When is digital going to get the soul of music?

When is digital going to get the soul of music?

when we stop worrying about it (Detlof corollary 1.0)

I'm open for suggestions about how one recording medium can be more or less soulful than another?

I've heard many good and bad recordings with "soul" on both vinyl and CD.

I think the answer may lie more in the field of psychology rather than technology.

I can see where one might associate vinyl with some great soul music of the past. Recordings were also mixed much differently back in the 60's. My CD of "What's Going On" by Marvin Gaye is loaded with soul I would say.

I've also heard some very well recorded CDs with "soul" in recent years. Two artists that come to mind are Herbie Hancock and Liquid Soul.

No kidding, uh oh. ;)

Hi Vince, that would be Alex Peychev of APL. See:
http://www.apl-hifi.com

Detlof, You have earned your place in the top sixteen. :)

Mmakshak, who is Alex?

Mak, Rife machines are thought to eliminate the common cold in 7 to 10 days, very much like Radionics machines, Brilliant Pebbles, and Clever Little Clocks, and sugar pills. . . for more serious infections I suggest you consult an AMA certified physician instead.

If you guys promise not to send the boys with the white coats to my door, I'll tell you what I think was responsible for my getting so high on Alex's system(my current theory). At the time, Alex had built a speaker that had a ribbon tweater that was crossed over at 23khz(I believe.). His system made my very good interconnects sound disjointed(I still use them.). Specificity and instruments sounding like themselves weren't outstanding. I think getting high had to do with the extended bandwith. It almost didn't matter what went on below this. Don't laugh, I'm currently undergoing treatment with a Rife Machine-which uses certain frequencies to kill bacteria and viruses.

Oh definitely, Newbee, pitch control problems throw any performance out the window. . . vocalists, string players some woodwinds can occasionally make me feel sea-sick. I would follow that by metric/rythmic problems. In reproduction I personally abhor treble overpressure, followed by bloat in other spectral regions. Subtractive problems may easily sap the 'life' (MRT plese note single-quote marks--I mean this metaphorically) out of a recording, but do not arouse in me the same 'fight or flight' reflex. And like I suggested elsewhere, bad engineering cuts and edits drive me positively batty.

Detlof, I'm taking up latin as a primary language. Then no one will realize how illiterate I really am! Your use of English remains exceeded only by....well, what is your first language anyway? :-)

Now, that aside, lets have some fun. Lets talk about what specifically we find distracting about the sound we get from our speakers. The sound that is so distracting that you wouldn't no longer hear the 'soul', when such soulfulness is actually in the pits and grooves, with our advanced audio systems and trained ears.

I'll start. Could it be - 1)Pitch, 2)Timbre, and 3)Noise - oh, lest I forget, 4) distortion? Pitch, for example, is a killer for me.

Perhaps, just perhaps mind you, soul is truly found only when we dumb down our audiophile expectations and listen to the performance.

Fun thread...............

Detlof! Absolutely Poetic!!

Are you sure English is your second language? Are you a poet?

I KNOW it sure is not German to English Translation software. How I know? Just read Porsche's user's manuals ;-).

That was beautiful Detlof! MRG

I think I'll join the fray again here, in spite of what I had said before:
1. Music can move you, no matter what medium is used toconvey it.
2. Once you have become an audiophile, sound matters, sometimes more than music. One might even go so far as to say, that music becomes just a means to an end, the end being to prove to yourself and others, that your rig sounds "right". That is one extreme of the complex phenomenon of audiophilia.

3. The other extreme is the music lover, who will indeed be moved by music, no matter what the sound, who -also an audiophile - will build up a system, which he feels will produce a sound in his own home, which will best transport the essence of music, the concept of which has most probably be formed by his listening to live performances.

Where in the one extreme music serves the sound, being subservient to sound, example being someone showing off his rig with the latest audiophile recording of a musically irrelevant ditty, like from the infamous "Jazz in the Pawnshop", proudly pointing out every belch from the audience there.

