleasure that isn't acheived by the average listener.
In the same way that a motorcycle ride relaxes by actually having the mind process tons in information -
"The Zone" feels good however you get there - It's kinda cool that we can do it with music!
-Mike
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Shape of the outer ear most definitely influences how you hear and process sound. Try this experiment - listen to a track of music like you normally would. The restart the track and listen to it with you hands cupped behind your ears. Sounds different. Same is true for the changes in ear shape from person to person.
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Shape of the outer ear most definitely influences how you hear and process sound. Try this experiment - listen to a track of music like you normally would. The restart the track and listen to it with you hands cupped behind your ears. Sounds different. Same is true for the changes in ear shape from person to person.
Yes but if you cupped your ears at the live recording venue would it sound the same using cupped ears with the most accurate sound system?
james
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If the playback system is absolutely perfect, with zero deviations from the sound of live music, then you are correct the "perfectly accurate" system will sound the same as the original event to everyone.
My point is that there is no "perfect" playback system currently, so every single one of them deviates in "some" way from live sound. Where these deviations occur is different from one system to the next.
Different ears mean we have different sensitivities to these deviations. So, someone with a high level of sensitivity to odd order harmonic distortion might prefer the sound of a tube based system, even though a tube system may have more overall distortion.
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Interesting discussion, but it seems to me everyone dwells on frequency response flatness.
If reproduction chain is not capable of producing natural dynamic levels, rounds leading edges, creates artificially long decays, etc., it will sound nothing like live event no matter how flat it is in frequency domain.
Or even if it does everything perfectly well, but is flat on axis only with serious deviations off-axis, it will sound nothing like live event (unless listened to in an anechoic chamber I guess).
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Another thing that has not been mentioned is that no recording method, even the most audiophile stringent, can capture the live event in the same way that our ears perceive the world. The most one can hope for is a recording that does the least damage to the music, that contributes to our "suspension of disbelief" regarding our enjoyment of the performance. The same could be said for the playback chain.
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Agreed, recorded music is by nature artificial. The best we can hope to do is to create a compelling, involving musical event at home. It might not ever be exactly the same as the live event, but it can still be great, nonetheless.
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I have to confess I rarely go to live events and when I do they are usually loud and not audiophile quality so a "live event" is not what I'm shooting for in my system. What I'm after is a look into the artists (producers) intention.
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Agreed, recorded music is by nature artificial. The best we can hope to do is to create a compelling, involving musical event at home. It might not ever be exactly the same as the live event, but it can still be great, nonetheless.
This is true, and with the Bryston gear, we get great results :D
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I have to confess I rarely go to live events and when I do they are usually loud and not audiophile quality so a "live event" is not what I'm shooting for in my system. What I'm after is a look into the artists (producers) intention.
How can live event be loud and "not audiophile"?
Live means not amplified.
I have never heard an orchestra, big or small, close or distand, to be too loud, or not beeing pleasing?
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Vegasdave,
Agreed! I used to own a 3b-ST and Bryston gear is solid, solid, solid. Very little coloration and great dynamics. If I owned it now I'd probably never sell it. But, audiophilia is a process and I sold my 3b-st a long time ago....
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Here’s an observation you might find interesting about a reviewer’s comments involving three highly priced and regarded speakers. “Each of these speakers has a distinctive characteristic that both sets it apart from the crowd and is obvious enough to polarize listeners. The very trait one person may highly value, causing big grins or even necessitating a mandatory purchase, another may consider a total turn-off. For example, the Speaker A throws luscious, intimate images and is somewhat lenient with inferior source material. Some people may consider Speaker A a little too mellow. On the opposite side of the spectrum, Speaker B can be intensely dynamic and incisive, and that might be too much of a good thing. Speaker C is amazingly quick and clean, but some may think it comes across as aloof or cool. Rather than buy first and try later, I would suggest a thorough audition to decide if their sonic priorities align with yours.” Based on those comments, how is one to determine the most “accurate sounding system” to a live musical performance?
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I have to confess I rarely go to live events and when I do they are usually loud and not audiophile quality so a "live event" is not what I'm shooting for in my system. What I'm after is a look into the artists (producers) intention.
How can live event be loud and "not audiophile"?
Live means not amplified.
I have never heard an orchestra, big or small, close or distand, to be too loud, or not beeing pleasing?
Well I was going to put a sentence in there stating I don't listen to much classical music. Live events means loud amplified concerts where the spectacle is the event as much as the music. Even small clubs where you can't have a converstion with the person next to you without shouting.
