Anyone know a place where one can buy binaural recordings?

[NicolasB]

Subject line says it all, really.

[NicolasB]

Totally shameless bump.

Anybody?

[Daneel]

There is some information here. Looks like you will have to import.

I tried some of the demos. Holy sh*t!

If you have a pair of headphones grab this and see what you think. There are more demos at the above link.

[gringottsdirect]

In 1979 I bought a pair of JVC binaural headphones complete with grey Kraftwerk style dummy head and three quarter-inch jack plugs, made many Open Reel recordings of my then girlfriend playing my organ, great at the time, wish I still had them, ( and the girlfriend ) oh well.

[CounterWhine]

Originally posted by gringottsdirect
made many Open Reel recordings of my then girlfriend playing my organ

[lmccauley]

I think the 3/4 inch jack plugs may have been a factor in you losing your girlfriend...

[NicolasB]

There is some information here.

Yeah, I tracked down www.binaural.com quite a while ago - but I don't know that the site is actually still active. They also say (somewhere) that many of their discs are imported from Germany - if that's the case it would make sense to try and find a European source.

[gringottsdirect]

Originally posted by lmccauley
I think the 3/4 inch jack plugs may have been a factor in you losing your girlfriend...

Funny ! but no, she moved to college 50 miles away and the inevitable happened, although it took a few years of Long Distance Love ( thanks Little Feat ).
The organ is a pedal powered Stirling Co, Derby, Connecticut, sounds pretty much like the one Neil Young used on Like A Hurricane.
The microphones in each earpiece recorded startling imagery of things moving around the room, dog barking, TV on, people talking, bin-aural is a fascinating technique, even the trailer link on this thread shows amazing depth of stereo image, awesome at the time .

[codling]

pearl jams album ~ 'binaural'

has three tracks recorded in binaural , i believe ~ nothing as it seems/rival/of the girl.

great album to (shameless plug )

carlos

[NicolasB]

From my perspective things are complicated by the fact that I prefer classical music - Pearl Jam not really to my taste.

I did some poking around on amazon.com yesterday - as distinct from amazon.co.uk - and they do have one or possibly two of the discs listed on binaural.com so I've ordered those. If and when they actually get to me, I'll let you know what they sound like.

I have to say, though, I've always thought binaural is the way to go. After all, we only have two ears. If you can correctly reproduce a sound at the ears then you should be able to realistically reproduce anything. Endlessly adding more and more loudspeakers (what are we up to, now, 8.1?) can only ever approximate to the authentic experience, and gets steadily more difficult to do properly as you get more and more cancellation between channels, and more and more infuence from room accoustics.

Also there are some things you can do with a binaural recording that are impossible any other way - for example if you want to reproduce someone whispering in the listener's ear. You could never achieve that with speakers no matter how many you have.

[Karma]

Hi there.

I'm on dodgy ground here, as this is a remembrance from nearly 25 years ago.

But i hope it helps.

When the quadrophonic debarcle was going on in the late seventies. Binaural sound came to the fore in the shape of Ambisonics. (since developed as a surround format)

Sony and CBS had their rival qaud. systems SQ and QS (they were seperate companies in those dark days). The BBC flirted briefly with a system they called matrix H.

From these experiments, I'm sure that Michael Gerzon was around at the time, they developed a two channel system for reproducing three dimensional sound called Ambisonics which had it's basis in binaural recordings.

In fact i can remember being the recording tech on The Archers which was recorded binaurally and using an Ambisonic encoder. Certainly it was broadcast as such even into the nineties, though not sure now.

The placement of sound was such that the standard BBC library effects could not be used, and had to be recorded specially for that programme. Including studio techs kneeling at the feet of the performers imitating dogs panting to get the "height" correct on the recording.

For full surround, you needed an Ambisonics decoder, but I'm pretty sure the system worked well enough through headphones etc as binaural does.

Anyway, I could be barking up the wrong tree. but it would be worth checking out BBC released classical music as i'm sure they were recorded binaurally for a while.

There is a site dedicated to Ambisonic recordings (in that they differ from Quadrophonic) at

http://home.earthlink.net/~larryclifton/uhjtext.html

Sorry, haven't worked out how to do the "here" thing yet!

There are links on that site to the York University Technology Group who have a dedicated site to 3-D audio (including Ambisonics and binaural)

Meridian, the Hi FI manufacturer was also involved, they have got Ambisonics written into the DVD A specification through Meridian Lossless Packaging. So there is a chance that Ambisonic (and by default) some of the earlier "stereo only" soundtracks becoming available by default.

They are a very helpful company and may well be worth a call to them.


As I said, I could be barking up the wrong tree, my memory of those days is a little hazy, especially as I didn't have much interest in surround in those days. I could therefore be wasting your time, but, of course it may give you a link to what you are after.

Good luck, good hunting.

Karma

[zoolap]

I found this thread by accident when searching for something else, but WOW.

Listening to some of the samples - so impressive. I wanna sample some more.

[waterpump]

Hi All,

As a professional binaural sound artist / recordist, you may be interested to know that there are a number of binaural downloads / CD's available, and some in the pipeline.

Headphones Essential !!!

Downloads try

www.waterpump.f9.co.uk

The Fireworks are particularly exciting, also Hell Bay.

Streaming - look under Dallas Simpson at www.emit.cc

Downloads also available from Farfield Records on emusic, again under Dallas Simpson.

Recent Commercial Binaural Releases:

Live at Lincoln : Ric Sanders Group (Jazz violin trio) CD 2 is multimedia - binaural / DTS surround / mpg video. Praised by the Audiophile communmity.

Live at Ambergate : Gordon Giltrap
Down to the Wood : Martin Stephenson /Jim Hornsby.


Forthcoming release:

From Silence : Troy Donockley & Dave Bainbridge, Celtic pipes and whistles, processed synth / guitar / Bozouki. recorded live at Lincoln Cathedral UK.

best wishes,

Dallas Simpson.