[ST]

That never happens, unless you're sitting in an anechoic chamber.

So how does that make stereo accurate in anechoic chamber? We listen to mono sound with a lot of reflections. Stereo simply attempt to create the soundstage illusion. It is unnatural but for the last 50 years or so we are listening in stereo and accept that to be correct.

Imagine a small band with the piano to the left, double bass in the centre and the drums on the right. Each instruments emits from a single source. In order to recreate the exact recorded playback perhaps we should put one speaker each at the exact location of the instruments and play the mono recording of the each instrument. It should be more accurate than attempting to recreate the three instruments with a single stereo recording over a pair of speakers.

We prefer to listen to the sound coming directly to us by turning our head towards the sound. Unfortunately in stereo, we fix our head to an empty space between two speakers and listen to sound coming from outside of our point of focus. How can that be natural? Do you stare and look right in the centre of the stage irrespective where the sound coming from in a live recording?