Monthly Archive: November 2004
Index to All 118 Discs Reviewed
Index to All 118 Discs Reviewed so far for November 2004: HI-RES REVIEWS, PT. 1 (Jazz) – Geri Allen, piano – The Life of a Song; Jacques Loussier, piano – Impressions on Chopin’s Nocturnes; Maynard Ferguson & Big Bop Nouveau – One More Trip to Birdland; Hilma Jensson, guitar – Ditty Blei; Blue Man Group – The Complex; Pete Escovedo – Mister E; Ray Charles – Genius Loves Company; Patrick Williams cond. The Ultimate Mancini; Herbie Mann – Camino de Casa; Wilma de Oliveira – Esquina de SP; Gene Harris/Scott Hamilton Quintet – At Last; Holly Hofman, flute – Minor Miracle; Mike Wofford Trio – Live at Athenaeum Jazz; Sinatra at the Sands with Count Basie & The Orchestra HI-RES REVIEWS, PT. 2 (Classical beg.) – BACH: St. John Passion – Trinity Cath. Choir; CHOPIN & LOEWE Piano Concertos – Mari Kodama/Nagano; SHOSTAKOVICH: Hamlet film score – Yablonsky; SIBELIUS & SINDING Violin Concertos – Kraggerud/Engeset; Russian Violin Concertos with Julia Fischer, v; Olivier Latry, organ – Midnight at Notre-Dame; Yoshitsune’s Ryuteki – Kagemitsu, bamboo flute; SCHULHOFF: Chamber works – Prazak & Kocian Q.; Dream of the Orient – Concerto Köln; HANDEL: Messiah – Paul McCreesh; LEBRUN: Oboe Concertos Vol. 2 […]
Home Page-November 2004
Our sixth Hi-Res Drawing features SACDs from Channel Classics. A dozen lucky AUDIOPHILE AUDITION readers who Register Here (or have registered earlier) will receive their choice of one of the above multichannel SACDs: The stirring Sym. No. 2 of Rachmaninoff with Ivan Fischer conducting, a choral Christmas album from The Gents, or Vol. 2 of the energetic oboe concertos of Lebrun. Drawings will be made Dec. 1, we’ll announce the winners shortly thereafter, and we won’t sell or share your information. Last month’s winners are listed below. Check back with us frequently for new material! November 2004 Contents New Mercury 3-Channel SACDs! New Audio News! 42 SACD & DVD-A Hi-Res Reviews (Pt. 1 – Jazz/Pop, Pt. 2 & Pt. 3 – Classical) 24 Classical CD Reviews (Pt. 1, Pt. 2) 24 DVD Video Reviews (Pt. 1 – All Music Videos, Pt. 2) Components: Elements Power Harmony AC Treatment; HeadRoom Total BitHead USB headphone amp 13 Classical Reissue Reviews (Pt. 1, Pt. 2) Feature of the Month: Jared Sacks on DSD/SACD useage Jazz CD Reviews (Pt. 1, Pt. 2) Summary of the Audio & Video Print Press (updated 11/7); Archives; Audio News; Index to All Disc Reviews this month […]
Jazz CD Reviews, Part 2 of 2
October 2004 Part 2 of 2 [Pt. 1] Nancy Wilson – R.S.V.P. (Rare Songs Very Personal) – with George Shearing, Toots Thielemans, Phil Woods, Kenny Lattimore, Ivan Lins, Gary Burton, Paquito D’Rivera and many others, featuring the All-Star Big Band – Manchester Craftsmen’s Guild MCGJ1013 – 53 minutes, * * * *: As with any disc you get from the Manchester Craftsmen’s Guild, you can be assured that these guys take their work to heart, and the results will always be extremely well crafted sonically and performance-wise. This new disc from Nancy Wilson does not disappoint in either arena – the sidemen and guest artists dish out superb accompaniment and remarkable solos throughout, and the recorded sound just absolutely sparkles – this is another one of those CDs that blurs the line between what Redbook and SACD are capable of delivering. I have to admit that I’m not really a huge Nancy Wilson fan – her offerings tend to lean a little too far towards the easy-listening side of the spectrum for my tastes – but I found this disc of mostly standards constantly surprised me with it’s straight-ahead jazziness. There are a few areas where the disc delves a […]
Jazz CD Reviews, Part 1 of 2
