LATEST ADDITIONS

To celebrate Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day and the recent Women's March, we turn the spotlight on Symphonies Nos.1 & 4 of Florence Beatrice Price (1887–1953), the first African American woman to have her music performed by a major American orchestra. In doing so, I extend a big thank you to Naxos, whose invaluable American Classics series continues to record works by American composers both famous and relatively unknown.

January 26 & 27: Florida retailer Bending Wave USA (10404 West State Road 84, Suite 101, Davie, FL 33324) is holding a Grand Opening celebration, featuring loudspeakers and cables from Göbel High-End in Germany and electronics from CH Precision.

When we premiered this feature in 1991, we felt that, rather than a selection of all-time (or year's) best recorded performances or a list of audiophile reference albums, we should choose recordings that were, in then music editor Richard Lehnert's words, "both musically and sonically impeccable—in other words, the best, the tops, to die for." As RL went on, "such a list also makes for some strange procrustean bedfellows—obscure recordings that would never make the proverbial 'desert island' list snuggling up next to towering classics of the concert hall and control room."

That's the question raised by Antheil: Orchestral Works (Chandos 10982), the latest anthology of symphonic music by composer/pianist George Antheil (1900–1959). This second Antheil title from John Storgårds and the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra finds Storgårds exploring music written on both sides of Antheil's successful Symphony No.4, which can be found on Vol.1 of what looks to be an ongoing Antheil series.

The Beatles: The Beatles—50th Anniversary Edition
Apple B0028831-01 (2 LPs). 1968/2018. George Martin, orig. prod.; Geoff Emerick, orig. eng.; Giles Martin, reissue prod., remix; Sam Okell, reissue eng., remix; Miles Showell, mastering. ADA. TT: 93:27
Performance *****
Sonics *****

The Beatles, aka the "White Album," was first released on November 22, 1968. On November 9, 2018, in honor of that event, Apple Corps Limited issued the new 50th Anniversary Edition. My comments here refer to listening to the two-LP edition of the newly remixed The Beatles, pressed for Apple by Quality Record Pressings. Also included in three other varying editions are 27 of what are now known as the Esher Demos, 50 out-takes and alternate takes, and a 5.1-channel hi-rez surround mix on BD.

Hitting newsstands, mailboxes, and tablets today, the February Stereophile features its renowned "Records2Die4" feature, now in its 28th year! The magazine's editors and writers each recommend two recordings that they couldn't live without—the 46 albums reviewed this month would be the basis of a great audiophile music collection. Ayre's EX-8 "Integrated Hub" amplifier is featured on the cover and also reviewed in this issue are speakers from Revel and Audio Physic; amplifiers from Air Tight, CH Precision, and First Watt; and tonearms from Swedish Analog Technologies and Sorane. And don't miss Herb Reichert's account of his visit last fall to amplifier maven Nelson Pass.

By Day Three of four-day CES 2019, reality had set in for most of the few high-end audio exhibitors who set up shop in the Venetian: the curtain has closed on CES as "the place" for high-end audio product introductions and business transactions. Several of the smaller companies I spoke with were already done with waxing nostalgic on the glory days of CES—an era when there were so many distributors, dealers, and journalists clogging the hallways and rooms that some exhibitors had to either close up shop at the factory or recruit extra help to cater to everyone. After wiping tears from their eyes, they had decided to move on.