My definition of Ambience

[PeterSt]

And Joachim,

While I read the article at a glance at first, I now read it in full and from there get your guesture;

No.

If you read all my blah about this speaker you will have seen that I will be the first person to recognize how higher frequencies hence harmonics from more square lower ones, are to deceive us;

You may also have read about me tuning this speaker flat to 17Hz and this is within 0.1dB (looking down from 100Hz). 0.1dB is nothing of course, but it hopefully testifies that I have been really really working on this.
(notice that right now it is -3dB at 18Hz because for commercial purposes the 17Hz is dangerous for the really higher SPLs)

You may also have read about my mere special means of getting there, and amongst that is looking at FFTs. You know, those thingies which show all the frequencies, thus harmonics.
And so I can guarantee you, that while I used this means to just simply see where the woofers start to distort (actually because of too high excursion), this obviously implied the observement of the speaker as a whole. And I can guarantee you that no harmonics (from a pure sine of course) can be seen anywhere.

Thus, the guy from the article is correct at this, but he assumes heavy THD from his bass bins in the first place, which would be true according to my own reasoning for cabinets.
Not so here at all. And with that your guesture failed.
But it was a good attempt of course. It's only that I was ahead long of it (thus see other posts elsewhere) and I think I know what I'm doing.

In the mean time the guy from the article refers to "rumble" of "some" electronic music in the 20-40Hz region, but this time the guy talks from his neck - which I would have done the very same 2 months ago. Really;
If you look at my pasted descriptions earlier in this topic from "ambient" music I tried to find for you all (or for Juan) you see me describing that complete main melodies play under that 40Hz and way lower (I play the same albums from before, but never heard any melody there in the first place). I did not talk from my neck there PLUS (and this should be kept in mind foremost) that this is not from false harmonics or more squared bass, because the a. false harmonics are not there as just described, b. it can easily be felt on the woofer when harmonics exist in the music itself (squares produce all odd harmonics in the world (3, 5, 7, ...) also knowing that any 25Hz would also play 75Hz which still is easily in the woofer region and c. that I have been looking at real live music playing through FFTs.
(and in the mean time I can not find any modern ambient album that plays NOT in this region explicitly)

Funny addition perhaps :
From the latter I learned that those hollow space ship sounds come from setting up a sine fundamental at e.g. 90Hz with now UNDER that harmonics like 45Hz, 22.5Hz which each decrease by 10dB or so. So the synthesizer plays 3 fundamental(ly related) sines here, and there is your space ship.

Peter

[PeterSt]

thanx for this nice post, and I believe, it is time now that you give us a chance to participate with your enthusiasm via a small film on Youtube.

We are waiting eagerly.

Believe it or not, but yesterday I was thinking of someone (forgot who) and to call the man by telephone and by this means I would be able to show him this crazy bass.
I am fairly sure this would work. Fairly, because this hardly can be about the low frequencies, but merely about the power of them (the guy from the article accidentally talks about this too) at the limits of the phone connection, in relation to the further music.
But it wouldn't make real sense because through the phone connection (or YouTube for that matter) one would not be able to judge colouring (which should obviously not happen, but would when the bass section would be, faslely, way tuned up).

Best regards,
Peter

[manisandher]

... and you know how my "old" system performed back in the days (say 3 years ago and a lot has changed for the better since anyway). So, you are amongst those who expressed that especially my "bass" was a sort of superb. But let me tell you (please), it was NO-THING.

Hey Peter, I also heard your "old" system. I remember listening to (your) Paul playing real drums and then comparing that to a recording you made of the same drums played back through your system. You may not have heard me, but I specifically stated that your system's LF impact was just a fraction of that of the real drums. If you're now getting close to the real thing, then I can't wait to hear the Orelinos for myself. The whole setup must be something truly special.

Mani.

[PeterSt]

A nice sample with an amazing deep bass is
http://www.amazon.fr/Fabuleuse-Histoire-Swing-Michel-Jonasz/dp/B000F39MI8/ref=ntt_mus_ep_dpi_7

Disque 2 - tune 2

So here is one example of what we may perceive as "amazingly deep"; I hope that you recognize a little what I'm saying :

Main "tune" of the bass - that being in 90% of the track throughout - is 55Hz. This is the round sound.
Funny for me is that I was spot-on with my perception of the lowest notes in there (ok, you won't believe that anyway, but *exactly*) is 38Hz. These are the once in a while occurring larger plucks (where the metal of the plucks is heard - at least here and which also doesn't need to show in all systems). The very last note in the track is that too.

