Having just returned from a business trip to Japan I sank into my favourite listening chair with the first cup of jet lag fighting coffee and woke the HiFi system up by popping a CD on.

Great stuff immediately. This had been a short trip away, about a week, so I had risked it and left the kit on in my absence. My god I miss my NAIM. But hang on a minute a revelation is occuring here I am listening to music. "Ah of cousre you are you stupid burke!" you all rush to say but wait a minute I need to explain further.

This is not a performance of music we are talking about here it is plainly and simply MUSIC complete and beautiful.

Now I don't want to lose a chunk of the audience here and I also defenitely do not want to bring an air of snobbery to the preceedings. I stress this because I have enjoyed every NAIM system I have had and as the upgrades have happened I have not been inclined to start "bad mouthing" my previous kit. No, in turth I have recalled little ways in which it was different and appealing. I have also ALWAYS been listening and enjoying music, so for those just starting out there is reassurance as well as warning here. Don't let this insinuate doubts or undermine your pleasure in your system and don't let it pressure you into planning a very expensive series of upgrades because ANY naim suystem produces a great sound.

A little history. I started out with a 112/150 and as some of you who have been bored to tears with my previous ramblings are aware, I have progressed through a CDX2 - 282 combination to the recently accquired CDS3 - 252 bolted onto the one constant, a 250.2, So this is really a "front end" story.

At all of the steps along the way I have willingling parted with the money, in exchange for improvements in the sound of the system, and have then proceeded to report these with a happy satisfaction and increasing pleasure in my system. All along it has been about performance. A noted extension in the musicality and power of the Bass perhaps, a sense of increased resolution, a definite impression that the sound has better dynamics and all the other virtues I have noted in the musical delivery.

With the advent of the 252 and the CDS3 something has changed in a different way. Intially I was a little disconcerted because after the first couple of weeks of "WOW" period that we get with every system upgrade I was no longer hearing the differences in peformance. I now realise there has been a transition which does not have an immediate added signature, it has just become music rather than performance.

Oh sure you can listen for all the performance things previously mentioned and they are all there in glorious detail but there is nothing obvious about this anymore. The system is not waving a hand and saying "Hey listen to this! How about that for dynamic bass? and what do you think of that great beat we've got going here?".

Now the system is almost self effacing and just plays away with a superior air which is saying quietly "I'm so bloody damn good at this that I don't need to make a point anymore". I guess in large part it is a purity of delivery thing.

To sum up for me there has been a move from "performance" to "music" which brings a different listening experience. I recall others commenting on this particularly as you reach into the stratospheric heights of the 552 and the 500, but for me this transition has coccurred with the CDS3 - 252.

Where does it/did it happen for others. Please do tell.

regards
GEOFF

The boring old fart

Hi Geoff (and welcome back...),
My humble "stereo set" experience I have gone through for the last 8 months resembles very much yours: It's just like two curves moving into opposite directions: The first curve denotes the amount of doubts, draw-backs, relationship to "hifi", the delta between what I hear and my assumption of what I "should" hear. The second curve shows only one aspect: "how close is what I hear to what I expect the musicians wanted this to be like ?"; and that is not necessarily "objective", but a hell of subjective. As is music.

As I (almost exclusively) listen to acoustic music, the "meter" is out there.

Along with the music goes

• Psychologic condition of the musicians: Listen to the Antibes concert of the Keith Jarrett "Standards" trio, which has been recorded under quite "hostile" conditions, and realize, how that sudden spark has fired them up DURING their performance. Shivers !
  
• Studio/Life: Whenever I read "recorded at Avatar studio, New York" or "recorded in St. Peter's church, New York" or "recorded life at the Village Vanguard, New York" (funny: all in NYC...), I expect to feel like "coming home" when I listen, because I will recognize the ambient. Very important aspect for me...
  
• Rooms: Just recently - on my trip to Cremona - I was able to buy some CDs that have been recorded in places "with history" and "with sound". Some of them, and the instruments used, I was able to visit and see. Now, if that's in a recording - it surely belongs to music.

I don't want to be distracted from these (for me) important aspects by a hifi system.

Now, coming back to your question: "Where does/did this happen for others": Every time I put a CD into my player. Now. After I have left behind some of the hurdles, that kept me wondering, doubting, ...
My personal guess is that I will still give Supercap, 252 and CDS3 a try, but I'm SOOOO much more relaxed in wanting this, that it could be almost a reason for Naim to pull this thread (get the picture ?).

Scary...