Gonzalo Rubalcaba – Paseo (Rubalcaba, piano/keyboards/percussion; Feleipe Lamoglia, soprano/alto/tenor sax; Armando Gola, elec. bass; Ignacio Berroa, drums) – Blue Note 7243 5 81832 21V ****: The Cuban pianist strikes me as one of the most exciting talents at the keyboards today. He’s matured some in the decade or so since he came up from Cuba, and shows off some new personnel in his New Cuban Quartet here, including versatile saxist Lamoglia. He does his versions of a couple traditional Cuban songs, some original tunes he’s done before, and a wonderful solo piano treatment of the classical Prelude in Conga, by Gonzalez. Paseo means “walk,” and Paseo con Fula is inspired by Rubalcaba’s dog, Fula. In some of the wilder excursions Rubalcaba seems to have three or four hands at work. But like many recent jazz albums recently, there are some forays into funk and/or fusion which lose this moldy fig rather quickly. Tracks: El Guerrillero, Prelude in Conga/Homage to Hilario, Bottoms Up, See So Far, Paseo con Fula, Meanwhile, Encantation, Quasar, Los Blueyes. – John Henry Herbie Hancock – The Piano – Columbia Legacy CK 87083 ****: This was a singular album indeed in its original release back in l978. […]
Three Years Working with DSD/SACD Recordings
Three Years Working with DSD/SACD Recordings I was fortunate to be living and working in Holland when Philips started to look for record labels for promoting their newest technology for DSD recordings. In June of 2001, Philips asked if they could set up a parallel recording room during my recording with Pieter Wispelwey and the Saint Saen cello concerto in Bremen Germany. We recorded on two complete systems. It is one thing to develop a new technology for the consumer and make SACD players, it is another world and even more important to make software (CD’s) available. This recording – CCS SA 16502 was released in February of 2002 and was the first commercial hybrid SACD on the market. The first thing that comes to mind when listening to SACD recordings (either stereo or 5.0 – I do not use the sub woofer channel ) is one of being more emotionally involved with the music. Yes we can speak about more clarity, depth, spatial transparency coming from the speakers, but to me it all comes down to not having the recording technique being in the way of the music. The music comes first. At recording sessions, the important steps for […]
Reissue CD Reviews, Part 2 of 2
November 2004, Pt. 2 of 2 [Pt. 1] MAHLER: Symphony No. 3 in D Minor/An Elizabethan Suite (arr. Barbirolli) Lucretia West, contralto Women and Children’s Choir of St. Hedwig’s Cathedral Sir John Barbirolli conducts Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra Testament SBT2 1350 64:26; 47:35 (Distrib. Harmondi Mundi):**** Recorded live 8 March 1969, this exemplary performance of Mahler’s Third Symphony under Sir John Barbirolli pre-dates his less expansive survey of the same work he recorded with his own Halle Orchestra at the Free Trade Hall, Manchester 23 May 1969 (BBC Legends BBCL 4004) with Kerstin Meyer, contralto. Contralto Lucretia West sang the Nietzsche verses for Mitropoulos in his appearance with the Cologne Radio-Symphony. For a conductor who only discovered Mahler (the Ninth Symphony) when he was 54, Barbirolli caught the temper and exalted flair of this composer with a passionate vengeance, and almost single-handedly created a Mahler renaissance both in England and in Berlin. The devotional respect with which Wolfgang Stresemann’s Berlin Philharmonic responds to Barbirolli is palpable in every bar, though perhaps nowhere so iridescently as in the final movement, whose slow and exalted meditation on Beethoven’s F Major Quartet touches the stratosphere. Along with a strong sense of musical architecture–difficult always […]
Reissue CD Reviews, Part 1 of 2
November 2004, Pt. 1 of 2 [Pt. 2] BEETHOVEN: Piano Variations John Ogden, piano Emil Gilels, piano (Op. 76) EMI Classics 7243 5 85761 2 69:16; 75:44****: John Ogden (1937-1989) recorded the lion’s share of these thirteen sets of variations in 1969, works Beethoven wrote mainly in the period 1790-1800, when he used tunes from other composers’ operas as springboards for his touring reputation as a brilliant keyboard improviser. All but the Op. 76 set composed on Beethoven’s own “Turkish” theme in D (1809) are without opus number, although their relatively youthful composition does not belie their invention, some of which are quite ambitious. For example, Beethoven’s 24 variations on Righini’s arietta Venni amore, WoO 65 (1791) are decorative and virtuosic, applying to the piano legato and singing qualities that would later illuminate his own sonatas. The WoO 73, 10 Variations on the duet La stessa, la stessissima, from Salieri’s opera Falstaff, pay homage to one of Beethoven’s teachers and point to refinements well beyond Salieri’s imagination. The 32 Variations in C Minor, WoO 80 (1806) are perhaps the most notable of the sets from the period, rife with Handelian modulations worthy of the Emperor Concerto, Violin Concerto and […]