The other extreme now would be an audiophile for example, who settles down to listen to a newly bought piece of music, which he had first heard on his car radio and which had moved him. He wants to hear it now in all its glory, hoping that the sound would serve the music, bringing out all its "soul" . If the rig sounds right to him, he'll get it in spades, the sound being a faithful servant to the music.
But what happens if the rig does not sound right? Most probably all "soul" is spoilt and gone.
This is one of the crucial moment in the life of an audiophile who is also a music lover. He will find, if he is introspective, that his loyalties are deeply split. He loves music no doubt, but he is also deeply attached to his rig. The rig should be servant and do its job as deliverer of sound and you will be able to forget about it, as long as it functions well. But if it does not it can spoil the music and the servant may turn into a tyrant. There is true love on the one hand (music) and on the other a "narcissistic fixation" (rig).
MrTennis is quite right in pointing out to us that "soul" resides in the music and not in the "sound". But in this strange neurosis called Audiophilia, sound, especially if it does not sound "right", will drive out all the soul from the music. The "dark angel" winning over the good angel "soul ".
This is just the point, where sound suddenly becomes immensely important and could spoil all the fun. If we were wise men, we would shut down the rig, take the cd to our car, drive to a nice spot we know, plunk it in to the player and get all the "soul" we want. Why? Because we don't care much about the car-radio, do not give it importance, so that sound can serve the music again undisturbed by our narcissistic predilections. Well most of us ain't wise, I certainly am not, rather we would forget about the cd and will worry about what is wrong with the sound and what we could do about it........

What now is the point of all my blabberings here:

Not all audiophiles love music. There are lots of variations between the two extremes . And of course not all music lovers are audiophiles. To them the sound matters not, the music does. Here MrTennis' argument holds good. On the other hand of course, the same argument will irk and insult our sensibilities as audiophiles. We know that he is right on the one hand, but with no pity and feeling for us at all, his reasoning cuts like a razor across those disturbances and upheavals in our inner being, when the rig just won't sound right and it spoils all our expectations for a wonderful shot of "soul". Only we know, in the dark night of our insulted ears how terribly important "sound" can be. Yes it does not carry "soul", but it can ruin it. It can ruin it because of our split loyalties between the music and the soft-and hardware. So to us, with our strange affliction,
"soul" is only forthcoming, at least if we sit in our listening chair at home, if the "dark angel" of the machine and the "good angel" of the music work together to form "soul in the home". Oh what bliss, if that works, because then we can forget that the life of an audiophile can be compared to a man who has two exacting ladyfriends at the same time, who both clamour always for his full attention. Strenuous at best, hell at its worst, but bliss, when all are combined in "soulful union". (((-; Detlof

People's tastes obviously differ, and can't be easily quantified or measured.

But if "quality" were purely subjective, why would there ever be a consensus amoungst experts or enthusiasts on anything?

Chateau Lafite, Lobb shoes, Porsche turbos, Amman hotels, and Frette linens are high "quality" because it says so in the ads?

More sophistry. . . Yaaawn!

hi mr g:
a wise man know that he knows not. he who says he knows when he knows not is a fool.

how did knowledge get into this ?

you make an excellent point about talking about music and sound.

you can enjoy the music without enjoying the sound, and you can enjoy the sound withjout enjoying the music. thank you for your profundity.

my point is that "soul" resides in the music, as a form of communication not in the "sound".

You are correct MRT--to know is to judge; to judge is to process; to process is to filter; that which is filtered is degraded; that which is degraded is flawed; to know objective Truth is but a pipedream; attempting to share knowledge is illusory and further corrupts the episteme; dribble dribble dribble; add more trite sophistry. you have vast audiophilic and musical experience, graduate studies, thousand of systems auditioned, have reviewed for years on end, have a clear command of the English language and an outstanding facility to communicate; we just can't measure up. . . who cares!

In the meantime. . . a few of us are enjoying each other's company, while talking about the beauty of Music and Sound from both sides of the ePond.

when you use the word "quality" to judge books, wine, food and art, the word much be defined so that one can recognize what quality is. quality is subjective. if i like it, it is good quality, if i don't quality is not good. thus, it is possible that an arbitrary definition of quality will not produce a relationship between it and enjoyment.

back to music... if you listen to a favorite "tune" on a table radio or other "inferior" medium, do you say "i can't get into the song because the sound is bad " ?

i would hope not. if you like the music, you like it, in spite of the sound. you can give reasons for liking it, regardless of the sound. note, sound "quality" is not absolute. it is subjective.

let's consider movies . a highly reviewed movie may not be enjoyable . a so called "quality" movie may or may not be enjoyed by many people.

there is no existing demonstration of a high correlation between enjoyment and any definition of quality.

