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Speakers for classical music

J

julesd68

pfm Member
If I want my system to reproduce the orchestral scale and depth of classical music, does that mean I should only be looking for "big" speakers??

I have a truly fabulous pair of small standmounts made by Chario that have a rich & deep sound that I love, but I can't help thinking I am missing out on something ...

The ability to also work with Led Zeppelin would be a bonus, but I listen to classical about 95% of the time, so that's my priority.
 
You probably are missing out on something, likely the bottom two octaves. How big is big?

Small, efficient, bass. You can have any two, but not all three.
 
Hi,

Well you could try a set of Shahinian Arc's or Obs'.

Failing that get a pair of Linn Isobariks.

If that does not move you nothing will :D

Cheers

John
 
I would recommend you to try out shahinian loadspeakers,
I went from Linn Kan to Naim Sbls and finally to Shahinian Obelisks,
the shahinians are on a complet different level, the depht and scale is just excellent!
 
You really need to set a budget. You can get scale with relatively small speakers like the Shahinians mentioned above but they need powerful amps to control them. Also the omni-directional characteristics go well if you prefer a 'live' rather than a studio presentation.

I have the new Shahinian Obelisk 2 and with my amps I get a tremendously dynamic system from the tinkling of a triangle though to chords played with all the stops out on a church organ. The music flows in all directions as in a live hall and with the Shahinians you can enjoy listening anywhere in the room just like a real venue.

A warning however is that such a backend will be ruthlessly revealing of those components further up the chain that also means those warts'n'all.

Cheers,

DV
 
Larger Tannoys
Larger (50 & up) Active ATCs

... would love to hear someone's properly driven big Shahinians sometime. Anyone near Edinburgh?
 
Thanks for contributions - lots of good words about Shahinian but I should have said that I will need a high sensitivity design to go with my 45W battery power amp.

Budget, another thing i should have mentioned - about £1500 second hand.
 
You might find some second hand Harbeths if you are lucky. I am finding them great for classical music, and piano more than anything. There have been a lot of Harbeth threads recently, and I think the resident Harbethians here are primarily classical listeners.
 
With a 45w amp then you need speakers with a sensitivity around 100dBWm so that you can handle those 105dB+ transients from classical music.

That means large speakers I'm afraid. Things like Tannoys or such like.

Cheers,

DV
 
I listen mainly to classical music and am very satisfied with my Shahinian Arcs. Previously I had Tannoy DCs and they were also very good - and a Naim NAP140 was more than adequate to drive them, they do not need a high-power amp.

Tannoys tend to be cheaper than Shahinians.
 
I currently have Arcs, Tannoy DCs and they are joined by ESL 63s. I find my NAP 160 can drive all of these at levels I'm happy with though I'm sure the speakers could give more with more appropriate amplification.

All 3 are great but very different soudning speakers, all could work well with classical music.

I love the speed of attack and ability to capture scale of the Arcs but find their version of a soundstage mildy disconcerting; the Tannoys have excellent drive, good imaging and an ability to really dig down deep into the upper bass region. The ESL63s are very recent for me and I'm currently spellbound by their transparency, imaging and ability to capture scale without compression. I'd expected them to be acutely compromised in the bass but well forward of the walls it is actually good though still shy compared to the Tannoys.
 
Michael J said:
What are the other 40 watts for?
Click to expand...

I would say headroom, lower output impedance and capability of achieving 110dB at a normal listening position - he also aleady has these 45W amps.

5W doesn't quite make it eh? Lets do some sums:-

Say sensitivity 100dBWm then with a 5W amp and two speakers we get 100+3+7 =110dB SPL. Hurray! But thats at 1m distance i.e. 3'3" listening position - pretty near field eh? At say a 10' listening position that 110dB falls to 100dB SPL not enough to give that listening to an orchestra in a concert hall (inverse square law).

Come in 45W. That extra adds another 10dB so at a 10' listening position we can now get 100+3+17-10=110dB peaks. QED.

10log 45 = 16.5dB (round up to 17)
10log5 = 7dB (near as dammit)

Cheers,

DV
 
Michael J said:
You probably are missing out on something, likely the bottom two octaves.
Click to expand...

Hmmm I wonder how important that is for classical music?

Several years ago I was talking to a recording studio bloke discussing the RIAA curve for vinyl. He laughed and told me yes they did correctly adhere to the RIAA standard but questioned its validity. Apparently they passed all music except organ works through a 70Hz high pass filter before applying RIAA equalisation. What that means is that music below 70Hz was attenuated and by how much depended on the slope of the filter. The reason? Because said that bloke the final recording sounded better!!!!!

S'funny that when I play classical type music that the 'slam' seems to come from the treble. True bass drum, double bass, bass guitar and Organ pedals do benefit from the lower frequencies. BTW my speakers are documented at 28Hz for -3dB but I feel that may be on the cautious side and out of date as they seem to go very low.

Cheers,

DV
 
wow, that takes me straight back to my Tech College days..Thanks Darth..:)..

Must drink less..much less wine..
 
Darth Vader said:
I would say headroom, lower output impedance and capability of achieving 110dB at a normal listening position - he also aleady has these 45W amps.

5W doesn't quite make it eh? Lets do some sums:-

Say sensitivity 100dBWm then with a 5W amp and two speakers we get 100+3+7 =110dB SPL. Hurray! But thats at 1m distance i.e. 3'3" listening position - pretty near field eh? At say a 10' listening position that 110dB falls to 100dB SPL not enough to give that listening to an orchestra in a concert hall (inverse square law).

Come in 45W. That extra adds another 10dB so at a 10' listening position we can now get 100+3+17-10=110dB peaks. QED.

10log 45 = 16.5dB (round up to 17)
10log5 = 7dB (near as dammit)

Cheers,

DV
Click to expand...
wow, that takes me straight back to my Tech College days..Thanks Darth..
 
I would suppose the amp in question can sustain 45W, but also manage higher output for short periods. Shouldn't that be taken into account when determining how much power one needs?
 
DV, Could you perhaps point out some sources to those of us who don't know about the science of acoustics? What's confusing me is that I realize that an orchestra will reach 110dB or more peaks in a concert hall, but I can't understand why such levels would be necessary to create an approximation of the concert hall experience at home.
 
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