What is the art of sound?

[Steve Toy]

Rob,

You've pretty well nailed your colours to the mast regarding your Art of Sound. Folks who know exactly what they want are less likely to waste money on upgrades only to be dissatisfied with them very soon after.

Marco,

I'm still not comfortable with these undefined notions of realism and accuracy. We still need to pin down exactly what aspects of a given recording and how it is reproduced can make it sound real in an absolute sense to absolutely everybody. My suspicions are that this is impossible. Hi-fi technology and its implementation have a long way to go before playback of recorded music is ever indistinguishable to the live event.

Yes we can step closer to subjective notions of realism and accuracy in certain aspects but in an absolute sense they are unattainable goals.

Defining your own notion of realism/accuracy that you can happily live with and enjoy is basically defining your own Art of Sound. For you then to define your Art of Sound as being realism or accuracy would thus be tautological.

[jimdgoulding]

If the event is recorded right and reproduced right, it is possible to be in the same time and space of the event and in the presence of the performers. Or, so it can seem. A good room helps. To me, that is very satisfying and a worthwhile goal. Very good comments above. I know you cats are down. Cheers.

[Filterlab]

If the event is recorded right and reproduced right...

That my friend is the real crux of hi-fi. If the guy sitting at the mixing desk has his head screwed on and his mind in the right place, the resulting sound will be excellent on any system and frankly outstanding on anything approaching hi-fi.

On the other hand, if he has fists of ham and ears of cloth then no hi-fi will ever be able to 'make' it sound good - quite the opposite in fact, I've found the better the hi-fi the worse a poor recording will sound.

[Marco]

Marco,

I'm still not comfortable with these undefined notions of realism and accuracy.

LOL. Undefined and not comfortable? Well go and wrap yourself in a duvet, darling; I don't think I could have defined them any more clearly!

Anyway, I think we've both had our say so perhaps we should step back now and allow our members to define their 'Art of Sound'?

Del (Artist) raised some interesting points which I will address later. However, as you know, I have a very busy day ahead with bits of paper

Jim,

I know you cats are down.

Man, don't ya just love Americans!

Rob,

Excellent post!

Laters,

Marco.