"Wylie Williams" wrote in message ...
John La Grou of Millennia Media, Inc. wrote
(p.s., I also found it amusing that an engineer looking for a
"natural" sound selected a "warm" micamp. Not that the end result
wasn't musically rich and beautiful, but "euphonic" and "accurate" are
usually mutually exclusive audio ideas.)

I have heard essentially that statement so many times from so many sources.
What is the conflict with euphonic (sounding good) and accurate, anyway?
What is our definition of "accurate" that makes it conflict with
"enjoyable"??

Great question. "Accurate," as it is generally used by the more
technical types here, means accurate to what's on the disk. Whether
this "sounds like live acoustic music in real space" depends on how
good a job the recording engineer did. And, as you know, that can
vary. A lot.

There's also the matter of taste, as some others have pointed out.
Anybody who thinks euphonic and accurate are mutually exclusive
probably has a preference for a certain kind of sound. Some people
think violins, reproduced accurately, are screechy. Turning down the
treble sounds more pleasant to them. Euphonic, but not accurate.

From an engineering standpoint, I'd like equipment to be as accurate
as possible, so that when I get a really good recording, I can enjoy
it exactly as it was made. But occasionally I'll give the tone
controls a tweak, and others own equalizers to give them even more
control over the final sound.

So there's no inherent conflict. They're two goals, which for each
individual sometimes coincide and other times conflict.

bob