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Newent Orchestral
Society Bill's Musical Notes, May, 2009 Art of the Loudspeaker My first real job was as a technical journalist and I spent much time listening to and assessing hi fi equipment, especially loudspeakers. I became aware then of the effect that sound reproduction equipment has on musical sound quality. Over the years, I've become used to the type of reproduction that comes via TV, radio, my car stereo, and those little earphones that dangle from many an ear on mp3 walkabout. The quality of this sound is, pound for pound, much improved compared with earlier years - I remember how frustrating it was trying to listen to music in my car, above engine noise and wheel hum and battling with weak radio reception. Now the sound reproduction is affordable and you can actually listen and hear. There is a downside. Our ears have become accustomed to a particular type of sound quality that can do no justice to the subleties of music appreciation. Mini loudspeakers and digital downloading call for music that has been doctored in the studio - compression, lots of compensating bass and upper mid-range are added to hide the tinny top end of the audio spectrum. Research has shown (a theory developed by Jonathan Berger, Professor of Music at Stanford University, California) that the mp3 generation actually tends to prefer this type of inferior sound quality. For good or evil, it's the instant impression on our ears that counts and how that makes us respond in terms of like or dislike. That's what we've got used to. "Getting used to" creeps up unnoticed. The first commercial music reproduction was from wax cylinders that would only play for about four minutes. Listeners became so used to this format that the result was a music industry based on the four-minute track that continues today. There has been a change in the emphasis on what is regarded by composers as important in music over the last 400 years. This has moved from the baroque emphasis on chord structures and progressions, to the classical, where equal importance is given to melody and chord progression, then to the romantic period and emphasis on the melody line. Then came the great exploration into atonal and serial music, experiment, new forms and structures, electronics and so on. This new music means composition is no longer so concerned with the traditional strictures of chord progressions and melody, but with sound. Little by little, without even knowing it, we have become assustomed to this so that even though one may not like Schoenberg or Stockhausen, their music would not seem at all out of place to any of us in, say, a film score. It recently dawned on me how the budget sound that I was used to hearing now was really spoiling my appreciation and enjoyment. To combat this, I've gone back to listening via a quality stereo system and have upgraded those dangly in-ear phones to a really good set of cans. And what a difference it's made. Maybe I'd forgotten, maybe it wasn't like this before, but it is ear-opening to be able to hear an orchestral piece and listen to all the component instrumental parts making a meaningful whole - sounding great. And, of course, this applies to whatever music you listen to from the Renaissance to Radiohead.
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Bill Anderton, May, 2009