In her kittenage, before we adopted her, Bagheera was a deli cat. I don't want to psychoanalyze an animal with a brain the size of a walnut, but Bagheera <I>loves</I> cardboard boxes. She will lie on them for hours—unless we do something silly like pet her or <I>notice</I> her. Then she'll go sulk in the corner.
The great Eliane Elias put on a quite a show last night in NYC. Touring in support of her new album, <I>Something For You, Eliane Elias Sings and Plays Bill Evans</I>, the pianist, singer and longtime Evans admirer lit up Dizzy's at Jazz at Lincoln Center, which is easily one of the best–sounding rooms for live music that I've ever been in. The food in there is fairly tasty and not wildly overpriced, a total rarity on the New York jazz club scene. And that behind the stage, floor to ceiling glass that adds a Central Park West backdrops to every performance is genuinely divine. Say what you want about Wynton, but the man did make the three JALC venues happen.
It's easy to be impressed by Simaudio's Moon Evolution Andromeda Reference CD player. Everything about it oozes quality and luxury, from its imposing two-chassis configuration to the multi-component disc clamp of machined aluminum. Even surrounded by my double-decker VTL amps, <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com/turntables/506vpi">VPI HR-X</A> turntable, and Ferrari Fly-yellow <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com/floorloudspeakers/619/index8.html">Wilson Audio Sophia 2</A> speakers, the Andromeda was usually the first thing guests asked about: "How much does <I>that</I> cost?" The answer is $12,500. The Andromeda <I>should</I> look impressive.
I feel a bit remiss about not commenting on Bobby Fischer's passing. As a bookish chess-obssessed kid, I lived for his <I>Boy's Life</I> chess column and, during the "Match of the Century," I was hitchhiking to and from Iowa and the Spassky/Fischer battle of wits was always a safe topic of conversation. (1972 was ground zero for the mainstream born again movement and it seemed like half the people that picked me up wanted a conversion in exchange for the ride. Thank goodness for chess!)
I'd pay cash money to know how "Some stupid with a flare gun" translates into Japanese.
In bed the night before last, images of large and heavy loudspeakers carefully maneuvered into their old shipping cartons and up the narrow flight of stairs from JA's listening room, around a tight bend made tighter by piles of shoes and other things, and up another flight into a hall separating dining room from living room. One heavy step at a time, carefully.
I first heard a CD player in my own system in 1984 or 1985, several years before I began writing for <I>Stereophile</I>. I was curious about the Compact Disc medium—I'd read about it, had listened to CDs in stores, and was eager to hear what they sounded like in my own system. I'd even bought a CD: the original-cast recording of <I>42nd Street</I>, which I already had on LP. One evening, a friend who worked for Sony and knew that I was an audiophile brought over his latest acquisition: a CDP-501ES, the second from the top of Sony's line of CD players. He also brought along a bunch of CDs, including some solo-piano discs, and Erich Kunzel and the Cincinnati Symphony's then-famous recording of Tchaikovsky's <I>1812 Overture</I> (Telarc CD-80041).
John Atkinson sent along <A HREF="http://www.motherjones.com/commentary/tomdispatch/2008/01/beast-without… Jay Rosen article</A> about why "the media" gets stuff like primaries so wrong.
It has a fan, it won't work without a monitor, and it contains a 750GB hard drive—for some audiophiles, that's a trifecta of reasons <I>not</I> to buy the McIntosh MS750 music server ($6000).