If you could just pick one instrument that you think sounds best on your speakers
What would it be? I love my OHM 5000s. The instrument of my choice would be the synthesizer. I'm now listening to EL&P's songs Tank and Tarkus on CD. Ive just played them 3 times because it gives me good frisson. (Other thread). In the opening of Sade "Smooth Operator" the synthesizer sounds like its notes are moving all around in the room. It's the same with Tears for Fears "The Working Hour". So if you could just pick one instrument that your speaker plays the best at. What would it be? I'm sure this would be a tough question for some members because there are many great speakers that do very good at all music. It might also be one instrument you like hearing best anyway. So what would be your choice?
I have 3.6 Maggies (Am jealous of Elizabeth’s 20s!), and for me it is sublime vocaks (Eva Cassidy) plus emotional instruments, i.e. Duane Allman playing a slow but oowerful solo at the 7 minute mark on You Don’t Love Me from their Live at the Fillmore album.
Also, acoustical guitar where you can hear the fingers on the strings as it gives a strong sense of realism.
Finally, really good Hammond organ.
Basically something that makes you thing OMG, that is SO amazing. I get a lot of that!
I'm listening to Bachbusters now on my Walsh 5000s and the sound is remarkably crystalline and pure. But I think the Walshs do pipe organ better than any loudspeakers I have ever heard.
After 50 years I’ve managed to cobble two good systems; ML 13a and B&W 801 with custom crossovers. The go to instrument when tweaking is the piano. I am thinking Dave Brubeck.
For my CLS speakers it has to be the violin (or any stringed instrument). I swear you just about hear the rosin flaking off the bow!
For my main system (Wilson Maxx 2) while everything is well rendered, the low bass, particularly drum, sounds better in a way that few experience. I never realized that most speakers render low bass imperfectly, with definite overhang, until I listened to the bass on the Wilsons. You hear the drum, and then it stops, No ringing (I'm not talking about reflected sound that come a fraction of a second later, but a situation where the main note slurs a little and hangs on for a fraction of a second).
You can experience the same thing at a classical music performance in a hall without proper sound treatment vs. one that has.
This can be very misleading.... Speakers are only the tail end. What precedes them can make a speaker into an entirely different creature. Even speaker placement can change its character. Be that as it may... In my system. One speaker stands out. I listen nearfield in very close proximity to where I sit. The speakers in my room need a bit of bottom enhancement . On good recordings I refer to them as headphones worn off of my ears. Audience 1+1V2’s. They are a breed of their own. Drums, bass, violins, electric guitars... anything well recorded.
"What you think sounds most realistic? " Really? Nothing comes close so I really try not to think about it. To me recorded music is at best a reminder, no more. I think audio's main weakness is its inability to replicate large scale music in the home so I don't listen to this so much anymore or expect much when I do.
"What do you like best". Piano and acoustic guitar, on which I can enjoy the music so much its hard to pay attention to all that audio stuff. :-)
FWIW I listen thru Silverline Bolero's. They are a fairly nice speaker.
Voice, especially Faure's Cantique de Jean Racine, played on an array of Quad 2905's (heavily modified: Plitron transformers, air gap capacitors, disabled protection circuits). The array of multiple speakers makes any volume easy without overdriving, on any material.
@shadorne Bells of Ste. Anne de Beapre by Alexander Russell, The Power and the Glory, M&K RealTime, RT114.
Speakers are ATC EL150ASL with all ATC in house drivers and electronics (no outsourcing). Nicely balanced and neutral with lifelike dynamics.
If I was to pick an instrument that sounds most impressive I think it would be a huge cathedral organ. Not because my speakers portray a huge cathedral organ any more accurately than anything else but simply because this single instrument is one of the most powerful and yet beautiful and delicate at the same time. It also has a range that is impressive and when well played it can produce a layered sound with root bass notes (foot pedals) that just make it the most complete timbral single instrument ever made.
I sort of did, but okay. Quad ESL (originals), Magneplanar Tympani T-IVa, Eminent Technology LFT-8b and LFT-4, ESS Transtatic I, Optimus Pro LX5, NHT Super Zero, Stax Lambda Pro Earspeakers, GR Research/Rythmik OB/Dipole Subs, Rythmik F15HP DIY Subs (in 4cu.ft. sand-filled enclosures of my own design).
I can listen to just about anything on one or more of the above, but my main interest these days is in vocals and acoustic instruments. Still, I want to hear the new Music Reference ESL speakers with direct-drive OTL amps. Plans are underway ;-) .
Saxophone. On my Merlin VSM Black Magic speakers, it sounds perfectly natural and real. When I put in a good recording of Getz Gilberto, for example (reel to reel or Analogue Productions 45RPM vinyl reissue), you can hear the spit flowing through the sax during the solo in Girl from Ipanema.
I also have Thiel 2.7 speakers, and I agree with prof o the oboe; however I also have a ss2.2 subwoofer, and I really like the sound of a Bosendorfer piano.
I'm sure we all want to say "everything." But restricting the answer asked by the OP, I'd say: Oboes/Bassoons.
I'm a soundtrack fan, and love Bernard Herrmann fan, especially the fantasy films - Sinbad, Jason and the Argonauts, etc - and his scores are notable for incredibly evocative use of the lower, growly registers of the wind instruments, especially Oboe, Bassoon etc.
One of the main aspects that attracted me to my Thiel (2.7) speakers is, aside from the authentic tone, was the incredible image focus and density to the sound. All this comes together especially right in the range of the lower registers of woodwinds. When a Herrmann woodwind is growling away menacingly, it's just "there" in front of me, a big, palpable instrument, vibrating the air in front of me. For a Herrmann fan it's just heaven. (I played the vinyl LP of Herrmann's Taxi Driver soundtrack, which has some killer moments of menacing solo woodwinds, for my musician brother and he was just in shock afterwards. Even though he's been listening to my various systems throughout the years, he said he's never heard sound reproduction like it.)
Well perhaps I'm inferring blueranger's request improperly but he didn't ask for speaker identification. He asked for one instrument that sounds best. Anyway it's a fun endeavor. Charles
Well come on folks please mention which speakers you have or this exercise is a waste. Ranger-I don't think people followed the intent of this quiz. Or was it me?
None. Nothing stands out materially. Everything sounds the way I would expect from drums and percussion to full orchestra to a single guitar or vocalist.
What you describe may be more of a combined speaker and room effect. Certainly Room modes and reflections greatly influence what sounds good. For rock and pop a more dead room will work best. For classical a more reflective room sounds nice.
Smooth Operator Sounds like a Fender Rhodes to me but I hear piano low in the mix too.
Blueranger, Yes, a tough question. Many instruments sound wonderful through my speakers. In keeping with the criteria of "1" instrument, Vibraphone, Charles
Vocals, acoustic guitar/dobro/mandolin/fiddle/etc., and cymbals by electrostatics (Quads, Sanders, Music Reference I presume); drums, upright bass, and piano by magnetic-planars (Magneplanar, Eminent Technology); cymbals by ribbon tweeters.
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