The idea behind OpenAL is a 3d positional spatialized sound library analogous
to OpenGL: instead of micromanaging each aspect of sound playback and effect,
the application writer may limit themselves to placing the sounds in the 
scene and letting the native OpenAL implementation determine the correct
amount of pitch alteration, gain attenuation, phase shift, etc, required to
render the sounds correctly.

That's the goal, anyway.  

WWW: http://www.openal.org/