Apple AirPods Pro 3: First Impressions

Hegel H150 Integrated Amplifier Officially Announced

Sonus faber Announces Amati Supreme Speaker

FiiO M27 Headphone DAC Amplifier Released

Audio Advice Acquires The Sound Room

LATEST ADDITIONS

Recording of the Month

Recording of June 2015: Yesterday I Had the Blues

Robert Baird May 21, 2015

José James: Yesterday I Had the Blues, The Music of Billie Holiday
Blue Note B002283102 (CD). 2015. Yoshihisa Saito, exec. prod.; Don Was, prod.; Chris Allen, eng., mix. DDD? TT: 49:33
Performance ****
Sonics *****

Unlike the conundrum of today's country music, whose lyrics celebrate family and tradition even as the country-music community ignores and disrespects the giants of the music's past, jazz and rock have for the most part remembered and celebrated their musical pioneers and game changers, and the singular, monumental virtuosity of artists like Billie Holiday.

Robert Baird

The Thrill Has Gone

Robert Baird May 15, 2015

His long, single note leads gave new meaning to the word “stinging,”

Fred Kaplan

Dave Douglas: Sound Prints & High Risk

Fred Kaplan May 15, 2015

Trumpeter Dave Douglas has two very different new albums out: Sound Prints: Live at Monterey Jazz Festival (Blue Note), featuring a Wayne Shorter tribute-band co-led by tenor saxophonist Joe Lovano; and High Risk, a collaborative excursion into electronica.

Sound Prints is also the name of the tribute band (a riff on Shorter's classic Footprints album), and, judging from the two times I've seen them play at the Village Vanguard, they're among the most vibrant, dizzying jazz bands around...

Munich 2015

Munich High End Beckons

Jason Victor Serinus May 15, 2015

As soon as one arrives in the Munich airport, days before the start of High End 2015, posters announcing the event are visible. This is no marginal show, with expectations of appealing only to a fringe group of dying, gray-haired audiophile fanatics. Rather, it is a major event, with an appeal that extends far beyond a set age group, as well as national and geographic boundaries. Extending for four daysthe first day of the show, on Thursday, May 14, is open only to the trade, which means dealers and press from all seven continents of the world are here...

Headphone Reviews InnerFidelity

The Oppo PM-3 A Competent Comfortable Mobile Headphone

Tyll Hertsens May 15, 2015

This story originally appeared at InnerFidelity.com

Third in a series of planar magnetic headphone releases from Oppo Digital, and at $399 their lowest cost entrant to date, the PM-3 is intended as a planar magnetic headphone for portable use...and it delivers.

As We See It J. Gordon Holt

The Weakest Link

J. Gordon Holt May 14, 2015

While we will not pretend for a moment that the millennium of high fidelity has arrived, we are finally having to face up to a fact that has been staring us in the face and nudging us in the ribs increasingly rudely of late: The state of the art of sound reproduction has gotten to be pretty damned sophisticated. Perfection is just as unattainable as it was almost 100 years ago when Thomas Edison was diddling with different diaphragm materials on his phonograph because some sounded better than others.

J. Gordon Holt Solid State Power Amp Reviews

Audio Research D-100 power amplifier

J. Gordon Holt May 14, 2015

We cannot recall when any new products have generated as much of a stir among perfectionists as the new solid-state equipment from Audio Research. Preceded by rumors of "a new kind of amplifying devicea cross between a tube and a transistor"the announcement of ARC's new power amp and SP-4 preamplifier elicited very mixed reactions from loyal ARC customers, some of whom gleefully anticipated a virtual revolution in audio electronics, others of whom felt betrayed by the company which, having originally convinced them that "Tubes Are Better," suddenly seemed to be doing an about-face and espousing the views of the Enemythe "Soiled-State"forces.

News

June is Bustin' Out All Over

Stereophile Staff May 14, 2015

Okay, we had a Rodgers & Hammerstein moment, but it was John Atkinson's review of KEF's bad-ass, made-in-England Blade Two loudspeaker, featured on the June 2015 issue's cover, that got us excited. And Art Dudley was also excited by the sound of another English speaker in this issue, the BBC-heritaged Super HL5plus from Harbeth. But it is AD's advice on how to audition cables that might generate the most excitement...

Historical Interviews J. Gordon Holt

Meridian's Bob Stuart

J. Gordon Holt May 13, 2015

Meridian's MCD CD player was perhaps the first audiophile-quality player to be introduced in the high-end market. I met with Bob Stuart of Meridian at the Winter Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, in January, 1986 (footnote 1). My first question was about the name of the company he runs with industrial designer Alan Boothroyd:

J. Gordon Holt: Meridian in England is called Boothroyd Stuart, right?

Bob Stuart: Yes, the company is called Boothroyd Stuart, Limited, and the trademark is Meridian.

Recording of the Month

Recording of July 1982: Callings

Margaret Graham May 13, 2015

Paul Winter: Callings
The Paul Winter Consort: Paul Winter, soprano sax, E-flat contrabass sarrusophone, conch shell; Nancy Rumbel, oboe, English horn, C contrabass sarrusophone, double ocarina; Eugene Friesen, cello; Jim Scott, classical and 12-string guitars; Ted Moore, timpani, surdos, berimbau, caixixi, pao de chuva, ganza, gongs, cymbals, triangles, handbells, whistles; Paul Halley, pipe organ, harpsichord, piano.
Recorded with the 3M Digital System in the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, New York City. Paul Winter, prod., Dixon Van Winkle, Chris Brown, engs. Additional recording by Richard Blakin and Mickey Houlihan. CD mastered by Clete Baker.
Living Music Records LMR-1 (LP). DAA. Living Music Records LD0001 (10488 00012-6) (CD). DAD. TT: 49:42.

It is hard for me to be objective about a record such as this. My very being responds to it, not only to the music but to the ideas and feelings behind it. Fortunately for me, this happens to be an excellent recording, with some extraordinary low end on it, so I need not compromise either my critical faculties or my sentiments.