Component Reviews, Part 1 of 2
No. 2 [No. 1] • November 2004 Flying in Style: My Time with the Headroom’s Total BitHead by John Brazier Dual 1/8″ headphone jacks Runs on 4 AAA batteries USB 1.1 connection for a direct S/PDIF link HeadRoom Process switch Volume control Power indicator Weight: 5 ounces SRP: $269 HeadRoom 2020 Gilkerson Drive Bozeman, MT 59715 800-828-8184 jamey@headphone.com www.headphone.com I hope all of you have been lucky enough to fly First Class at least once. With mileage reward programs, airline “we’re sorry that we at ABC Air have deplorable customer service” upgrades, or just being in the right place at the right time, it seems that the lair of the traveler with means has been adulterated by the common man. Notwithstanding the palpable disdain for the commoner, First Class is da bomb, with roomy seats, silver silverware, real food, and your own TV, yet the audio that is piped in from those confusing headphone receptacles is strictly pedestrian. Once I broke through the glass curtain separating economy from what I call the “we think we’re better than you” class, I concluded that the seats alone are worth the upgrade. Keep in mind that every trip that I have been in […]
Component Reviews, Part 2 of 2
November 2004, Review 1 of 3 [2] Power Harmony 1000 by Element Specs: Size – W-17” X D-10” X H-5.25” Front Plate – W-19” X H-5.25” Weight – 36.5 lbs. Shipping Weight – 57 lbs Four Acme Audio™ silver plated grounded outlets. Acme Audio™ silver plated IEC input for the included Monster™ Powerline 200™ Acme Audio™ silver plated fuse holder for 8A slow-blo fuse 120V 60Hz Continuous Maximum Power. Power Factor corrected to .9 worst case. Other voltages, frequencies and load ratings upon request. Element 895 B Street Unit 351 Hayward, CA 94541 510.703.2313 Fax 510.278.3767 info@element.us.com www.element.us.com Introduction The Power Harmony 1000 claims to deal with power supply problems in a different way than most power conditioners. Most power conditioners simply try to filter power line noise from the incoming AC power. Unfortunately the more perfect the voltage waveform is, the worse the current waveform gets. The Power Harmony is designed to improve the behavior of rectified power supplies. It maximizes the power transfer through a rectifier (either solid state or tube) and at the same time virtually eliminates the noises caused by rectified power. Power Harmony’s strength comes from its patented circuitry that optimizes the power factor of […]
DVD Reviews, Part 2 of 2
Pt. 2 of 2 – November 2004 [Part 1] Fahrenheit 9/11 (2004) Directed by Michael Moore Studio: Lions Gate/Columbia TriStar Video: 1.78:1 enhanced for widescreen Subtitles: English, closed captions Audio: Dolby Digital 5.1 Extras: Featurette on The Theatrical Release of Fahrenheit 9/11, The People of Iraq on the Eve of Invasion, New scenes: Homeland Security Miami Style, Outside Abu Ghraib Prison, Eyewitness account from Samara Iraq, Extended interview with Abdul Henderson, Lila Lipscomb speaks at Washington D.C. Premiere, Arab-American Comedians and their acts and experiences after 9/11, Condoleezza Rice 9/11 Commission Testimony, Rose Garden press briefing after 9/11 Commission Appearance Length: 122 minutes Rating:**** Biased political propaganda or carefully-researched facts presented with humor? Michael Moore was on unusually good behavior (for him) in making this documentary and generally refrained from some of the wilder ploys he used in earlier films – although stopping the senators on the street to ask if they would like to sign up their sons to go to Iraq was a bit over the top. He had a large staff carefully check all his facts, but of course we know from these last days of the presidential race that factual information can be spun a number […]
