What is "Sound Stage?"

[RogerD]

Mark, as usual, you have a knack for hitting the nail on the head. For someone to say there is no such thing as image height tells me that they've never heard a good high-end speaker or system.

Every recording, every speaker, every cartridge, every component in the room, affect imaging and image height. Some even exaggerate it. Other components make a recording sound like The Lilliputian Symphony Orchestra or Schroeder's piano. On a good recording, you should be able to see in the mind's eye where the singer was relative to the mike. That's esp. true for line source speakers in my experience. And yes, you can not only hear and feel the side walls but the ceiling. It should be made obligatory for everyone who talks about anything in audio to go to HPs to hear what a truly great high-end system can do. Until then, most have no idea what they're talking about.

+10

 

[bblue]

puhleeze....and bumble bees can't fly either.

And sorry that single driver, xoverless speakers or electrostats blow your theory.

And they don't produce height based on information in the recording either. To my point, they would be far less inclined to do so because there are no (or minimal) crossovers. Just room interaction and listener interpretation.

--Bill

 

[treitz3]

Bill, do yourself a favor and get the Chesky CD w/ the LEDR test. Unless I'm misunderstanding what it is you are trying to get across when you say, "And they don't produce height based on information in the recording either.", you might have something to learn as well.

What it says it does, it does. That is, unless your room or setup is affecting the height.

 

[treitz3]

Tom, my real name is Tom as well and I would be more than willing to try this out for you. I do not have tone controls at all throughout the rig, though. The only thing I could possibly do is unhook the top end of the speaker [bi-ampable speaker] altogether but that would [in theory] yield me nothing, as these signals are coming from the upper range of frequencies. What do you suggest with this, if anything?

 

[treitz3]

Test 1)...Play your chesky cd w/ledr test, but ONLY one speaker hooked up and see if you still get the height information above the speaker in the same degree you get with two channels hooked up.

There was absolutely no change that I detected in the height during this test. I tried this twice. With only one speaker, the image stays directly at the tweeter without any detectable movement either vertically or horizontally.

 

[mep]

There was absolutely no change that I detected in the height during this test. I tried this twice. With only one speaker, the image stays directly at the tweeter without any detectable movement either vertically or horizontally.

Stand by, Tom is probably dreaming up some more parlor tricks for you to try.

 

[RogerD]

I'm always amazed at the information especially ambient ques that are in recordings. I'm sure the setup has something to do with height,but I can turn off the psycho speakers and and stiil that grand organ sounds 16 feet high. I have had these speakers in 3 different settings and it has always been highly dimensional.

btw the toe-in has been adjusted since the photo was taken.

 

[mep]

btw the toe-in has been adjusted since the photo was taken.

Didn't want me ragging on you again eh?

 

[RogerD]

Didn't want me ragging on you again eh?

How did you know!

 

[JackD201]

Here I was thinking Roger's camera lens suffered from astigmatism

 

[treitz3]

Here is most of the rig I am offering my evaluations on. Many things have changed but this should give you some indication that I'm not evaluating on a BOSE rig. This was my rig featured at an audio event about 2 and half years ago...

 

[NorthStar]

Mark, as usual, you have a knack for hitting the nail on the head. For someone to say there is no such thing as image height tells me that they've never heard a good high-end speaker or system.

Every recording, every speaker, every cartridge, every component in the room, affect imaging and image height. Some even exaggerate it. Other components make a recording sound like The Lilliputian Symphony Orchestra or Schroeder's piano. On a good recording, you should be able to see in the mind's eye where the singer was relative to the mike. That's esp. true for line source speakers in my experience. And yes, you can not only hear and feel the side walls but the ceiling. It should be made obligatory for everyone who talks about anything in audio to go to HPs to hear what a truly great high-end system can do. Until then, most have no idea what they're talking about.

I got absolutely nothing to say! :b

* By the way Myles, do you have Pink Floyd 'Dark Side Of The Moon' LP (best remastered version) and/or SACD version?
Pink Floyd 'Wish You Were Here' latest LP and/or SACD version?
Roger Waters 'Amused To Death' best LP and/or CD version?

... Spaciousness with Width, Height, and Depth ... In front, on the sides, and even behind ...
Low & High (Height) ... 3D ... :b

--> Listen to track #12 (13-14 also) from 'Amused To Death'. ... Track #1, might as well too.

=> Don't think, do it! And just listen, attentively; everyone here, at WBF and beyond, who is reading this post right here right now & who has that album, or CD.
... And hear, see, that huge soundstage, low in the middle, high on the extreme sides, above your head, and even behind. See, hear, how deep (depth) you can go, into your own room's dimensional space; from that recording.
And crank it up! Don't forget!

 

[c1ferrari]

Terrific First Post, Tim...

So is the difference between imaging anot of nd 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

I wouldn't advance that sound stage is entirely a creation of our systems/rooms and will be reliant on the recording and not of the recording

 

[NorthStar]

Hmmm ...

People do have very active imaginations, and if they believe they're hearing a height element, that's what they hear.

But think about it. A single speaker produces sound forward. The better the design the more absolutely forward it is. Around the crossover frequencies you may find some phase shift, and some crossovers require the individual drivers to be out of absolute phase with one another so they will be in phase during the crossover transition. These characteristics can create an illusion that particular frequencies are shifted one direction or another, and can also interact with the room in a similar fashion. But the important issue is that with a single speaker there is no signal control in a recording that will shift the audio in any direction but straight ahead.

