Alternatives to the traditional classical recording (Part 2)
Written by Hugi Gudmundsson   

 

Volume and dynamics in classical recordings

A continuation of the article mini-series about the possibilities of close-up recordings


Soft and loud at the same time


We've probably all heard rock songs where the drummer is going crazy on the drum kit, the distorted guitars also sound loud but on top of that there is vocals which are sung softly, still we can hear them better than the drums and the guitars. How does that work?

On a recording you can do things which are almost impossible to do live. You can have the softest talk sounding louder than a shout or finger tapping sounding louder than a heavy metal drummer. Then when we listen to these recordings we are in no doubt when something is being played loud and when it's being played softly. How exactly we now that I'm not entirely sure of, but I expect there may be two key factors. An instrument has very different overtone structure, or spectra, wheather it's played loud or soft. Loud sounds have wider frequency range. We seem to sense that instantly regardless of the sound level we're listening at. The other factor is that we seem to sense the physical effort put into making the sound. That can be due to some transients we hear when a string is struck loudly or some other small things we pick up on unconsciously. Whatever it is, we are very good in using it to judge loudness of sounds regardless of sound levels.

Using our sense of loudness as compositional element in a piece of music is not very common, at least not in instrumental music. In electronic music with sampled sounds it's used quite a bit though, maybe not always conciously because this is an inherit part of the compositional material, but composers like Trevor Wishart uses this very consciously in his music. Where this is most evident in modern instrumental compositions is when amplification is used at concerts. There the natural balance of instruments can be altered.


Dynamic range of a recording

How loud should soft be?


Dynamic range is the range between the softest moment on the record and the loudest. In most classical recordings this range is considerably wider than on pop and rock recordings. But due to that the average volume level is much lower than on a pop album. You can compare the two by first putting in a classical CD and adjust the volume to a comfortable level on your stereo. Then you take a random pop CD and listen to it at the same level. Most likely the pop CD will sound much louder.

The reason for this is largely due to something called compression. That is a tool which is used extensively in all pop and rock productions but is a big no-no in most classical recordings. Here is how it works (and as always, very simplified):

First let's look at the classical recording which uses very little or no compression. In order to determine the sound level on the CD the producer finds the loudest part of the piece and adjusts the levels so that the loudest peak doesn't clip (that is, go over the maximum level which causes nasty sounds). The overall volume is determined by this point, even if it is just a few second peak. So if the piece isn't constantly at one level but has some pp places and some ff places, the pp will actually sound very soft from your speakers (and this is why it's hard to listen to classical CD's in cars).

The pop approach is very different. In order to bring the average sound level up they use compression. What the compressor does is actually quite simple. When the sound level goes over a certain level (decided by the producer) the compressor turns down the volume and turns it up again when the sound level goes down. So by rounding off the top peaks the actual output is softer than it was before but the range from the softest point to the loudest point is now narrower. The dynamic range is compressed. What you can then do is gain the level of the compressed output. Then the loudest peaks are again at the same level as they were before but in doing so you've also increased the level of everyting else, making the average level higher. The reason you can do this without losing all power in the places that are supposed to sound really loud is largely due to our sense of loudness (discussed earlier in this article). We still sense them as being loud even if they are not at that much higher levels than the rest of the music.

Why not compression in classical music?


So why doesn't this work for all music equally well? That is largely due to the difference in recording techniques but also the difference in the nature of the music itself. In pop music the compressors are first applied on each individual instrument and then the master output is also compressed. If you would not treat each instrument first then the compressor would probably begin doing very audible changes to the music, like turning down the volume of everything each time the drummer hits the snare drum. In classical music which is recorded with microphones at a distance from the instruments (as opposed to up-close), treating each instrument independently with a compressor is not an option. Therfore anything more than just a tiny bit of compression sounds very bad on these type of recordings.  That is increased by the fact that the music itself is usually composed over a large dynamic range which calls for more dynamic range in the recording and makes compression more audible.


Why bother if it doesn't work?


By recording each instument up-close and on individual tracks you can make more use of compression without it sounding too obvious (audible changes when the compressor is “pumping” the volume up and down). By doing so you can also turn up the average volume of your recording. So why is that desireable? It all comes down to taste. We live in times where the younger generation (which at 30 I'm hoping I still belong to) has got used to in-your-face recordings. I have heard too many classical CD's with works which were extremely powerful at concerts sounds anything but on the recording. I personally like having the soft movements sounding loud and in-your-face, as opposed to distant and unclear. Others may hate that!
Finally I must state that despite what may appear as a glorious praise to the pop industry I do actully dislike the majority of the recordings and production techniques used nowadays. The over use of compression makes everything sound flat and boring. Loud yes, but boring. You can't save a bad song by making it louder.



Previous articles in series:

Alternatives to the traditional classical recording (Part 1)

Classical and contemporary music doesn't always have to sound the same on the CD as it does at concerts!



Related articles:

Recording and production of contemporary music

Can modern composers learn something from the production techniques used in the pop industry?






 
Discuss (4 posts)

Joshua Parmenter
Alternatives to the traditional classical recording (Part 2)
May 10 2008 03:56:55
This thread discusses the Content article: Alternatives to the traditional classical recording (Part 2)

Your conclusion is pretty right on. And as a general rule of thumb, I think close mic and the tools available today give recording artists a large number of choices that can be used until experience takes over!

The microphone, like everything it is recording, is an instrument. An experienced expert with a microphone has a similar kind of control over timbre and dynamics as a cellist with a bow or the embouchure of a brass player. But it needs as much practice. And the other side of this is the wide array of signal processing that is now cheaply available to a wide range of recording artists.

Like a composer learning orchestration, a recording artist needs to start with rules of thumb and begin to experiment and explore. Recording can just as expressive as a performance, and as sampling rate and bit depth begin to give more head room in the information domain, recording artists will begin to have new dynamic and expressive room to explore. It is in the details beyond the rules of thumb that digital recording can now start to explore, but these are aspects that take much trial and error.

In other words - save, tinker and undo often!
 #10

Robert Davidson
Re:Alternatives to the traditional classical recor
Jun 03 2008 23:10:15
I had a great talk with James Poke of Icebreaker (London) about this - he agrees that compression and close mics are a tool that is there within the spectrum of possibilities to be used.

To me, the classical tonmeister dogma of no compression, no close mics is a very limited view. Imagine if movies were just single-camera, single shot films of live plays. Why do people want records to be mimicry of live performance? They're records. They need to sound good through loudspeakers.

Yes, there's a place for the purist approach, but it's just one option amongst many. I like the sound of modern production techniques on classical music. So much so that I often add some processing to other people's recordings so that they are more enjoyable.
 #35

Daníel Bjarnason
Re:Alternatives to the traditional classical recor
Jul 03 2008 14:51:26
Very good couple of articles. Thank you.
I think the biggest obstacle in recording everything separately is the problem of rubato vs. the clicktrack. Would be nice to hear your thoughts on this.
 #37

Nigel Keay
recording string ensembles
Jul 08 2008 09:46:48
I think that an ensemble of strings will always need to be recorded together for the intonation, above all else.

If a multi-tracking approach was going to be used then it should be possible to make a click-track with rubato on a modern sequencer using enough subdivisions of the beat; I remember a very early version of MOTU's Performer that had no tempo variation, but that has been incorporated for over 20 years now.

Congratulations on writing such an interesting series of articles on this hugely important area. I'm all for using any means that works to make a detailed recording that is well balanced, and allows the listener to discover a new piece of music.
 #38

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