Why do you listen to music through your system?

Live is the best but you have to attend when it's available rather than when it suits you  - one for the system.

If you live in the sticks you've got the faff of getting to (usually a decent city) - another for the system.

Your tasteless lager will be around £4, roughly the same price as half a bottle of very decent wine (after which you couldn't drive back anyway).

Some enthusiasts like the hifi more than the music and some vice versa. If you're in the happy camp that likes both you're in a good place (equally so if it all leaves you cold - I have good friends who stream a bit of background stuff through the TV and they're perfectly happy with that).

I've now got more CDs and LPs than I can comfortably accommodate and I view the collection as an embarrassment of riches (this makes me happy).

I've recently resolved to step off the upgrade path and am looking for speakers commensurate with my existing system rather than with an eye to the next black box 'to really make them sing'.

It started (buying speakers) as quite exciting but has become a PITA so I'll be glad when I've found some.

Sometimes my system sounds disappointing but I've discovered that some recordings will always sound bad and I go to my core of 'good performance and a good sound' discs to redress the balance.

How's that for rambling?

a very good ramble madasafish and good points there! many thanks. i actually have the same 'problem' with CDs and LPs -- since i started streaming all are in the loft now, but lately started to bring some LPs down for cleaning and 'rediscovering'. there's some stuff that I bought in the 70's. Uriah Heep, Black Sabbath, etc...

enjoy

ken

get all the LPs down now - that 'been in the loft smell' never goes away once its impregnated in the covers.

Much as I've enjoyed going to certain concerts in the past, I never feel I'm accepting second best when listening to music through my Hi-Fi system. It's a different experience and TBH in many ways I prefer it to the live experience. The latter is often spoiled for me by the ignorance of my fellow concert-goers, the discomfort and aggravation of getting to and from the venue, and the often lousy sound quality on offer when you get there. Rip-off prices, uncomfortable seats (I'm not into standing around for hours), hot and sweaty environment, need I go on?

Perhaps I'm getting a miserable old scroat but unless it's someone really, really special I'm really not bothered with live gigs any more.

problem is space, space, space Madasafish!

i have brought down about 300 so far -- and even these are causing a headache -- found some spare space on a bookshelf for some of them.

there is going to be a lot of record cleaning going on at my house over the next few weeks. :-)

enjoy

ken

i know what you mean Tony. The hassle factor!

I do recall though attending an LSO+Wynton Marsallis concert at the barbican sometime ago (some kind of fusion righ?) and i recall being astouned by the qulaity of sound/music (even though some buffs claim that the acoustics there are not that good, but what do i know?

enjoy

ken

I am pretty much with all of that. I want music in the comfort, privacy and isolation of my own home (or occasionally the car) 99% of the time. For me music is a solitary experience, or shared with my wife, not a communal one. Oddly I think it always has been, even as a yoof I was never greatly impressed by live gigs. A few good experiences but they were not really about the music

bruce

Why do you listen to music through your system?

For solace, enlightenment, surprise, hypnotism, elevation, insight, distraction (amongst other altered mental states) - and let's not forget seduction - but mostly it's for the calming and elevating effect, particularly present in baroque music.

While some of this can be obtained at live concerts, it's just so much easier to point and click, or swipe and tap.

Jan

Perhaps it boils down to music's ability to suspend time and bring the listener completely into the present moment. A forcing, if you will, of the brain to focus on what is happening now, while holding the immediate past in short-term memory and building expectation for the immediate future - the next note.

When a system does this, it's highly addictive, as our favourite audio company well knows.

well put Jan, wish i had said all that myself...

so you are into Baroque?

enjoy

ken

A bit of poking around on the web unearthed this :

** I'm not up to walking on hot coals yet.

Listening to Andy Stott at the moment. I wonder what's happening to my brain ?

Ken,

I get as much pleasure from both the system and live concerts. I am lucky to live near Frankfurt and Darmstadt where there are some fabulous live events to go to. When I can't do that then it is also a pleasure to listen to my CDs and LPs through the system. There are times when coming back from Frankfurt is not so nice, e.g. during the winter months and sitting in front of the system is better as Tony suggests 

No doubt that I could have settled for a lesser system, but the upgrade bug hit and the money is spent. Now I have stayed with what I have since 2004 (Naim components) and 2005 for the LP12 and have discovered a lot of great music thanks to the local events and of course people on this forum.

I consider my self fortunate not to have lost focus on what the system is there for and am glad that I stopped where I did. The upgrade bug can be quite serious if not kept under control as has been demonstrated with some of the posts that I have read on here over the years. In any case, life has so many different priorities, where good music reproduction and live events are just one of them.

