Classical Music Forum banner

What's That Hissing Sound?

5K views 39 replies 20 participants last post by  HaydnBearstheClock 
#1 ·
My cellmate — err, wife asked me the other day during a string quartet DVD, "What's that hissing sound? It sounds like breathing." and I told her, "That's because they have vipers in their viols." Correct?

What is that "hissing" sound?

What's the "hissiest" string quartet recording you've ever heard?
 
  • Like
Reactions: HaydnBearstheClock
#4 ·
You mean, the microphones pick up the snake hissing? ~giggle!~ A condenser mike would do that.

Nobody has actually explained where the hissing is coming from.
 
#14 ·
I know what the hissing sound was. Nobody has identified it yet. I figured it was a common sound heard in many string quartet recordings, but apparently I was wrong.
 
#15 ·
I told her, "That's because they have vipers in their viols." Correct?
Yeah...that might make for a dicey concert. Hit vibrato on a high C and you get tagged.

Incidentally, is the DVD coupled with a CD release. Go to a music shop or library and hunt down the CD. If it says AAD then you see the answer for the "hissing noise". It comes from the analog recorder that they used to record the original performance=Analog recording; Analog Mixing and Digital tranfer to CD...meaning that you got a recording in CD format that's just a straight cut off a concert recording tape.

If I recall correctly analog recording always carried a hiss because of the microphone picking up ambient noise as well as the inner workings of the analog machine used to record.
 
#18 ·
no, no. It's not a continuous hiss. I can tell tape hiss, and it's not that. (see opening post) I know what it is, but nobody else has come up with the right answer.
 
#16 ·
Hissing/breathing sounds don't especially bother me in chamber works but I find footstomping to be a little more irritating. Why not have mats under each performer's feet? Perhaps that would provide better purchase for the 'cello spike as well if a holder isn't used.
 
#17 ·
I think they should mike the feet, and have a special resonant foot-stomping box under their feet. The cello spike should be acoustically coupled to a resonating soundboard as well. Maybe this would put the Beat into CM.
 
  • Like
Reactions: HaydnBearstheClock
#19 ·
Groovy. Perhaps there could be a secondary 'cello spike then the whole thing could be converted into a kind of theremin (as long as someone didn't mind lying on the floor under the 'cellist to activate it - perhaps that would rule out a female 'cellist wearing a skirt, though...).
 
#31 ·
#33 ·
The horsehair bows scraping on the strings.
 
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top