Tvad, did you wink?
Reversing Polarity -- Voodoo or Easy Tweak?
In a recent thread I noticed a comment about reversing polarity of speaker wires on both speakers which sparked one of my earliest audiophile memories.
On the liner or cover notes of Dave Grusin: Discovered Again on direct to disc vinyl, circa 1977, it too recommended reversing the polarity on BOTH speakers, for best sound.
Although my first system was a 25 WPC Technics receiver with Infinity Qa's and lousy speaker wire, I still remember getting very enthusiastic about reversing the polarity and wondering if it did anything.
Can anyone explain this and/or recommend if this is even worth the experiment?
On the liner or cover notes of Dave Grusin: Discovered Again on direct to disc vinyl, circa 1977, it too recommended reversing the polarity on BOTH speakers, for best sound.
Although my first system was a 25 WPC Technics receiver with Infinity Qa's and lousy speaker wire, I still remember getting very enthusiastic about reversing the polarity and wondering if it did anything.
Can anyone explain this and/or recommend if this is even worth the experiment?
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- 49 posts total
Jea48, no, I didn't wink. Why? I was serious. Write him and ask him...unless he's dead, and I didn't know it? Perhaps one issue with this recording is that it was cut direct-to-disc. Maybe doing so eliminated one link in the signal chain that would have otherwise corrected the polarity? Just guessing here... |
Tvad, I thought maybe you were pulling my chain...LOL... I did do a quick look for a possible email address for Grusin on Google. No luck yet. I did Run across a thread where Clark Johnsen gave this link; http://www.stanrickermastering.com/polarity.htm |
Phil Spector introduced his "wall of sound" back in the 50's. Basically he had the vocalists in correct phase and the backing instruments out ophase. What this did was to make the intruments sound 'big' as the out of phase recording smears the the fine detail and creates a bigger subjective image. The voices remain in sharp focus however, and give the overall tune a nice presence. In the film commentary of the Commitments, Alan Parker does the same thing. In order to showcase the vocalists he plays back the backing instruments out of phase, while keeping the voice in correct phase. In the case of the Sheffield labs disc. I think they just screwed up.... Stu |
I ran across some excellent reading material on the subject of this thread. Check out the links provided in the article. http://recforums.prosoundweb.com/index.php/t/2661/0 |
- 49 posts total