DVD Reviews, Part 1 of 2
November 2004 Part 1 of 2 [Pt. 2] All Music Videos MOZART: Die Zauberflöte (complete opera) Glyndebourne Festival Opera/London Philharmonic Orchestra, cond. Bernard Haitink/Glyndebourne Chorus Pamina: Felicity Lott; Tamino: Leo Goeke; Papageno: Benjamin Luxon; Sarastro: Thomas Thomaschke; Papagena: Elisabeth Conquet; Queen of the Night: May Sandoz; Speaker: Willard White; Monostatos: John Fryatt Stage production: John Cox Design: David Hockney Studio: Arthaus Musik DVD Video: 4:3 Sound format: PCM stereo Length: 163 mins. Rating: ** Despite a lackluster production, unimaginative conducting, and schematic sets, this live recording of Die Zauberflöte (The magic flute) has its compensations. The Three Ladies (Teresa Cahill, Patricia Parker, and Fiona Kimm), who sport unnaturally high foreheads, are melodious and full-throated. Felicity Lott provides some pleasing moments despite her nervousness. Goeke as Prince Tamino is charming and pleasant, but his uneven tone, threadbare vocal chords, and clunky enunciation are grating. May Sandoz’s coloratura in the two Queen of the Night arias is quite decent, with good intonation. Thomaschke as Sarastro has a regal bearing, but his sternness (that of a Greek hero) precludes a nuanced interpretation. Perhaps the most credible portrayal is of Monostatos, by John Fryatt. And the best singing is done by Kate Flowers, Lindsay […]
Classical CD Reviews, Part 2 of 2
November 2004 Pt. 2 of 2 [Pt. 1] Let’s start off with a pair of rather quirky crossover albums… Aria 3 – Metamorphosis (Created by Paul Schwartz) – Koch Records AD-5765 ** or ****, depending: This disc is billed as the long-awaited followup to Aria and Aria 2, which were both on Billboard’s charts. Must say I for one wasn’t waiting. In fact the whole thing is news to me, but I found it worth listening to at the very least. What Schwartz does is cook up music for the short-attention-span crowd. He selects small but powerful moments from grand opera and transforms them into contemporary ambient/dance soundscapes designed to transport the listener to a different world. The soprano vocals on all of these is Rebecca Luker, and I gather most of the instrumental sounds are synthesized. As seems to be part of the new classical crossover effort, absolutely no credits are given for the original composers or the works these bleeding chunks are ripped from. Perhaps that’s due to this being an advance CD without the liner notes. I recognized quite a lot of Handel. In fact the second track – Furioso – might be subtitled “Dr. Who […]
SACD & Other Hi-Res Reviews, Part 3 of 3
42 SACD & DVD-A Reviews This Month November 2004 – Pt. 3 of 3 (Classical concl.) [Part 1] [Part 2] Click on any cover to go directly to review ******** MULTICHANNEL DISC OF THE MONTH ******* MAHLER: Symphony No. 5 – Berlin Philharmonic/Claudio Abbado (rec. live) – DGG multichannel SACD 477 071-2 (2 discs) 44:48, 24:44 *****: Record live in the Berlin Philharmonie Hall in l993, this is a magnificent performance full of electricity, played to a fare thee well by the organization many consider the world’s top symphony orchestra. Though it may be said to have no specific program, the Fifth opens with a Funeral March and the rest of its 69-minute length is devoted to reflecting on, transcending and justifying what that march implies. (And why didn’t DGG put the entire symphony on a single disc then, since they hold up to 80 minutes? If this is a two-discs-for-price-of-one album, then it doesn’t really matter.) The march is one of two “orchestral songs” heard in the work; the other is the famous Adagietto movement – often performed separately. This is just about the most heart-rending version of that movement I have ever heard. The work’s Rondo-Finale is […]
SACD & Other Hi-Res Reviews, Part 2 of 3 – Classical (beg.)
