LATEST ADDITIONS

Henry Threadgill should be better known than he is. A topnotch musician on alto sax and flute, one of the more innovative composers in jazz, a veteran of the Chicago avant-garde and a revivalist of ragtime improvisational styles (the two are not so contradictory, as he was the first to demonstrate), Threadgill started out on small labels, briefly landed contracts at RCA Novus and Columbia during their brief flirtations with experimentalists (in the late ‘80s and mid ‘90s, respectively), then went back to the indies—all the while retaining, even advancing, his spirit of adventure and his restless but disciplined innovation.

<B>Beethoven: <I>Piano Concertos 1&#150;5</I></B><BR>
Paul Lewis, piano; Jir&#237; Belohl&#225;vek, BBC Symphony Orchestra<BR>
Harmonia Mundi 902053.55 (3 CDs). 2010. Martin Sauer, prod.; Philip Knop, eng. DDD. TT: 2:55:42<BR>
Performance *****<BR>
Sonics *****

"Is it live or is it recorded?"

Speaking of old formats, one major appeal that is lost with downloads is packaging. Or are those packages just waste? How important is the packaging (liner notes, album art, etc.) that comes with physical formats?

DeVore Fidelity Gibbons, in cherry and bamboo and rosewood cabinets, in all shapes and sizes and states of life. Some of these little sweethearts may never see the light of day, while others may wind up in the home of some happy music lover.

It doesn't take a genius to appreciate the audacity of naming a company after Albert Einstein, the iconic science and math whiz. Clearly, company founder and owner Volker Bohlmeier knew what he was doing—this German brand of boutique electronics has enjoyed worldwide critical and marketplace success since its founding more than 20 years ago.

On Saturday, November 6, John DeVore of <a href="http://www.devorefidelity.com/">DeVore Fidelity</a> hosted a <a href="http://www.monkeyhaus.net/">Monkeyhaus Listening Party</a> at his Brooklyn Navy Yard factory. If not for the pictures, a selection of which I’ll post over the next three days, I might not remember the event at all&#151not because the party was forgettable, but because we had <i>so much</i> fun.