On Mon, 20 Oct 2003 15:44:23 GMT, RPS wrote:

This is inspired by the recent discussion on possible replacement for
my Spendor BC1's (thanks for all the comments in that thread):

Many of you have commented on a speaker being more or less
neutral/accurate than others.

If you were not present at the original recording session, with good
memory, how can you judge the accuracy of the reproduction?

I mean, I can tell that Spendor, Proac, and Dynaudio are sounding
different, but don't I need to be familiar with the actual original
sound to judge which one is accurate or uncolored?

There are many experienced audiophiles in this forum and I would
appreciate all comments, theoretical as well as how you approach
auditions personally.

I cheat, and use my own master tapes............... :-)

I believe that most people would consider a 'neutral' speaker to be
one which produces a natural-sounding speaking voice, and also sounds
as much like an original concert hall p[erformance of unamplified
music as possible. Failing that, note that several companies such as
PMC, B&W and ATC produce a range of professional monitor speakers
which are widely used in the recording industry. Use a B&W N801 for
instance, and you'll be listening to your classical music on the same
speaker which was most likely to have been used by the mixdown
engineer.
--

Stewart Pinkerton | Music is Art - Audio is Engineering