Best regards, freundliche Grüße

Stefan

I'm defenitely appreciating this difference more easily since listening at length to a CDX2 - sounds like there's plenty more where that came from! Notwithstanding your 'to-die-for' front end Geoff (not to mention the stuff in the middl)' for me it's more HOW I listen. Sometimes I'm analytical, sometimes I just let it act as a soothing sonic bath. One thing I'm in no doubt about is that the higher you go, the more your system allows/assists you to listen how you like. Take the Jupiter. Clear crisp fun, but it demands that you pay attention to everything, as opposed to delivering insight through stealth. If that makes any sense.

As to bad mouthing old stuff: with two exceptions I have loved everything I ever bought. Sometimes it didn't last but in nearly cases I now wish I hadn't given it away or sold it or chopped it in for next to nothing. I could have at least two classic systems dotted around the house now, each having it's particular strength, and better to listen to while working than a boom box or PC sound card.

Cheers

\ramble

Harry

Dear Geoff,

I think your point is absolutely valid. For me it has been a long road to recovery. My first gramophone (mine rather than one I had eccess to) was a forty year old portable HMV, which ploughed entrancingly through over the 1000 odd 78s I owned and had access to, till they were worn out! I never once considered the replay aspect. There were no expectation, obviously. But I learned a huge quantity of great music and between that and my tiny transistor radio plumbed to a decent 8 inch paper coned loud speaker I made the box for, I had everything I wanted. I would listen, hypnotised by the music making. When I was twenty one I bought a hifi stereo. [Sony 40 watt amp, Dual TT, which played LPs and 78s]. I still listened to music as before, but the effect seemed more distant. By now I was playing the bass in orchestras and that eventually went professional, and this gave a whole new perspective, which further undermined my set. However that Sony based set survived for seventeen years. Really I was happy enough and it took one channel on the amp to fail for me to look for a new system. By now I was CD only, and so I got a Nait 3 and and CD 3, which simply bombed anything else at the money, or so I thought. It almost put me back in mind of the hypnotic effect of my old accoustic gramophone. Ceratinly it caused a huge renaissance in my attention to the replay of great music making. But I caught the up-grade disease! As it happened this coincided with the end of my bass playing because Arthritis was ruining my left hand. I sold the bass and got a 52 and second hand 180 (which I always regarded as a happy compromise between a stop-gap and something very fine indeed). Then my late grandmother in her last weeks simply told me to go and buy something mad I really wanted as the inheritance laws in Norway simply do no allow for the estate to divided as she would have wanted. [It can, but it requires the agreement, not fortcoming in this case, of all parties as it can be challenged in the court and then old Norse Law applies]. Result: A brand new CDS 2 shared my living room, so now I had the makings of a really fine set.

The Eureka moment came when I got some SBLs and the 200, and as recently as some set up experiments earlier this year. Though the set is more or less finalised and only waiting for an even finer power amp, I have to say that the effect draws me in whenever I am not too tired to attend properly. I am back as happy as I was in the mid 70s with my wind-up machine and tranny radio on Radio Three on 464 metres. Marvelous! And this in my post-playing state, which so made me realise what music is all about!

Fredrik Fiske

[This message was edited by Fredrik Fiske on Sun 22 August 2004 at 21:38.]

My first gramophone was a forty year old portable HMV. - I would listen, hypnotised by the music making.

Isn't it funny that it takes that much money (CDS2/52/200/SBLs) to equal the acoustic grammophone? When listening to a 78 on an acoustic grammophone it always sounds so real to my ears. I think this is because the path of the signal is so immediate. Recent HiFi seems to be much too complicated and somehow destroys something in the music which cannot be measured...

Just recently - on my trip to Cremona - I was able to buy some CDs that have been recorded in places "with history" and "with sound". Some of them, and the instruments used, I was able to visit and see.

Please let us know what CDs these are and which instruments you were talking about! I am a violinist and recently bought a Maxim Vengerov CD with works for solo violin by Shedrin, Ysaye and Bach, and on this recording he uses a Stradivarius and a Landolfi... Very interesting indeed!

- Jun

Geoff, please forgive my being a relative "newbie" on this, but I would like to relate an interesting transition.

In the mid-90's I brought home a Nait3 and new model CD-63 player. I was overjoyed. The CD-63 responded to every future tweak that I applied. The last tweak was the addition of a 100lb. block of medical spec. Chinese granite upon which I placed the CD. Immediately I noticed that I could hear the distinct separation between the notes that the 1st part violins and the 2nd part violins were playing.

