Originally Posted by
Ian Mackenzie
...In layman terms l’m referring to soft passages or sounds between subtle transients such as a flute in the background while a piano is playing. This is where the fidelity can suffer. That is because those subtle sounds are much closer to the noise floor. The human ear has more difficulty translating certain sounds as the level drops.
All this happens very quickly with recorded music so the ear - brain is working hard to pick up everything. If the sounds closer to the noise floor aren’t accurately made out then the perception of what’s heard will change. This is because most of the dynamic range in recorded music sits below your normal listening level. If these subtle sound aren’t as pin sharp as the louder sounds then Houston we have a problem.
Of course this is just one facet of high fidelity sound reproduction but one that is constantly overlooked....