I know the 555+552+500 is better (never heard an active system), but I think you need the room for this level and although my room and setup is OK, I feel that it would not do it justice. Kidding myself perhaps, but I have no desire to go there with all the other priorities.

Regards,

Mark

well put Pev.

i have this mad idea that perhaps live music is a good way of to 're-calibrate' every now and then the role hifi systems play in 'reproducing' music at home.

have fun at the Eilen Jewell show. I dont know her...

enjoy

ken

The simplistic answer is that CDs and LPs are useless without a means to listen to them.

I think that truly live music (and by that I mean unamplified acoustic music, not amplified rock or in fact any amplified "live" music because in the latter case you are listening to a PA system) is quite distinct from music reproduced at home on whatever system you have.

I would rather listen in the comfort of my own home almost every time - it is cheaper, available whenever and as often as I want, of consistent quality and I can listen in whatever state of dress or undress I feel like.

...So many reasons for that:

1. The music through the system is always at my disposal

2. I can listen to what I want - depending on mood

3. Not all concerts you would like to go to are available (f.i. Keith Jarrett is difficult)

4. Not all live concerts are great 

But of course in addition I go to a lot of live concerts. Living in Germany makes a lot of music accesible in Nurnberg, Frankfurt and Munich..

is it?

enjoy

ken

I had to go the hi fi route, as whenever Led Zeppelin, The Beatles or Pink Floyd come to my town, it is always at an inconvenient time for me to go, it seems.

i find live music has a dimension that reproduced music at home will never have. i know the hassle factor -- but that is convenience of reproduced music at home could be likened to the difference between playing vinyl and simply point and click for streamed music. noone will deny that streamed music is very good these days -- but compared to vinyl there is still a gap between the 2 formats. as to which camp is 'better' -- well that is a rather different argument.

sometimes you will go to a concert and it proves to be not worth it for whatever reason. (same as our hifi systems that sometimes simply refuse to play ball).

but there has been a few times when i have ventured out and been amply rewarded. the most memorable one was at the Blue Note in New York where keyboardist Billy Preston was playing.  i dont even have any of his recordings in my collection. The venue was crowded as hell, smoky -- you could say uncomfortable but we were rewarded with a most moving musical performance! i simply do not believe i could have got that from any reproduced music at home.

enjoy

ken

Ken I thoroughly agree.  I truly enjoy live performances, mostly those where I am close enough to the performers to really see as well as hear their performance.

I am not a big fan of attending the symphony, as I don't feel that connection, whereas I do in a smaller club or sitting up towards the front at a rock concert.  Perhaps I should just buy better seats to the symphony!?!

Hi Ken,

The reason I have a good reproduction system, as we all do here, is for the enjoyment of music.

I have been to many, many concerts and live performances over the years and this only served to encourage me to buy more music and to have the best system I could afford to enjoy it on.

Often the sound quality of the music at a concert may not be that good but that can be offset by the general atmosphere in the venue. I remember seeing Jethro Tull in Plymouth in the late '60s at the Guild Hall and the feedback, caused mainly by the granite walls, was appalling but the concert was no less enjoyable for it. This is one area that home replay cannot replicate, the atmosphere. The smaller the venue usually the better the atmosphere, as you found at Blue Note. I had similar experiences in the Blues Clubs in Chicago. Derry is correct in about the quality of live amplified music as opposed to acoustic performances and, in many ways, home reproduction on a good system can sound better, but the atmosphere of a live venue is not there. Having said that you don't have some of the extraneous noises at home, like someone in the next seat talking or coughing.

Live recordings are also variable in quality which also doesn't help but sometimes if you have been at a particular concert that has been recorded the memory of that event can bring back the 'feel' and make the experience of home listening all the more enjoyable.

I don't care for the massive venues of today, like the O2 because the SQ is so poor and the atmosphere just isn't there and it's so damned expensive. I agree with Tony's sentiments on this one.

So it's horses for courses really. Both live performances and home system replay have their pros and cons. I say just enjoy the music.

This thread seems to be conducive to do as the Led Zeppelin song 'Ramble On'.

ATB

Steve  

this could also be part of the 'atmosphere', i guess?

i believe Sviatoslav Richter actually encouranged normal 'ambience' at his live performances -- so you can actually hear shuffling feet etc...

mind you, i draw the line at someone opening a packet of crips at a live music show !!!...

and sometimes, my next door neighbour's dog barks foever when i am trying to listen to my system. i guess this explains why i sometimes play my system quite loud...

enjoy

ken