LATEST ADDITIONS

Loudspeaker manufacturer Polk Audio announced on December 31 that it had acquired an interest in <A HREF="http://www.gen-tech.com">Genesis Technologies</A>, manufacturer of both loudspeakers and digital products. Not only did Polk invest $500,000 in Genesis convertible preferred securities, it also obtained a three-year option to purchase the Colorado-based high-end audio company, which is led by three industry veterans: Arnie Nudell (co-founder of Infinity), Paul McGowan (co-founder of PS Audio), and Mark S. Schifter (co-founder of Audio Alchemy).

The one-two punch known as the Holiday Season is only half finished; Christmas is simply the warmup for the biggest blowout of the year. For a successful New Year's party, the only ingredient more essential than a well-stocked liquor cabinet is an ample supple of party tunes. (Recommended accessory: a reliable CD changer. It's hard to play host and DJ at the same time.)

<B>Larry Archibald on CD:</B> <BR> This article on Compact Discs and CD players is by Doug Sax, president of Sheffield Records and a longtime opponent of digital recording. J. Gordon Holt offers a <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com//digitalsourcereviews/193/">response</A&gt; elsewhere in this issue, in which he advises readers to buy a Compact Disc player as soon as they can afford it. Gordon in general hails the Compact Disc as the greatest thing to hit audio since the stereophonic LP.

Recording and music production technology has seen enormous change in recent years. Engineers and producers now have unprecedented power to manipulate the tinest details in recordings using computers and other tools. But the process may be taking the life and soul out of music. Some feel that commercial recordings lack the spontaneity that makes live music so immediate and satisfying. Others prefer the "perfection."

Martin Colloms argues persuasively in the January 1998 <I>Stereophile</I> that negative feedback is not the panacea that amplifier designers believe it to be. His experience of an amplifier (the Cary CAD-805C) and a preamplifier (the Conrad-Johnson ART) that use no negative feedback other than local degeneration, yet have sound quality better than he has previously experienced, convinces him that even when a design's closed-loop distortion appears to be acceptably low, the listener is still aware of an amplifier's very distorted open-loop behavior.

<B>DELBERT McCLINTON: <I>One of the Fortunate Few</I></B><BR> Rising Tide RTD-53042 (CD). 1997. Gary Nicholson, Emory Gordy, Jr., Delbert McClinton, prods.; Russ Martin, Marc Frigo, engs. AAD? TT: 38:12<BR> Performance <B>****</B><BR> Sonics <B>****&#189;</B>