Musicality and Engineering

[tirthankar]

It is our love for music which drives us into this audio hobby. We all love listening to music, and we love listening to it in a way that it can dig deep into us and evoke the sense of peace, happiness or for some the sense of raw emotion.. the same raw emotions that drive a musician to compose the music.
Yes there may be some who are into high end audio more for the sake of snobbishness than for the love of audio itself, but I believe that most of us here do not fall into that category.

Last night listening to my system, immersed in the beautiful depths of a harp concerto, I was suddenly struck by the thought.. how does the designer of an audio equipment put so much life into something so inert. It is basically a pulse of electricity which ultimately is causing a diaphram to vibrate and produce sound waves. But the designer designs everything in such a manner that even this mundane thing is able to produce such beautiful musicality.
My system is very basic, and I have heard systems which are even more beautifully musical.

This made me think, what was it about the designers of these equipments which makes their creations such. Is it only excellence in engineering and design? Or is it that these people loved music more than anything, and their excellence in engineering allowed them to create something which could produce something so musical.

If we look at some of the greatest designers in the field of audio - John Bowers of B&W, Raymond Cook of KEF, Tom Colangelo of Mark Levinson and Cello, Dan D'Agostino of Krell, Sir Nelson Pass, Jeff Rowland, William Johnson of Audio Research, Dave Wilson of Wilson Audio .. all of them were/are either musicians themselves, or real music afficianados. They had real love for all things music and the passion to get that music in their creations.. who tried to incorporate as much honesty, emotion and musicality in their creations as possible.

So, to be able to create musically engrossing audio equipment, especially speakers, do you think it is more important to be a musician/music connoisseur first, and then an engineer? Or is it engineering which has the upper hand?

Please discuss...

 

[Thad E Ginathom]

I really think that you should be asking the engineers that! All we, the listeners, without technical background, can do, is decide whether we like their results or not.

From the listening point of view, music comes first. Without that, what's the point?

To hazard an answer to your question, without good ears and appreciation of music, what would be the point in the engineering skills --- but, without engineering skills, nobody is going to be able to make anything.

In all of the world's arts there is the matter of understanding of materials and use of tools. Even if they choose to spend their lives in expressing the world through splurging paint, the best paint splurging artist will still have spent a long time learning the basics of art, even of accurate drawing.

One of the most amazing exhibitions I have ever seen was of Jewellery by Rene Lalique. The beauty was just breathtaking, astonishing. So was the engineering. For those who know the name, yes, the famous dragonfly woman was there. She's gorgeous. She's also damned impossible to make! But he did it. As an artist in glass and jewels, he probably had no equal, ever --- but all of it would have been pictures in his head if he and his workers had not been the most superb craftsmen, and the craft is just another form of engineering.

Whatever the ideas, whatever the aims, it takes engineering to get there, in theory, in design and practice.

 

[square_wave]

To hazard an answer to your question, without good ears and appreciation of music, what would be the point in the engineering skills --- but, without engineering skills, nobody is going to be able to make anything.

.

Superbly put !

Sound engineering skills is where a designer starts. This is just the beginning. Sadly this is also the end for most tech bandwagon gear.

Exceptional listening skills, innate music appreciation, unwavering dedication to quality and focus results in an exceptional music creation component.

 

[2chFreak]

Sound engineering skills is where a designer starts. This is just the beginning.

But prior to this, the designer should "have had" a thorough understanding of acoustic music & its notes so that he has a clear idea what he's trying to -recreate thru his engineering excellence.

Or else its pointless. And for such, he should have cultivated years attending Live Musical events OR play an instrument or actively participate is some form of music making. Without which, no way will he hold any clues of fundamental notes like the middle C for example or the various sustain or staccato that individual instruments produce like 'the bass out of a kick drum vs. the bass out of a double bass'.

 

[thatguy]

Last night listening to my system, immersed in the beautiful depths of a harp concerto, I was suddenly struck by the thought.. how does the designer of an audio equipment put so much life into something so inert.

One must not confuse sound with one's experience of it. Reproducing sound is an engineer's job. His goal is to reproduce sound as it occurs in nature and he has tools to know when he falls short of the goal. Music is sound. It may mean a lot to the listener but to the engineer it is just sound.

If we look at some of the greatest designers in the field of audio - John Bowers of B&W, Raymond Cook of KEF, Tom Colangelo of Mark Levinson and Cello, Dan D'Agostino of Krell, Sir Nelson Pass, Jeff Rowland, William Johnson of Audio Research, Dave Wilson of Wilson Audio .. all of them were/are either musicians themselves, or real music afficianados. They had real love for all things music and the passion to get that music in their creations.. who tried to incorporate as much honesty, emotion and musicality in their creations as possible.

So, to be able to create musically engrossing audio equipment, especially speakers, do you think it is more important to be a musician/music connoisseur first, and then an engineer? Or is it engineering which has the upper hand?

Please discuss...

Nothing to discuss really. Speaker/amp design is pure engineering. Being able to reproduce music is what keeps the money flowing in (and the interest alive) for the research, but music and physics are two completely different specializations and it would be hard for anyone to master both. I can't see any involvement of musicians/audiophiles other than beta testing the products. All businesses employ beta testers for their products, hifi industry should be no difference.

