"I am there" vs. "They are here"

Hi David. My experience follows. Basic: a speaker capable of putting our ears and brain completely at ease with the sounds emanating -- that is, we make minimal to no effort to recognise and UNDERSTAND intricate musical detail... i.e. we're just "there", passive recipients of music. Quad, Soundlab, Genesis, AudioExklusiv, Avantgarde are SOME such (note, my experience is limited!)

Now, the speaker "kit" needs a commensurate signal.

1. Top notch pre: tonal balance, realism in low-level detail and dynamics and correct micro-amplification of speed variations.
CAT, FM acoustics 288 (?), Goldmund (22?), Aesthetix tubes + multiple PS, Symphonic Line rg3 "special order" 4xPS. (again, my LIMITED experience).

2. A "tricky" source: either suberb (on all accounts given our present technology) or one that, within its compromises, DOES at least pick up tonality & tonal balance. A Fender is NOT a Gibson, a Steinway is NOT a Bosendorfer... i.e., "a piano is not (just) a piano": which one, for pete's sake. OR a pre that picks up subtle changes in rythm (speed nuance the musicians play with). IM experience, a top notch TT + average LP, wins over a top cdp + good redbook cd in the "naturality" area.

3rd: an amp that has the quality to amplify these nuances (and, ofcourse, enough juice so that the said speakers will make these audible in our analogue world). Many in as many, high, price brackets.

Ofcourse we have the "wires". Anything that works well is expensive, regardless of production cost. Necessary evil perhaps...

Mucho tough to emulate, IMO... A good pre (CAT) allowed me to *understand & justify the musical presence* (for want of better wording) of certain lower-level, second and 3rd plane details, that were merely cosmetic until then! With a FM Acoustics set-up, my wife hardly recognised music she (thought) she knew by heart. Detlof virtually has a sound wall to satisfy his ears that the orchestra *just could be* in the close vicinity of his room. His amplification is commensurate. There are many others here at A'gon!

Thanks, all, for your patience... the subject fascinates me.

Oooops, my speaker experience should read Acapella "Excalibur" rather than Avantgarde. Sorry, all!

Wonjun, you pose a most fascinating question, which is obvious and very important, annoyingly so..just because I never thought of it myself. (-; I haven't read all of the above replies, except for Gregm's, which I find brilliantly accurate. In my opinion, many well and closely recorded solo instruments, can give you the "they are here impression". The Impulse recording of "Swing low Sweet Cadillac" with Dizzy Gillespie et al, which I heard last night, put Dizzy and his men together with his highly appreciative audience right into my listening room. Another recording which does this perfectly,is "For Duke", as another example and there are many, many more, of whatever musical genre. As has been said above, the more and more a recording team takes care to capture the natural accoustics of the recording venue, the more you get a chance to be transported "there", if you have the equipment, so well described by Gregm. Here a magnificent harmonia mundi LP, "Fête de l'Ane" does this for me, as do many of the early Mohr/Layton recordings of symphonic music of the CSO in their old hall in Chicago. Not that my system can capure the entire volume of the hall, but with the lights out, my ears are fooled to be in a presence of a soundspace, which in all its directions is much much larger than my listening room. This effect can of course be most easily achieved with any decent recording of organ music, done in a big cathedral, with tremendous reverb from all possible directions. Here the accoustics of the recording venue easily override the accoustics of your room and- again with the lights out - you will find yourself transported into a huge sound space, with the music coming at you in huge waves, which- if you have enough bass energy - can be quite frightening at times. So much for my 2cents and thanks again for bringing this fascinating subject to our attention!
Cheers to all! Detlof

"I am there" is of course the correct ideal model of what we want a music reproduction system to accomplish. But Sndsel and Danner (above) have gotten to the crux of our shared dilemma as critical listeners - what you might term the "Audiophile Condition". By far the two most important variables affecting a system's ability to approach this ideal are the recording itself and the room in which we listen to playback. Unfortunately, and paradoxically, these are precisely the areas in which we have the least amount of control: none, in the case of the recording; and usually very limited (and almost never to the ultimate degree) in the case of the room. If these starting conditions were effectively dealt with in our playback systems first, I strongly suspect that any competent (and competently assembled) high-end component chain could transmit the "I am there" sensation to near the limit that two-channel reproduction allows (although this may not be so high to begin with - theoritcally more so with some sort of multi-channel scheme, but this leads us back to the optimization of the recording process [and let us not forget the visual aspect, basically unaddressable but for to close one's eyes!]). Is this conundrum - our essential lack of control - what directly results in our becoming susceptable to "audiophilia nervosa"? I would like to able to think so, but I frankly doubt it. I suspect our preoccupation with gear would, alas, probably persist even if all our recordings and listening rooms were idealized tomorrow. This is because gear is just sexier, more of a status symbol, and upgrading and tweakage are more receptive (not more productive!) outlets for our neuroses, than purpose-built rooms and recordings bought "as-is" will ever be. But think about the further implication of all this: It also means that we may really prefer to wallow in our audiophile tendencies over and above what is, after all, the ostensible aim of any high-end system and its owner - to enjoy listening to music reproduced in our homes with as little distraction, and as much suspension of disbelief, as we possibly can! Let's put that in our peace pipes and smoke it a while.

Detlof, Great mention of a great Impulse recording. "Swing Low Sweet Cadillac" is Dizzy at some of his most memorable. Dont be afraid to get the remastered CD version in the LP styled box. It is very well done. Sorry to drift off topic, but this is very noteworthy music.
"You are there" was my preferred description when I had it all just so........Frank