Heyser Lecture

Special Events

Presenter:
John Meyer, Meyer Sound Labs - Berkeley, CA, USA

The Richard C. Heyser distinguished lecturer for the 145th AES Convention is John Meyer. 

Taking the Room Out of the Loudspeaker: New Tools for Transparent Reproduction 
With few exceptions, loudspeakers are not used in a free field environment but rather in an enclosed acoustical space. This is inherently problematic as an acoustical space behaves in a manner similar to that of loudspeakers, making it difficult to separate the problematic characteristics of each using common measurement tools or subjective listening tests. John Meyer’s lecture will review the history of loudspeaker measurement tools as used both in the free field and in acoustical space, including Richard Heyser’s pioneering TDM methods and Meyer Sound’s own SIM (Source Independent Measurement) systems. A key focus will be on a new multi-component studio monitor that exhibits absolutely flat amplitude and phase response from 27 Hz to 20 kHz. Because this system effectively “takes the room out of the loudspeaker” it opens up possibilities for correlating new objective testing techniques with subjective listening observations. The lecture also will discuss a new test signal known as M-Noise, which effectively mimics the dynamics of music and avoids inherent weaknesses in the use of pink noise with third-octave analyzers when testing loudspeaker systems used for music. The retrospective will touch on other benchmarks in the quest for linear sound amplification, including the early Glyph large-horn systems, the Grateful Dead’s “Wall of Sound” and the HD-1 high resolution studio monitor, a trusted near-field reference that remains in Meyer Sound’s product line 29 years after its introduction.