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I just bought a Steinway which sounds like a banjo.

I have a question: I’ve seen a lot of terms in audiophile jargon: laid back, top end, low end, harsh, soft, smooth, etc.
I don’t understand them. I only listen to recorded music, almost nothing synthesized. So the adjectives I know are: pitch, timbre, dynamics and spatiality. I cannot think of sound characteristics that are not inscribed within these four adjectives.
I believe that a sound reproduction device must first of all take care to satisfy these 4 characteristics.

When I read that a loudspeaker sounds harsh to me it means that the timbre is wrong because nobody would describe as harsh the reproduction of an instrument that has a harsh timbre. That would be a speaker that has a correct timbre. It can only be described as harsh the reproduction of an instrument that does not have a harsh timbre. The same goes for the other terms listed at the beginning. For spatiality it is even simpler because it is a geometric, spatial question. An ensable of which occupies 5 meters must sound like an ensambe that occupies 5 meters, not as one that occupies 2 meters nor as one that occupies 20 meters. Then the dynamics is linear so it is the simplest of all.

When Steinway puts a Steinway on the market it does so by taking care of a certain amount of objective characteristics, i would say 96-98% and 2-4% are probably left to the "character" of the instrument.

In the audiophile field, judging by the immense difference between one reproduction technology and another, it seems that the opposite meter is used, that is 4% of objectivity and 96% of character.
As if a Steinway sounded like a forgotten Pleyel in a basement, and a Pleyel sounded like a Boesendorfer. The whole is defended with sword drawn by the audiophile community as and cleared as subjective perceptions or eventually as an incompatibility between the elements in play (source, amplifier, speakers, cables) Hahah! Obviously, if all the products that follow the 4% objectivity meter and 96% "character", it takes a lot of luck to have a system in your hands that allows you to recognize a Pleyel from a Steinway.

When will sound reproduction become serious?
128x128daros71

Showing 1 response by replicnt6

replicnt6
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So the adjectives I know are: pitch, timbre, dynamics and spatiality. I cannot think of sound characteristics that are not inscribed within these four adjectives.

Please do not take this as snarky. I am actually sympathetic. But I can't help but note that those four terms are nouns, not adjectives, and therein lies the difficulty.

No system can produce all four of those things perfectly. Depending on what resources you have to work with, you will have to make tradeoffs. What's more, the best reproduction depends on the quality of the recording, too. And tradeoffs are made in recording. Sometimes those tradeoffs will complement the tradeoffs you've made in your system and sometimes they won't.

The actual adjectives people use describe aspects of those four nouns. For example harsh usually means a bit to much amplitude at certain frequencies, an aspect of timbre. People talk about the soundstage and instrument separation which are aspects of spatiality.

So people are actually talking about what you want to talk about.
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