42 SACD & DVD-A Reviews This Month November 2004 – Part 2 of 3 – Classical (beg.) [Part 1] [Part 3] Click on any cover to go directly to review J. S. BACH: St. John Passion (complete) – Soloists/Trinity Cathedral Choir and Baroque Orchestra/Eric Milnes – DTS Entertainment multichannel DTS (Only) 69286-01066-2 (2 discs – 53:16 & 57:51) ****: This recording was made by the small classical label PGM and released by DTS. I must confess that it is not a new release, but I saw it reviewed elsewhere as such, and so requested and received it. DTS no longer issues DTS-only discs, but this is an excellent performance and recording which deserves to be heard since it is the only St. John Passion in multichannel. The venue was Portland Oregon’s large Episcopal cathedral, which has impressive acoustics. The recording date of the live concert performance was March of l996 and Schoeps mics and a Nagra-D four-channel 24-bit digital recorder were used. The six vocal soloists are uniformly good, especially Mark Bleeke as the Evangelist. And the realistic and detailed sonics don’t seem to be compromised by the DTS encoding process. There’s only one other con to be balanced against […]
SACD & Other Hi-Res Reviews, Part 1 of 3 – Jazz
42 & Reviews This Month! November 2004, Pt. 1 of 3 – Jazz [Part 2] [Part 3] Click on any cover to go directly to review Geri Allen, piano – The Life of a Song (with Dave Holland, bass; Jack DeJohnette, drums) – Telarc multichannel SACD-63598, 65:30 ****: Thought I had reviewed this in its original CD guise a while back but I guess this time I just put it aside knowing the SACD version was on its way. If you aren’t familiar with Allen you may be wondering how she got such a prestigious rhythm section. It’s because she was pianist for some time with the late vocalist Betty Carter and Holland and DeJohnette were Carter’s rhythm section. This Detroit-based pianist wrote eight of the 11 tracks here, and chose three of the greats of black jazz for the others. Namely: Billy Strayhorn, Bud Powell and Mal Waldron. her lush, almost symphonic treatment of Strayhorn’s Lush Life is one of the most affecting interpretions of this tune my ears have ever perked up to. Some of the originals tie in with the Detroit music scene and black achievements in music and civil rights in general. A […]
THE MERCURY SACDs – SPECIAL REPORT
November 2004 – Special Feature THE MERCURY SACDs – SPECIAL REPORT Since the first five of the new Mercury Living Presence three-channel SACDs are now available everywhere and the next five have been released as I’m writing this but not yet received here, I’d like to update readers on this unusual hi-res reissue event without waiting until our December 1 issue. The general idea here is that this hi-res reissue project turned out much better than the RCA Living Stereo one, but the discs sell for the full price rather than the mid-price point of the RCAs. Part of the reason for the terrific sonics of the new hi-res Merc might be that though – as with the Living Stereos – they were not played back on the original Ampex machines with tubed electronics, the German engineers used one of Wilma Cozart Fine’s own Ampexes for constant comparison and mixing. And they really used their ears, because these transfers are nothing but superb. I’ll start with the best of the bunch so far – the Rachmaninoff Piano Concertos Nos. 2 & 3, with Byron Janis, and Antal Dorati conducting the London and Minneapolis Symphonies. Though one of the other Byron […]
Classical CD Reviews, Part 1 of 2
November 2004 – Part 1 of 2 [Part 2] GLAZUNOV: Symphony No. 5 in B-flat, Op. 55; The Seasons–Ballet, Op. 67 – Jose Serebrier conducts Scottish National Symphony Orchestra – Warner Classics 2564 61434-2 70: 31 (Distrib. WEA)****: Jose Serebrier (b. 1938), one of the more gifted of Leopold Stokowski acolytes, brings his considerable skills in color and balance to a pair of Glazunov staples, the 1895 Fifth Symphony, long a favorite of Evgeny Mravinsky, and the ever-popular ballet divertissement The Seasons of 1900. Recorded January 2004 in Henry Wood Hall, the B-flat Symphony is expansive and Germanic in the international style that Tchaikovsky had established for the Russian symphonic tradition. The internal color and instrumentation often suggests Dvorak, along with a strong sense of sonata-form. The G Minor Scherzo has a tinkling sensibility between flutes and percussion, not far from The Nutcracker and the miniature, jeweled style of Liadov. The Andante has a moody, Wagnerian character, with rich scoring and an extended melody. The finale, an Allegro–Maestoso of high, brassy energy, recalls Borodin at several moments, still retaining the national and imperial character particular to Glazunov. Very glossy playing from the Scottish National Orchestra makes this music a suave […]
Stereotypes Audio
Cembal d’amour
Pure Pleasure / Speakers Corner
Cedille
