Music as an art form and Highend audio

sts9fan · « **on:** 5 Dec 2005, 04:21 pm »

To me music is the most powerful art form. While I love the visual arts such as painting and sculpture neither of them invoke such a emotional response as music can. Music also in my mind has the wonderful attribute to be the most accessible art form to the masses. Ten to twenty bucks and you could own a copy of a masterpiece the likes of the world has never seen before and may never see again. I think that’s a bargain! I know you can get a poster of a Rembrandt for ten bucks but its not even close to the real thing. I guess people will say that cds are the same as posters but I think they are way closer to the real thing. Even more so with music that may not even be able to be played live or composed and preformed by less people then there are parts ie.Surfjan Stevens. So this brought me thinking on high-end audio. How the endless list of tweaks and ultra expensive gear that may or may not make a huge difference somewhat takes away one of the best attributes of music. I mean I think it is safe to say you could by a cd player for under 10k that would sound just as good as one for 20k. So why is there a market for the 20k model? Could it be a way for the privileged to feel like they are not enjoying the same art that I am on my 1k system? A way to separate ones self from the plebs. Just a thought I had.

woodsyi · « **Reply #1 on:** 13 Dec 2005, 01:53 pm »

I love my music but the most profound artistic epiphany moments have come from that old fashioned thing called BOOKs. Highend bibiophile equipment is also very cheap!

sts9fan · « **Reply #2 on:** 13 Dec 2005, 02:20 pm »

Absolutly!! I think many people would be well served to ditch the HT, pop on some tunes and read a book. I don't care if its Tom Robins, Dolstoyevsky or John Grishm.

JoshK · « **Reply #3 on:** 13 Dec 2005, 02:30 pm »

I dont know about artistism, but I usually am working on a project with the music playing. That is about 4/5 weekday nights and the weekends are for many more hours than that. I usually watch no more than 1 hour of TV a day.

ctviggen · « **Reply #4 on:** 13 Dec 2005, 02:39 pm »

I think 1 hour of TV a day is a lot. I typically watch less than a half hour of what my Replay has taped (generally, Alton Brown's Good Eats or tennis or Antiques Roadshow, etc.) then read. Sadly, my music listening has even taken a backseat to my reading, although I do have my upstairs system on.

sts9fan · « **Reply #5 on:** 13 Dec 2005, 02:45 pm »

This site seems more music based as opposed to HT. Thats why I like it!!

AudioStone · « **Reply #6 on:** 14 Dec 2005, 11:03 am »

Quote from: woodsyi

I love my music but the most profound artistic epiphany moments have come from that old fashioned thing called BOOKs. Highend bibiophile equipment is also very cheap!

Hallelujah to that!

I remember one of my magic moments with Herman Hess "The Glass Bead Game".......

This crops up alot amongst my non ''audiophile'' friends and its a debate that only makes sense in the context of money....if you have it or if you don't, if your willing to finance it or not.

I can buy a CD/DVD/MP3 player for about $25 at my local equivalent to WalMart (tm) so why on earth would I pay even a thousand dollars

I could save the $975 and buy about a 100 of my favourite CD's (on sale).

Then again.....If I had alot more money to spend I could drop 50k on the very very nice Burmester CD setup and presumably still have enough left over to buy all the CD's in the shop. (I saw a CDNow franchise for sale for $35k on ebay including stock). Thats a thought.......

The way I tend to look at it is relative to cars (automobiles). You want to drive to Walmart (tm) in a Porche Cheyene SUV but you can also get there a little less comfortably in a Fiat Pinto.....

Now having said that - My very highest end friends spend a lot more time in their listening rooms than they would ever spend in any vehicle. Money well spent? Why not!

woodsyi · « **Reply #7 on:** 14 Dec 2005, 02:08 pm »

Quote

Then again.....If I had alot more money to spend I could drop 50k on the very very nice Burmester CD setup and presumably still have enough left over to buy all the CD's in the shop. (I saw a CDNow franchise for sale for $35k on ebay including stock). Thats a thought.......

I would be inclined to sink that 50k on analog front end and room remodeling for acoustics. Too much is happening with digital formats at the moment and I still get more music out of my analog set up. There is more information from CD but not all of it is music. At least with my set up, I reach a point where the music from digital front end gets too grainy -- as in photo. It's not just the highs or lows but all over. I don't get that with analog. Analog may not be as dynamic but what it has is all music. You get the texture of music like an oil painting on canvas -- digital is only a flat photo copy, albeit with gorgeious Kodachrome colors. Of course I should qualify that statement by saying that I never heard a 50k digital end and it may be better than analog but I don't know that.

AudioStone · « **Reply #8 on:** 14 Dec 2005, 03:51 pm »

Quote from: woodsyi

I would be inclined to sink that 50k on analog front end and room remodeling for acoustics. Too much is happening with digital formats at the moment and I still get more music out of my analog set up. There is more information from CD but not all of it is music. At least with my set up, I reach a point where the music from digital front end gets too grainy -- as in photo. It's not just the highs or lows but all over. I don't get that with analog. Analog may not be as dynamic but what it has is all mu ...

You are correct. For most systems the music was and always will be analogue. We cannot hear digital. We are not binary beings.......room acoustics is very badly understood - especially amongst the big kit buyers. Have you seen TaCT audio ? they know what is right but they also spend too much money.....

A basement full of very good books......floor to ceiling that is for me...