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Thread: Comparison of Painting and Music

  1. #1
    Join Date: Apr 2016

    Location: Bishops Stortford

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    I'm Chris.

    Default Comparison of Painting and Music

    Although I have a pretty impressive system I never cease to be amazed how much enjoyment I can get from music played on the car radio or a simple transistor radio. Equally there are those that get immense enjoyment from fairly modest systems.

    So here is a theory that helps me to explain it, and I draw comparisons with paintings.

    The modest system can paint a beautiful 'picture' of the music. Its very often just the interpretation of a scene referred to as artistic licence. It can lack fine detail, but replaces it by an opportunity for the viewers brain to fill in the details with its own emotional interpretation. With a great picture like this, you can stand for ages seeing fresh images within the whole and imagining what's going on. Its very attraction comes from allowing the viewer (listener) to interpret it as they wish. Just remember the members of the public that stand for an eternity in front of a work of art in the galleries

    The high res, high fidelity system paints a picture to be admired for its lifelike presentation of sound stage, frequency extremes, resolution and tonal values, and is much more akin to an 'HD photographic' painting. For many that's more impressive than the performance from a modest system, but it leaves less opportunity for creative imagination by the brain, already presenting the whole picture in stark detail. Although some may see this as a weakness, for me the emotion comes now, not from imagination, but by finally hearing the emotion in the music that the performer placed there for us.
    Source
    SW1X Universal Music Server UMS I Signature with Power Supply Unit PSU I Signature
    SW1X USB II
    SW1X DAC III Special
    Audiolab 6000 CDT transport
    Amps
    Pre amps -- Hi fi Collective twin mono ladder stepped attenuator, with Charcroft Z-foil and silver wired. And First Watt B1 active no gain buffer.
    Power amps -- Welborne 45 SET monoblocks 1.8W / Decware Taboo 6W / Elekit 300B TU-8600SVK plus further improved components 9W / ICE Power 1000W
    Speakers
    Highly modified Endorphin P17 open baffle speakers containing both vintage and modern alnico drivers and paper cones. All silver wired - 8" Cube Audio FC8 full range drivers and vintage 15" Altec VOTT 416 bass drivers. All sat on Townsend Audio Podium seismic isolation platforms.
    BK Electronics XLS400FF Sub.
    Cabling
    Silver mains cables, interconnects and speaker cables by SW1X
    Headphones
    HRT HeadStreamer and SennHeiser HD650 headphones

  2. #2
    Join Date: Mar 2017

    Location: Seaford UK

    Posts: 1,861
    I'm Dennis.

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    As a system increases in resolution so does the retrieval of information, and hence the artist's intentions, but there is a limit to what is expressed and performed, much of which many/most systems can retrieve.

    Going beyond that point a system becomes 'forensic', which may be of interest to mixers and masterers, and Hi-Fi fanatic nutcases, but his can detract from the artistic message.

    For me my Hi-Fi is iconically representative of my general stance in life; I want to perceive the realities.

  3. #3
    Join Date: Feb 2010

    Location: Moved to frozen north, beyond Inverness

    Posts: 2,602
    I'm Dave.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Pharos View Post
    For me my Hi-Fi is iconically representative of my general stance in life; I want to perceive the realities.
    If you were to get involved (I don't know whether you are, or not ...) in making/producing recordings, you might spot that recordings are almost never, in any sensible way, "realistic". Just as with photographs, which are imperfect renditions of scenes, people, events - but which can be manipulated, live sounds are very different from recorded ones.

    There can be approximations to "realism" - for example, if one wears headphones, and has either a live microphone linked, or a recording made in an appropriate environment, and then someone says something over your left shoulder - and you turn around to discover that the "person" is actually in the recording.

    However, a lot of music recordings are highly manipulated, so really don't represent "realism" at all.
    Dave

  4. #4
    Join Date: Sep 2013

    Location: North Island New Zealand

    Posts: 1,757
    I'm Chris.

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    A lot of recordings too are so realistic it is a work of art how they were recorded. It is timing errors that are leading you to think of imperfections. If the timing errors are properly addressed,
    realism then comes in to focus. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j71NrNMx2rU
    Last edited by Light Dependant Resistor; 17-05-2020 at 09:18.

  5. #5
    Join Date: Mar 2017

    Location: Seaford UK

    Posts: 1,861
    I'm Dennis.

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    Quote Originally Posted by dave2010 View Post
    If you were to get involved (I don't know whether you are, or not ...) in making/producing recordings, you might spot that recordings are almost never, in any sensible way, "realistic". Just as with photographs, which are imperfect renditions of scenes, people, events - but which can be manipulated, live sounds are very different from recorded ones.

    There can be approximations to "realism" - for example, if one wears headphones, and has either a live microphone linked, or a recording made in an appropriate environment, and then someone says something over your left shoulder - and you turn around to discover that the "person" is actually in the recording.

    However, a lot of music recordings are highly manipulated, so really don't represent "realism" at all.
    What I meant was that I want my system to be as faithful to the listed to source as possible, but I accept that all recordings are a facsimile, surely no one would really suggest that what we hear cannot be distinguished form an original event. I just do not want a further layer of displacement way from what is recorded.

    However, a lot of music recordings are highly manipulated, so really don't represent "realism" at all.[/QUOTE]

  6. #6
    Join Date: Sep 2013

    Location: North Island New Zealand

    Posts: 1,757
    I'm Chris.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Pharos View Post
    What I meant was that I want my system to be as faithful to the listed to source as possible, but I accept that all recordings are a facsimile, surely no one would really suggest that what we hear cannot be distinguished form an original event. I just do not want a further layer of displacement way from what is recorded.

