Small Town Story – Zhang Ling Ling’s Gu Zheng Musical World – Zhang Ling Ling, Gu Zheng – M•A Recordings M077A – One Point 5.6448 Megahertz WSD 1 bit digital recording (Red Book CD), 52 min. ***** [Distr. by Allegro]:
M•A Recordings really pushes the One Point 5.6448 Megahertz aspect of these two recordings of traditional Chinese music. However, there’s no mention of the recording technique in either the accompanying booklets or on M•A’s website to explain or tout the virtues of the practice. Some Googling quickly revealed that the 5.6 Megahertz 1 bit digital recording is essentially the same process used to produce SACDs; the disc is essentially an SACD without the SACD layer. I could find nothing, however, that referenced the One Point aspect of the recordings, so I can only assume that a single point microphone was employed to capture the very realistic soundfield presented on these excellent discs. The discs are also unusual in that they are manufactured using M•A’s Emerald Audiophile Series process, which uses a green colored polycarbonate, much in the same way that products such as CD Stoplight use the color green to impact laser light refraction for “improved sound.” I don’t know whether the combination of everything contributes to the sterling sound quality of these releases, but they definitely do sound superb.
From the massive opening drum crash from “The Marriage Journey” on the disc Sorrow of the River, it’s obvious that these discs are something very special, especially for Red Book CDs. The bulk of Sorrow’s music revolves around the Suo-na, a sort of Chinese traditional oboe that has a beautiful but often quite piercing quality. I’d be very careful of playing this disc too loudly out of the gate until you find a comfortable listening level. Guo Ya-zhi is obviously a master of the instrument, but I could only handle limited exposure to the Suo-na (much in the same way I can only take John Coltrane on soprano sax in limited doses). Fortunately there’s enough variety on the disc with many of the tunes including a mixture of traditional Chinese instruments and percussion to make for an entertaining listen.
The second M•A disc here, Zhang Ling Ling’s Small Town Story, doesn’t pack the dynamics of Sorrow, but is remarkable in its own right. Its focus instrument, the Gu Zheng, is a large-scale stringed Chinese traditional zither of sorts, and Ling Ling is also a master of the genre. While the music is a mixture of traditional Chinese music with more contemporary songs, it maintains a spirit of authenticity throughout. Several of the songs contain vocals, and they’re surprisingly well rendered – not at all the screechy quality that you may associate with some Asian vocal performance. And some of the playing is drop dead gorgeous, particularly on “Butterfly Lover’s Story” and “Autumn Moon on Placid Lake.”
If you have any love for traditional Chinese music, you’d be hard pressed to find a more impressive pair of discs. Very highly recommended!
— Tom Gibbs
