Of course, that's probably never the case as each thought leads to the next but it makes for a good headline.
In any case, it occurs to me that as we strive so hard to get as close to accurate as possible (as reader, Mike suggests) in our high-end systems we're trying to do two things: uncover all that is on the recording and to do so without affectation. In other words, a perfect reproduction of the live event where instruments and voices sound like themselves.
Pulling back for a moment to look at the big picture we see that "live event", in the recording studio or on stage, has actually more to do with getting right with what the recording engineer captured, as opposed to what we believe to be the correct sound of instruments and voices.
Why does this matter? Because using our tweaks and expertise to get a clarinet to sound like a clarinet may have a bit of futility built into it. How accurate was the recording? If I, as the engineer, capture more of the upper squawks of the reed as opposed to the body of the instrument and you, as the listener, try and make adjustments to your system to compensate, we're in an endless loop doomed to failure.
What do we do with this? My first impulse is to figure out a way to make a perfect recording capture of specific instruments that we might all choose to rely upon as the standard. My second thought is how flawed that idea is.
Or is it?
I have told this story before but just recently, while recording Octave's Steinway piano and a soprano saxophone, I was surprised by the comment both musicians made to me upon coming into the control room after their session. Listening to the playback on the aspen FR20s, they both remarked how "it sounds better in here than it did in there."
Better than live? We've been down this road too.
Just some rambles on this morning.