    However, a lot of music recordings are highly manipulated, so really don't represent "realism" at all.
    [/QUOTE]

    Where you might sit at a concert, is unlikely to be as good as where microphones are located. A good engineer will locate the recording device for minimal loss. in this regard
    what is captured at the time of recording can be better, than if you attended the concert.

    Companding where used provides ability to capture at the time of recording the full dynamic range. It is interesting to observe that today's replay equipment is still behind the ability of
    what was recorded over 40 years ago. In this way recordings are moments preserved, until we use equipment capable of releasing, what these recordings actually contain.

    If we look at some truly outstanding recordings lets say Mercury label https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercury_Records
    or in more modern times the Sheffield label. , our palette of appreciating recordings would include
    some information about the engineer too. Bill Schnee comes to mind, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Schnee

  7. #7
    Join Date: Feb 2008

    Location: South Wales

    Posts: 9,151
    I'm NotTakingLifeTooSeriouslyTheseDays.

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    Music can be heard from many sources, on good equipment, and not so good, but its the music that makes you want to listen, its the music that creates emotional reactions in us, therefore, you could be in your car, listening to the radio, in your garden, doing some weeding, down the garage messing with your car, etc, etc, and a song will be heard that will stir up memories, and emotions that can take you back to a place in your life of great happiness, or extreme sadness, and it can be so profound that for a few moments, your back there, and that's the power of music, no matter what its heard on, its all about the music, for me, most days i wake up, and i put on some tunes on my old 1950's jukebox, and although its performance is far from HI Fidelity, its good enough for me to connect with' and enjoy what's being played.
    Quote Originally Posted by bumpy View Post
    Although I have a pretty impressive system I never cease to be amazed how much enjoyment I can get from music played on the car radio or a simple transistor radio. Equally there are those that get immense enjoyment from fairly modest systems.

    So here is a theory that helps me to explain it, and I draw comparisons with paintings.

    The modest system can paint a beautiful 'picture' of the music. Its very often just the interpretation of a scene referred to as artistic licence. It can lack fine detail, but replaces it by an opportunity for the viewers brain to fill in the details with its own emotional interpretation. With a great picture like this, you can stand for ages seeing fresh images within the whole and imagining what's going on. Its very attraction comes from allowing the viewer (listener) to interpret it as they wish. Just remember the members of the public that stand for an eternity in front of a work of art in the galleries

    The high res, high fidelity system paints a picture to be admired for its lifelike presentation of sound stage, frequency extremes, resolution and tonal values, and is much more akin to an 'HD photographic' painting. For many that's more impressive than the performance from a modest system, but it leaves less opportunity for creative imagination by the brain, already presenting the whole picture in stark detail. Although some may see this as a weakness, for me the emotion comes now, not from imagination, but by finally hearing the emotion in the music that the performer placed there for us.
    "Today scientists have substituted mathematics for experiments, and they wander off through equation after equation, and eventually build a structure which has no relation to reality"
    Nikola Tesla



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  8. #8
    Join Date: Jan 2009

    Location: Essex

    Posts: 31,859
    I'm openingabottleofwine.

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    Quote Originally Posted by anthonyTD View Post
    Music can be heard from many sources, on good equipment, and not so good, but its the music that makes you want to listen, its the music that creates emotional reactions in us, therefore, you could be in your car, listening to the radio, in your garden, doing some weeding, down the garage messing with your car, etc, etc, and a song will be heard that will stir up memories, and emotions that can take you back to a place in your life of great happiness, or extreme sadness, and it can be so profound that for a few moments, your back there, and that's the power of music, no matter what its heard on, its all about the music, for me, most days i wake up, and i put on some tunes on my old 1950's jukebox, and although its performance is far from HI Fidelity, its good enough for me to connect with' and enjoy what's being played.
    Nail - head!

    That is more or less what I said in another thread about 'High Fidelity': that one can be moved emotionally hearing something on a cheap transistor radio, just as powerfully as if you heard it on an audio system costing thousands of pounds.
    Barry

  9. #9
    Join Date: May 2020

    Location: England

    Posts: 19
    I'm Jim.

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    Hello Barry, Hello Athony and Hello all

    To amplify your comments



    To quote Lisa Alkana;
    "There are good singers, there are great singers -- and then there's Billie Holiday"

    And as Geoffrey Smith said on JRR "Worra rekerd" and "Don't you just wish you'd been there" [edit] in 1937.

    Sounds great on my FH3's

    Cheers - J

  10. #10
    Join Date: Aug 2009

    Location: Staffordshire, England

    Posts: 37,786
    I'm Martin.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Pharos View Post
    What I meant was that I want my system to be as faithful to the listed to source as possible, but I accept that all recordings are a facsimile, surely no one would really suggest that what we hear cannot be distinguished form an original event. I just do not want a further layer of displacement way from what is recorded.

    However, a lot of music recordings are highly manipulated, so really don't represent "realism" at all.
    But they do! How many enthusiasts say that their reference is live music and 'the sound of real instruments'? Lots. But hi-fidelity replay is about fidelity to the recording, not to the events that were recorded. An important distinction that is missed by many.

    I see a lot of people including so called 'professional reviewers' banging on about how many live events they attend and how that gives them an insight into how playback should sound. When in fact it is completely irrelevant.
    Current Lash Up:

    TEAC VRDS 701T > Sony TAE1000ESD > Krell KSA50S > JM Labs Focal Electra 926.

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