Why do musicians have lousy Hi-Fis?

This. My sister's a professional musician. She'll always ask me to turn any music I'm playing down or off if she's visiting.

 

I wonder if they would pick tubes or solid state?

 

Good question!

 

Obviously the musician pool is big enough that there is a "Bell Curve" of stereo equippedness from none at all to terrible to halfway decent to good to superb.

One datum is the late Howard Roberts. I'm a huge HR fan. Howard didn't want and would not have a record player in the house. He could have afforded any rig he wanted and chose to not have a record player or records.

Howard was a bit of an extremist. He once Towsered (smashed:"Towsered" after Pete Townshend, the El Kabong of rock) a lovely Martin dreadnought because its mahogany neck gave way under the pressure of his huge hands and detuned. His main guitar was a thoroughly butchered ES-150.

On the opposite side of the bell curve we have classical musicians like David Sarser, a violinist under Toscanini who sold Ampex gear and built many custom amplifiers: several jazzmen known for high dollar sound systems (I am told that all the Marsalis brothers have Linn Sondeks) and many others.

The question is, where is the AVERAGE musician on this scale. My guess is the average musician probably has something on the order of an old receiver and a pair of inexpensive two way speakers, a CD player, and an iPod dock, or something less than that. Really wealthy ones with big LA or Hamptons houses probably have a lot of expensive gear but have no idea how to use it for best results and it is probably not a well matched or set up system unless whoever set it up happened to be good.

Only expensive and time consuming research will provide definitive results, which isn't likely, since it isn't that important a question. Overall empirical evidence points to "not very good on average".

 

Ok, but why, as the thread title states.

 

Which in fact it turned out to be

It's the P.A., plain and simple. Few responsible for sound design these days consider sound quality as a meaningful concern in the sort of massive, public events that involve stadia intended for sporting events, not music. Get rid of the P.A., get rid of concerts in ballparks, everything will sound better.

In this one regard, rock really sucks. There's the ego of being loud, there's hearing damage and there is, inevitably, really horrible sound quality. Perhaps one reason why I hold Classical Music dear. Acoustic music in an appropriate venue sounds to me like reality, stadium rock sounds like an amp clipping.

 

I found this too, and also found that really good level reducing earplugs made a huge difference to my enjoyment.

I think my ears were clipping. YMMV, but it really helped me.

That said, it's nice to go to the Symphony now and then. I've been to some concerts where Jazz is attempted acoustically, but it's really not successful even in small venues these days. Even tiny ones like the Village Vanguard. I watched a really cool local bunch playing some inventive original and old modal bop, and it really wouldn't have worked without the artificial balance enabled by a (string) bass pickup and one mic that the soloist could sidle up to when necessary, which they did at times artfully controlling their own mix. And they were right in front of me (withing ten feet, including the drums).

 

A guess: Same reason (almost) no one who can work on a Ferrari owns one.

Almost is the weasel word here.

 

Almost without fail, every rock/metal concert I've been has been aural punishment. ALL bass, nothing else, insanely loud. If music is insanely bass-heavy and well over 90db, what does it sound like? MUD. Small venues, no different; worse, in fact. Could be the venue, but I think it's the sound guys. There seems to be a belief that overwhelming, boomy, distorted bass frequencies is what "sounds good". Granted I frequent mostly death metal, so maybe that has a sub-culture of its own. In any case, the best place to be directly at the front, right in front of the drums, or the guitarists' amps to one side - there you get the real sound.

 

I'm a musician, and I don't care all that much what I'm listening on. I do have a good system (Rega amp & speakers, Panasonic Blu-Ray deck), but am happy hearing music I love via a boombox. I suppose it's the performance...the musical spirit itself.

 

These were big name concerts.

 

Add Kansas to your list. I saw them in 1977 at the Mobile Civic Center (a theater in the round kind of affair where they used to have the Junior Miss Pageant) which has simply awful acoustics. The opening band was Louisiana Leroux (remember them), and true to my expectations, they sounded awful. There was about a 20 minute intermission before Kansas played (the stage had to be cleared of the other bands instruments and equipment,) and when they began I was astounded. The sound quality at that concert set the standard for all other rock concerts I went to afterwards. I'll sum it up like this: Kansas' records SUCK by comparison to the live sound I heard that night. BTW, those guys are amazing musicians, one and all; as my friend who I went with to the show said: "They are musicians' musicians!"

As a singer in a choir I can say that I would love to have a really high end system to get closer to the musical truth, but budget won't allow that, so I have the best I can afford. I'm happy with my choice. Oh yes, before someone asks if I play an instrument, I'll say no (though I do know three chords on the guitar, LOL,) but I'm still a musician. I once said I wasn't a musician because I didn't play an instrument in front of my choir director, and he said "You couldn't be more wrong. You are a musician; your instrument is the Human Voice."

 

Ok, I see what you're getting at now.