What is "Sound Stage?"

Phelonious Ponk · Feb 9, 2012

I get imaging. It happens in all directions and is primarily a function the recording and the mix -- the engineer pans the stereo image of the elements of sound, placing them in the L to R plane. He uses mic choices, placement, studio ambience, processing and, mostly, volume in the mix, creating a sense of depth. Assuming - and this is a huge assumption these days - that the mastering engineer doesn't throw it all away at that stage, and all of this is done really well, you should have a recording with a reasonably good illusion of space, even if it was all recorded in a small studio. Playback electronics can, in my view, only subtract from the recording. If you switch one relatively transparent (another "what is" if there ever was one) DAC for another and hear a dramatic expansion of the sound stage, enjoy that, but it's expectation bias. And if, in a perfect theoretical world, your electronics get out of the way, the engineer's creation of space should reach your speaker terminals.

Then all hell breaks loose and all bets are off.

So is the difference between imaging and sound stage something that happens in the interaction between our speakers and our rooms? Is it entirely a creation of our systems, dependent upon, but not a part of the recording itself?

Enquiring minds want to know....

Tim

fas42 · Feb 9, 2012

The "original" definition strikes me as being as good as any:

The accuracy with which a reproducing system conveys audible information about the size, shape, and acoustical characteristics of the original recording space and the placement of the performers within it.

An extension of that I've come across which nicely rounds things out is:

There will be an awareness of the reflective boundary walls of the acoustic space behind and to the sides of the performers, and the spatiality of the hall itself will extend a considerable distance beyond the distance between the loudspeakers.

Frank

Ronm1 · Feb 9, 2012

Tim

My 2cents

Sound stage The width of the wall of sound created by your setup, between and to either side of your speakers and possibly even some height and depth depending on room etc...
Imaging within that wall, the ability to pick out and differentiate individual components, instruments, voices, etc..

fas42 · Feb 9, 2012

Following on Ronm1's comments, and to take a somewhat difficult track for possibly some systems, "Real Man" on Springsteen's "Human Touch" album. This is a very heavy, dense mix, but the imaging allows each of the instruments, and vocals to be clearly seen occupying their own position in the space behind the speakers, they occupy a distinct "area" for want of a better term. But beyond that a very high level of artificial depth has been engineered, there is no natural hall or such ambience but a very deep and reverberant echo has been added; this would be the soundstage for the overall recording. As well, there are slight soundstages existing around some of the elements of the mix; in particular you can hear the space in which the vocals were recorded as a separate, much smaller soundstage.

Frank

Phelonious Ponk · Feb 9, 2012

fas42 said:
The "original" definition strikes me as being as good as any:

An extension of that I've come across which nicely rounds things out is:

Frank

Frank -- What are the sources of these definitions? Like many notions of "sound stage," they ignore the way recordings are made and attribute something to them that is almost never there.

Tim

Phelonious Ponk · Feb 9, 2012

Ronm1 said:
Tim

My 2cents

Sound stage The width of the wall of sound created by your setup, between and to either side of your speakers and possibly even some height and depth depending on room etc...
Imaging within that wall, the ability to pick out and differentiate individual components, instruments, voices, etc..

This works for me. This would make imaging mostly a function of recording and sound stage almost completely a function of speakers, speaker placement, and the room. It will not be sufficient for many, though.

Tim

rockitman · Feb 9, 2012

Phelonious Ponk said:
Frank -- What are the sources of these definitions? Like many notions of "sound stage," they ignore the way recordings are made and attribute something to them that is almost never there.

Tim

I try to keep it simple..I view the sound stage as just that...Imagine a live stage with musicians playing... There is perceived width, depth and height of sound coming from the stage to your ears in the crowd (Hopefully DFC) or at home when listening to the stereo in front of you. The imaging to me is the placement of the instrument/voice sounds within the sound stage whether fore or aft, left or right, high or low. Maybe that is too simple of a definition, but it works for me.

MylesBAstor · Feb 9, 2012

If you need to ask, there's something wrong with your system

BTW, get a copy of Gordon Holt's book. He defined everything quite well. You're just reinventing the wheel. You can also check the old Stereophiles where Jack English had a series defining different audio terms.

Ronm1 · Feb 9, 2012

Phelonious Ponk said:
This works for me. This would make imaging mostly a function of recording and sound stage almost completely a function of speakers, speaker placement, and the room. It will not be sufficient for many, though.

Tim

Speaker placement has to play a part, as a simple ex . Orient/aim a speaker more towards the sweet spot soundstage narrows or widens. I don't think one just changed the recording. We changed how it was being presented.

Phelonious Ponk · Feb 9, 2012

Ronm1 said:
Speaker placement has to play a part, as a simple ex . Orient/aim a speaker more towards the sweet spot soundstage narrows or widens. I don't think one just changed the recording. We changed how it was being presented.

That is true enough, you can narrow the aim of the speakers and narrow the imaging, to a degree. You can't change the placement of elements or the precision of that placement (well, you can, but once you've found the sweet spot you can only degrade them), but you can certainly change the breadth of the presentation. And that does not change the recording. Fair enough. But that's still down to the recording, the speakers and the room. How could, for example, someone change DACs -- and let's say both, for the sake of discussion, are very good quality with very similar channel separation performance -- and experience a dramatic (or even audible) expansion of sound stage, without changing anything else? How can any electronic component change the height/width of the soundstage (depth could be a function of S/N, dynamic range, resolution of detail)?

Tim

JackD201 · Feb 9, 2012

It's where the images are.

Phelonious Ponk · Feb 9, 2012

JackD201 said:
It's where the images are.

What is where the images are?

