Is 5.1 Really the Correct Format for Surround Music?

[wavelength]

Although it is the most common surround mixing technique today, my contention is that 5.1 for music is simply not correct. If you want the music to surround you then why would you want the forward part of the field to be better represented than the rear portion. Somehow 5.1, which works for movies, became the de facto choice for music as well. Where movies have sounds near and far, music should be consistent so that all the speakers come together to present a single surround field. All parts of the musical spectrum that is being reproduced are equally important and equally necessary to realize the desired outcome. So give each speaker an equal role to play.

I feel that multi-channel systems for music should always be of an even number: 2.0, 4.0, 6.0, etc. so that equilibrium can be maintained.

Furthermore, I feel the the subwoofer has no place in a multi-channel music system. The speakers should be full range in order to produce the lower end of the audio spectrum of music. With that, no sub is necessary. The point is to give full control of the signal to the speakers without introducing a totally different animal (the subwoofer) to complicate the reproduction of the surround field.

 

[Kal Rubinson]

My replies are from the perspective of classical music.

Although it is the most common surround mixing technique today, my contention is that 5.1 for music is simply not correct. If you want the music to surround you then why would you want the forward part of the field to be better represented than the rear portion.

The answer is that the performers are in front and not the back. The hall is the surround.

Furthermore, I feel the the subwoofer has no place in a multi-channel music system. The speakers should be full range in order to produce the lower end of the audio spectrum of music. With that, no sub is necessary. The point is to give full control of the signal to the speakers without introducing a totally different animal (the subwoofer) to complicate the reproduction of the surround field.

In a perfect world, yes. In a real room, optimal placement for the lowest frequencies is rarely the same as that for best imaging.

 

[4-earredwonder]

Although it is the most common surround mixing technique today, my contention is that 5.1 for music is simply not correct. If you want the music to surround you then why would you want the forward part of the field to be better represented than the rear portion. Somehow 5.1, which works for movies, became the de facto choice for music as well. Where movies have sounds near and far, music should be consistent so that all the speakers come together to present a single surround field. All parts of the musical spectrum that is being reproduced are equally important and equally necessary to realize the desired outcome. So give each speaker an equal role to play.

I feel that multi-channel systems for music should always be of an even number: 2.0, 4.0, 6.0, etc. so that equilibrium can be maintained.

Furthermore, I feel the the subwoofer has no place in a multi-channel music system. The speakers should be full range in order to produce the lower end of the audio spectrum of music. With that, no sub is necessary. The point is to give full control of the signal to the speakers without introducing a totally different animal (the subwoofer) to complicate the reproduction of the surround field.

I am totally with you on that, wavelength. 5.1 WAS created for movie theaters where a center channel (NOW multiple center channels) was/were utilized so that theatergoers could enjoy the dialogue from every vantage point.

Four FULL RANGE matching speakers capable of prodigious bass output could easily create a PERFECT phantom center not only in the front but also in the rears (thus 6.0). And FROM EXPERIENCE, unless your center channel is PERFECTLY matched with the front r/l speakers, there will hardly be a 'flow' of sound across the fronts.

Height channels are all well and good for motion pictures and could probably also be employed for spacey music but in reality, FOUR FULL RANGERS are all you really need and they better match front and rear because especially with QUAD you will have the exact same amplitude front and rear...that's if the mixing engineers have properly done their homework.

And I also mentioned (numerous times) when listening in STEREO (NO DSP modes employed) you are actually listening in THREE channel which even Steve Wilson pointed out....the phantom center being the THIRD CHANNEL!

 

[rtbluray]

My answer is as long as there's two discrete channels in front and two discrete channels in the back, anything at or above that is correct for surround music.
It's all in how you use it!

 

[Snood]

Tipsy Snood says:

While Tipsy Snood agree with some of your points..........tipsy Snood says:

Love me some Stereo Love me Some Quad, but Snood has always loved to center channel especially when the LEAD vocals are localized to it and and not the other channels. Love hearing famous artists lead vocals (any artists) right there in front.........like they are in front of me singing. It feels unreal like they are there........even more unreal knowing they are deceased but jeeeeeeeeeeeeeeez it sounds like they are right there IN FRONT OF ME!

While Tipsy Snood agrees on the subwoofer part in a perfect nice 4 speaker arrangement..............Tipsy Snood and many like Tipsy Snood do not have 4 full range mega speakers........in that case the subwoofer is a must. Maybe not the best reproduction of tunes in someone's sense, but if not for that........... Snood would not be here and many more. Thus leaving about saaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay hmmmmm 60 to 70 percent of the QQ community out on the lurch..........and thus even more...........destroying the surround community completely.

5.1 is a standard............4.0 is quad and while not 5.1, it is AWESOME when done well.......