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Hi Jeff,
Thanks for the input. I realize I am speaking in hypothetical’s here because no speaker or system is perfect and I will exaggerate to make a point but...
Let’s assume that your hearing is dead flat at 10K as you suggest above and mine is 3dB down at 10K.
We both listen to a live singer in a room and record her voice. Then we listen to that voice recording on a playback audio system that is also dead flat at 10K.
Would we not both agree (even though our hearing is different) that the dead flat audio system was in fact more accurate? Conversely if the audio system had a 3dB dip at 10K then it would sound dull to both of use because it would be down 3dB from our personal reference point based on the live voice experience? Down 3dB for you because your hearing is dead flat at 10K and down 3dB for me as well (for me a total of 6dB from flat because my hearing is already down 3dB at 10K)?
I think that would be true, but it's much more complicated than that. Frequency response is not everything...
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Hi Jeff,
Thanks for the input. I realize I am speaking in hypothetical’s here because no speaker or system is perfect and I will exaggerate to make a point but...
Let’s assume that your hearing is dead flat at 10K as you suggest above and mine is 3dB down at 10K.
We both listen to a live singer in a room and record her voice. Then we listen to that voice recording on a playback audio system that is also dead flat at 10K.
Would we not both agree (even though our hearing is different) that the dead flat audio system was in fact more accurate? Conversely if the audio system had a 3dB dip at 10K then it would sound dull to both of use because it would be down 3dB from our personal reference point based on the live voice experience? Down 3dB for you because your hearing is dead flat at 10K and down 3dB for me as well (for me a total of 6dB from flat because my hearing is already down 3dB at 10K)?
I think that would be true, but it's much more complicated than that. Frequency response is not everything...
I realize frequency response is not everything I was trying to focus the discussion on one aspect so we could agree or disagree on what is common, or not to us all.
james
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OK change of course: Maybe we could compare it to watching a football game.
Lets say the 3 of us are at the stadium watching our favorite football team. The colour of the sweaters are purple, black and grey.
We go to a Future Shop on the way home and there are 3 TV's on display showing hightlights of the game we were just at. Would we all agree that one of the TV's had better rendition of the purple, black and grey ...... even if my perception of purple was slightly different then yours due to my particular eyesights colour capabilities?
james
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Hehe, go over to the videophile forum at avscience and there's massive arguments around vision and reproductions of video. The fact is that audio is more ephemeral than video, and thus even more difficult to nail down to any sort of objective standard, particularly if end user preferences are taken into account.
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Hehe, go over to the videophile forum at avscience and there's massive arguments around vision and reproductions of video. The fact is that audio is more ephemeral than video, and thus even more difficult to nail down to any sort of objective standard, particularly if end user preferences are taken into account.
Hi Tyson,
Gee I was afraid of that!
james
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Not only that, but preferences change. To continue or video example (again, assuming there is no perfect reproduction of video currently), I used to prefer to sacrifice a bit of brightness in order to have better black levels (a common tradeoff), but now I find that I prefer a brighter picture with less dense black levels. So goes the nature of end user preferences.....
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OK change of course: Maybe we could compare it to watching a football game.
Lets say the 3 of us are at the stadium watching our favorite football team. The colour of the sweaters are purple, black and grey.
We go to a Future Shop on the way home and there are 3 TV's on display showing hightlights of the game we were just at. Would we all agree that one of the TV's had better rendition of the purple, black and grey ...... even if my perception of purple was slightly different then yours due to my particular eyesights colour capabilities?
james
Nope, that's a much worse comparison because people don't perceive color the same. And you are dealing
with reflective color vs. transmitted color (ie. the color you see on the sweater is made up of light bouncing
off of it and the TV screen is passing light through it to create the color) The backlit image will always appear
more rich, no matter what. It's like comparing prints to transparencies on a light box.
While I can understand the quest for accuracy as a great place to start, it's still going to come down to user
preferences in the end. The people that like your gear (or anyone elses for that matter) will buy the presentation
they enjoy the best.
I can live with that..
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OK change of course: Maybe we could compare it to watching a football game.
Lets say the 3 of us are at the stadium watching our favorite football team. The colour of the sweaters are purple, black and grey.
We go to a Future Shop on the way home and there are 3 TV's on display showing hightlights of the game we were just at. Would we all agree that one of the TV's had better rendition of the purple, black and grey ...... even if my perception of purple was slightly different then yours due to my particular eyesights colour capabilities?
james
TV is a much better example for me as I actually gave it some thought. I used to stand in front of a wall of different TVs when I worked at a casino. TVs were used for simulcast horse racing.