The medium is relevant.

I used to think there was something special in a live performance that couldn't be captured in any recording. I thought it was something almost magical going on between the performers and the audience that made the difference—that wavelength can't be recorded. Then I finally heard CDs through a system that can recreate what is IN the recording. It's not magic. It's the full range of audible frequencies, the dynamics, the impact, the transients, the musicians breathing, the fine details. It's the space between the notes. Distortion of any and every kind takes away those 'special,' 'magical,' 'mystical' qualities and the detail that make live acoustic music ALIVE. Limit the bandwidth, something is lost. Add noise, something is lost. Of course, we can enjoy music through a boom-box or a clock radio, but it's no comparison to the impact of live, is it? Analog or digital is not the real issue, but LPs can't begin to hold all that's on a quality analog tape recording. Recording quality and reproduction quality can and does convey the 'soul' of music.

Thank your MRT for your valuable lecture in Poetics. I consider myself duly chastized. next time I Listen to the aforementioned recording, I shall remind myself that my emotional reaction is woefully incorrect, or at least that my recollection of emotive change is essentially flawed.

Obviously this group of music lovers over here, including myself must live on another planet, since

"there is no evidence that enjoyment of music is highly correlated to sound quality. in fact there were two studies published in stereophile, authored by markus sauer, which indicated that the satisfaction accruing from listening to music was not highly correlated with sound quality".

Then the enjoyment of a painting does not correlate with the quality of a painting, a good cigar not with the quality of the leaf, a good book not with the quality of the writing, o good glass of wine not with the quality of wine. Aw well, if that is the case, I'd rather be on my planet... and of course the issue of digital vs analog vs live music is one of sound quality. No doubt about that. But if you demand good sound quality, the chance of you being moved by lesser quality, especially if your are blessed with a first class system, is rather slim. Well, I rest my case and get some "soul" from my rig, analog no less and I am out of this thread. 'T was fun, thanks to all.

Detlof

"its the music and the style of its performance that imbues it with soul."

Absolutely! And the equipment is a more or less imperfect conduit for that performance to reach us and trigger our emotional response. Example: several years ago I purchased a re-issue on 2 CDs of all the Dvorak [yes, I know, I am absurdly monomaniacal about this author] string quintets and sextets played by 'strings of the Berliner Phil'. I bought it as a documentary recording of sorts, it was recorded in the very early '60s. My initial impression was that the recording was blandly hazy. . . and supremely boring. My system consisted of EAD 1000 + DSP7000 MK3 CDp, ARC LS2B linestage, Rowland 7M monoblocks, Maggie IIIAs. I then started to replace some components one at a time: first the CDP was switched to X-01, then linestage became ARC Ref 3, recently speakers became Vienna Mahlers. At each step the music became cleaner, deeper, more emotional. . . and started to become 'beseelt'. . now because of its sweet emotionality it is one of my favorite recordings, in spite of being far from 'audiophile' quality .

the question is:

does the ability of music to commuincate depend upon sound quality ?

i say no. if one accepts that premise, the medium is irrelevant.

sound quality has varied over time, based upon the available technology. 80 years ago, people were enjoying music. today, people are enjoying music. people experienced the message of the music 80 years ago, as they do today.

do people enjoy bach, beethoven or brahms more today, because of sound quality of stereo systems than they did 80 years ago , listening to "phonographs" ? i think not.

there is no evidence that enjoyment of music is highly correlated to sound quality. in fact there were two studies published in stereophile, authored by markus sauer, which indicated that the satisfaction accruing from listening to music was not highly correlated with sound quality.

so, it seems that the issue of digital vs analog vs a live performance is one of sound quality, not "soul".

