Openers
... and then the Carnegie Hall ticket window clerk asked, "Where would you like to sit, sir?" This question is not as simple as it may seem. I'm fairly certain each of you has a preferred seating position in a concert hall. There may be many reasons for selecting wherever it is, but in my case it is always a matter of finding a way for the sound to serve the music and musicians in the best possible fashion. Many years ago I had the good fortune of sampling different seats at Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center's Philharmonic Hall during rehearsal sessions. That was a lot of fun and obviously very educational. So, for a long time, my traditional top pick seat location was usually in the center section, about a third of the way back from the stage. Well, times change and so have I. The following story details some recent adventures that touch upon a few related audiophile topics. I trust this may be of some interest.
A Different Kind of Gear
It is probably fair to say that the vast majority of audiophiles find time to enjoy real concert performances in addition to the recorded libraries which most of us possess. I certainly hope this is the case. For me, witnessing and savoring live acoustic music is an ultimate sonic, emotional and intellectual joy. Over the past six years, my personal interest in tape recording, especially of live concerts, has brought happiness, new awareness and a variety of challenges to the table. The bulk of these live performance activities involve acoustic classical music covering a wide range of genres, musicianship and venues. Pipe organs, string quartets, madrigal singers, choirs, wind ensembles, chamber orchestras, symphony orchestras and a mix of soloists on piano, harp, oboe and such represent about 90% of those efforts, with the remaining 10% covering small jazz ensembles.
The learning curve associated with effective sound capturing is a steep one. Except for a few tips and bits of advice from two professional recording engineers, my self-styled empirical approach to taping mastery has been a bumpy but fun ride. To do this well involves a lot more than plopping down a pair of microphones and praying for a quiet audience. Happily my recent recordings have become better and feedback from those musicians involved, as well as fellow audio buddies -- including a number of friends from the New York Audiophile Society and others -- seems to concur. In the taping setup, I sit in the audience, usually quite close to my microphone stand, running a two channel DAT rig powered with custom-made battery packs so as to keep noise low and short cable lines without extra gizmos or gadgets. This typically allows me to find a highly desirable seat in the house, too.
Naturally, one big feature is witnessing the concert directly. Rehearing it reproduced on either my own sound system or those of friends is always several steps removed from the actual live performance, of course. That should be no news to anyone who reads the audiophile press. Still, this exposure and taping activity has its place. It is informative, fascinating and humbling all at once. The best part of doing things this way is that I know, with certainty, that there is no electronic gimmickry on my tapes compared with conventional recording studio modifications as generally found on commercial discs. I use no compression, equalization or related signal modifications. Fine German microphones running simply into pro level 16/44.1 taping gear on clean lines constitute the pathway. Happily, this is sonically obvious.
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The Treat
So why am I telling you all of this? While the following may not involve Carnegie Hall, it will make sense in the end. Each summer our part of northeastern Pennsylvania is blessed with a six-week music festival presented at a fine prep school a mere three miles from my home. This ambitious program is intended for young musicians between 12 and 18 years of age and attracts students from across the country as well as some from across the pond. The caliber of musicianship is quite high and the enthusiasm, energy and dedication to excellence here speaks volumes. Over that six-week period, there are more than 30 performances of either small recitals or full-blown concerts, mostly free to a very appreciative public and ready to be recorded. Due to some recent health issues which thankfully are starting to improve, this year I was able to only tape a few of these musical events. Even so, the pleasure of it all has been profound, and I do think contributed to keeping my mind off those medical problems.
My purpose for writing this little essay really has to do with hearing some of this live music from a unique and spectacular perspective. Namely, over the years I have had the pleasure of becoming a friend of one of the guest orchestra directors, Victor, who travels here each summer from Arizona to teach, perform with, and conduct these students. During a dinner party last year, he and I chatted about music, music festivals, recordings and things audiophiliac. In that conversation, I mentioned a life-long dream of being able to hear a symphony orchestra from the perspective of the conductor's podium. He got a glint in his eye. This ultimately turned out to be a real treat and benefit for me. Once he saw how much this meant to me, I was invited to stand behind him during a dress rehearsal for a musical excerpt. Thankfully, that all happened last year and I was on Cloud Nine for weeks as a result of such an outstanding 10-minute experience.
Summer 2004 provided a continuation of that adventure in an enhanced way. It was obvious to Victor that my previous sonic encounter was an enduring and remarkable event. So, among the final concerts of the festival, he was directing their 70-piece orchestra in the Tchaikovsky Sixth Symphony. At dress rehearsal, I was again positioned about a foot behind him and felt ready to witness the glory and grandeur of this music. I really am at a loss for words in trying to express the wonderment of it all. The music was delivered with enthusiasm, feeling and power, along with something more. Sonically the experience was spectacular. Forget about what you think dynamics mean via any sound system. Dispel any thoughts you might hold regarding frequency extension, depth, width, imaging, etc. as provided by electromechanical devices. This is the real deal!
No doubt most of you have experienced the sound of live, unamplified musical instruments. Perhaps it is/was an acoustic guitar, piano, horn or other easily accessed instrument, or small groups of instruments. (Obviously I am focusing on acoustic instruments, but one could make a decent case for something like an electric guitar, assuming you know how that particular guitar amp behaves during an otherwise unamplified hearing.) Hopefully you know what these sounds are like from both a distant and near-field perspective. Clearly in my own history that has been the case for decades, but having the peak experience of witnessing a big orchestra playing softly, loudly, passionately and joyfully is not such a common event for most of us. Let me humbly suggest that if any of this sounds exciting to you, it might be worth the effort to seek out a local orchestra, make some inroads by being a supporter, and then take the conductor out for a nice lunch. You should be able to find opportunities at rehearsals as did I, to get an earful of happiness and enlightenment. Somewhat jokingly, I mentioned to Victor that there might be a small audience of music lovers/audiophiles much like myself, who would entertain the idea of traveling here to stand with him at the podium to have this sonic and intellectual experience. While I did not couple that idea to any monetary assessment, a well-intentioned donation, perhaps earmarked for the 'music student scholarship fund' or something like that might just be the ticket to this exciting and instructive experience.
Let me elaborate just a bit. The sheer power and intensity of a symphony orchestra up close is difficult to quantify. Oddly, while I had expected to yet again be blown away by big crescendos and other powerful sections, there was an equivalent connectedness to the music that emerged even during delicate, quiet passages. At the outset of this year's audition, I stood with my eyes open scanning the group before me. However, one major surprise emerged that really caught me off-guard. Namely, these players, almost to every last individual, had such attention and focus directed at the conductor that it was spooky and practically hypnotic for me. You see, my head was a mere 12 inches behind his so I was essentially seeing everything the maestro saw. That had tremendous emotional content and really added a significant element to my perception of the overall event. For a while I elected to close my eyes in order to reduce variables and focus the nervous system's inputs. This removed the excitatory sensations associated with seeing faces and instruments in full technicolor but the sound remained the same. I did get buggy enough to think about imaging, soundstage, bass extension etc. but promptly caught myself and just focused on the music after a minute or two. It is really futile to try to analyze this session in conventional audiophile terms since so much was happening so intensively, with the outcome significantly more impactful that the sum of its parts. Energy, vitality, joy, elation, introspection and such are much more the kinds of descriptors I would prefer to employ in this modest attempt to capture the essence of the experience.
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