The recorded music industry may be emerging from the gloomiest period in its history. US disc sales have picked up for the first time in more than four years, and the global market for legal downloads is up by a factor of 10 from a year ago.
<A HREF="http://www.audioasylum.com">Audio Asylum</A>, in association with <A HREF="http://www.audiogon.com">Audiogon</A>, is sponsoring an online auction for the benefit of victims of the recent earthquakes and tsunami in Asia.
Like the audio exhibits at the CES earlier this month in Las Vegas, the NAMM show in Anaheim, California is all about the passion for, and the business of, music. Or, to put it another way, both shows are about making music.
Do you still listen to the radio? With regular FM stations coming in for heavy criticism and satellite, Web, and cable radio readily available, we're wondering how or if you generally listen to broadcast music.
The modification of disc players is a hot topic on the various audio newsgroups, where the discussion includes do-it-yourself options and the recommendations of commercial modifiers. These range from tweak guys to such serious engineering firms as EMM Labs and everything in between. Not surprisingly, the objects of these endeavors are usually players made by one of the electronic behemoths: Sony, Philips, Technics, Toshiba, etc. In fact, it was just such a discussion that precipitated John Atkinson's purchase of and <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com/digitalsourcereviews/904simaudio/index1.html… comments</A> on a stock Toshiba 3950 player, a popular target of modifiers.
My normal practice in seeking out contenders for Affordable Speaker Nirvana is to pursue speakers I stumble across at our Home Entertainment shows, and to keep tabs on new designs from manufacturers whose wares have impressed me in the past. This time, however, editor John Atkinson called me out of the blue: "How would you like to review the Amphion Helium<SUP>2</SUP> loudspeaker? It's the entry-level speaker in a Scandinavian speaker line distributed by Stirling Trayle of Quartet Marketing."
Yamaha once made a loudspeaker shaped like an ear. I felt sorry for the guy (especially if he was an audiophile) who had to write the ad copy explaining why a speaker shaped like an ear would sound better than one shaped like a shoebox or a wedge of cheese. An ear-shaped loudspeaker makes about as much sense as an eyeball-shaped television. But what about a loudspeaker that is designed like a musical instrument?
Giuseppe Verdi gave the world more than two dozen operas, some good sacred music, and one string quartet. He also provided the young Arturo Toscanini with one of his first big breaks—conducting the singing of "Va pensiero" at his burial procession—and gave the flagship consumer product from England's dCS Ltd. its name. That the latter two gestures were posthumous and unwitting does nothing to diminish their poetry.
The <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com/news/010505ces">Consumer Electronics Show</A> (CES) in Las Vegas is not the only major electronics event held in early January each year. Apple Computer and allied companies throw their own specialty shindig more or less concurrently.
The new year got off to a litigious start as the audio industry's seemingly endless battle against the gray market continued with a pair of federal lawsuits.