Oh joy, oh rapture!

Over the past years, being teased by my dealer and Chris Koster (NANA) I brought home a Nait5/CD5 last year. With the addition of the CD5 I have lost any interest in heavy tweaks.

I'm no longer focused on hearing the separate notes that the violins are playing, but on the beautiful chord that Haydn wrote (in my test piece.)

It is an evolution, as you observed, and it is a really enjoyable one. Who would care about being able to spot where the 2nd violins are sitting within the orchestra as long as they are really doing a good job at their art in playing the tune?

Now I enjoy the performer and not the detailed performance, the song and not the details of the song.

Did the equipment evolve, or did we evolve?

BTW the test piece was Haydn's Sym. no. 60, a rerely performed, but really fun and funny single purpose composition. If you listen to it, be sure and read the story first-it explains lot.

Thanks for your courtesy.
jim

Geoff -

Were you in Tokyo? You should have told me first. Could have met up.

Nick.

Geoff!to my ears one of the biggest differences
between performance and music,is the room feeling.Listening to live music or to a real perfect reproduction,i forget to think over the
room,(in live performances in a jazzbar as an example it is not nesecary to sit perfect infront of the piano player to get the music feeling),and the music is an perfect "homogenic"thing.So it is with an old 78gramohon.Our try to do it perfect(specially concerning all frequencies,and the "virtual created translation of music"called"stereo"makes it technical a lot more complex to get a perfect performance=music.
I would say music is a perfect (and perfect senseful translation of live music)while performance includes imo the feeling n o t 1to1
and the word "Interpretation"concerning the reproduction system.(means hifi system).
those two ,or three perfect music events i listened with a reproductionsystem brought the effect to my ears that i did not think about the sinngle attributes of the hifi or its performance.it was this "live feeling"where you do not think about systems performance because of there is n o reproduction system(concerning natural unamplifi3ed instruments).and the difference in a live event
is allways that there are "live"source and no reproduction sources(like our humble cd players).one of the indicias that "perfect source first"brings our hifi systems nearer to music.Live dynamics are alwayas an atribute off the "source".other parts like amplifiers or loudspeakers are from its function very similar to our hifi and therefore i am sure that the "secret"of music is always hidden in the source or in the software feeded to it.(software is produced by feeding music to a recording equipment and thats nothing than a "source" working in an "against" direction.
O.J.(and as far as i know vinyl records have theoretical less "performance altering factors" during the recording than cds.)

quote:

---

Originally posted by Jun Keller:
Please let us know what CDs these are and which instruments you were talking about!
- Jun

---

Hi Jun,
in the "hall of violins", there were 7 or 8 violins, the oldest being an Amati from 163x, the most interesting the "il Cremonese", made by Stradivari. There were instruments by Guarnieri, as well. If you are looking for recordings, check out Fone Label. Very well recorded and musically dense. There is an Accardo CD (which I have) where he uses all of the displayed Cremona instruments.

Best regards, freundliche Grüße

Stefan

Lots of interesting points made:

Fredrik and Jun.
Your comments about a simple analog path from record to listener, as in a lowly old gramaphone, have a ring of truth about them. I agree we seem to be trapped into increasing complexity to attempt a return to this simpler purer sound. To some extent that was part of what I was saying I guess. The CDS3 and 252 together with their dedicated power supplies are an example of this, at least for me. In spite of their complexity together they bring a musical experience which is easy to recapture over and over on different music types. The performance aspects seem not to stick out like they did in my earlier sets of Naim kit.

Jim.
Please don't apologise for being a newbie. You also recount a telling example of the difference I am attempting to highlight bewteen performance and music. Getting past the tweaking thing is difficult because it often does bring perceived benefits. Tweaking is not bad per-se but I think we have to leave it alone once the basic good practices have been observed. There is a temptation to be at it on a constant basis, moving wire layouts on the floor, re-positioning speakers, rearranging the room, buying large pieces of granite as you describe ( not a crtiticism, just an example). The biggest problem is it continues to trap you into listening to the performance rather than the music.

Stefan
Thanks for the comments. I am as envious as Jun of your recent experiences in Cremona.

Stefan & Harry
You both offer the suggestion that getting music rather than performance is a state of mind and not purely an equipment quality issue, though there does have to be a certain capability in the electronics. As you point out this is a mood thing, but I do believe it is easier to recapture the music with higher grade electronics. I guess I am saying when the price/performance ratio is at its most demanding, as in entry level systems, the electronics is perhaps tuned to give an engaging sound because some compromises have to be made. These sorts of systems do tend to major more on "performance" rather than "music" as we are discussing it here. I hasten to add this is not about a system having a bad sound it is more a question of how much the system draws attention to itself in the playing process.