So, amazingly deep is not so deep at all. But at least you implied (!) that this is a good example of the real low for you, and as far as I can tell it counted the same for me that few months back, including my 12Hz subs.

Another thing : That last "pluck" (in the last 10 seconds of the track) possibly is not perceived as the lowest in there at all. This is because this plucking implies those higher frequencies (see article) which you for sure will hear (apart from the fact that too is not all that easy as I just said above, but with XXHighEnd and NOs1 you should). Anyway, this really is 38Hz. So you can compare that nicely to the 55Hz which is all over the track. Btw, the two never go together. So it's or the 55Hz long sustained tones or the 38Hz plucks (but which also can sustain, see last 10 seconds).

Btw, a more normal album you all might have (outside of ambient I mean) is Zappa - The Yellow Shark. Try track 04;
The hits you hear in there (for sure) are all 32Hz. Not amazingly low either,  but notice that the 32Hz in this track is the loudest of the whole spectrum. So key is here that this 32Hz should blast in the room, knowing that the second loudest instrument in there is the oboe + clarinet (I think) and they play mainly at 400Hz).
With my previous setup this played as well - perceivedbly - because the 32Hz sound is square and its harmonics are easily heard and the more airy sound of the fundamental kept working well because it is so loud. I'd say this is not "room" reveraration we hear in his track which already can be seen in the FFT by the very straight and solitude fundamental.

Happy listening !
Peter

[PeterSt]

Hey Peter, I also heard your "old" system. I remember listening to (your) Paul playing real drums and then comparing that to a recording you made of the same drums played back through your system. You may not have heard me, but I specifically stated that your system's LF impact was just a fraction of that of the real drums.

Hi there Mani,

Of course I know, and I never forgot it. And knowing that you follow quite well what I say and claim "around the globe" you will have seen me writing possibly a dozen times that the only thing which made that self recording apart from live was the kick drum (base drum).
But you just reminded me, and I should try that recording again ...

Btw interesting within itself, because that recording so well represents the colours of the real live toms and all, even that kick drum (you will sure recall that too). So, if now only the real impact is there BUT the colour stays the same ...

Till later ...
Peter

[christoffe]

There are not that much instruments that goes below 30Hz, and therefore we need some records with a pipe organ (on a CD).

Ok, I see your post for Juan from the on 2013-10-08.

[PeterSt]

Ok, now I will be in raving mood and raving mode; I just played my Demo track #1.
Not that I ever knew that before I just played it for the very first time in my life ...

First off, this is about this recording session(s) which are all named "Base Drum". So, back at the time, July 2010, me and Bert set this up to test something I have forgotten by now, but obviously this was about the base drum and to test it through the audio playback chain. What came from this is the best recording of drums I ever heard in the universe, and up to today this is still so. I can't help that. Maybe I can, by not knowing how to molest recordings, hence all I did was giving the recordings a suffecient headroom and never touched a thing afterwards. Recording was through a FireFace800.
Nice.

What Mani referred to is the one recording out of the 9 we took and it were 9 of them (each being 5 to 15 minutes in play length) merely for placement of the two (measurement) microphones and how to give the drumkit the right size. Yea, what did we know. Btw it included the 30 meters or so XLR from mics to FireFace.
We played that track in San Francisco (show) a couple of times and people drooled (no matter the speaker perfromance). I planned to play it at last X-fi as well, but never got round to it. Things didn't work out there anyway, so I did not bother.

I just played that track to look at, hear, and feel the response, and the FFT was running (same microphone used, but now capturing the loudspeakers).
To discover similarities or whatever I wanted to see, I played about all the tracks just now for longer and smaller parts, trying to get the merits;

What I could see is that the base drum plays at 38Hz. Felt the woofers and what I actually noticed was the 2 seconds of "after vibes" at the base drum hits. So, went upstairs where the very same drumkit resides and thought to find reverb of the room.
Mwah, that could not be it, because the base drum actually is dry (short) as hell. How could that give any impact in the first place ? Felt the skin, and that really does not incur for after vibes.
Then, without real notice at first, I heart that all the toms (which are 6 or so .. yea, or so, easy to count hem of course) payed along with the base drum. Aha. Actually it's so that the dry kick of the base drum produces its real sound through all the toms in aftermath.
Hmm ...

