Romy the Cat wrote:

It played well, though I question if it makes sense to use that caliber music for audio evaluations.

Let just for sake of illustration to presume that any expressed opinion (a review) about audio element/component is a positive thing then, how could we understand the validity of an audio examinations in relation to musical material? This subject might be complex and as many others things has evolutionary nature. I personally recognize 4 stages of relationship between audio critiques/assessments and music.

1) First Level – the ”Moronic” Level.

At this level an audio expert uses ANY music. At this case music is a substitute for a noise generator and the audio expert try to register how those individual sounds got processed by playback elements.  At this level the critiques of audio is the pure criticism of “disconnected audio”, where audio has no relevancy to cultural level and the audio assessment might operate only at the First and Second levels of Sixth-Leveled-Listening Benefits ™ (SLLB). In my view the 90% of audio practitioners, including the professional reviewers and manufactures, operate at this level. In many instances the people who operate at this level include in their assessments the elements from the following Second Level but they do it just for publicity and self-hype as they have very little REAL connection with the level of demands and interests that dominates the Second Level.

2) Second Level - the “Real People” Level.  

At this level the audio experts already understand that playback system is not a “sounds rendering machine” but an environment is capable to exercise cultural, spiritual and divine demands of individuals and arts. The people of the Second level frequently have extended collections of personally selected music, generally good knowledge (at least about the trends or period that they most appreciate) and they evaluate the playback in context of how much a given audio solution serves their listening objectives. At this level the audio experts is capable operate at all 5 SLLB levels. Generally the Real People are around 9% of all audio practitioners. Interesting that is a manufactures is capable to use audio expertise at this Third evaluation level then it is very much does NOT mean that he/she will manufactured audio at this level. In fact, there is practically no audio that is manufactured at this level.

3) Third Level - the “Evolved” Level.  

The Evolved audio experts is a next level up from the Real People. The Evolved experts, after prolonging practicing at the Third Level, come to the observations that using very fine nuances of audio assessment to scale up the most valuable moments of human musical endeavor is not the most objective way to assess audio. The Evolved’s listening consciousness is capable to plug itself into necessary advanced communication algorithms, removing the playback’s capacity absolutely out of picture. The Evolved audio expert listen predominately very “contend-loaded” music and there is no room at this listening level for “audio failure”, as if the failure does take place then the awareness of the Evolved Expect overrides the audio’s shortcomings. It is silliness for Evolved person to appraise how a given pieces of audio plays Du Pre/Barbirolli/Elgar concerto, as the concerto performance is so powerful that  any inadequacies of audio might be shattered by interruptive  awareness of a person operating at the “Evolved” Level.  

4) Fourth Level - The “Unnamed” Level

I intentionally would not go into great details about the “Unnamed” Level. I will just mention that this level is an organic and non-conflicting merge between Third and First Levels.

manisandher wrote:

PS Have you ever come across the writings of Ken Wilber?

Nope, I did not. I googled him as it looks like I deliberately stopped to read this type of writing years back

manisandher wrote:

Is there any reason why you haven't expounded your ideas on SLLB beyond level two?

This is very good question and I people occasionally ask me about it. The last I think I got 2 emails with basically the same question. I usually reply something indefinite. The true reason is that the answer to this question is very complex. The articles about levels 3-6 were written in one way or another, then re-written a few times. But I never felt comfortable to post them and I have multiple reasons why, quite multifaceted reasons.

One of the reasons why I never was convinced that any more or less detail methodologies for levels 3-6 shell be published is that the level 3 and above has great faculty for self-profanation. The notion professed in the SLLB methodology is in many cases and for many immature listeners is more powerful then their authentic understanding of own listening experiences. I just did not want my SLLB to become a crutch of self-delusion. It is very easy to happen and I have seen it happen with people I witnessed.

You see, generally I feel that the quality the readers of this site is not overlay evolved. People mostly read this site to learn what audio toy they need to trace, or to primitively-enjoy another public beating of a next idiot from audio-industry, or to learn/share what material of turntable mat is more desirable with a given mass and material of platter. They are all legitimate areas of interest but they are in way primitive areas of interest. The more interesting and more progressed subjects do not have a lot of momentum neither at my site not anywhere else. So, I try to keep a certain balance of audio bouncy, not letting the level of the site to submerge where it’s content would be understood only by than less 1% of it visitors. So, I kind of hold back with truly evolved and really “dangers” views, knowing that mostly readers would not “get” it and mostly writers who would be able to go there do not have need to express those views .

Regarding the higher levels of SLLB – it is exactly what it is: I deliberately decided, at least at this point do not upload any further information then what was given. The concept of stratification of listening perception was given and exampled at lower levels, even those now I would explain it differently than I did 5 years back. At the higher listening level I do not think that the explanations are necessary and I use my favorite in Audio discussions Darwinist Approach – “imply but do not tell”, letting the Darwin’s natural dyeing-off of un-adapted to take care about the rest. The point is that the people who do “get” what it is all about do not need to witness chewing details and they do not need any explanations – they have own mind and own ability to discover (reinvent) the thing on their own. You give to them an initial push with the stratification concept for instance and the right person come up with all own (identical!!!) discoveries what the level are and how they operate. This stunning similarity of the final conclusions is an amassing subject itself BTW… Anyhow, if the person does not have the mind set to “get” it and have no personal inters about the subject of algorithming of listening preposition then what the purpose to write for him/her? In fact those people (and I have seen it many times) have tendency to miss-use the SLLB stratification. Some of them even have the have no idea what it is all about but they still employ the SLLB and (believe or not) some of them even sell audio using the alleged SLLB justifications.

So, I decided to let sleeping lion lay and for now do not continue the “marketing” of the SLLB subjects. Nether right or wrong people do not need any further explanations. At least they are my views as they are today.

Romy the Cat wrote:

The point is that the people who do “get” what it is all about do not need to witness chewing details and they do not need any explanations – they have own mind and own ability to discover (reinvent) the thing on their own. You give to them an initial push with the stratification concept for instance and the right person come up with all own (identical!!!) discoveries what the level are and how they operate. Rgs, Romy the Cat