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If you can’t hear this then you’re not an audiophile [See description for link to followup video] Is a new song from a very high talented artist Audio Masterclass, listen and download it here for free in mp3 format.
If you’re an audiophile then you can hear the tiniest defects in all kinds of recordings. But can you hear the problem in this recording? *Check out the followup to this video at* https://youtu.be/EdDnAnSPQpg
CREDITS
The Clarinet as Prima Donna – Evil Penguin https://www.eprclassic.eu/items/Weber.-The-Clarinet-as-Prima-Donna
Video clips and orchestra images source – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OAiYOF2Mx5c (highly recommended)
Roeland Hendrikx – https://www.roelandhendrikx.com/
Woodland video – Matthias Groeneveld
00:00 if you can’t hear this then you’re not
00:02 an audio file those crazy audio files
00:05 you know people who would spend a
00:07 thousand Great British pounds on a one
00:09 meter interconnect and clearly hear the
00:11 difference between that and their
00:13 previous 10 pound cable bought from
00:15 AliExpress yes and by lifting their
00:18 speaker cables a few centimeters from
00:19 the floor they can hear that too no I’m
00:22 prepared to believe that some people
00:24 really can hear this and if I had a no
00:26 sarcasm Emoji I’d use it now I’m
00:29 prepared to believe that some people
00:31 really can hear this notice I didn’t
00:34 quite say I believe if you’re watching
00:36 this then perhaps you’re an audiophile
00:38 who’s up for a challenge or perhaps
00:40 you’re just curious to know whether you
00:42 can hear what audio files can hear or
00:45 what audio files can’t hear we’ll see so
00:48 I have a recording and there’s something
00:49 wrong with it the challenge is can you
00:51 hear what’s wrong I can hear it clearly
00:54 without golden ears ears made of
00:56 coarsest flannel cloth in fact here’s
00:59 the clip foreign
01:04 [Music]
01:21 foreign
01:24 [Music]
01:47 so there are two possibilities here you
01:50 heard the problem oh you didn’t hear it
01:53 if you’re an audiophile with thousand
01:54 dollar interconnects suspended speaker
01:57 cables and all the rest and you didn’t
01:59 hear it then you wasted your money
02:01 if you can’t hear this you can’t hear
02:03 anything by anything of course I mean
02:06 all those details your equipment and
02:08 upgrades were supposed to provide
02:10 but maybe you did hear it what did you
02:13 hear I’ll give you a moment to firm up
02:15 your thoughts then I’ll tell you what
02:17 you heard
02:19 you’ve heard the solar clarinet
02:21 wandering in the stereo image sometimes
02:24 it’s Center sometimes left sometimes
02:26 right
02:27 and it can vary from note to note I
02:30 think we should listen again
02:31 [Music]
02:48 no no no no no no no
02:51 [Music]
02:52 no no no no no
02:54 you heard it this time for sure and even
02:57 audio files can hear it you know
02:59 sometimes listening out for all those
03:01 tiny tiny details can make you forget
03:03 about the proverbial elephant trumpeting
03:06 in the room
03:07 let me throw in some credits here the
03:09 clarinet soloist is the amazing Roland
03:12 Hendricks from his album the clarinet as
03:14 prima donna I know I’m pronouncing his
03:17 name wrong but if I attempted what I’m
03:19 guessing should be Flemish pronunciation
03:21 it could be a lot worse
03:23 the piece is vabus second Clarinet
03:25 Concerto and you can buy this on the
03:27 evil penguin label along with other
03:30 music by Weber originals and interesting
03:33 Arrangements the link is in the
03:35 description oh and it’s on Spotify too
03:37 and probably the other streaming
03:39 services so you can listen right now
03:41 right now after watching the rest of
03:43 this video where I’ll explain what’s
03:45 going on there may be some listeners who
03:48 still have doubts the problem is easier
03:50 to hear on headphones or closer to your
03:52 loudspeakers in the direct field
03:55 so try that here’s a clip of the
03:57 clarinet alone and I’ll help you with a
03:59 vectoscope display you’ll see a lot of
04:01 fuzziness in the display which is the
04:03 reverberation in the room what you’re
04:05 looking for is the overall tilt tilted
04:08 to the left means that the stereo image
04:09 is biased to the left tilt it to the
04:11 right then it’s biased to the right
04:13 let’s go
04:17 [Music]
04:22 [Applause]
04:23 [Music]
