Musical or Accurate?

[MarkBK]

So, we have these two different kind of sounds -- how would you describe the difference, and which do you prefer?

Musical, period. I've heard systems that are not that special in terms of pumping out great detail and dynamics, but do a great job of conveying the feeling and enjoyability of a performance........

..........Though I wish it were otherwise, I still think musicality can be a difficult, sometimes accidental quality to achieve.

Larry,

VERY well put! I concure that I too have heard many systems that are quite musical, engaging the listener with the music and not the "speakers"...at that magical moment, the emotional qualities of the performance make one forget about all the gear and get lost in the music itself.

[meagain]

I once took a CD out to my stock stereo in my car only to find it sounded better than my khorns.

I was very upset the rest of the day. []

[Mallette]

While most of you know I willingly open myself to all opinions, this is an area where I draw the line. Crappy recordings only sound good on a crackling fire.

This goes back to my first audio engineering job for a maker of educational filmstrip/cassettes (yes, a while back). They brought me in because they were unhappy with the sound. It took me nearly a year to convince them that just because they were being played back on a Wollensak with a 6X9 "full range" speaker with everything below 150hz filtered at 18db/decade so as not to activate the auto advance of the filmstrip spuriously you could not assume that the quality of the elements was irrelevant. In fact, I conclusively proved the opposite. The worse the target device, the better you have to start out in order to wind up with anything. EOS.

Some things I espouse or practice are beliefs and subject to change. To me, the above is not just a good idea, it's the law.

Dave

[@silverfox@]

hi all

ive been reading snippit here and there from this and am reminded of some thing craig once wrote , this is not a quote . that the volume has to reach a certain level for the system to open. and is not about low verses high power as much as realisim.

how i would describe musical is when what ever is beign played brings you into its time and space, wherein there is involvement from you, and open itself to imput and creativity from any other medium , ie dance,song , rthym .once music is played and recorded its complete. accurate as a musical term seems misleading unless machanicaly produced, and timing becomes the driving force void of emotions but is rthymic,and convey all the detail. what is left is the space between you and your speakers, called (preference)

[sheltie dave]

Dave, it took me a couple reads, but I think I get what you are saying. Excluding everything else, if you don't start with good, you can't get to good at any point down the road. IOW, quality can not be an ADDED feature.

To Dean's question, I think the starting point has to be musical. If you have a system, various speaker parts, crossovers, whatever, if they can not relate well internally - then they can not recreate a musical passage that moves and interacts with an active/passive listener, no matter how they function on a bench.

Once you have something musical, then you strive to obtain accuracy. Too often, people fall prey to the false God of accuracy. Digital ready speakers, digital high current amps with THD levels of 0.0005 %, slew rates of .30 usec, all these wonderful specs are used to differentiate and sell equipment.

Some of my technogeek friends are amazed when they realize their five figure computer designed audio systems can be blown out of the water by a more musical and less accurate system where the speakers were designed in 1945, and the rest NLT the early 1960s, by crew-cut engineers using sliderules.

Start with quality, and end with good sounding music.

[Colin]

When I think of accurate equipment, I think of <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" />NelsonPass monster X250 amplifiers and my own vintage Pioneer M-22 amplifier, with its 2Hz to 150kHz within 1dB frequency response and THD below .001% at 15 watts. Both solid-state amplifiers make bass and treble pound and sizzle, but impart as much musical enjoyment as ASLs $99 little Wave 8 tube wonders do.

Yet it also true that as home movie and music reproduction systems improve their objectively measured frequency response, removing the subjective artifacts which color them, they also become musicalto a point. Over do it though, and the system seems lifeless, dull and un-musical.

<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />

I am impressed by what some loudspeakers get so right: cohesiveness, spatiality, quickness, effortless, and in the case of big ole horns, dynamics and amazingly low distortion. Some of these qualities are objectively measured. Except we do not compare them from speaker to speaker. This is the reason that the venerable Stereophile magazine continues to captivate me, despite its gushing reviews of wildly priced high-end equipment. At least it provides visually comparable measurements along with subjective reviews of what those measurements might sound like.

Musicality is also a matter of tone. That said, no musical instrument is pristinely accurate. In fact, instrument harmonics are replete with inaccuracy and distortion.

[H]