When is digital going to get the soul of music?

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

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.

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.

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

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.

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.

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.

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

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. .

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.

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.

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

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".

"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 .

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

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.

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.

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.

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.

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".

More sophistry. . . Yaaawn!

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?

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

That was beautiful Detlof! MRG

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 ;-).

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...............

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.

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.

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.

Mmakshak, who is Alex?

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

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

No kidding, uh oh. ;)

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.

When is digital going to get the soul of music?

when we stop worrying about it (Detlof corollary 1.0)

Mapmann, I start my morning with the "What's Going On" cd(issued 2003). Remember, that was recorded in analog originally. I do think that people recognize there is something too clinical with digital. Guidocorona, the AMA is a political organization, and is dedicated to protecting MD's interests(Although, I read something recently about the AMA selling those interests to the insurance companies.). Actually, the head of the AMA tried to buy the original Rife Machine. Has anyone heard the HRx system from Reference Recordings(as mentioned in the recent issue of Absolute Sound)?

Makk, I hope to see before long an audiophile-grade version of the Rife machine offered by Machina Dynamica.

That would be something to see, Guidocorona! It would have to be all silver, with pebbles placed at appropriate locations.

Wadia 581se seems good to me.

I just recently got my analog(Linn Sondek, Ekos, nude Archiv, Lingo, Mana table, Lehmann Black Cube SE) going. It seems to me that if you listen deeply, digital has an end, or something, to the sound(dither?), and analog doesn't. With analog, all you have is the instrument sound, and nothing else. Now, I have heard digital recordings of analog where it seems there is no difference(from Alex of APL), but I no longer have access to these. I will be going to BAAS's session this month where we will compare live versus recorded(both analog and digital). Cookie, who owns her own recording studio and is hosting this session, claims that you have to record to 3 1/2 inch analog tape to get proper sound. I don't know if I've stated this before, but I have the following theory: With analog, you have the iron(?) particles lining up(or changing)due to music. And with digital, you have the recording mechanism imposing(you fit into my one's and zero's-or else..) itself on the music. Maybe that's the difference?

Mmakshak, I think the difference between the finest vinyl and digital has closed greatly in the last five years with better dacs and teflon output caps as well as going to read until right hard drives as a digital source. Finally, I have found the finest of isolation, Halcyonics, drives both to their highest levels yet.

I still suspect that neither will ever equal quality reel to reel tapes at close to the originals.

I also believe that neither digital nor vinyl will closely approach live with the speakers and the amplifiers being the major reason for this failure.

With every improvement I have made to pursue realism, I still hear a difference between vinyl and digital. Vinyl now has virtually no surface noise, thanks largely to the Halcyonics and the use of the Walker Audio Prelude four step cleaner. The bass has location and no boom or overhang. Digital has much the same character thanks to no errors in reading the digital information and the clarity of teflon caps. Having the dac well isolated on the Halcyonics also makes a major improvement.

Finally, my new H-Cat amp is like no other I have heard and make both live, but that is another thread.

Analog tapes have a from of distortion/compression that is very pleasing - many pros still prefer it. Perhaps the close miked approach to music recording means that analog tape is the optimum medium for taking the sting or harshness out of the music.

Tbg, I see you have a very resolving system. I am not anti-digital, as I just recently bought 180 cd's, and I feel the damage that digital did to music was mostly done in the past. The only Halcyonic isolator I could find costs $7,500(their headquarters is less than 20 miles from me.). I could imagine that the Halcyonic lowers the noise floor. My Lessloss pc's lowered the noise floor, but I still have reservations about digital. Do you hear a background to digital that isn't natural? Also, do you feel as relaxed after listening to digital as you do after listening to analog(We used to do muscle testing that showed that digital weakened your muscles.)? Shadorne, I will go into my live versus recorded sessions with an open mind, but will revisit what you said after they are over.

I did not think older CD players got the sould of music, but they are doing better lately. I think Simaudio Andromeda does (maybe not as good as TT), and some others I am sure depending on system. It also depends on what musical characteristics you like (insturments sound somewhat real, somewhat real dynamics, etc).

To me the soul of music depends a little on my mood too. Sometimes I am in the mood, other times no.

Thanks

Bill

Both digital and analog have distortion. Neither will truly compare with live music. That said, there is a big difference between the distortion caused by analog, and that caused by digital. To grossly summarize it, there is actually more distortion in analog, as digital fans are fond of pointing out. However, the distortion is almost entirely at quite low frequencies. The distortion in digital, though much less, is still MUCH more musically objectionable, as it takes place at higher frequencies, and is much more audible all of the time. As some have said, advances have been made in the quality of digital reproduction; however, this fundamental distortion of the frequencies that are the most used in music cannot be helped, and that is why despite the advances in resolution, etc., digital will never really rival analog. Close, maybe, but definitely no cigar.

There is nothing inherently problematic or wrong with digital today, even in the cases of CD and broadband internet. There are increasingly more cases everyday where it is done right rather than wrong at a cost most can afford.

Also, digital processing options add tremendous flexibility regarding the nature of the resulting sound, based on personal preference.

Analog sounds great too when done right but the medium is inherently limited as a whole compared to digital which is why its future is limited and digital's is not.

Analog only lovers are going to have to face the fact that maybe digital will never capture the soul of music for themselves but for many people digital already surpasses the sound quality of vinyl and it will surpass it for most people very soon.

I have read many reviews and threads where dedicated vinyl lovers have found digital players that they enjoy as much as their vinyl gear. This will never happen for Michael Fremer or for some on this forum, but you have to realize that you are a very small but vocal minority.

I have already mentioned a few of times on these threads that according to the RIAA and Nielsen Soundscan, about one million new vinyl albums were sold last year. That is just not a lot of people buying a lot of vinyl.

Digital sound is improving rapidly and the learning curve on how to make digital sound great is about to go parabolic. I suggest that everyone keep an open mind on digital and get ready for high-res digital downloads.

" I suggest that everyone keep an open mind on digital and get ready for high-res digital downloads"

Hard to do when someone is convinced the medium is inherently flawed, which it isn't......

Personally, I'm ready to move forward and lay my fond memories of analog systems of the past to rest. In this case, truly the best is yet to come.

I just need a nice sized flat panel monitor so I can easily read about what I'm listening too, just like in the good old days of 33 1/3 lps. Only now, I will learn more as well because I am not limited to the space available with album packaging for content (let's not even talk about CD packaging though, the small size and packaging truly is the pits from a graphics design perspective).

Learsfool - Perhaps it was asked before, but don't they press some (or most) of the new LPs from digital master tapes? You said that "digital will never rival analog" - digital already won, seems to me.

Fear not... till Burnham Wood doth come to Dunsinane...

More seriously...if this thread keeps going...how long will it be before the complete works of Shaespeare are typed?