Klarinet Archive - Posting 000778.txt from 1997/11

From: "Jerry Korten" <jerryk@-----.com>
Subj: Re: Recording the Clarinet
Date: Fri, 21 Nov 1997 13:26:03 -0500

Jonathan Cohler writes:

>Good point, Neil. But let's remember that this whole thing started with
>someone (I don't remember who) making the factually erroneous statement
>that said something to the effect of:
> The clarinet sound cannot be captured well on digital recordings,
> and it can be captured well on analog recordings.
>This is patently false. End of story. The rest is explanation for those
>who have the time to learn and understand why.
>By avoiding the how and why of music, we often end up with large
>discussions on this list that go on and on and are fueled by a never
ending
>fuel of misinformation. I, personally, find this more annoying than
>discussions that get down to the meat of the why's and the how's of some
>important clarinet-related issue such as recording the clarinet.

>- -------------------
>Jonathan Cohler
>cohler@-----.net

Well, of course I said it Jonathan!

And it was in the vein of trying to explain why digitally recorded sound
doesn't capture the full analog waveform that that discussion got started.
Somehow we got out of the world of A/D converters (Nyquist) and I missed
that turn. Which is why I was so insistent on showing why A/D converters do
things differently.

You agree that in fact there are errors in how an A/D captures the signal,
but these errors are very small. Recording companies are trying to improve
this by increasing the sample rate and the number of quantization levels,
but (unless I missed something else) you suggest that it is not necessary
and they are wasting their time and money.

So let's get back to the issue of recording clarinet.

Here is my problem...

I have recordings of clarinet on CD, and clarinet on record. My recordings
on record sound more like clarinets.

I have spent quite a lot of dough on a D/A converter, (but perhaps not
enough). What type do you recommend?

At one point you allude to the fact that it is most likely in the recording
setup, but how can this be for all my recordings on CD? Is there an
inherent distortion in records that make things sound more life like (or is
this an unconscious bias to analog so that I can complicate my life by
having to deal with cleaning records and otherwise make my life miserable)?

Believe me I would much prefer to deal with CD's than records, its just
that I can't get the same sound out of them.

Does nobody else on Klarinet find this to be the case?

What are your comments.

Jerry Korten
NYC

   
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