O.J.
I get what you are saying. As we have discussed before there are so many influential factors in the reproduction chain that we cannot expect a perfect representation of the real live music. I don't disagree. However If you listen to the same piece of music recorded onto for example a CD, through mostly the same system, in the same room, then some components major on performance others seem to be delivering music. My point is aimed NOT at differences between Krell, Levinson and Naim for example, which are obvious, it is about subtle less obvious differences between different combinations of Naim kit compared with each other.

Nick

My trip to Tokyo was quick and busy. I actually was there only as a base and had train rides to Oduwara and up north etc. Thanks for the invite and next time I will let you know and if possible take advantage of the chance to meet up.

regards
GEOFF

The boring old fart

quote:

---

Originally posted by Geoff P:
(...)
Stefan & Harry
You both offer the suggestion that getting music rather than performance is a state of mind and not purely an equipment quality issue, though there does have to be a certain capability in the electronics. As you point out this is a mood thing, but I do believe it is easier to recapture the music with higher grade electronics.

---

Well captured and translated, Geoff.
Just a little divert of the mood thing: I frequently suffer from migrane, which keeps me knocked-out between 1 and 3 days, on a scale from "nice hang-over kind of headache" to "can't stand to see, smell, eat, feel and hear anything". Now, when I'm in this state (and, don't do anything "chemical" against it...) and the phone rings, or someone talks to me in a louder voice, or the radio plays somewhere/something "inappropriate", I tend to suffer. Sometimes I dive into my listening room, and put the right music on. This can include tenor sax, piano, any kind of strings, voices (!), not so much (for obvious reasons) percussion, electric guitars, chain saws, starting air planes...

What can I say: A year ago, only thinking of it would have been a BAD idea, now it helps me getting over it (to be true: usually, I fall asleep, but what a sleep !).

I told you guys - a little bit off-topic...

Best regards, freundliche Grüße

Stefan

[This message was edited by sjust on Mon 23 August 2004 at 16:03.]

quote:

---

Originally posted by Geoff P:
Stefan
Thanks for the comments. I am as envious as Jun of your recent experiences in Cremona.

---

Hmh, don't know if I raised the expectation bar to high:

Some of the instruments displayed were:

The "Carlo IX" by Andrea Amati (1566)
The "Hammerle" by Niccolo Amati (1658)
The "Quarestani" by Giuseppe Guarneri (1689)
The "Cremonese" by Antonio Stradivari (1715)
The "Giuseppe Guarneri detto del Gesu" (1734)

All of them are played on the hybrid SACD "I violini di Cremona" by Salvatore Accardo accompanied by Laura Manzini (Steinway), the cover shows the beautiful room where they are displayed, the program is a little "pathetic" potpourri more capable to demo the instruments (which works well) than to present a closed musical experience (a bit like the Horowitz show downs in NY and Moscow...), but...

Excellent recording by Giulio Cesare Ricci (he's a maniac and genius) with just a very few (Neumann) mics at the "Palazzo Cavalcabo" in Cremona, which - following this thread offers maximum information about room and instruments. Very nice !

Hope this helps...

Other than that, Cremona is just one phantastic city: Noble, quiet, people well educated and distinguished, everything a bit slower than in the rest of Italy, some still active violin builder around, a very nice Piazza (that can very well compare to Siena's without the crowds of tourists).

Go there, if you are in Italy, next time ! Just a 1 hour drive from Milan...

Best regards, freundliche Grüße

Stefan

Stefan

My sympathy on the migraines. A member of my family has the same problem and has to shut themselves in a darkened room.
It is great that you can sooth it with music. I must admit I get sinus problems and sometimes a piercing tension headache results. I find the same cure as you AND I do agree this is not something that a boom box can do. It has to be quality music to work.

Thanks for the info. You have sold Cremona to me. I will try to get the SACD since I have a player. Did you see any Sonus fabers in the shops?

regards
GEOFF

The boring old fart

quote:

---

Originally posted by Geoff P:
(...)You have sold Cremona to me. I will try to get the SACD since I have a player. Did you see any Sonus fabers in the shops?