Hi Newbee,
Heck I wished i had never confessed about that language thing....it makes me feel embarrassed now..., but besides my red face Newbee, I absolutely agree with everything you say here and neither am I in disagreement with Mrtennis as far as the above is concerned. It IS the performance together with the composition per se, which may carry meaning and can touch the soul. I have no quarrel with that in the least. The only thing I am contending and will keep on maintaining is that this thread belongs rightly here, because of the simple fact that until today there seems to be a better chance of being moved and touched by an analog attempt to mimic the real thing, especially with complex classical music, inspite of the undisputed shortcomings of analog, simply because analog in many cases ( not in all of course )still conveys more information than digital will. So the medium matters also as far as "soul" is concerned, with the right kind of music and its interpretation of course. Not to all and everyone of us of course, but to some and I happen to be one of them. This is quite an objective find, which in experimenting with a group of friends was repeatable, as we have done here but at the same time it is paradoxically purely subjective and applies only to myself and some other kindred spirits which, I suppose, have been bitten by a peculiar substrain of that bug called audiophilia, which will drive you to almost every live concert in town and compel you to do (almost) everything to put together a rig, which will help you to achieve a similar frame of mind, or of "soul" at home with the right kind of music. If you like digital, like I do and use it and enjoy it for what it is, but find it falls short for reasons sufficiently discussed in these posts in the rendering of certain types of music, then I simply fail to see that the medium should have nothing to do with conveying "soul". That at the same time you can experience this and be moved by music from a table radio is another kettle of fish entirely and has nothing to do with the question if digital will finally be able to convey soul or not which we are discussing here. Contrary to MrTennis I find this discussion here under this heading appropriate and legitimate in spite of the fact, that I agree with most of what he has to say.
Cheers,
Detlof

Detlof, LOL! English is my first language and your competency in a second (?) language brings tears to my eyes. I'll never lift my eyes/head again. I'm so embarassed!

That said, I really agree, for the most part at least, with Mt T's sentiments. For myself, and for a very simple reason, the performance itself is what imbues music with 'soul'.

By way of example, I happen to be very moved by a recording of Sibelius' Finlandia Hymm which was reduced for male chorus and intended to be sung, acapella by simple marching soldiers (as in going to the front in the war with Russia).

Finns in general are all moved by 'Finlandia', with or without(more common) the Finlanda Hymm. It amounts to their national anthem, at least for the Finns I have known.

For myself, the full orchestrated version of Finlandia is very enjoyable and I can intellectually understand why it is considered patriotic. However it doesn't 'move me' in any recorded form, nor did a complete version move me live a couple of weeks ago. But two women with me at the live performance were moved to tears by the inclusion of the Hymm.

What moved me about the recorded acapella version of the Hymm by male chorus was my ability to appreciate the nature of the music as it might have been sung by common solders actually marching to war! I can tear up. I can visualize it!

Now that has NOTHING to do with recording format or any live v canned preferences. Its simply the sum of understanding the composers music and his intent as well as its effective communication (to me). Interestingly, this same music performed by a mixed chorus, has much less impact on me.

From this I conclude that, for myself at least, its the music and the style of its performance that imbues it with soul.

I think hearing the 'soul' as a result of the performance of music will always be dependent on the actual performance. The method of hearing the performance, whether live, or recorded on tape, LP, CD, etc will always be subordinate.

You can have a soulful performance without a specific format, but you cannot have a 'soulful recording' without the soulful performance.

IMHO.

Boy, from what I read here, can I make English to not be my native tongue? I see nuances with the language, that are beyond my capabilities. Guidocorona, it looks like you are benefiting from your second job. I find that I'm more in the Detlof camp, with one exception. One listening experience at Alex's(APL Hi-Fi)that left me unusually high for a few hours afterward. And it was digital.

Thank you Detlof. . . unfortunately English is far from being my mother tongue. . . I fear I am just a neighbour from South West of the Brenner Pass, now residing in the American South West. .

Drubin,
thanks so much "for the flowers". I just read your comment right now after having written the above. Glad I'm not alone on this......
Cheers,
D

Guido, since English is not my mother tongue, I would not have the vocabulary to describe what you have so beautifully put forth, it is now my turn to say that I understand what you mean... in spades! Thank you!

