Classical listeners - 4D recordings from Deutsche Grammophon

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So I picked up this Wagner Gala CD and started to read the liner notes for any information on how it was recorded and I see it is in 4D. What's that I wonder?

I flip through the booklet and the first sentence I read under "What is 4D Audio Recording?"

"Is a new concept in sound recording from Deutsche Grammophon. It is based on the notion that by using the most sophisticated technology available today, it is actually possible to eliminate the listener's awareness of the technical medium, allowing the enjoyment of a completely neutral sound quality."

To which I vomited and died. Sounds like something a kid like this would say about his art.
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So I know this is old technology, the recording was done in 1993, and as stupid a statement the above is, at least from an audiophile point of view, my real question is this.

How does this 4D recording technology compare in terms of other classical recording techniques and technology? Or is it like anything else, you get some good, a couple great, and some not some good, and a few awful.

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Originally Posted by atomicAdam

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/...500_AA300_.jpg

So I know this is old technology, the recording was done in 1993, and as stupid a statement the above is, at least from an audiophile point of view, my real question is this.

How does this 4D recording technology compare in terms of other classical recording techniques and technology? Or is it like anything else, you get some good, a couple great, and some not some good, and a few awful.

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My entire classical and jazz collection is as you described above.........irrespective of label or technology.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by atomicAdam

So I picked up this Wagner Gala CD and started to read the liner notes for any information on how it was recorded and I see it is in 4D. What's that I wonder?

I flip through the booklet and the first sentence I read under "What is 4D Audio Recording?"

"Is a new concept in sound recording from Deutsche Grammophon. It is based on the notion that by using the most sophisticated technology available today, it is actually possible to eliminate the listener's awareness of the technical medium, allowing the enjoyment of a completely neutral sound quality."
...

So I know this is old technology, the recording was done in 1993, and as stupid a statement the above is, at least from an audiophile point of view, my real question is this.

How does this 4D recording technology compare in terms of other classical recording techniques and technology? Or is it like anything else, you get some good, a couple great, and some not some good, and a few awful.

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4D? Beats me. (Sorry for the alliteration :biggrin5: )

But for a while DG was advertising what they called "Original Bit Image Processing". I gather this was remastering taking the forty million separately microphoned tracks from the original recording sessions and diddling them with sound delays and the like to create supposedly more depth and air in the soundstage. This was mildly effective.

Given that this is an old recording, my guess would be that "4D" is more or less just a new term for the aforementioned "Original Bit Image Processing".

Vivaldi's "Four Seasons" on DG4D was so clear+beautiful I went out and bought copies for friends. Highly recommended. Also pretty great is Holst's "The Planets" on DG4D. These albums are well miked and heavily Noise-Reduced. They provide a unique listening environment at healthy volumes. At lower volumes they seem to be nothing special. They are so quiet and so heavily NR'd that you may not like them. It depends on mood+what you generally like in a classical recording.

I find them to be vastly different and great; not superior to others but well... y'a gotta try them out!!

I buy a few classical CDs each week... so I hear lots and am always on the lookout for CD groupings that tend to be unique+enjoyable.

Mein Gott!!! They've ruptured the space-time continuum! Run for your farking lives!!!

You become one with the music lost in a vacuum of space and time. You forget where you are becoming completely absorbed by the musicality of the recording thus becoming hypnotized and when you wake up you will be in the future.

Given that the fourth dimension is the unification of time and space as a four-dimensional continuum one would gain not only a oneness with the music but understand the true perspective of composer as well...all due to the futuristic and sophisticated 1993 mic placement.