You forgot to mention the marketing department's contribution to the hifi products.

 

[Thad E Ginathom]

One must not confuse sound with one's experience of it. Reproducing sound is an engineer's job. His goal is to reproduce sound as it occurs in nature and he has tools to know when he falls short of the goal. Music is sound. It may mean a lot to the listener but to the engineer it is just sound.

That is a good point too. There may well be successful engineers in the trade who just happened to study electronic engineering, just happened to get a job in the audio industry, and rose within it. I cannot imagine, though, that too many of them are disinterested in the result of their work. I don't see how they can be! Perfectly possible that their interest may be more analytical than artistic, and perfectly possible that they don't have anything to do with making music.

Nothing to discuss really. Speaker/amp design is pure engineering. Being able to reproduce music is what keeps the money flowing in (and the interest alive) for the research, but music and physics are two completely different specializations and it would be hard for anyone to master both. I can't see any involvement of musicians/audiophiles other than beta testing the products. All businesses employ beta testers for their products, hifi industry should be no difference.

You forgot to mention the marketing department's contribution to the hifi products.

In my (IT) industry, the marketing people very often sold some sort of dream to the customers, leaving the technical people to pick up the pieces and create some sort of reality that did something like what the customer wanted. This is true at all levels of the industry: in fact, it is the huge, high-value projects that get noticed by the media when they go wrong, and it seems there is no shortage of them.

The marketing people love to sell pure subjectivity. The engineers are often (surf and read) utterly frustrated by this, because they want credit for good engineering, not some sort of nameless magic.

But still, I find it hard to believe that many of them, even in the big corporations, make it to the top of their professions without some love for the end result of their trade: the sound that comes out of those speakers.

 

[Sumanta]

There is no art or music in designing a speaker. Pure engineering and correct selection of an equipment or parts which ultimately sounds right for the purpose is what an engineer do.

Speakers just convert electrical energy into sound energy.

The designer's ear and love/knowledge decides selection of equipment to make a speaker.

Music is the source of input and inspiration. Engineering is the mere tool to guage and make a product.

 

[Thad E Ginathom]

May I say, "Not so much of the mere!"

A surgeon may well be inspired to follow his career by a love for life, but I have two or three to thank, and I would not describe their technical knowledge and expertise as a mere tool. When components sound superb, it is an engineering knowledge and experience that we have to thank for that.

 

[theredcommando]

Any human-machine interface has strong engineering influence than artistic (because designing machine is not known, comparatively human knows something about the final goal of the product naturally, as he himself is human). Speaker is interface between human and sound. Though, having some knowledge of human perception of sound would help, its not a necessity. Its an added advantage.

There are domain experts in all areas which are hired in cross discipline industries. Speaker companies would have such experts who do such testing and educate designers about the final need of the intended product, but designers themselves are not/need not be artists.

 

[thatguy]

Music is the source of input and inspiration. Engineering is the mere tool to guage and make a product.

Umm ... I would rate engineering a HiFi system as a far more sophisticated skill than producing music. Even primitive societies have managed to produce music, sometimes pretty decent stuff. How many of them could invent a music recording and playback device?

 

[jenson]

If there is anyone who has the upper hand, it's the engineer.

a music connoisseur could always work with a top of the line engineer to look at existing designs and their functions and do tweaks as required i dont think it could work the other way round.

as much as we would like to think of engineering as less of an art form, the truth really is - everything thing in our life is touched by engineers.

 

[square_wave]

Please remember we are talking about creation of original designs

The designer can have both the skills - Art and Engineering. This will work well.

Or

The individual can work in tandem with another capable individual who fills the gap. There are many such successful teams.

Or

A capable engineer can just copy a design and make a good sounding component. This is a very technical skill. There are many who do this.


-------A pure engineer with no listening skills cannot make a find sounding original design nor can a music buff with no technical skills---------

 

[tirthankar]

Thanks everyone for your opinions. There seems to be quite a few opinions that the design of an audio equipment is more about the physics and engineering of speaker design than about the understanding and passion for music.

Now while I do agree that excellence in engineering is of paramount importance, as that is what is needed to create the equipment, my primary question is.. is excellence in engineering and physics sufficient? Dont we also need a thorough understanding of music, either by practice or passion, which will allow us to, what is called, voice the equipment better?

I agree that the correlation between a musician/afficianado and an engineer may be a successful formula. but.. to really understand the consultant, will a mere degree in electrical engineering (maybe a brilliant degree at that) be sufficient? Designing, researching, and manufacturing a speaker can be an expensive proposition, and we cannot expect a non-technical consultant / industry tester to fully understand the mathematical aspects of design or the simulations.. He can provide his inputs only after he has heard the final product.

Lets look at the works of the great composers.. mozart, beethoven, handel, ravi shankar, alla rakha, ustaad bade ghulam ali.. they are not mathematicians or engineers, they created great music by sheer virtuosity, talent and understanding and love of music. It is THEIR creations the speakers are meant to reproduce. Doesnt the designer need to understand the nuances of musical reproduction.. timbre, harmonics, temparament, timing, difference between the fundamental tones produced by different instruments for the same note and such? Is it all mathematical precision and measurement? If I dont know what I have to reproduce, how easy is it to produce that based purely on other's opinions?