Raving mode not so strong yet, I decided to play the last three tracks recorded. These were 24/192, while all of the others but one were 16/44.1.

Just *because* these are 24/192, I never listened to them. Oh, I recall to briefly listen to one of them, but since we're into CD Redbook maybe I didn't even want to hear whether it sounded better. Point is : I never listened to them, and certainly not the very last one.

Ah, you now think you see it coming eh ? Well, you won't !

The first of the two are a bit of the same as the others with the difference that the snare of the snare drum was off. This annoying always co-souding profounding thing should never have been in any of the recordings in the first place. So, good that's off - in all of these last 3 tracks. Now :

To start at the end (do I ?) that last track can well be the best drumming recording I ever heard in my life. This time though I refer to the drumming, not to the quality of it. Or ?
Well, if you only know it was me drumming there and also know that if I have been 20 times behind that kit all together, how ?? Must be because I like myself ? haha, maybe.

Part of this sheer excitement about me myself drumming there is the so-well rendering of all what's really there. Actually it is outrageous. So, that track I played more often, well, also nice, but what happened in that last track beats everything and all.
When it was finished I looked at the recording date and this was 4 days after that session of Bert and me. Must have felt good or whatever.

So ... raving mode at full trottle now ...
... but also back to the plain subject of this topic ...

What you hear me doing there is -somehow- trying to hit all the toms at the same time.
And, don't say that I didn't see coming what is in the various posts of this topic already ... how "ambience" emerges ...

While hitting the toms, which most clearly does not go in the most wild fashion, and which btw is a very first thing to notice from these wild speakers (meaning : how I perceive the very same from other recordings, all in the category of "air"), I glanced at the FFT again which was still running but which lost my interest because I thought I had seen it all already and ...

I see exactly what I already described earlier;
The hitting of those toms, a base drum underneath, goes all the way to 18Hz. And as how the FFT captures it - in a fairly flat fashion (all the frequencies up to wherever play in sequence, so no harmonics or anything to be seen. Call it rumble all over.

Listening to this - and what most probably makes me excited about a best drum track ever - is that you hear a sheer flow of nice warm water, while in the mean time all the real hits stick out so superbly. Swamped in music. Dwelmed in something which just matches and which I never heard before. A rumble which belongs to it all. And still by no means created by the listening room. All is so totally clear that again I wonder myself how it can be.

But 18Hz ??
Remember, this is no clear frequency at all. It's just from of just under 18Hz (the speaker's response) that the level goes up and it stays a sort of flat up to where the base drum shows its 38Hz and beyond that the higher heyed toms etc. And the mere interesting thing : None of this I saw in the other tracks. But also, none of the other tracks produced the running into eachother frequencies of the individually hit toms. There it were subsequent hits, while here I let all flow into eachother. Nothing different from the end of that Sanctus track where I felt the excursion going wild at very low frequencies, and although I did not measure that, I know now it will be the same.

Large deep orchestra hits ? the very same I bet you.

So, while this latter track gave me super joy and the others were merely about "base drum" as such, those others made me feel a bit sick in the stomache. Because indeed, that now works (Mani !).


Now, because of the superb rendition, I have been thinking many times before that this "known" track should be uploaded to somewhere, so people can have a reference of what can be achieved these days. I never did that because the drumming is really too poor (that was also me). This track though ... hey, I could sell it !
Whether especially this track works out for you I can't tell. It's 15 minutes long and all I know is that it's full of cymbals just the same. They should work out ...
Now I must find some space with a for you high download speed. DropBox perhaps. It's 1GB in WAV.

One more thing before you all start to think too much of me :
This is nothing about wild drumming or never heard roffles (I wouldn't know how to). But what I notice (remember, I never heard it myself before) is some kind of perfect timing at a strange means of operating the drumkit which matches some kind of adrenaline which must have been in me, that envoked by what I must have heard myself in that (14x6x4m) room. So what I perceive of it is a rythm on the ... ambience ? Go with the flow or something.