---

Hi Geoff,
I was on holidays, and that also meant holidays from disappearing into my "cave" (as my family tends to call my listening room) in order to listen to music every free minute, so visiting shops was a self-decided no-no, with one exception: I strolled into FNAC in Milano and scanned their Jazz CD dept. What did I find ? I still can't believe that I found a double CD with German Jazz trombone player Albert Mangelsdorff in the middle of their (well sorted) offering. A German label (MPS, years before the term "audiophile" was created, they did very good Jazz recordings, already. German Jazz "pope" Joachim Ernst Behrendt and one son of the SABA family were involved...) had combined three Mangelsdorff records on one double CD. All three of them sold out for years. On one of the albums ("Trilogue" with Alphonse Mouzon and Jaco Pastorius, recorded life 1976 at the Berlin Jazz days) they play a tune "Ant steps on Elephants toe" which I had (and lost) on tape, and searched ever since. Two years ago, I was close to buying a bootleg CD from a guy in Japan for a very unpronouncable price, but it didn't happen, so... Imagine how happy I was to "shoot" it.

So, the answer to your quetion is: No. But...

In the before mentioned "hall of violins", there was a "minimalistic" system with just a Linn CD-receiver playing into Sonus Faber "Guarneri Hommage" (...), but the volume was like the music volume in escalators, and I didn't feel like a "hifi session"

Actually, I WAS tempted to visit the Sonus Faber factory. They are in the Venice area, and would have been (more or less) on my way, but as I said: I was on holidays.

For the SACD, check Amazon.de or others. The label is Foné (chose Italiano, or the database engine won't work). Good luck !

Best regards, freundliche Grüße

Stefan

[This message was edited by sjust on Mon 23 August 2004 at 22:47.]

Geoff,

I enjoyed reading your post, and here is my story of how I moved from "performance" to "music".

It is with a wry smile that I think back to the journey that I have made over the years with my systems, and the lingering doubts that I have had over those years when the latest addition or tweak to a system yielded short term satisfaction, followed by a nagging feeling that something was not quite right.

In 1990 I was a newly single male intent on pleasing myself. One of the treats I afforded myself was to buy a hi-fi system. I made changes as I found my system lacking in one area or another. Ultimately I ended up spending a lot of money on the audio equivalent of an electron microscope, only to experience total dissatisfaction with the result. I remember sitting infront of £12ks worth of equipment thinking that it was a total waste of money and that I had gained more enjoyment out of a pair of headphones plugged into my first CD player. The point was reached where I no longer enjoyed the system. I sold the speakers, put the rest of the equipment in the loft and gave up listening to music. This happened in 1997.

Curiosity and pair of headphones earlier this year got me back into listening to music, and that in turn led me to my current system. Whilst I have a lesser front end than you, with a late model CDS and a 52, I have found that listening to music has again become a great pleasure. The system does all the expected things – soundstage, imagery, bass extension, trouser flapping power etc. – but all of that kind of irrelevant in that I don’t listen for or demand/expect those things anymore. I know that I can go there, but I no longer need to. What I am actually listening to is the musical whole – and feeling very satisfied and content.

Last night I tidied up the pile of CD by the equipment stand and was surprised to note that in the last couple of weeks I have played in whole or in part, about 100 CDs, some of them numerous times. I believe that more music has passed my ears in recent weeks than ever I can remember – and I have enjoyed every moment of it.

Finally I have arrived at a system that can deliver "performance", but more importantly it delivers "music". I am not concerned about any lack or deficit any more – for me there is none. I am not even that curious to find out whether a CDS3 and 252 could or would provide any more than my CDS and 52. As for a 552 and 500, I am sure they are fine – and to use your phrase “stratospheric”. For my part I am a happy bunny with what I have and I am content to stay where I am. Maybe in the future when my CDS can no longer be resurrected I will look into a CDS11 or CDS3. I will worry about that at the time – for now I have lots more music to listen to.

As I said at the start – I enjoyed reading your post. It is reassuring to know that we are not alone in our thoughts and experiences.

Hearing is believing

Yeldarb

Thanks for your comments. It is an interesting example of parallel feeling.

I don't want to sound arrorgant here but I do believe there is an element of "wisdom gained by experience" that applies to serious hifi.

I also think that like the wisdom that adults attempt to pass on to children it falls on "deaf ears" (pun intended). When we first venture in to HiFi we are like children and have to learn the wisdom. To gain musical experience in other words

Of course because it is an idividual thing we have to make the journey. We can be helped by other peoples experiences but must still learn for ourselves. Anyway that's half the fun.

regards
GEOFF

The boring old fart