I agree that music ultimately is sound, and it is upto the listener to determine whether the sound coming out of a speaker is music or noise. But can that determination be done by an amateur with little or no understanding of music.
To go back to square one, can an engineer be so ignorant of music and depend solely on others inputs to produce musical equipment of excellent musicality?

To look at another angle.. why do we need architecture as a separate profession? Why cant civil engineers do it all?

To clarify, I am an engineer myself, and I have utmost respect for my profession.
I am just trying to understand, what extra does an engineer need, other than his knowledge of the science, to create instruments which reproduce music.

@thatguy: I did not bring in marketing, as my question was not about the gimmickery in audio. But only about creation of equipment that produce sounds which touch the hearts of the listener instead of hurting his ears.

 

[Thad E Ginathom]

Lets look at the works of the great composers.. mozart, beethoven, handel, ravi shankar, alla rakha, ustaad bade ghulam ali.. they are not mathematicians or engineers, they created great music by sheer virtuosity, talent and understanding and love of music.

How much "technology" comes into that word Understanding! Whilst it is true that years of study of musical theory, harmonies, rhythmic calculations etc will not necessarily produce a great composer, it would be hard to be one without it.

It's not as if engineering is just cold mathematics and mechanics. Without imagination, intuition, flair, creativity, nothing new would ever have been invented, and nothing would progress or develop past its basic working form.

 

[thatguy]

That is a good point too. There may well be successful engineers in the trade who just happened to study electronic engineering, just happened to get a job in the audio industry, and rose within it. I cannot imagine, though, that too many of them are disinterested in the result of their work. I don't see how they can be! Perfectly possible that their interest may be more analytical than artistic, and perfectly possible that they don't have anything to do with making music.

Hard to argue with that.

But why would one get into and stay in the audio industry if one didn't enjoy sound (remember, all the good stuff got done in the west where people could choose their career). It would be no different from any other industry. You get hired because you are smart and then 'learn the business'. You stay if you like it or move on.

The aura of mystery (around the development of HiFi equipment) is created by wooly headed audiophiles who believe that their imagined 'listening skills' is worth something. That they are participants in the creation of HiFi sound and not just consumers of it. These self indulgent couch potatoes need to feel good about themselves and their 'skills'. Their contribution to the HiFi industry is no different from the contribution of ugly women (who believe they can look better by wearing more gold) to jewellery industry.

I don't know much about speakers, but almost all the technologies that led to the creation of the solid state amplifiers were invented in the Bell labs. Not exactly a place where musicians gather for jam sessions.

 

[Thad E Ginathom]

wooly headed audiophiles who believe that their imagined 'listening skills' is worth something.

I really don't doubt that, within limits, they are worth something. Furthermore, everybody who puts together their own system is a part of creating their own hifi, albeit with industry-supplied building blocks.

Within limits... What limits? That is defined differently by each, and is an ongoing debate which is part of the fuel of forums like this one . There are a few audiophiles who would do well to read up on the psychology of hearing and buying, and take a little more notice of what is possible and what is not. That for me, is where things become woolly headed, and what the marketing departments love to encourage. Is it ironic that I only just started doing that, in the past few years?

The other thing is that engineers talk a different language. They may describe the same thing, but they do so in technical terms. The kind of engineers you find in recording studios have the same problem with musicians, who tall about effects in subjective, imaginative ways that somebody has to discover how to translate into specific movements of knobs and sliders on a mixing board, or type or positioning of microphones.

...which makes me think: maybe both ends of the music chain, creator and listener, are subjective --- with objective engineers and technology delivering one to the other!

 

[square_wave]

The aura of mystery (around the development of HiFi equipment) is created by wooly headed audiophiles who believe that their imagined 'listening skills' is worth something. .

Not to get into an argument here.

Listening tests using individuals with very high listening and music appreciation skills is a very important part of any high quality music reproduction gear (original designs). It is standard procedure in the industry. Either the team is internal (designer) or they are carefully chosen dedicated teams on hire.

Many timeless designs in the audio industry are created by visionaries who have exemplary listening skills and focused design criteria based on their listening and music appreciation skills. There are dozens of such examples. To fine tune a design and to know that something is right or wrong, this skill is extremely important. In fact it is the corner stone!

The kind of people who are employed for these exercises are not the typical wooly headed - brass knob polishing audiophile.

Do you know any designer who does not use listening tests for an original design? I am just curious.

 

[doors666]

A great but deaf engineer can design and create a killer amplifier.

 

[square_wave]

A great deaf engineer can actually create the first iteration of a great design on paper. But he will get stuck right there. The rest of the journey will need great ears !

 

[Thad E Ginathom]

A great but deaf engineer can design and create a killer amplifier.

A great but deaf musician can create some killer music! hyeah:

But then, Beethoven was not always deaf, and modern-day miracle people like Evelyn Glenny have coped with deafness by finding other ways to use their senses