Mine.
Here are some larger systems in my area.
LMC:
Sluket:
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Graham, Just out of curiosity. Did you compare the stacked 57’s to their version of the 63?
Yes, Joost, I did. I actually had QUAD ESL 63s (made in Huntingdon) before I bought the ESL57s.
The Gering-built ESL63s are rather closer to QUAD’s own ‘professional’ version of the ESL63, with a much more rigid frame (which Philips Records used to use as monitors for their recordings).
I actually have a pair of them, which I used in a ‘second’ system in my house in London before I moved to Brighton, which I will stick on a well-known auction site soon, unless a friend (who’s eyeing them up) takes them off my hands.
Excellent post! I have always wondered how people claim that their systems recreate the live performance regardless of genre. To my mind, domestic HiFi reproduces studio recordings to a varying degree of enjoyment. Live albums create a different experience - maybe greater insight to individual elements and an impression of the ‘warts and all’ performance of the artists (apart from my all time favourite live recording of Thin Lizzy’s Live and Dangerous - a famously re-recorded ‘live’ album) giving some notion of a live performance.
Although the term fidelity means adherence to the truth, HiFi actually just gives an impression of a performance - live or studio.
Let’s not forget that a studio album incorporates the performance of the artiste(s) plus the ‘performance’ of the recording/production team.
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Wow!
Wow! Incredible!
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Returning to the thread, I do not think even the finest hi-fi can reproduce
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the concert hall. I have a reasonably flagship system: LP12/NDX/52/PS/135s/B&W800s but in the next room I have a Steinway concert grand piano. Good though the Naim is, it doesn’t come remotely close to the real thing. So hi-fi is hi-fi and should be loved as such. IMHO I do not believe you can have a concert hall in your living room. Just enjoy what we have.
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I agree. We have a modest Steinway upright in the house, and I (who cannot play) occasionally pound out Merrily We Roll Along as a corrective to the hifi experience.
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Do I correctly read that as a negative view of the latter “performance”, it almost sounding as if you’d like your system to undo it… As I see it the two combine to make the music as a released recording (presumably to the artist’s/artists’ satisfaction), which is what I exoect a good system to reproduce accurately.
Not meant as a negative at all! 
The recording/production engineers are the people that provide the final product that we listen to. The musicians’ performances are often ‘tidied’ up or as a minimum, levels are adjusted to make domestic reproduction viable. Imagine playing a full orchestra performance at home that could capture the full dynamic range!
My point was actually that the engineers play a massive part in the enjoyment of music in the home. Arguably, as important (maybe more so in some cases?) as the Artistes themselves.
Many years ago, Gramophone Magazine had a section for engineering in their annual awards. I think it’s a pity they dropped them as I find the whole business fascinating and would love to read some in-depth interviews with recording engineers. There’s so many issues they have to address.
I mostly hear professional orchestras and musical performances in a concert hall, but recordings are also made in studios and churches, for example. So how important is capturing the acoustics of a venue that is not the intended performance space? Another big issue is a concerto with, say, a violin soloist. Some recordings make the violin almost as prominent as the whole orchestra, the argument being that it compensates for the lack of visual information that an audience has. And multi-miking (eg Decca, Sony) vs simpler setups (eg Telarc, BBC)? There’s no universally right or wrong answer, but I’d enjoy some informed discussion, particularly as we can now often go straight to Qobuz to hear for ourselves.
Apologies for thread diversion … back to speakers!
Roger
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Arguably if the acoustic sound of a venue is captured, rather than close-miking to minimise, then the recording may sound best in a room with minimal character of its own, acoustically on the dead side. Conversely a close-miked performance might benefit from some room character - but then sounding more like the orchestra in the room rather than the listener in the auditorium that the former approach might approximate.
I cannot enjoy symphonies the slow movements i cannot hear .
But chamber music. And concertos i hear everything.
No problem with jazz and rock or big band count basie or kenton
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I agree max. A large symphony orchestra only in a concert hall.
At home jazz and rock sound okay.
Here in Manchester concerts are no problem. The hall is opposite
The tram stop. My tram journey only 20. Minutes.
Needs turning up so the peaks are at realistic concert hall levels - then the quietest pianissimos can be heard (assuming a not too noisy listening room), but the speakers and amp have to be capable of doing those peaks…
Yes, I only listen to orchestral music when there is no-one else in the house so I can turn it right up.
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London’s Kingsway Hall, a rather decrepit Methodist chapel (near The Strand) was a favourite recording venue for recording classical music with companies such as EMI and Decca.
I was once able to sneak into the back of the hall while Rostropovich was conducting one of the London orchestras (the LPO?) in a recording of one of the late Dvorak symphonies.
The Hall was immediately above the Piccadilly Line Underground trains, and it’s said that the “Kingsway rumble” of trains can be heard on certain recordings - although I’ve never heard that.
I think that the Hall has now been demolished.
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Yes, I think I have an LP with that rumble (or it may have been buses outside). A trio iirc…Gilels, Kogan, Rostropovich (?) can’t think offhand… something like that.
Yes, I have at least a couple recordings made there, with it distinctly audible though I wouldn’t call it very intrusive. I recall when first I heard it on one, its duration and repeating, combined with awareness of the hall being in Holborn made me realise what it must be, before ever reading about it being a known phenomenon (pre internet). I remember commenting to my wife about it! Off the top of my head I don’t recall which recordings I have from there, but will note some time.