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Why Might People Say That Compression In Music Is More Detrimental Than Beneficial?

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Research Question: Why might people say that compression in music is more detrimental than beneficial?

Ever since I attended my first concert I had a sudden realization that the music sounded so full and rich. It made me wonder how people get their music to sound the way they want it to sound. This had me consider how music is made along with all the steps in the process from writing it to distributing it. The process that most intrigued me was the production and mastering aspect of it, which comprised of taking the recordings of instruments or vocals and choosing what to do with them to make everything sound cohesive with one another. I had learned somewhat recently of how compression has impacted music both positively and negatively. If audio compression did not exist some aspects of music would never be able to be heard over others and music would cost more due to data compression of music files. This research question affected my values when it comes to obtaining music I will always buy the original album or …show more content…

The author argued that dynamic range has not decreased from this process. He says that there was just heavier limiting which decreases the overall sound which makes everything sound quieter. Some record producers might agree that everything as whole might have gotten quieter from increasing use of limiters which “limit” the sound of the overall song. Many audio engineers have disagreed with him and say that it pretty much does the same thing as compressing the whole song. They have argued if the loud parts get quieter and the quiet parts stay the same that the range between them is closer, which results in less dynamic range. The author seems to be a little biased in the way he doesn’t state that without explicitly the processes being identical they effectively do the same thing with the range of

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