Music on TV Programmes.

[SamsarandaParticipant @samsaranda]

Dave Halford, if I didn’t know that you were trying to wind me up then I could have taken offence. 😇 Dave W

[Howard LewisParticipant @howardlewis46836]

Maybe its my hearing aids, but often the "incidental" music drowns out the dialogue; especially when they speak softly, mumble, or whisper. Galloping anno domini!

My definition of "incidental"; is often "unnecessary."

Howard

[George ArcherParticipant @georgearcher16419]

If the TV are getting their historical information from the museums the errors are understandable, The N.R.M. described the LSWR M7 as being designed for suburban traffic when it was actually intended for express passenger traffic west of Exeter but was reassigned after one derailed at speed near Okehampton (they did change that after I gave them a history lesson and suggested they consulted the railway inspectors accident report) !. The custodians of the "Discovery" were blissfully unaware that all the worlds registered merchant ships have had since the introduction of Net and Gross tonnage to mark "excluded spaces" with a plaque over the door stating which rank of crew member uses the space for work or accommodation and therefore not to be included in the calculation of the size of cargo space for port dues assessment. The custodians of a stately home on the north bank of the Firth of Forth hadn't realised that the reason for the jetty directly in line with the front door was so the occupants of the house could get into a boat hoist the sail and be in Edinburgh in a couple of hours or so depending on tides rather than taking the 3 days to travel over rough roads and the ferry before the railway line was built.!

I suppose they all came from the same universities.

[Peter HParticipant @peterh38181]

It can be done with no music or commentary.

Handmade Episode 2 Metal BBC Documentary 2015 Link

[Gary WoodingParticipant @garywooding25363]

Neither my wife nor I could be mistaken as being young, and we both have problems with sound tracks on TV and cinema obliterating dialogue in favour of incidental music. Strangely, it doesn't happen with the sound tracks of old films where speech is clear and mood music only apparent when needed.

Personally I reckon that the youngish producers are totally disinterested in the older generation and want to cater entirely on the young. To my old ears the sound tracks in cinemas are far too loud for comfort – possibly to cater for hearing loss in lovers of pop music.

[Nigel McBurney 1Participant @nigelmcburney1]

Very true about the comment on the camera being pointed at the presenter rather than the craftsman doing the work,no doubi it is probably due to the producer or director who instructs the camera man,its similar to wild life programmes where the presenters always have binoculars and the camera shows the presenter and not what they are looking at,and I oftenwonder if the presenters even know what they are looking at.And in a lot of programmes particularly bbc2 the presenters always seem to wear scarves,also annoying is where presenters must have a go at whatever a craftsman is doing,who wants to watch a prat making a fool of himself or in "country file " where a presenter says they have come to help say someone planting trees,what a load of rubbish,and also who would want them helping and in a number of programmes where the garden tools are all brand new.

[Nick WheelerParticipant @nickwheeler]

Posted by Nigel McBurney 1 on 08/11/2021 10:28:52:

Very true about the comment on the camera being pointed at the presenter rather than the craftsman doing the work, no doubt it is probably due to the producer or director who instructs the camera man,its similar to wild life programmes where the presenters always have binoculars and the camera shows the presenter and not what they are looking at, and I oftenwonder if the presenters even know what they are looking at.

The presenter is being paid. The craftsman, meerkat or whatever isn't.

[Anthony KendallParticipant @anthonykendall53479]

Sort of a little bit to the side but I find the practice of using contributions from people with their computers has understandably increased recently.

This is allright for me if the sound is decent – it is so easy to improve it with a proper microphone and just a little accoustic deadening.

Unfortunately we are often presented with someone sounding like they are in a jam jar at the bottom of the sea with significant break-up. Very few people, and no politicians, are worth listening to with this quality.
Unfortunately, the audience is beginning to accept it as inevitable and there will be more of it on the better-crap-than-nothing principle.
It must be really difficult for people with hearing difficulties with the screeching going on.

