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From: rfg@hound.UUCP (R.GRANTGES)
Newsgroups: net.audio
Subject: Re: Stereo Imaging at Live Concerts
Message-ID: <1209@hound.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 7-Jun-85 12:48:58 EDT
Article-I.D.: hound.1209
Posted: Fri Jun  7 12:48:58 1985
Date-Received: Sat, 8-Jun-85 03:59:36 EDT
References: <2392@decwrl.UUCP> <371@olivee.UUCP>
Organization: AT&T Bell Labs, Holmdel NJ
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[]
As I said in a recent posting, there is an incredible range of sound
heard in concert halls depending on the hall, where you sit, etc.
I certainly agree with the point that orchestra seating arrangements
are intended to create a blend. However, in many halls, at the front
center of the balcony, you are looking down on the orchestra from above -
a position the conductor probably did not have in mind when arranging
his forces. This is also the perspective of many micing arrangements.
It is to be expected, therefore, that the reproduction will pretty
well allow pinpointing of most sources. As long as it all holds together
and blends, that is probably a good thing.
Now, given reasonable imaging, ultra-fidelity (either CD or LP, choose
your own poison) everything of real golden ear quality. You are practically
never going to confuse the reproduction with the real thing except in
certain situatiuons: You are in the next room. You can often be surprised
that you thought someone was in the next room when it was "just" a
recording. This can also happen with recordings of small forces. You
can persuade yourself that there really <is> a string quartet in your
living room as long as you are not in that room. I am not referring to visual
cues, only auditory ones.
I wonder if the new AR magic speaker will change that result.
While on the subject let me relate an interesting deception that happened to
me. Before most of you were born (1953) a group of guys from my school came easton an interviewing trip. Over the weekend we took in Radio City Music hall,
sitting in the balcony. We were very impressed with the acoustics of the hall.
Especially when the orchestra was playing classical sounding stuff, why you could look right down and pinpoint each instrument. The flute, the chimes, they
really carried well in that huge, cavernous hall. A couple of days later I
was being interviewed by Harry Olson at RCA in Princeton. Even I had heard of him and, of course, I was properly awed. He mentioned that he had been involved
with the design of the Radio City sound system and I really gave him a
big compliment when I revealed how impressed we had been - and we had not
even suspected that sound reinforcement was being used! Of course I should
have known it was, but I didn't. And we detected no clues. The imaging
with the live performers was that close. The boost that subtle. I understand
they used to have a mixing console right out in the middle of the audience
downstairs, but I never saw it.

-- 

"It's the thought, if any, that counts!"  Dick Grantges  hound!rfg