Several readers have been asking "What's with all of the Musical Fidelity reviews in <I>Stereophile</I>?" Michael Fremer fearlessly wires the <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com//digitalsourcereviews/838/">Musical Fidelity Tri-Vista SACD player</A> into his system, noting, "Overachievers tend to rankle people after a while."
Overachievers tend to rankle people after a while. Musical Fidelity, a relatively small British company run by Antony Michaelson, has issued a stream of high-performance, high-value electronic products over the past few years, along with a limited-edition line of pricier designs based on the military-spec nuvistor vacuum tube. With few exceptions, Musical Fidelity products have garnered outstanding reviews worldwide, with consumer acceptance to match. Michaelson is also an accomplished clarinetist, recording and issuing classical-music CDs in his "spare" time.
<I>Poetry, painting, and sculpture must lie, but they should lie with grandeur, charm, and splendor.</I>—Napoléon I
With hindsight, one of the sideways steps taken by the High End in the early 1990s was the splitting of CD players into separate transports and processors. There were good reasons for this development, not the least of which was the flowering of creativity it engendered in high-end audio engineers. Having open access to the digital audio data also made possible effective digital equalizers and room-correction processors, but in the rush to increase a system's component count, it was overlooked for too long that keeping everything in one box offered certain advantages.
I was in a jam. John Atkinson was gently reminding me of rapidly approaching deadlines, and my longtime reference CD player, the <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com//digitalsourcereviews/343/">Simaudio Moon Eclipse</A>, had just been recalled for an upgrade. This wouldn't normally have been a problem, but I was also in the middle of relocating from New Mexico to California, and all of my backup gear was either in storage or on a moving truck somewhere.
Starting with the June issue of <I>Stereophile</I>, Kal Rubinson will contribute a quarterly column on high-resolution multichannel audio. Have you converted your audio system to include surround channels?
For <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com//artdudleylistening/834/">Listening #5</A>, Art Dudley tackles audio moderation, Lowther Land, and the audio puritans spying on the nudists next door. AD also explains the statement, "Just because I have a job in the lunch line doesn't mean I have to keep serving the kid who shows off for his friends by spitting out his food."
Apple's unexpected initial success with its iTunes subscription music service shocked and pleased many in the music industry—and appears likely to prompt a rash of imitators.
Music sales in the US continue to decline, according to a May 8 report from the <A HREF="http://www.narm.com">National Association of Recording Merchandisers</A> (NARM). Retails sales totaled $8.93 billion in 2002, down from the $10.46 billion reported for 2000. Most (87%) of the organization's members reported a drop in music sales last year—only 13% posted higher totals.
A ticket to Home Entertainment 2003—The Hi-Fi and Home Theater event, to be held June 5-8, 2003 at San Francisco's Westin–St. Francis Hotel will offer attendees a chance to hear over a dozen live musical performances from great artists performing contemporary jazz, blues, rock, and classical music.