[Stuart BridgerParticipant @stuartbridger82290]

Personally I think this has a lot to do with modern flat panel TV design and potentially the decoding of surround sound audio to the TV speakers. There is no room for anywhere near decent sized speakers in the cabinets. The sound experience is going to be seriously comprised, without investment in external kit such as a sound bar or full home cinema setup. It amazes me that all the technology seems to go into the display with sound being an afterthought. I have a modest home cinema setup with a full size front speaker delivering the center (mostly speech) channel. Two additional stereo speakers deliver the L&R front effects, which is mostly the incidental music.
I have no issues with the vast majority of programming as the sound is well separated and I can adjust the levels if needed. Without such a setup and relying on internal speakers, I wonder how they balance the centre and front LR channels? If the L&R effects are too high compared to the centre channel, it could well lead to the challenges some are reporting. Not sure if there is any controls that can be tweaked to adjust for this?

[Peter BellParticipant @peterbell11509]

Stuart, Your comments and setup are interesting as I have just got a flat screen TV and now realise after experimenting with settings that I'm going to have to spend to improve the sound quality. Speech is fine for me but overall it sounds very much like its coming from a tin can. The previous CRT 20 yr old Phillips TV sounded great!

So looking around and of course so much to choose from, are home cinema kits much of a step up from sound bars and is a "modest home cinema setup" just a smaller/cheaper version of a larger outfit?

Peter

[duncan webster 1Participant @duncanwebster1]

I've got a fancy Bose setup. The news and similar are crystal clear on main channels, some dramas I just give up on. Netflix subtitles are very good, BBC are so far behind and obviously badly computer generated (and incorrect) as to be nearly useless.

[old martParticipant @oldmart]

I have poor hearing and tinnitus and sometimes have difficulty separating the "background" music from the dialogue. I use headphones when I can and also any subtitles if available. I very much doubt if programme editors have any idea that some people would like the dialogue to be clearer. I have been known to give up even when a newsperson has a regional accent, or mumbles without any background music. People might think that the old fashioned newsreader with the crisp type of English is bad in this world of equality, but at least every listener in the country could understand them whatever their local dialect was.

[Russell EberhardtParticipant @russelleberhardt48058]

One of the main problems with audio on flat screen TVs is that, apart from the speakers being too small, they are in the back rather than the front! I bought a £10 digital to analog converter from Amazon and connected it between the SPDIF output from the TV to a pair of spare inputs on my 30 odd years old hifi. The sound now comes from a pair of Rogers speakers and I can now understand (most of) the dialog.

Russell

[Stuart BridgerParticipant @stuartbridger82290]

Posted by Peter Bell on 08/11/2021 13:45:08:

Stuart, Your comments and setup are interesting as I have just got a flat screen TV and now realise after experimenting with settings that I'm going to have to spend to improve the sound quality. Speech is fine for me but overall it sounds very much like its coming from a tin can. The previous CRT 20 yr old Phillips TV sounded great!

So looking around and of course so much to choose from, are home cinema kits much of a step up from sound bars and is a "modest home cinema setup" just a smaller/cheaper version of a larger outfit?

Peter

Hi Peter,
tbh I have never compared a sound bar to a full setup. Sound bars "weren't a thing" when I first invested in my setup. I would say budget and room layout/WAF are the key factors. Nt everyone wants a full sized speaker under the TV. I would recommend going to a decent dealer e.g Audio-T or Richer Sounds (will have lower cost options) and explain your problem and get a demo.
By modest setup, I mean I have a pretty much entry level AV receiver and speakers. If you are not that technically savvy a sound bar will need less integration and be easier to manage than a home cinema setup.

[duncan webster 1Participant @duncanwebster1]

I tried connecting the audio out of the TV to a high fi system many moons ago. There was a huge time lapse somewhere and lip movements were miles out of synch with sound. Never did understand it. It was a quad amplifier, still in the loft just in case!

[DMBParticipant @dmb]

Stop paying license, get rid of TV, go down workshop!

[Bill DawesParticipant @billdawes]

Regional accents should not be a problem, you can be true to your accent and still speak clearly.

