Goldberg Variations – Acoustica, 3D Blu-ray
Six-performer improvisation on Bach’s masterpiece
Performers: AIX All Star Band = Dean Parks, elec. guitar; Laurence Juber, acoustic guitar; Jim Cox, B3 & piano; Kevin Axt, doublebass; Alberto Lopez, percussion; MB Gordy, drums
Studio: AIX Records 86060
Video: 16:9 color 1280x720i HD, 2D or 3D options
Audio: Dolby TrueHD 5.1, option of “Stage” or “Audience” perspective, DD.5.1, PCM Stereo
Extras: Channel ID 5.1 Test, 3D music album details
Length: 53 minutes
Rating: ****
This is the very first music 3D Blu-ray release and the first to use Dolby TrueHD lossless codec on the soundtrack. It is only the second 3D Blu-ray release period, following on the heels of the animated feature Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs. Several more 3D Blu-rays will be coming from AIX soon – a label with the highest technical standards, who have jumped on the opportunity to provide no compromise hi-res surround along with the ultimate in current home video, 3D HD. All of their releases are recorded visually and aurally in their own studio and produced especially for these Blu-rays. The option for playing back the BD-J encoded 3D version of the visuals doesn’t appear on standard Blu-ray players (you only see the right eye output), but several of the new 3D Blu-ray players are compatible with it and others will have their firmware shortly updated. Then upon insertion the 3D option will appear on the screen.
This is basically the same sextet of musicians as heard on the previous AIX Blu-ray, Pachelbel Canon Acoustica. The idea is for these skilled studio players to re-interpret and improvise on the baroque masterpieces in styles that range from quiet drifting sound collages to driving, rhythmic and jazzy improvisations. The subject of the first session was variations on the overly-familiar Pachelbel theme which has somehow become accepted (there’s obviously no accounting for public taste) as the most popular theme of the baroque period.
This time around it is both the main Aria theme of J.S. Bach’s masterpiece The Goldberg Variations, as well (I suppose) as the many variations which Bach composed on that simple theme. At least a paragraph about Bach’s original work might have been useful in the note booklet or onscreen. The disc has 14 variations following the Aria plus a closing Quodlibet. But they are not identified onscreen.
Does it work? Well, there are many positive things about it: The performers are excellent and the audio pickup is superb thruout. The variety of sounds from the six performers is quite astonishing. Bassist Kevin Axt is especially creative in some of his solos. And of course the video coverage adds immensely to one’s interest in the proceedings – which we’ve found with all music videos on Blu-ray. However, musically, I personally found it extremely frustrating. It frequently sounded like the sextet was slowly building up to a real gangbuster and swinging improvisation on one of Bach’s masterpiece themes such as the opening of the D Minor Harpsichord Concerto or the D Minor Two-Violin Concerto – something in roughly the style of the Jacques Loussier Trio. But it never happened. And the quieter sections sometimes seemed to be just passing the time with a few little fillips on each instrument until it was time to get a bit more active.
– John Sunier
