by Mark Waldrep

At least once a day and sometimes more, I get an email from a local music industry pundit ranting about the state of the music industry and the players (both artists and record company executives) behind it. He talks about everything in his blog. Readers have been treated to descriptions of his trip to Hong Kong to be part of a music industry panel, his ski trip to Vail and his frustration at Los Angeles traffic...but it was his recent post about how great his wife’s new LCD flat panel TV is that prompted me to respond to him and write about this piece. Basically, his position is that high definition video is delivering an entertainment experience that is superior to that of his music system. I don’t know what kind of music playback equipment he has but you would think that a guy that is heavily involved in the music industry (at least as much as a lawyer can be) would have a fairly decent system...maybe even more than one. The room with the new LCD screen should have an accompanying 5.1 surround home theater setup at least. Maybe he has another room dedicated to playing music without the intrusion of a video display. I know many audiophiles prefer listening to two channel music and set up a separate room from the home theater to accomplish this. Bob has mentioned that vinyl is his gold standard for music reproduction, so maybe he has a special music room. Bob is not what I would call an audiophile or even an interested aficionado of music fidelity. Chances are that he hasn’t experienced really great music played on a great playback system. If he had, I suspect his opinion might be different. He lives in Santa Monica, which is about 5-10 minutes from our studio. I have written to him and invited him on several occasions to come by and experience high definition, surround music done the way that we do it...but so far he’s not responded. Ignorance is not necessary bliss in this case. HD Video is a flat representation of an image. It might be a segment of a movie telecined (transferred from film to HD Video) or a video sequence that was actually shot using high definition cameras. From what I’ve seen at various trade shows and demonstrations, there is a difference between these two ways of acquiring HD video content. Moviemakers like the “look” of film. It is part of the creative process and often time integral to the story telling. HD video of a drama, sporting event or situation comedy on television has a different look than film...and many times the images are clearer and show more detail. That’s because the entire production chain was accomplished using digital tools. From camera to display, everything was maintained as digital bits...in high definition. This production method works with sound too! Current HD video is made up of 1920 pixels by 1080 pixels.  This is the ATSC (Advanced Television Standards Committee) specification. HD broadcasts and Blu-Ray discs can deliver really great looking video to the new HD sets. But the images are still flat...like photographs! The experience is much better than the SD TVs but not even close to reality. The difference is stereo...for your eyes! Yes, we have two eyes to provide stereo optic vision. Just think back to your childhood when you used to stare through a stereo slide viewer to see really impressive 3D imagery. These days there is a lot of effort in Hollywood to bring more 3D movies to the big screen. I know of at least 9 major productions that are being developed for 3D projection...with the polarized glasses and everything. I’ve seen some 3D stuff that looks really incredible! So the 50” LCD screen in Bob’s media room might look quite good but can it approach a state-of-the-art music playback system. Absolutely not! Music production made the transition from monaural records to stereophonic sound 50 years ago. Audio engineers have mastered the process of capturing, mixing and delivering music that has depth and spatial differentiation (although some do it better than others). It might not be the immersive experience that surround sound can provide, but stereo is decades ahead of a lovely HD video display. And it can get even better! If music is recorded digitally at 96 kHz/24-bits or better AND mixed into a full array of surround speakers, the listener can be completely immersed in the music. The mandolin player is sitting to the right of you, the pianist on the left and the guitarist/singer straight ahead of you. This may not be indistinguishable from sonic reality but the experience is far beyond that of a 50” LCD screen displaying 1920 x 1080 pixels. So to Bob, the music industry pundit, self-anointed critic and commentator of all things music and media, I say, get off your behind and check out a really great music playback system. Listen to a well-recorded HD surround audio track and then try to tell your readers that an HD video TV is a better experience than the accompanying sound...unless your ears are failing, you’d be telling a lie.