[Gary Eickmeier]

William Sommerwerck wrote:
PS: I am reminded of someone arguing against Special Relativity, when
the fact is that many experiments have established its general
validity.
The argument that the listening room somewhat alters the sound is a
red herring.

William -

I directly answered the matter of accuracy in my lengthy response. If it
might help, let me put it one very brief other way.

You record a live concert with the intent and purpose of the facsimile
reproduction of the auditory perspective for a loudspeaker presentation.
There is nothing wrong with your recording techniques, your speakers are the
best in the world.

If, by "accuracy" you mean that it will sound exactly the same as that
larger room that you recorded, then the answer is no, you cannot get there
from here. If you have normal acoustics in the playback room, you will hear
that room superimposed upon what you have recorded. If you kill all or most
of the playback room (read anechoic chamber) it will not sound the same,
won't even sound good.

My conclusion, accuracy is a false goal. Perhaps a further question to ask
ourselves would be "accuracy" of what compared to what? The mistake that
many make with this misleading term is to think that what you want is
accuracy of the output of the speakers to the input signal into "the
microphones." But that is misleading because the recording engineer has not
placed the microphones at the best seat in the house, he has placed them so
that the final result when performed on loudspeakers at some distance in
front of you in another room will sound best.

Perhaps what you are thinking of is accuracy of the original sound to the
playback sound. If so, how do you get there from here? Nearfield monitors?
Ambisonics? Surround sound? I'm afraid it is still going to be elusive,
because our ears require some support of a real playback room to anchor the
sounds and externalize them. I have written about that in the past as well.

So OK, your turn. How do we get there fom here? First, accuracy of what
compared to what. Second, how do we do it. Sorry to be so blunt, but if you
are going to use a term and demand that I address it, you've got to define
it.

Gary