I watched an episode of the Larkins the other day, Bradley Walsh as Pa was ok but some of the others I had difficulty with. Later watched an episode of the Saint, not one problem understanding anybody.

So is it modern 'actors' or sound techniques or a bit of both. You would think modern audio equipment for studio recording and playback would beat the old mics on poles hands down but does it?

Bill D.

[Peter BellParticipant @peterbell11509]

Thanks for the advice Stuart. Good idea t get a demo, not near any of the stores but sure we can do something about it. Some systems very fancy (and pricy) !

Tried Hi-Fi through TV previously with mixed results so dont really wnat to go that route again.

[Brian JohnParticipant @brianjohn93961]

Most of my gripes have been covered here :

1. Loud and irrelevant music on youtube videos.

2. Annoying background music on TV shows and movies.

2. Inaudible dialogue due to mumbling and/or background noise.

I have also found that most TV's and car radios are factory set for ''music'' : the bass is turned way up and the treble is very low. Speech is best heard with treble set high and the bass almost off. This is easy to change on a modern TV in ''settings'' but I have found it almost impossible to work out how to do it with my car radio. One large knob seems to control everything by pushing for the menu and turning for selection…great in theory but useless in practice.

[Howard LewisParticipant @howardlewis46836]

Sadly, getting rid of the TV will bring other problems.

In the form of TV licencing who will NOT believe that anyone has no TV.

When the house next door was long term unoccupied, they offered to come and interview under caution

I told them "Come by all means, but be prepared for a LONG with on the doorstep of an empty house"

That did stop them.

I'd been redirecting the mail to my neighbour's new address, but repeatedly told TV licensing that the house was unoccupied so there was no one to watch the non existent TV.

Other friends, actually had a visit to confirm that they had no TV.

Howard

[duncan webster 1Participant @duncanwebster1]

I had a chap on my team once who had an ethical objection to TV, when the licence people came and demanded entry to check he didn't have a TV he told them to go and get a warrant. Didn't hear from them again

Edited By duncan webster on 11/11/2021 21:56:10

[Neil WyattModerator @neilwyatt]

Victor Meldrew rides again…

Neil

[Nigel Graham 2Participant @nigelgraham2]

I've been lucky so far in that I've never had a visit from the Licensing people! They do seem to have moderated their tone slightly. The difficulty muight be with me is firstly there are still ariels on the wall, too high for me to remove safely, and if they did gain entry how I would prove I do not use this PC as a television.

The last letter or two I've had from them has been less aggressive than in the past – I think enough people must have complained for them to re-write it.

The original theme of this thtread is as bad as ever, with increasing amounts of pointless background music or sound effects on radio programmes too. Maybe it's that the producers now are of a generation congenitally incapable of doing anything without music in the background.

[SillyOldDufferModerator @sillyoldduffer]

I've been a Radio Amateur since I was 16. This hobby, particularly shortwave radio, involves making sense of signals buried in horrendous man-made and natural radio noise. There was fading, phase distortion, static, splatter, heterodyne whistles, ionosondes, inter-modulation, over-the-horizon radars, electric motors, round-the-world echos, and many people using the same channel: often as not the wanted signal was the weakest.

The brain is a superb filter and some people are really good at picking wanted information out of a racket. Sadly, it's very noticeable as I've got older that my filter ability isn't what it was! Apart from my ears being less sharp, I find it much harder to concentrate. What I used to enjoy doing almost effortlessly has become hard work that I can only do in short bursts, I think it's happening with TV sound too: though not deaf, I struggle if a programme isn't a good match to my ears and brain.. A touch of tinnitus doesn't help either. The giveaway I'm part of the problem is my kids have no trouble decoding mumbles on top of intrusive sound tracks! Not yet anyway!

Dave

[Anonymous]

Posted by Nigel Graham 2 on 12/11/2021 21:08:59:

there are still ariels on the wall, too high for me to remove safely, and if they did gain entry how I would prove I do not use this PC as a television.

Do you have to prove that you don't or do they have to prove that you do?

(A genuine question from someone who's been out of it – the TV licence thing – for 50+ years)

[Author]

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