WAVE buddy you have been around since say the prehistoric days of quad or early 5.1...........Tipsy Snood envies you @:

Tipsy Snood envisions a day when tunes emanate from thin air (without a so called wifi)........me Sheeeeeet you not, Tipsy Snood thinks this will be reality in the relatively not too distant future. There will be no wifi.....it will be easy access. Tipsy Snood do think 5.1/7.1 will become a norm even in the simplest of hardware set ups. It is ridiculous to think it will not.

Music is not about pounding it into you........it should and will be about experiencing it as if it were a movie. Simply put..............this is why we all love the surround experience. It is music put into a holographic experience. :banana:

Music will never be free in a sense...........but the bridge will bring it to more people - and the norm will catch on into surround.

Viva la :banana: .........ooops Snood meant, Viva la Snood-A-rama..........umm typo yeah umm yeah

Long Live Surround!!!!!

 

[himey]

I think 5.1 mixes can be balanced from front to back. ...but my setup more resembles a quad one with an additional speaker between the two fronts, unlike your avatar where the rears are more to the sides.

My first thaught is it isn't about the speaker setup, it is the mix for the setup that is most important. The "mixing artist" decides on what his canvas is, 2.0, 3.0, 4.0, 5.1, ect, and mixes his creation to those parameters.

Then your question becomes, what is the "best" canvas to paint the surround picture? That is where it gets very personal. So many preferences based on experiences that you can't ever come to a universal consensus, and why would we want to.

Like an artist, let the mixer express his vision in whatever form.

One size does not fit all...so many styles of music, one setup would be a constraint.

 

[wavelength]

My replies are from the perspective of classical music.
The answer is that the performers are in front and not the back. The hall is the surround.

You are talking about re-creating the live experience. For me, surround music is not at all about how you would hear performers in a concert venue. It is about creating new experiences that simply sound wonderful based on the choices of the mixing engineer. When the music is all around you there is a magic...don't know how else to describe it.

 

[wavelength]

In a perfect world, yes. In a real room, optimal placement for the lowest frequencies is rarely the same as that for best imaging.

Ok, good point; I'll take your word on that. Still, I have never had much luck making the sub seamless with the rest of the sound. It should be just an extension of the lowest speaker frequencies, right?

 

[Kal Rubinson]

You are talking about re-creating the live experience.

Yup.

For me, surround music is not at all about how you would hear performers in a concert venue. It is about creating new experiences that simply sound wonderful based on the choices of the mixing engineer. When the music is all around you there is a magic...don't know how else to describe it.

I would describe it as, with rare exceptions, annoying.

 

[himey]

Yup.

I would describe it as, with rare exceptions, annoying.

So if the music isn't in front of YOU it is annoying?

 

[himey]

Yup.

I would describe it as, with rare exceptions, annoying.

A studio mixer and band goes to all the trouble of miking instruments, laying down tracks, fading, and manipulating sounds, for the purpose of sounding like a live experience? That sounds totally counterintuitive. Then they release a live album...

 

[Kal Rubinson]

So if the music isn't in front of YOU it is annoying?

Yup. I don't usually turn my back on the performance.

 

[Kal Rubinson]

A studio mixer and band goes to all the trouble of miking instruments, laying down tracks, fading, and manipulating sounds, for the purpose of sounding like a live experience? That sounds totally counterintuitive. Then they release a live album.

As I implied, that's not the kind of music I usually listen to.

 

[himey]

As I implied, that's not the kind of music I usually listen to.

If a musician wants to create a live experience, don't go into the studio, tell the audience to shut up and mic the performance. Going into the studio is a totally different ballgame.

 

[4-earredwonder]

Let's ALL be real. When you go to the movies, even a 3D movie, the SCREEN is in FRONT of you and yet to create an aural 3D experience the sound can NOW come from as many as 60+ speakers (Dolby Atmos). In the early 70's when QUAD was created, was it just a gimmick to sell more speakers and amps or was it envisioned as a 'tool' to enable musicians to expand the soundscape of their creations?

My guess.....BOTH.

The home environment is neither a full fledged Dolby Atmos Movie theater or a cavernous concert hall for that matter. Kal prefers gimmick free ambience in the rears and yet wasn't it Stereophile's founding father J Gordon Holt who once surmised that one cannot create a concert hall in the home...unless, of course, your home listening environment 'happens' to be a former CONCERT HALL.

Perhaps with today's more refined equipment and DSP modes, the impossible is now possible but for all intensive purposes, I do prefer more than ambience in the rears, even from classical music because it does add a layer of texture and allows the instruments to expand beyond the limitations imposed by home listening environments in stereo, only.