Tim

Steve Williams · Feb 9, 2012

Phelonious Ponk said:
What is where the images are?

Tim

Imaging

Robert · Feb 9, 2012

Ronm1 said:
Tim

My 2cents

Sound stage The width of the wall of sound created by your setup, between and to either side of your speakers and possibly even some height and depth depending on room etc...
Imaging within that wall, the ability to pick out and differentiate individual components, instruments, voices, etc..

I disagree with this definition. A soundstage in many ways is an audiophile anomaly. It is up there with the 'black background', 'pin-point imaging', and 'separation between instruments'. I hear none of these things in a live performance, just as I do not hear a wall of sound with a discrete boundary.

In a live performance, the music surrounds or envelopes you. There is no wall, edge, or drop-off. Performers do not have a discrete height, although they do occupy a sense of space with sound emanating in all directions. Harmonics interact and summate between notes and musicians, so the music needs to congeal as well.

And, it really does not depend tremendously on the recording. It is dependent upon the system.

FrantzM · Feb 9, 2012

Huh !! Robert has a point in most live performance there is no sense of instruments really at least when it comes to a symphonic performance ... I would however say that in small ensembles, Chamber music, Jazz and the likes there is such ... There is separation between instruments and they have a physical presence and dimension...

I see the soundstage as the virtual volume of space from which the sound comes from. This voume has dimensions that usualy vary with recordings and it seems that some components suggest more of that volume than others given the same speakers and room.

The more I listen to Live performance and I have these past past few weeks, the more Irealize how much 2-ch stereo is lacking ... I am really hoping that Surround sound gets the recognition it needs to bring music reproduction to a different level. So far it is not entirely there but it seems tome that should be the new focus of High End Audio .. I am a 2-ch person

MylesBAstor · Feb 9, 2012

Robert said:
I disagree with this definition. A soundstage in many ways is an audiophile anomaly. It is up there with the 'black background', 'pin-point imaging', and 'separation between instruments'. I hear none of these things in a live performance, just as I do not hear a wall of sound with a discrete boundary.

In a live performance, the music surrounds or envelopes you. There is no wall, edge, or drop-off. Performers do not have a discrete height, although they do occupy a sense of space with sound emanating in all directions. Harmonics interact and summate between notes and musicians, so the music needs to congeal as well.

And, it really does not depend tremendously on the recording. It is dependent upon the system.

Of course that depends upon where you sit. When I sit close to an orchestra in Carnegie Hall (or say BSO), I certainly can hear where the various instruments/musicians are seated! And don't you think that the musicians seated onstage know where the other players are located? Now if you're talking about a Cyril Harris travesty like his hall in DC where the National Symphony performs, then all bets are off.

Also microphones don't hear like our ears do. And the imaging (and center imaging) depends greatly upon the miking pattern used eg. Decca tree, multi-miking, M-S, etc. It's also going to depend on the instruments how they "radiate" sound (that's also going to be applicable to tonality too).

And what about replaying a Blumlein miked recording back on a normal speaker arrangement. Is that the way to do to hear this single stereo mike recording technique?

rockitman · Feb 9, 2012

FrantzM said:
The more I listen to Live performance and I have these past past few weeks, the more Irealize how much 2-ch stereo is lacking ... I am really hoping that Surround sound gets the recognition it needs to bring music reproduction to a different level. So far it is not entirely there but it seems tome that should be the new focus of High End Audio .. I am a 2-ch person

Really ? I never have attended a surround sound concert. I have never heard music coming from behind me at a concert save for the reverberation off the back wall sitting in a crappy seat. I don't find 2 channel lacking in the least for live recordings and I have 100's of them from my bootleg taping days with DAT.

FrantzM · Feb 9, 2012

Myles

Seating close to an orchestra still doesn't give you the "separation" . You hear the instruments within a soundscape and yes you knwo where they are but their individuality is only apparent inwhen they play a solo, at least in symphonic music. The musiciam on the stage has a different perspective. The clues are both visual and auditory, i could add that the knowledge of the seating arrangement helps in this regard...
You are raising other question concerning Blumlein and other miking techniques and as they relate to speaker arrangements .. To me an entirely different topic

Robert · Feb 9, 2012

Myles, You are correct in that performers occupy a position and your seating distance has a large effect on the sound. My point was that many systems serve to exaggerate the positioning element, and I've heard systems which presents the performer as too discrete, and also as too large. I am seeking a sound that is natural. Once you have a natural sound, you stop actively listening for this descriptor. The brain knows.

Frantz, I am also a 2 channel person, and I believe this is all that is needed. God didn't give us 5 or 7 ears (yet). For some reason, the microphone picks-up these cues and feeds them back through the system. Like the Ragu tomato sauce commercial: "It's-a in there!".

FrantzM · Feb 9, 2012

rockitman said:
Really ? I never have attended a surround sound concert. I have never heard music coming from behind me at a concert save for the reverberation off the back wall sitting in a crappy seat. I don't find 2 channel lacking in the least for live recordings and I have 100's of them from my bootleg taping days with DAT.

rockitman

I am a 2-ch person. let me repeat it .. Whenever you go to a concert you are surrounded by sound. I would say more than 60% from the front ... ANY Live performance .. You hear quite a bit from the back... How do you reproduce these things that are comig from the side and back with ony 2-ch in the front? Do you have to rely on the reflections (false) on your own room boundaries to simulate but not truly reproduce these.. These can only be reproduced , not simulated by surround channels.. No way out of this... You and I have been quite satisfied with 2-ch and for now i don't see myself moving away from the thousands of software i have in2-ch but admitting it lacking is not the same as saying it is not satisfying ...

I am a 2-ch person

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