Mrtennis,
Yes, we do not speak of sound here, we speak of music. The former of course will not, the latter however may touch the soul. Of course it is both semantically as well as psychologically not quite correct to say that music has soul. Music may move your soul. Per se however music, let us take a Bach fugue, is a mathematical construct within a certain set of rules and boundaries, written down to be turned into sounds, which, when performed, we, especially if we have been socialised within the same cultural context where these compositions stem from, will percieve as music. Music, as we all know, can have an emotional impact on us, will trigger feelings, which sometimes even will touch the realm of the transcendental. Such music, we say colloquially " has soul " . There is a beautiful phrase in German which points into the same direction: Here we say a certain interpretation of a certain composition is "beseelt", which is best translated as "endowed with soul". I think basically up to here, we are in agreement. I would also see eye to eye with you in your statement, that quality of recordings have nothing to do with soul. I just have to think of most of HP's (TAS) favourite list of recordings and to remember how often some of them bored me and left me unmoved. I liked the sound, but not the music.
I also agree with your statement, that at best soul inheres in a live performance. I suppose we are in agreement, that most of us in our hobby try to come as close as possible to our perception of live music through our rigs. Now, just speaking for myself, I have lots of redbook Cds the sound of which I find great. Amongst those -within the classical realm- there are only two performances, solo performances, mind you, one by Hilary Hahn, the other by Janos Starker, which really move me and let me forget both rig and medium. I could recount infinitely more instances of analog rendition, which will do the same for me. This is only me naturally, hence of no statistical relevance at all, I realise that, also of course, as you say, this discussion could very well be held within the music section of A. as well. However, within the context of certain shortcomings which digital still to this day seems to have vis a vis LP or analog tape, in the rendition of the total "gestalt" of a musical performance, the chances are great, that LPs will get under your skin much more often than digital would. So, even though I would wish that it were not so, the medium, especially to someone deeply spoiled by live music, is still quite an issue to me and hence reason for me to join this discussion just here, where I find, it rightly belongs.

gentlemen:

what does sound have to do with soul ? have you ever heard a musician play in a poor acoustical environment where the sound was poor ? yet, one might say "he plays with soul".

i am afraid one may be looking for sould in the wrong places. if there are complaints about sound quality of recordings, that has nothing to do with soul.

sound quality and soul are two different issues,. at best soul inheres in a performance by a human being. sound quality has nothing to do with it. in fact a great sounding cd may not have much going for it as to performance. one could possibly say that such a performance lacks sould, while it sounds great.

this discussion belongs in the music section. it has nothing to do with digital or analog. the medium is not the issue.

Detlof, I now understand what you meant. . . in spades. . . but only a few months ago I was slightly less aware of the pervasiveness of the issue of black-inter-track background vs in-track musical silence. Since I have replaced my trusty Maggies IIIAs with the Vienna Mahlers, I have become increasingly upset by the cavalier attitude of those recording engineers who cut off a recorded track before all harmonics have decayed, all ambient echos have subsided, and the recording venue has returned to a state of baseline quiescence. Similarly, I get even more annoyed when a track starts at the very millisecond of the attack transient, or even worse, a couple of milliseconds into the attack without letting me hear the 'new' acoustic--which on a revealing system is positively gross sounding: The transition from black opacity of absolute lack of sound to acoustics 'in medias res' and viceversa is disconcerting, and most unmusical. With my current system, on a reasonable track which has not been recorded by implanting a microphone surgically into the uvula of the vocalist, those very faint ambient cues a--musical and not musical--are present and obvious. The true 'black' background exists only between tracks, and is. . . shapeless. A good acoustic track, recorded live or in a studio, brings to me the sound of the silence of the venue. Related to this is the problem of sudden engineering splices in the recording created out of acoustic context: the new fragment may have been inserted correctly into the final recording, but its low level ambient signature may sound disconcertingly different from what was heard in the previous millisecond. My source is the TEAC X-01 Limited CDp.

Detlof: your description of the sonic differences between analog and digital is superb!

Hi Guido, do you think the Panocha disk would also work with ferrets? We have some frolicking in the attic. Yes, and I must try the Lenny CD. It might get the ferrets out of my head...Seriously now, I also know quite a number of redbook CDs full of ambient cues. But that is not quite what I meant.As you probably know, there are cues much more subtle than the ones you refer to. You can hear them in those silences, which simply are not "black" in reality, but also in the way a tone will spread into space, creating an aura around the instrument. Here to put in bluntly, both analog and digital fall terribly short. I always get a shock, when I settle down in orchestra hall and hear the first notes spread in the hall. And, there is just no way around this, the analog facsimile of this, though still far off the real thing, does come closer. The soul of music, to come back to the essence of this thread, can be found anywhere, even on a table radio. If the music moves you, the gear rendering it, is of no importance. However, if you wish to come as close as possible to the real thing in your home, for classical music, as far as i am concerned, the "soul" still has its lonely place in analog in spite of the fact that sometimes digital comes close and can enthrall you. If however the music becomes more complex, where the tiniest of modes of intonation and tempi play a role ( I am thinking of the Alban Berg Quartet right now and their ensemble playing)and you begin to compare the same take both in digital and on LP, you will be amazed, what digital will gloss over and thus in a very subtle way change the piece. Of course I don't know if it is my gear or the medium itslef, which falls short.
Anyway, basically I don't worry about these things, don't even think about it, when I sit down to listen to music. I am glad we have all these media and can pick and choose for our enjoyment. We are truly privileged and i am very grateful for that.