Whether its politically incorrect to have music coming from the rears really doesn't diminish the sensation of having a limited space expanded by that happy "gimmick" we refer to as Surround Sound. And I'm sure as we've ALL noticed, a great surround mixer can 'unearth' instruments hitherto buried in the original stereo mix and of course, a not so great one can also bury instruments that WERE present in the original mix, as well.

 

[wavelength]

As I implied, that's not the kind of music I usually listen to.

But you review a lot of very pricey, high-tech, multi-channel equipment. I am amazed that all you want in the rears is ambiance.

 

[salsdali]

I feel that multi-channel systems for music should always be of an even number: 2.0, 4.0, 6.0, etc. so that equilibrium can be maintained.

but isn't that counter-intuitive to "discrete"?

There is usually only one mic and one singer so shouldn't they have their own channel (center)?

That would fit the definition of discrete to me.

"Phantom" is NOT discrete.

just like how the LFE's should go to the sub, because the sub is discrete at producing sound waves below, usually 60hz, than MOST speakers cannot produce.

 

[4-earredwonder]

but isn't that counter-intuitive to "discrete"?

There is usually only one mic and one singer so shouldn't they have their own channel (center)?

That would fit the definition of discrete to me.

"Phantom" is NOT discrete.

just like how the LFE's should go to the sub, because the sub is discrete at producing sound waves below, usually 60hz, that MOST speakers cannot produce.

NOT necessarily because as I've pointed out STEREO produces a VERY convincing and discrete (if you will) phantom center channel and I've read that a lot of music surround engineers are really NOT comfortable with the center channel......like what should they put in it besides vocals.

In the end, it's really what you're comfortable with and what space limitations and budget allow.

I'm just waiting for some QQer to go FULL Dolby Atmos ........ like 62 channels and a bunch of subs......but of course....what would one play on it........Perhaps Steven Spielberg or George Lucas have access to those digital projectors and Dolby Atmos digital masters. Wouldn't surprise me.

 

[LuvMyQuad]

I think the goals of a classical audiophile, and a pop/rock audiophile are different. The classic listener wants to reproduce the original performance as closely as possible and ambient rear channels can get a classical listener closer to his goal. The pop/rock listener wants something better than the original performance, because lets face it, a tenth row seat for your typical rock show has relatively poor sound. Rock needs a studio with multi-tracked instruments and vocals, overdubs, reverb, etc.,etc., to sound good. Even when rock is recorded live, it is still mixed in the same way. Its all artificial to be sure, but a rock listener wouldn't be happy with a faithful reproduction of the original performance. A rock recording isn't trying to re-create, it is its own creation. And discrete rear channels get a rock listener closer to his goal as well.

The comments on the phantom center channel do have some legitimacy. In most cases, a discrete center channel probably isn't necessary to project a good center image. Unless you have a very wide front wall with your front l/r speakers far apart, there probably isn't an annoying "hole in the center" effect. The center channel has its roots firmly planted in movie sound reproduction for the purpose already discussed. But 5 channels is by far the most prevalent surround format. Some artists/mixers make very little use of the center channel, while others use it extensively. Either route can be effective. If heavy use of a center channel is what the artist had in mind, why would I want to disrupt the plan by splitting it to create a phantom center channel? Why not just play it as is? Especially in a system like mine with 3 identical monitors, all at approximately the same distance and at approximately the same height. A phantom center will sound no better, and quite possibly will sound worse.

The need for a sub is a different matter entirely. Kal's comment cant be overstated. Getting the best imaging and the best bass response from a single loudspeaker placement is truly rare. One or the other usually suffers to some degree. Being able to locate the low bass drivers where they sound best offers a great advantage. Beyond that, there is a practicality issue. With stereo, I could place two behemoth speakers on the front wall and live with it (and I often did). But I would be shoehorning the same speakers into place at the surround positions. It just wouldn't be practical in my living space. The use of a sub does not complicate the reproduction process, nor do I have a problem getting it to integrate well. Most of the time I cant even tell that its on. Until low bass kicks in that is. Then it makes all the difference. And I dare say, it will likely outperform all but the largest full range loudspeaker when it comes to bass extension.

 

[salsdali]

NOT necessarily because as I've pointed out STEREO produces a VERY convincing and discrete (if you will) phantom center channel and I've read that a lot of music surround engineers are really NOT comfortable with the center channel......like what should they put in it besides vocals.

In the end, it's really what you're comfortable with and what space limitations and budget allow.

After 100's of 5.1 discs I've never heard a stereo phantom center sound as discrete as a proper 5.1 with center for vocals.

I've also had speaker arrangements where the center wasn't actually in the center, but was off to the side and closer to me so that when I listened to those 5.1 discs I could hear the vocals (center) completely discrete from the rest of the music.

Ingredients of a song:

1. Music
2. Words

I like to hear both, independently.