Now, you add a second speaker forming the L and R pair.. Each of those speakers can only fire forward. However, the amplitude and phase shift of the signal, one channel relative to the other, simulates L to R position to varying degrees. THERE IS NO UP AND DOWN. It's strictly lateral apparent motion.

Hi Bill,

You are also the same person who before posted that there is no height information in music recordings.
I simply disagree with you, and categorically so. :b
Too many "if, can, imagination, believe, may, some, illusion, but", and all that Jazz pizzaz ... :b
Just my own opinion on your explanation, no more no less, and respectably yours.

Now, add the effects of crossover performance, absolute phase of drivers and a room randomly inserting its signature in there, to the lateral positional information and you can get some pretty bizarre effects. They'll typically vary significantly from recording to recording and are only playing with your ears. There's nothing real about it, and it's not recorded so you can hear it that way.

Once you learn how those effects and limitations actually sound and hear them for what they really are, what you hear starts making more sense. Yes, some of the 'magic' is gone, but ...

--Bill

More of the same, and from your own personal experience, or 'croyances' (convictions, opinions, beliefs), and again I simply disagree. :b

Microphones do capture height information, and loudspeakers do convey that height information.
All 'bout the proper mic technics, spot-on positioned, and from good quality of course (mics). And the right types too for each positioning spot in that full sound stage.
Record it all, reproduce it all as well. :b
No ambiguities, no phase shifts (EQ corrected), no ifs, no cans, no buts, no nothing but just Height info real and concrete there here before and after.

Best regards,
Bob

 

[Soundproof]

I am repeating the two Spotify tracks referred to earlier, as well as adding the album art, in order for posters to be able to find the music in their archives. The two tracks are an excellent illustration of the importance of the recording technique relative to the sound stage. The Zukerman/Barenboim recording has been reissued many times, due to the quality of the playing, not the recording:

Here's Barenboim/Zukerman, in an atrocious recording of the Kreutzer. No complaints about the performance, but poorly recorded. Everything is inside the area described by the speakers. There are different remasters of it:
http://open.spotify.com/track/3TdMFhukNobGk6hUfenOF8
http://open.spotify.com/track/2CXilemzVKZKE1dgj3VdtK

Here are Argerich/Repin in the same work - recorded quite differently:
http://open.spotify.com/track/0gQGjZqOhplmv9kL76z3I2

Useful tracks for evaluating what creates a sound stage, and what doesn't. You'll find that in the latter case, the sound seems to emanate from places far outside the extension of the speaker set-up.

 

[andromedaaudio]

I am not a great classical music fan but i listen to it from time to time on lp / cd .
last weekend i was in oslo for a weekend .
As they have a beautifull opera house and a good price ( very low for norwegian standards and that standard is very high , lol), i went in for a listen.
The interiour is mainly beautifull wood and gives a warm feeling .
The hall has 3 rows up and i sat way above in the middle of the most upper row , as i understood the soundpressure level was the same anywhere you sat in the theatere at least thats what they said .
My impression of the sound imaging dynamics and all that :
First the sound came from far away ,there was defintively a distant soundfield , the orchestre had no amplification.
further it had a silky very fine upper frequency sound which i have not heard being reproduced like that by any tweeter or any system .
Dynamics were less than with a very good hifi set , probably that has all to do with close mike lp cd recordings .
Imaging was not very much present , you could hear the singer upfront , drums left ,contrabas cellos on the rightside and that was merely it
It had a natural ease which is not so easy to reproduce i reckon , i do might use felt on my next model because the sound was anything but hard on the ear.
Next time i go to the amsterdam opera house i take a groundfloor mid 10 th rowseat or something like that.

 

[c1ferrari]

An Analogy

Image is to Soundstage
as
Tree is to Forest

 

[Soundproof]

The Opera in Oslo has not quite gone to Wagner's lengths in Bayreuth, but one has sought to create an orchestral sound that supports the singers on stage, without overpowering them.

Here's the Bayreuth schematic:

The goal there was to let the sound of the orchestra appear indirectly in the hall, while the singers were always in focus. Due to the seating lay-out in Bayreuth, there is no risk of audience members looking into the pit. In Oslo, the orchestra is inside a quite deep pit, and the goal of the acoustic planning was to achieve a similar effect to that in Bayreuth, without the orchestra suffering in the infernal warmth of being in the Wagner-pit in mid-summer.
The wood paneling in the Oslo Opera has been carefully shaped to help in achieving an "ethereal" sound from the orchestra - as you write, without precise indications of source, though with a general idea. Symphony orchestras have played there, but are placed on stage, and the received sound stage is then completely different from that of hearing the opera orchestra in the pit.

Link to image of the hall: http://www.architecture-buildings.c...tta-oslo-opera-house-interior-opera-huose.jpg

 

[andromedaaudio]

Yeah thats it , i would have liked to have sat on one of the middle frontrows for a comparison of imaging and soundpressure level .
The tweeter that does remind me a bit so far is a diamond ,but they can sound a bit harsh when driven hard (i like to step on the gas ) at least in my designs .
another one was a V3 magico (ringradiator scanspeak???)driven by the nagra 845 monos , very clean sound as well

 

[Soundproof]

The wood paneling seen in the link keeps the High Frequency portion of the music alive, ensuring it doesn't get absorbed too soon, and accounts for the silky quality you noticed. A lot of effort was put into working this out.