Brrr
Peter

[juanpmar]

A nice sample with an amazing deep bass is
http://www.amazon.fr/Fabuleuse-Histoire-Swing-Michel-Jonasz/dp/B000F39MI8/ref=ntt_mus_ep_dpi_7

Disque 2 - tune 2

Btw, a more normal album you all might have (outside of ambient I mean) is Zappa - The Yellow Shark. Try track 04;
The hits you hear in there (for sure) are all 32Hz. Not amazingly low either,  but notice that the 32Hz in this track is the loudest of the whole spectrum. So key is here that this 32Hz should blast in the room, knowing that the second loudest instrument in there is the oboe + clarinet (I think) and they play mainly at 400Hz).
With my previous setup this played as well - perceivedbly - because the 32Hz sound is square and its harmonics are easily heard and the more airy sound of the fundamental kept working well because it is so loud. I'd say this is not "room" reveraration we hear in his track which already can be seen in the FFT by the very straight and solitude fundamental.

Happy listening !
Peter

Peter, The Yellow Shark (Frank Zappa) is one of the best recordings I remember and talking about ambience this album transmits the stage (and the audience) in an impressive way. Another album, although not a live recording, that has really a deep bass is "Deeper" from Pete Belasco, in the track 2 (Deeper) the bass is hard to reproduce correctly but if your woofer can you´ll get a very very deep bass (in some notes) perhaps down to the 20Hz or even lower. I know that here we are talking about bass and ambience but also, I guess, about the capability of the woofer to reproduce the bass frequencies correctly.

Please share that recording with the drums!

Juan

[GerardA]

Yes Peter, please share the recording, because I  don't get what it is your saying about it!
The only thing that resonates in my mind while reading your story is maybe the walls and floor resonate to make this low frequency?
Question, is there low frequency ambience when the musical instruments don't go so low?

[PeterSt]

Gerard and all,

I realize that I - with my ever (indeed) controversial ideas and approaches - will be hard to follow. Of course this is difficult to begin with because this is audio, but my theories of how things really work expand and expand, while no one "white paper" exist to find the proper base (of those ideas). Fact is : it is always about using that just different/new "environment" so it is pioneering in the first place. This latter says I can easily be wrong on a couple of things, but it for sure tells that nothing will be in school books.
And it *really* is difficult, because those owning a NOS1 and thus know the comparison with their former ($$$$$) DAC, have that base which I take for granted but which also *is* that base. Or prerequisite if you want. And you (Gerard) lack that base, like so many others of course. So how to understand even the slightest ?

But I'm sure that eventually we will get there.

We will start with that recording, which also is as controversial as can be. This time because "how would I be able to outbetter the whole universe". Well, you will see I did once I managed to upload it to somewhere, but it is not about that really. What it is about is that this is so outrageously better and that it proves that our chains are THUS capable. I mean, if you listen to this you won't need any new DAC or speakers or whatever. You will see that you need new recordings.
Which sadly can't happen, so you need a new DAC etc. after all. It really is ridiculous.

Peter

[acg]

Yes Peter, please share your drum track. 

And I am with you on the recording quality thing.  It annoys me that some of my favourite music sounds so ordinary.


Anthony

[PeterSt]

Let's not forget what the intention of this topic is :

How ambience emerges. And really, I started to wonder myself when Bert found 4 seconds enough for that 09 track mentioned earlier. And in aftermath, he really could have heard that 24Hz (?? - must check it !) organ. Unless it was the sound from the right speaker which to me sounds like opening some organ cover, but probably is just the organ player opening a register or something. Mind you, this is not about audience voices.

So what actually should be by definition of ambience ?

This was not covered in this topic yet, but this is foremost NOT about people talking or coughing or moving etc. This is how I referred earlier to it NOT being stupid Pawnshop stuff. That *is* about talking. Sure, it could be named "ambience" as such, and again sure, some systems may show this better than others, but the pawnshop example os too excaggerated.

And so I say - at least for this topic - that there's a mere technical thing that creates ambience, but it is about the room response. And mind you, the room of the recording.

So, via-via-via I am now as far that the ambience of the recording space by far overrules the response of my own playback room. And this was due to come with all my ever talking about no standing waves etc. etc.
To really understand this, one must just experience the crazy "possibility" of what mainly the low frequencies can "do" in my room, which already to myself seem impossible. I can't explain this by words, although yesterday I tried (by means of the average sound pressure not changing (kept at zero)).

It is all a very large bag of working-together phenomena and it needs technical explanations (with actually the best base knowledge which I may not have) to explain what theoretically can happen in your listening rooms too.
But as I said, I think we can get there.

