CompuServe Messages

David, that depends on the instrument. An instrument with a single point sound source (such as claves) would indeed not need stereo. But the vast majority of real-world instruments would require it for the most realistic results. For instance, a piano doesn't have one hammer and one string. It has 88 hammers that hit hundreds of strings (three each for the mid-range and high notes, two each for the upper bass, and one each for the lowest bass octaves). A pipe organ has pipes carefully arranged throughout a chapel or concert hall to take fullest advantage of the acoustics. A string ensemble has many violin players sitting in various seats, and each violin has four strings. Then there's Orchestra Hit… well, I think you get my point by now. The Yamaha Clavinovas make a careful distinction between "stereo panning" which all of their samples on all of their Clavinovas have, and which most of the competition likewise has, vs. "stereo sampling," which is what we're talking about here. Stereo panning tries to duplicate the effect of the arrangement of piano strings by having the panning keyed to the pitch so that the higher a note is, the further towards the right it is panned to, and vice-versa. But true stereo sampling takes into account that it isn't the strings themselves which produce the sound we actually here, it's that big spruce sounding board. And IT is producing sound waves from all over its surface (dozens of square feet for a large concert grand, which is what is usally sampled for the highest quality piano sounds), and you would indeed hear actual tonal differences from one ear than from the other whether you were the one actually playing, or merely in the audience. The importance of full surround sound come into play because of the relatively recent discovery that left and right are not enough — having a sound come equally from left and right does NOT sound the same as the same sound coming from a true sound source in the center. Thus the true center channel that is in surround systems. The "surround" channel can be handled by multiple speakers arranged behind the listener, and mainly provide reverbation-type ambiences, though some recordings place actual sound sources there as well (such as real or faked audience reactions).