Loosely based on a true story.
The Movement Control Order due to covid19 continued into 2021. Our group of audiophiles was restless. The only HiFi thing we could do as a group was to chat, banter and debate on WhatsApp.
The discussion turned to soundstage. We know there are many audiophiles who take the soundstage as the be-all and end-all of a HiFi system. A system is not considered up to snuff if it does not produce that soundstage with the requisite qualities.
It went on thus:
"What creates the soundstage we hear from our system?"
"Soundstage stems from the reflected sound / the reverberation / the ambiance sound from the recording environment that is captured in the recording. Having said that, an artificially generated ambiance/reverb done by the sound engineer can also create the perception of a soundstage."
"If soundstage formation is a result of the reverb or ambiance information, then other than the recording avenue, the reverb/ambiance sound from our listening space should also influence the soundstage formation. The soundstage heard from a HiFi system is so different from that heard from earphones, the latter has only recorded ambiance sound and is without any reverb or ambiance of the listening environment, so this shows that the listening room does affect the soundstage."
"I meant the soundstage formation should primarily be a function of the reverb/ambiance of the recording venue. The listening room's contribution must be minimized or eliminated so as not to interfere with the ambiance of the recording venue. Indeed, I have heard well formed soundstage from high quality earphones too."
"What about speaker positioning? Different speaker positions can affect the perception of the soundstage, such as width and depth, not to mention other qualities like image focus and separation."
"In purist recordings, the miking technique affects the soundstage formation. Different miking technique, such as the Decca tree, Blumlein stereo etc. will portray different soundstage."
"Then, taking in all of the above, is there a real world representation of the soundstage as the one heard on our system? Or, soundstage is purely an artifact produced by our HiFi system?"
"We have heard enough times that live performances don't have a soundstage, at least not like the one produced by our systems."
"That is the million dollar question. But regardless of the answer, we can take it as an area for out HiFi tuning, don't we audiophiles derive so much fun from tuning our system to our liking? That is just a part of the enjoyment of our hobby."
"Well, how do we judge whether the soundstage portrayed by a system is good or correct then? If there is no real life reference, is it subjective?"
"Of course there is a way! I look at it from the angle of perspective and proportion, like when we draw a scenery. But that is story for another day, let's do this over a good coffee next time "
"Audiophiles judge soundstage quality based on various facets of the soundstage. Let's see if I can list them out and give a visual equivalent of each one. When we talk about soundstaging, imaging comes hand-in-hand too, in my opinion.
Soundstage width
Soundstage height
Image size
Image sharpness / Image focus / Image definition. This visual analogy as to what is good or bad does not always translate to the audio one, some listeners like a slightly diffused definition, deeming it to be less fatiguing and more natural sounding. I think the key is to get it just right, like the middle image of the eagle
Image density
Image separation vs congestion
Soundstage distortion
Soundstage transparency. This image is blurry and the see-thru quality is low, but at the same time it can also be deemed as romantic and beautiful! The audio equivalent is the same too.
Background darkness
Background noise level (noisy vs quiet). In the audio equivalent, I wonder whether sometimes some audiophiles took noise as low level details or ambiance information? hmm..... I am not sure.
Anything else I missed?
Lastly, as to whether certain qualities are more important than others, or what level of performance is considered good or bad for each of these qualities, I think audiophiles should agree to disagree, rather than getting into heated arguments 😁."
"Are you sure it is logical to equate soundstage to visual representations?"
"It always strikes me that people use visual description for their perception of the soundstage, such as 'I can see the singer in front of me', 'I can see the singer's mouth floating mid-air', 'I can count the heads in the choir', 'it is like seeing the band playing in front of me."
"Anyway, this is just an analogy and you can take it as just for fun lah. 😊"
And thus our intrepid audiophiles moved on.
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