04:27 so what’s causing this
04:29 it’s the recording technique I have to
04:31 say that other than this issue I’m very
04:33 well satisfied with this recording and
04:35 since the music and performances are so
04:37 good a small issue with stereo Imaging
04:40 isn’t going to stop me enjoying it
04:42 firstly let’s look at a video of the
04:44 recording session we can see that Roland
04:47 does move quite a bit quite a distance
04:49 and the clarinet is in almost continuous
04:52 motion now any recording engineer would
04:55 prefer that the solo instrument doesn’t
04:57 move this is where the piano was
04:59 invented but the piano has its own
05:01 problems but also any recording engineer
05:04 even fresh out of college knows that if
05:06 a performer moves it’s usually not a
05:08 good idea to try and persuade them not
05:10 to movement can be part of the physical
05:13 expression and the performance will be
05:14 dull and flat if the performer tried not
05:17 to move when it’s more natural for them
05:19 to rock and roll a little what we can
05:21 see in this wide shot are a number of
05:23 microphones and we perhaps can’t see
05:26 them all what we don’t know is whether
05:28 all of the microphones we used aren’t in
05:30 what proportions they were balanced into
05:31 the mix any stereo microphone setup will
05:34 pick up movement in the solo instrument
05:36 that’s just going to happen and we have
05:38 to accept it the way to get a firm
05:40 Center image of a soloist or singer
05:42 leaving out large instruments like the
05:44 piano for now is to use a single mic
05:46 fairly close not as close as you would
05:49 for popular music The Sound needs to
05:51 breathe in a little air before it hits
05:53 the mic but what do we see here aha two
05:56 mics spaced apart which in this
05:58 configuration would normally be panned
06:00 hard left and hard right if you want to
06:03 capture movement this is the best way an
06:05 alternative approach is to use a
06:07 coincident crossed pair which will
06:09 capture the movement but not so much as
06:11 a spaced pair because it isn’t sensitive
06:13 to timing differences I see a third mic
06:16 as well and all three of these mics seem
06:18 to be pointing towards the solo clarinet
06:20 the third mic is spaced by height
06:23 the reason for this may be to avoid
06:25 Reflections that might affect the sound
06:27 in the horizontally spaced mics the
06:29 third mic in this position would almost
06:31 certainly be panned Center this might be
06:33 an either or situation spaced mics or
06:36 upper mic setting up microphones that
06:39 you think you might need helps the
06:40 session run smoothly it’s better to set
06:43 a microphone and not need it than to
06:45 need it and you haven’t set it or
06:47 perhaps the third Mac is balanced with
06:49 the spaced pair I’d say though that the
06:51 spaced pet is doing the heavy lifting
06:53 here but notice that Roland’s movements
06:55 are sometimes up and down if all three
06:58 marks are being used this will alter the
07:00 balance between the spaced mics and the
07:02 upper mic the upper mic Shifting the
07:04 image to the center so if Roland moves
07:07 from high Center to low left the image
07:10 in the stereo sound field will move from
07:12 Center to left if Roland stays low and
07:15 move to the right the image will move to
07:17 the right and don’t forget that sound
07:19 comes out of the entire length of the
07:21 instrument not just from the Bell
07:23 this accounts for notes randomly popping
07:25 in from random directions
07:28 as far as I can think it out this
07:29 completely explains the sound we’re
07:32 hearing I don’t want to come across as
07:33 though I’m saying the engineer is doing
07:35 it all wrong as I said in all other
07:38 respects the recording is excellent and
07:40 when it comes down to my point in
07:41 question
07:42 it’s a matter of taste my taste just
07:45 goes a different way so my questions to
07:47 you are you an ordinary audio or music
07:50 enthusiast did you hear it are you an
07:52 audio file did you hear it
07:55 if you thought you were an audiophile
07:57 but you didn’t hear it what are you
07:59 going to do now
08:00 in the comments one more thing in the
08:04 video I spotted a brakasti M7 stereo
08:07 Reverb processor does anyone have any
08:10 comments on this in the context of
08:12 acoustic instruments in the real world
08:14 and what would audiophiles think of this
08:18 see you soon