General 5.1 Question (non-technical)

drbam wrote on 5/27/2003, 8:56 AM
This is not a Vegas related question per se, but I'm curious how many of you know someone who listens to music on a 5.1 system as their *primary* listening environment? I was discussing the whole move to 5.1 with an artist/colleague who over a 20 yr period has released over 50 albums and has won numerous awards for his cutting edge sonic innovation. He posed this question to me and I said I didn't know anybody. He said he didn't either and most of this artist's fans are either audiophiles or have pretty good listening systems! So I thought I'd pose the question to the forum. Thanks in advance to anyone who cares to respond. ;-)

drbam

Comments

kilroy wrote on 5/27/2003, 4:43 PM

Here's my take on this for the record.

I personally think surround is a pretty silly format for listening to music. Here's why. When you go to see a live show, all of what really is supposed to be capturing your attention is coming from in front of you...not from the sides...not from behind you. In other words, it is pretty much a stereo, "in your face" experience, by and large, that you are listening in. Any other "surround " cues tend to be distracting rather than enhancing the total experience.

For film and video games it's a total nuther thing. Here you generally want to enforce the actual sense of a real world urban environment. Stuff is coming at you from every direction all the time, so we are used to and prepared for this kind of stimuli and rather than distracting us necessarily, it appears to us as natural and normal. Clearly, it's what one expects to experience.

Surround for music is a bit of a gimmick, though one some artists are plainly willing to pay for, it seems. Elliot Sheiner and Chuck Ainley are two guys that are doing what I would call tasteful 5.1 work for music, a good balanced approach, in my opinion. If you what to have a go at 5.1 for music then then study these guys work and pay careful attention. You will see what separates the men from the boys in this field, namely those that put the music before the fun and games.

It's what we call maturity.

Sijon wrote on 5/27/2003, 10:03 PM
I know of no one and I've been in the location recording business since 1968 having lived through SQ and QS encoded LPs. I believe there are several reasons for this:

1. Phase cancellation of mid-bass frequencies (in particular) due to poor microphone technique leads to less than acceptable quality sound.

2. The cost of a quality loudspeaker setup and the space it requires. I'm sorry but Bose doesn't cut it or even come close!

3. Even if the above problems have been solved the setup time to achieve believable imaging is problematic. The fact that there are so many variables means that there is no reference setup like we might be used to with a "stereo" setup. Reminds me of the old Chinese proverb: "Man with watch knows the time. Man with two watches never sure." With "stereo" we "know" what we're listening to and it doesn't change. With surround sound it's different every time because we've tweaked some variable from the last recording listened to to make it more "believable" and that affects what we now want to hear.
kilroy wrote on 5/28/2003, 12:07 AM

Exactly and painfully true, Sijon.

5.1 or any surround format has so many "gotchas" it isn't funny...at all. How about these?

What exactly do I put in the center channel anyway??

Well, we forget it entirely for music, just mix stereo front and rear, heavy on the front cuz (hopefully) the consumer knows enough to at least position *these* speakers somewhere intelligent...and in phase. Go easy on the lows in the surround channels. Which brings us to...

Whoa!...where'd all those lows come from?!

Where indeed. I nearly die when I hear some of these surround mixes. Don't forget the Bass Management "gotcha". It's going to take alot of lows from the surrounds and chuck it into the sub channel. Lows most folks aren't even aware of when they are mixing. Aggressively roll the lows out of the surrounds and filter the ultra low stuff out of the sub channel. The whole system will have way more headroom and when you crank it up it will kick instead of mush.

Image shift vertigo.

Start saving for those pricey multi channel dynamics processors. You actually *can* do a OK job without, but your mixing room had better be good or else these compressor image shifting "artifacts" can go unnoticed...lost in phase cancellations and too many room reflections. A good surround mixing environment has to be *very* controlled, far more so than for stereo.

"And now for my next trick..."

Uh huh...just how many ridiculous ways are there to make the band fly around your head?! Let me count the ways... Now I realize everyone is entitled to have his/her jollies now and then, but puhleeze...enough already, some of this stuff actually makes barf bags a mandatory accessory to the listening experience.

Here's something to watch for...OEM surround systems in cars. Just think how dumb *that* will be for a second.
jorgensen wrote on 5/28/2003, 12:40 AM
You may check the new SACD from Pink Floyd, The Dark Side of the Moon. The remastered CD is considered one of the best production for music surround sound.

As surround sound for video has become a common installation, it is obvious also to hear surround music on this system. Likely many productions are to abuse the system for popular music, but most people wouldn’t care about that.
Some years ago I attended a SACD demo where I heard some SACD productions, and the most interesting was a heavy metal band, who used the various speakers for special effects.

So surround sound production will be common, when the better CD players are replaced by the new CD/SACD/DVD players - and for now it is impossible to pirate a SACD.
kilroy wrote on 5/28/2003, 9:03 AM

"You may check the new SACD from Pink Floyd, The Dark Side of the Moon. The remastered CD is considered one of the best production for music surround sound."

Aaaah...yes indeed, a very good example. Regarding the original album in general, one of the best selling in all time...veeerrry little compression and lots of dynamic range, it's not squashed to death with modern limiting. Very open and spacious. Incidently, if you have a high end vinyl system this album is a treat to listen to...turn the lights off, start some insense burning, settle into a comfy beanbag chair (preferably with a friend), crank it up to taste, and enjoy.
cosmo wrote on 5/28/2003, 10:04 AM
I think there is room in the audio world for 5.1 music. I like mixing my stuff in 5.1 because I like the separation. I'm not trying to recreate what live music sounds like in this scenario, it doesn't fit. Just making music...and listening back to it in 5.1 I think is great.

As for listening to multi channel audio as a consumer - haven't bought a single dvd-a or sacd yet....
JohanAlthoff wrote on 5/28/2003, 9:29 PM
5.1 music is a fad, and like all fads it brings some cool stuff with it. I still think 99% of all producers should learn to mix in stereo first, though.
Cold wrote on 5/30/2003, 11:40 AM
Most of the people I know listen to music on a 5.1 system. But, they almost exclusively listen to stereo music. Most of the people I know can't afford a seperate audio and home theatre system. So the ability is always there to listen to surround recordings (at least ac3 or dts, barely anyone I know has a dvd a or sacd player- just myself and a friend who didn't want to upgrade his amp, he wanted the analog outs to feed a prologic amp with five imputs and a toshiba that plays dvd v and a fit the bill nicely. Of course after buying this, one of his favorite bands of all time, Floyd, rereleased on sacd rather than dvd a. ) I think surround will become a staple for music, but only after dvd replaces cd as the delivery medium, something debateable itself. When dvd a/sacd sorts itself out, when more dvd players are everything players, when there is a bigger pool of work available... but it's going to happen and probably faster than you'd think.
my 2 cents.
Steve S