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You should worry about your chair

Paul's Posts — 08 June 2012

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You should worry about your chair

Just when you thought it was safe to relax in your listening room and enjoy the music let me make you aware of the damage your chair might be inflicting on the music.  Yes, the chair.

One of the items of furniture in the room you should be careful with is the chair and its back.  If you’re using a low back chair as your main listening seat, you’re good to go.  But if you’re using a high back chair, a couch or anything much larger than you are, it’s changing the sound.

I changed all the chairs out in my listening room to ones with a simple wooden frame and cushion that I sit on.  There are as acoustically transparent as I can find.  I think they were from Ikea and they cost me about $150 each.  Interestingly enough they have high backs but are shaped such that the back doesn’t interfere with the sound if you remove the head rest it comes with.

Here’s a picture of mine I think it’s called the Poang chair and you can get it online.

poang chair 22268 PE107124 S4 300x300 You should worry about your chair

 

I am sure there are many fine chairs out there but just be careful to do what I did, remove the headrest, or go low back.  It makes a difference.

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About Author

Paul McGowan

Paul McGowan is the CEO and co-founder of PS Audio Inc. a Boulder Colorado design and manufacturing company of high-end audio products and services. McGowan has been designing and building high-end products for nearly 40 years. Hobbies include skiing, music, hiking, artisan bread baking, kick boxing and cooking. He lives in Boulder Colorado with his wife Terri and his 4 sons.

(17) Readers Comments

  1. Ladderman

    June 8, 2012 at 4:22 am

    Great choice, I got mine a few months ago (mines is in cream leather) the backside got tired of the thin wood chair and uncomfortable cushion. Easy to move to the sweet spot. Only one problem, being very comfortable I find myself dozing off sometimes.

    • June 8, 2012 at 6:04 am

      I found that adding a peice of wood under the back edge to tilt the chair forward was better – no so sunk into a hole – definitely benefits from a good cushion.

      (my first post here, Hi folks!)

  2. Rob

    June 8, 2012 at 4:46 am

    Yep, great choice alright.I got mine from Ikea some time back. The late Colin Whatmough who made exceptional speakers here in Australia also had these chairs perched in front of his speakers at his show room listening room in Melbourne.Might be something to it Paul. I spoke to Colin once and he told me he was working on building a speaker that would sound like you were listening to the orchestra from 5 rows back or if you were listening from 30 rows back.Enthusiasm and love of what he did. I had his big Paragons cranking out Roy Buchanan’s Wayfaring Pilgrim number in one of those chairs-thought Roy Buchanan and band were there.-enjoy the chair Paul

  3. petewilson

    June 8, 2012 at 6:38 am

    …agreed – I have several in the house.

    But they’re less than $70 at IKEA (depending on finish) – AND you increase your involvement by putting ‘em together yourself…

    Maybe IKEA should do loudspeakers, too….

    – P

  4. Soundminded

    June 8, 2012 at 7:05 am

    Take a look at the way seats are arranged in a concert hall. Pay particular attention to the elevation drawing. You will see they are invariably “raked,” that is they are on a ramp so that the seats further back are higher than those in front. This isn’t done just to give those sitting behind someone else a better line of sight to the performers instead of the back of someone’s head (there isn’t much to look at at a concert), it’s done because it’s been discovered that when raking isn’t adequate, the bass sounds in the direct field die out as you go further back, the people in the front literally absorb it. The literature on acoustics says this can be compensated for if reflections at bass frequencies, that is in the reverberant field are sufficiently strong. What this raking also does is restrict horizontal reflections from the rear of the concert hall from reaching you when they are below the raking angle. This is what a high back chair will also do. Perhaps this is why Beranek underestimated the importance of reflections from the rear in calculating listener envelopment (LEV) and corrected it in a technical paper he published in 2008 available as a download on his web site. (He also underestimated the importance of reflections from the ceiling and corrected that too in the same paper.)

  5. hahax

    June 8, 2012 at 7:22 am

    I’m going to agree and disagree with this post. A few years ago I changed chairs and the sound became more open and transparent. So I agree the chair is important. But I was using a less costly, but similar IKEA seat and I switched to one that ended much lower below the ears and that’s when I got the big improvement. Just lean forward after having your hrad against the seat back and the sound will open up. The ears are too close to a sound affecting surface when sitting back on a tall back seat.

  6. Skipperjay

    June 8, 2012 at 8:21 am

    Absolutely right. In my previous home I had a very comfortable chair from Relax-A-Back, I think that is what it is called, in my dedicated listening room. The problem was, as I later learned, the back and the headrest were too high and not let the sound waves to freely flow around me. Interestingly enough, I see that same chair now advertised on Audio Asylum.
    My listening room is now in the den and I have scaled down my gear but I would say the sound in many respects is as good as in my last room. I use the couch for my listening position and it works just fine.

  7. GoingCrazy

    June 8, 2012 at 9:24 am

    With the modest room sizes and layout of most normal houses in the UK, audio has to share space with day to day living. I’m sure my wife would be very pleased if I junked our leather suite and replaced it with two flimsy chairs. Get real guys!!

    • Terry Franklin

      June 8, 2012 at 10:42 am

      I am with you, nevertheless it is fun to see how the other .5% live.

  8. lmf22

    June 8, 2012 at 9:54 am

    I have the Ikea Poang chair as well, but have never thought about removing the headrest. Will give it a try tonight. What I have noticed, however, is that the material of the cushion also changes the sound. I originally had the soft fabric cushion, but found that it dampened the sound too much when I put my head on the headrest. So I got the leather cushion (like the one on the photo) and noticed improvement in the sound. Has anyone tried other materials?

  9. Lawrence Schenbeck

    June 8, 2012 at 1:01 pm

    Paul, didn’t you mention once before that you also — like jrhill — put a shim of some kind under the chair, so that it pitched forward a bit? I tried that too and it helped immensely (as does simply leaning forward in the chair, away from that comfortable but acoustically dangerous head rest). It’s a great chair otherwise.

    • June 8, 2012 at 3:12 pm

      Not sure how you know that but thanks for reminding me – you’re absolutely correct. I drilled holes through the legs and added a custom threaded screw to make the angle perfect. Totally spaced out that detail.

      • Soundminded

        June 8, 2012 at 4:36 pm

        Now that’s what I call someone who takes his audio listening experience very seriously! :-)

  10. oliver T. Finch

    June 8, 2012 at 9:29 pm

    So very true. If one sits on a high back chair all one has to do is to sit up straight. This moves the ears a foot or more from the high part of the back of the chair. The highs become clearer and the whole sound becomes slightly more open. It seems the part of the chair behind the head acts as a diffuser. Regards.

  11. a.dent

    June 9, 2012 at 2:06 am

    I too have a Poang chair. i bought the matching foot stool although I rarely us it because it does force your head back against the cushion.
    I chose a fabric cover rather than leather because I had heard the leather reflected sound near the ears and created some additional degradation of the SQ!
    Obviously IKEA have hit on a winner here.

  12. July 5, 2012 at 8:22 am

    Paul, you’re welcome for the original tip to remove the head cushion ; )

    I’ve since sawed the top stage off. This is actually (believe it or not) pursuant to my efforts toward being less “tweaky”. Now I don’t have to guess about whether it is having an effect or not!

  13. Mark Brockway

    August 21, 2012 at 9:04 pm

    I like the saw idea!!! Gonna have to do that if the backrest is too high!

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