[PeterSt]

So we can get there ...

The only thing that resonates in my mind while reading your story is maybe the walls and floor resonate to make this low frequency?

Gerard, this is a very good one and at least this is what I can still see happening in my own listening room. So the answer is actually Yes. It is not the only reason more low frequencies emerge, and it may not be a profound one, but it sure is partly a key to what happens.

When I have the measurement by microphone set up and no music is playing, it is totally easy to see that even when I try to walk in the room with no audible foot steps, there's a ~50Hz fairly high SPL measured. This is way under music playing levels, but fact is it is there. What does this mean ? well, I'd say that music itself hammering on to the floor will do similar, if not way more. Remember, I walk as light footed as possible, and still the most easy to see. So what will the music do ? Or the speaker itself being on that floor ? Most probably more (speaker itself way less I'd say).
(btw, when this hous was designed, in design it contained chains attached to the sealing of the floor above, and my speakers would be connected to those chains ... just saying (but that never happened))

But I don't see any of this when music plays (through FFT and e.g. reoccurring common denominator) frequencies. Still it has to be there, and this is "ambience". It is my room.

While I in the previous post just said that the ambience of the recording space overwhelmes the response of my room, this can be explained like this I think :

Take for example that drumming recording; I already prepared a text for it (going along with the upload) and it tells that at such and so fairly loud level you will be playing at 10dB under reality levels. That's a good thing, because cymbals play at 110dB in reality and you don't want that. But what it means is that in reality that drumkit is hitting with 10dB more at that same floor (would the drum kit be in my listening room) and that thus 10dB more hammering on that foor (but also walls etc. of course). So what creates the ambience ? obviously the live recording (room !).

Remember, this all takes as a prerequisite that the sound waves are quite undistorted in the first place and that e.g no ringing is allowed from D/A converters. Why ? well, when that happens there's already a sort of added waves ("standing waves") springing from the speaker, and certain frequencies overwhelm others to begin with, and for example the base drum can now sound louder than the cymbals AT PLAYBACK. Next that thus hammers unevenly more on my floor, and there you go ... the whole reasoning immediately fails.
(and I could chain together so many more elements for failure)

But Gerard, although I started this with quoting your text, I don't think this is the answer to it ...

[PeterSt]

Question, is there low frequency ambience when the musical instruments don't go so low?

I think this has two possible answers;

First, cough in a church. Doesn't that hall back to us in a lower frequency than what sprung from our coughing mouth ? I think it does. I don't think the brick walls will vibrate much of our coughing. So something else plays a role. And this is in the second answer :

Specifically referring to my (empirically !) found LF happening only when more than one (drumming) tom was used at the same time, this is about two frequencies which superimpose on eachother and the result is ... a lower frequency. Similar can happen with bouncing waves of the same frequency, but this is more difficult to explain, especially because it needs good graphical simulation of it. But that aside, look here (the best I could find in 15 minutes of time) :

http://www.acs.psu.edu/drussell/demos/superposition/superposition.html

Scroll to the bottom where you see "beats" explained;
Look at the top grey sine as one of the toms, and the line under that as the other, and both do not produce the same frequency. The resulting sound wave is the bottom blue wave.
Now, just look how fast the frequency of the two top waves change and compare that with the max amplitudes of the bottom wave passing by. Easy to count, and the resulting wave is 10 times slower than the original either two. So, my toms which play at 60Hz or so (try to look back in my mind what I saw yestyerday), now play at 6Hz. Rumble ! But especially rumble because of how this "beat" evolves. So, the blue line actually has a resulting frequency that is similar (in between) the two toms, but the level (max amplitude) changes at this much lower frequency.

Are we getting somewhere now ?


PS: If you think "ringing" I briefly touched above, on that simulation page you will also find some "data" on what happens with that. But the example does not suit it really (would be the second simulation) because both original waves should follow eachother at some distance (and here one stands still). But you may get the idea.

PPS: Don't stare at the picture below. Instead click the link more above !

[Leo]

I think similar things happen when you tune a bass guitar for instance. When the two strings (one open , one 5th fret) are not exactly in tune you get a very low frequency of the difference. In former days bassplayers held the flame of a lighter in front of the speaker when tuning. If not in tune the flame would wobble with this very low frequency and you turned the peg untill the flame stood still....