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In Reply to: I Very Much To Know Which Recordings Were Utilized posted by Robertc88 on March 26, 2006 at 08:17:46:
More than two years before I completed my multi-channel system I always held out the Telarc Sibelius Symphony #2 as a benchmark for me in sound staging, but especially depth of soundstage. The back to front layering on that disc is incredible. (Boy, I hate talking this audiophile lingo...I'm not good at it). This may be true perhaps to a fault because I'm not sure that you really get sound staging or imaging that distinct in a live setting.So, last year while I was auditioning EMM Labs gear, I always used the Sibelius disc for demonstration for both two-channel and multi-channel auditions. To be honest I was initially concerned that the center channel would "get in the way" of the perfect two channel sound stage because in my experimentations at home with an unconnected middle speaker I "thought" that the center speaker was active. It appeared that music, as wonderful as it sounded, was coming from a speaker that was not connected. But this was purely psychological because I night when the speaker was not visible the soundstage was a perfect as before. It was just that the center speaker seemed to be "visually blocking" my line of sight to the back of the orchestra. It took a few days for the center speaker, still unconnected, to become sonically invisible. I hope that makes sense!
But the bottom line is that in multi-channel the Sibelius lost nothing in comparison to the two-channel the soundstage. I can't say to a certainty that the * frontal depth* of the soundstage or "imaging" (and I'm not quite sure how to define that) improved in with multi-channel. But absolutely nothing was lost.
It's the *rest* of the soundstage and presentation (height, width, and overall depth, not just *frontal depth) of the Sibelius disc that is distinctly superior in multi-channel over two-channel and that no two channel format whether it be reel-to-reel, vinyl, CD, SACD or whatever simply can't begin to match and what brings this disc, much closer to the symphony performance I attended on Friday evening.
The Sibelius 2 is very typical of the Telarc multi-channel experience compared to the two channel Telarc experience. Indeed, I have found this to be the case with all classical multi-channel recordings in my collection.
There are many, many, that come to mine but recordings that feature organ can be the most dramatic when compared to the two-channel counterpart because so often the organ *is* in the rear, such as the Linn recording of Poulenc's Organ Concerto. Now there will be some listeners that say, well, "I don't care if the organ is suppose to be in the rear I want to hear it in the front like I'm use to hearing it in two-channel". Nothing wrong with that, but it shows there is different paradigm that must be taken into consideration with *all* multi-channel.
Another example, certainly a more aggressive (read: lot going on in rear channels) multi-channel than any classical recording is Telarc's "Monty Meets Sly and Robbie". See my comments at:
http://www.sa-cd.net/showtitle/449 (See Review by Oakland)Another jazz example is the ubiquitous Miles Davis "Kind of Blue". The multi-channel, though not aggressive at all, is far better than the two channel, especially in the bass.
My R&B/pop example is what is for me may be the most authentic (most like being there) recording I have heard from any format, the multi-channel version of Earth, Wind, and Fire's "Gratitude". See my comments at: http://www.sa-cd.net/showtitle/814 (See Review by “Oaklandâ€)
Robert C. Lang
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Follow Ups
- Here are 3 recordings for starters...classical, jazz, pop/R&B - Robert C. Lang 16:54:33 03/26/06 (1)
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