Hi Detlof, if you really were bent to source terrible newer digital recordings, there are still a few around. . . for the fan of slow dentist drills grounding one's front upper teeth, that is! Try the Supraphone box set of the Panocha Quartet playing all string quartets by Antonin Dvorak'.. . . truly an enlightening experience. . . haven't had a roach in the house since I unwrapped the box and played the darn thing for the first time.

Yet, the opposite is also true. I have a most wonderful live recording on CD of the Israel Phil playing Dvorak's New World Symphony under Leonard Bernstein (DGG). In spite of this having been recorded c.ca 1983, you can hear plenty of ambient clues, including a sweet sense of the hall, objects being dropped from the music stands, Lenny stomping on the podium to press the 'tempo'. . . . then again Lenny muttering encouragements to the orchestra.

. . . all of this musical Heaven and Hell takes place through my TEAC X-01 Limited.

On the other hand however, to pay justice to digital, the art of digital recording has tremendously improved in the last 10 to 15 years. Recordings of small combos, indidividual solo instruments and voices seem to my ears mostly better rendered through the digital medium, simply have more presence and imediacy than analog. The harshness which used to plague early digital and made it unlistenable for me is thankfully no more. All the same, I would never give up my analog rig, because with big orchestral music, digital falls sadly short so far, even though well designed USB-DACS like Steve Nugent's "Spoiler with PaceCar" show promise also in this field, in spite of the fact, that here silences are really pitch black (;
Cheers,
D

Davemitchell is right to my mind and ears: If a LP is properly cleaned and well treated, there will be no clicks and pops on a properly set up TT and quite often, Abe, there is a hell of a lot of hiss on prerecorded open reel tapes. I know, I own and listen to a lot of them. Abe is right about dynamic range of digital, but wrong to my ears about "details" and if you are familiar with live music and take that as reference, "black background" to my ears is completely unnatural ( just as a noisy one of course ). Rather the background in a good concert hall is full of tiny reverberant clues, it "breaths" so to speak and I would expect that as well from a good recording of classical big orchestral music. Even the great Zanden or the DCS gear will not pick that up, a good analog recording of a classical piece will. The proof lies in the listening.
In fact I am wondering, if by the means of clever advertising and constant repetition of it, one of the central failures of digital, the lack of rendering of all the necesary ambient clues in a recording have not been turned into the so called advantage of "black background". There is simply no such thing in a live event as every regular concert goer knows.

I can't stand the hiss and pop of LPs.

First, the "hiss" is not from LP's but from the original analog master tapes. LP's don't create hiss. Second, this kind of comment about not being able to tolerate the "pop" and noise of LP's is usually stated by people who have little or no experience with high end or state of the art turntables, which are extremely quiet.

With proper DAC, output stage design and implementation, digital will win over LP if you consider ALL aspects of listening music: black background, dynamic range, details, etc. LP may edge out in a few areas, but OVERALL digital will win.

If only this were true I couldn't be happier. LP's are a pain in the a**, but they are so superior sonically that we are forced to deal with it. They don't just edge out digital in a few areas, they are vastly better in nearly every area.

It's both funny and bizzare to those of us who listen to high end examples of both, when people claim that digital is better. It really isn't even close.

I can't stand the hiss and pop of LPs. True great analog may be the one and only original open reel tapes. LP is a CD equivalent to the Master tapes.

With proper DAC, output stage design and implementation, digital will win over LP if you consider ALL aspects of listening music: black background, dynamic range, details, etc. LP may edge out in a few areas, but OVERALL digital will win.