Having seen the reference we probably could agree on which TV was the closest to the actual event. It is the small 8" screen. Not having seen the actual event, we have variations on how green the field should be, or we may agree on the color of the field but have different opinions on the hues of the colored teams jerseys. And thus we can't agree on which TV has the right settings.
Even though the 8" screen is the most accurate. People then have variations on which TV they prefer to watch. Some will watch the small screen as accuracy in color is more important. Some will pick the TV with the best resolution. Some will watch the big screen because the big screen gives a more convincing feeling of being there. If a big screen met all our requirements then the majority of the people would probably watch the big screen. However the big screen may not be appropriate in the lounge were a smaller accurate resolution screen is preferable.
What all the TVs do regardless of size or picture accuracy is convey the information of what is happening.
We can apply TV preferences to stereo but instead of vision its sound.
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Good one Mag.
james
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I have to confess I rarely go to live events and when I do they are usually loud and not audiophile quality so a "live event" is not what I'm shooting for in my system. What I'm after is a look into the artists (producers) intention.
Hi Timind,
On your point of accuracy vs preference (or as you say the producers/artists intent) one of the issues that always comes up in discussions in recording studios is whether the recording being produced should be as accurate as possible or have a ‘sonic voicing’ based on what the ‘intent’ of the recording engineer or artist wants.
I remember my first experience with this was many years ago doing a recording in a studio in Toronto with Lorne Lofsky, an incredibly good Jazz guitarist. He came to the recording session with his guitar of course but he also dragged along this old beat up box with and amplifier and speaker in it. His instructions to the recording engineer was ‘please do not put the microphone on my guitar. Place the microphone in front of the speaker/amp box please.’
Reason: he loved the sound of his guitar through his personal speaker/amp rig.
So here we have an example where the accurate sound of the guitar through the speaker/amp box was very important to the artist. So the job of the recording engineer was to try and capture this particular sound as close as possible while the intent of the artist was to produce a specific sound he found pleasing.
james
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Hi All,
"Everyones ears are different" - I hear (no pun intended) this all the time and I thought it might make a great topic for discussion.
Lets say 3 of us go to listen to an unamplified trio with a set of drums, a saxophone and a piano. We then go to each persons home and listen to a CD of that very same recording on each of our own audio systems. Would there be a consensus among the 3 of us as to which system sounded the closest to the original live recording we just heard?
Is it not really more a matter of 'we all have different preferences' rather than 'everyones ears are different'?
james
The Ear as a Judge of Fidelity.
It is common practice to regard the ear as the final judge of fidelity, but this can only give a true judgment when the listener has acute hearing, a keen ear for distortion, and is not in the habit of listening to distorted music. A listener whit a keen ear for distortion can only cultivate this faculty by making frequent direct comparisons whit the original music in the concert hall.
H.A.Hartley (July 1944)
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A number of years ago I read something by Scott Frankland ( audio manufacturer at that time, maybe still is? ) who, I thought, made an interesting comment on an issue similar to this.
He said," Every playback system is ( or ought to be ) a statement of the owner"s sensibility to sound and music and that strict accuracy is, at present, not only impossible to obtain, but impossible to verify.
The upshot is that we ought to pursue accuracy to the extent that it does not clash with our inner sensibility."
So a musically satisfying system is partly the components and partly you. Until you have a handle on your own *sensibilities* , you are only dealing with one part of the equation.
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Interesting thread.
As for video I too have found that I would rather loose a little black level for detail I found missing.One of the reasons I let go my Pioneer Kuro.
As for my previous stereo system which was great for what it was and gave me great pleasure as a teenager and into my 20's, but I couldn't listen to it anymore because of the sibilance that I was unaware of till recently.My Brother has owned the system now for years and wasn't kind to the gear so that may have loads to do with it's performance.
Where I live I have to buy before I try so building a system this time with the help of the internet has been invaluable.To be honest I can't afford "Upgrades" and the gear I have now and the remaining gear I need is and will be my last.So to say I have a preference through experience would not be accurate,I do however follow my gut instinct about what I like, at least in "Theory" how I prefer my "Sound" to be.I also took the time to listen to the meager systems I had access to and so by doing that I knew what I didn't Like "Sound wise" building this new and last system.
Also through much careful digging around on the internet and forms and sometimes reading 'Between the lines" is why I went with Bryston and B&W.For better or for worse this is the path I have ventured.