I know we are supposed to have live music as a reference, I think that analog is, at least, a reference for digital. By that, I mean that sometimes we don't realize where digital errors, until we hear some analog. Analog is better than no reference at all. That being said, I've been listening to digital exclusively for awhile while I get my analog going. Alex, of APL, proved to me that digital could be music-which I didn't believe when I started this thread.

Shadorne, just for the record, I don't bash digital. In fact I like it and can get drawn into the music with a well recorded cd. The Zanden combo is magnificent and what it does to redbook is simply amazing and also the DCS combo with SACD gear can be highly satisfying. USB dacs, like the Spoiler are pointing a way into the future. However, as Nilthepill so rightly points out, analog is closer to the real thing. If you are familiar with that, there is no way around it. Anyone is free to prefer whatever he or she likes. That is entirely another matter. Therefore I tend to consider all the bickering about what is "better" futile, boring and besides the point. I you like big dynamic swings, black silence between notes and an etched out presence of voices and instruments within the soundstage you MUST prefer digital. If you wish to "feel" the presence of the hall, where the music was recorded, consider "blackness" as unnatural, rather have the silence between notes "breathe" as the sound softly decays in minute reverberations, you will prefer LPs or prerecorded tapes, because it comes closer to what you might hear in your favourite concert hall. As most things in life, it is a matter of taste, where everybody is free to prefer what is pleasing. Anyway, even the best rig, be it analog or digital falls sadly short of the live event. Neither digital nor analog provide sufficient "air", that is space where the sound , emanating from every instrument, seems to float and spread in space, to come even close, except that analog sometimes seems to mimic that just a tad better.

To the Shadorne and the "Amen" guys who think all CD players sound the same: aren't you in the wrong hobby? If you think, as Shadorne does, that all cables, amplifiers, preamps, and CD players sound the same (or have negligible differences) why waste your time pursuing or discussing audio any further? There's nothing left to talk about.

I haven't followed the entire thread, but I'm inclined to agree with Nilthepill- almost - but then, I first refused to believe my ears, I listened again - in my system no less - to a well set up Goldmund Reference I, a Clearaudio Insider and a WAVAC phono. I hadn't listened to vinyl for five years, but now through this rig and listening to big orchestral classical gear my truly unwilling answer is: "NEVER" at least not with that kind of music.

Mrtennis, Yes I do see your point... and I have been moved by music from a table radio, because the musical message was so strong. However, if audiophilia goes together with love for music, you would expect from your rig, that it would move you emotionally with the right kind of music. After all, that is what you set it up for, to listen deeper into the essence of a musical piece. Exceptional systems will reveal information which a simple system really cannot and the deeper you are enabled to listen into the interweave of a complex musical message, the more you may become enthralled by it. This is a simple truth I'm afraid, though elite in a way of course, which may make it unsavoury to many. However, the sad truth is, if you're used to guzzle cheap wine, you wouldn't know what a good bottle of Bordeaux can do to you. You may get drunk on both, but the way to there is oh how different.
Cheers, D,

MRT, I conveyed your thoughts to my TEAC X-01 Limited this morning. . . and I would like to let you know that she immediately started to throw hissy fits. . . she's rather emotional sometimes, no matter how much I threaten to put her on a strict regime of Brian Eno.

there is no emotion in a machine. an emotion is a reaction from a human being. music conveys the emotion, but the reciver expresses it or feels it.

it is not the function of a "machine" to convey emotion.
sound quality is not necessary to experience an emotion.

a simple medium, such as a table radio will suffice, as will a personal stereo which can be purchased from a mass merchandiser.

as poor sounding as a recording may be, it is still possible to receive that which music is communicating. while you may not like the sound, the message can be communicated in spite of the sound.

This is definitely yesterday's news folks. . . lots of CDPs out there that are fully emotionally involving.

Vulcanaudio, I have too! Through Zanden digital combo!!

i have heard digital convey soul;audio aero capitole classic se in an appropriate well setup system.

OK...who might those people be that helped you out tremendously? You should thank them.

Cdwallace, sorry, I lost me also. Can I thank those people that mentioned that cd has been getting better(If I go to find their names, I usually lose my "response"). That advice has helped me tremendously! Maybe we should take note of their names, and listen to what else they have to say about things?

Mmak - you lost me!