I hope you'll enjoy it.
I play him as rare as I can resist in order to keep the thrill from that music fresh. Later I discovered that Paco de Lucia's performances have similar emotional effect on me.

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Pretentious? Rather critical of you. Actually, I'd call your comment offensive given Ponty's background:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Luc_Ponty

Not going to comment further.

Your dead right that was offensive. I mixed up Jean-Luc Ponty with Jean Michel Jarre. Blame it on senility.

I like acoustic bass: Ray Brown's Super Bass and Super Bass 2 (Telarc) have 3 acoustic bass players. These CD's (and I think excellent way to hear how well your system and your room acoustics can resolve midbass when all 3 are playing at once. Musically, these CD's are a lot of fine. If 3 basses are too much for you, then Brian Bromberg's "Wood" also has excellent sound.

Norah Jones' "Come Away With Me" (SACD) is wonderful. So is Sarah McLachlan's "Surfacing" (CD). A good vintage rock recording is Fleetwood Mac's self-titled 1975 album (remastered version).

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Norah Jones' "Come Away With Me" (SACD) is wonderful. So is Sarah McLachlan's "Surfacing" (CD). A good vintage rock recording is Fleetwood Mac's self-titled 1975 album (remastered version).

Sorry to say that the SACD won't sound that much different from the CD.

http://www.stereophile.com/digitalsourcereviews/1104fifth/index.html

One that is not in this list yet:

The Talking Heads: Speaking In Tongues.

And anything recorded by Rudy Van Gelder. He Da man.

My choices for top sound quality:

1) Anything on OPUS 3; I especially like the traditional jazz recordings, but they are all wonderful.

2) The EVEREST reissues are all amazing ("Corroboree"..."The Plow That Broke the Plains"...etc.)

3) "A session with Chet Atkins" RCA; mono; LP, 1954

4) The SACD reissues of the RCA Living Stereo classical recordings (even the CDs are very good...)

5) The early MERCURY CD reissues; especially "The Civil War" and "Hands Across the SEA" CDs by the Eastman Winds

6) "Cincinnati Fats" ; Fats Waller's music played by Dick Hyman on the organ of the Emory Theater of the University of Cincinnati (Musical Heritage Society)...simply an amazing recording!

7) REFERENCE RECORDINGS CDs

8) Lots of good recordings issued by Concord Jazz

9 "Will the Circle Be Unbroken, Part 2", by the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band and 20 or so other stars of folk/ country...the sonics are simply amazing, and great material too.

AND LAST...BUT CERTAINLY NOT LEAST...MY CHOICE FOR GREATEST RECORDING OF ALL TIME...

10) Beethoven's Symphony #9 by Peter Maag with the Orchestra of Venice and Padua and the Athestis Chorus. (ARTS CD 47248-2)

If you are a classical music fan, and have not heard this recording, you are missing out on a truly amazing recording with wonderful performances, enhanced by the flawless acoustics of the San Antonio Cathedral of Padua and a masterful job of engineering!

I have 16 recordings of the Ninth, and several have things to recommend them, but this one simply blows all the rest away; one can hear the soloists with immaculate clarity and purity, and hear every word sung both as soloists and in ensemble; the conducting and orchestra are also above reproach; it is simply wonderful in every aspect!

(I cannot figure out why this has not become a staple for audio demos, but I suppose that a demo simply needs to be relatively short, rather than this lengthy.)

I definitely concur with you on #4. I have two of the LS Reiner/CSO SACD's and they're excellent. I'm not familiar with the other stuff you've listed, but I'll keep my eyes (and ears) open for it.

Finally... someone else who appreciates "Rough Mix"! When I got some new speaker cables (Kimber 8VS; I HIGHLY recommend them) recently, "Rough Mix" (DualDisc, DVD-A side) was the first thing I put on. The Dire Straits and Tori Amos are good choices too.

I agree with Buddha. It's well-recorded and a great album.

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Jazz:
Miles Davis, Kind of Blue

Smooth Jazz:
3rd Force, Force Field
Paul Taylor, Hypnotic

Blues:
Boz Scaggs, Come On Home
Bugs Henderson, Have Blues...Must Rock

New Age:
Terry Oldfield, A Time For Peace (this one will really expose weakness in the highend)

Classical:
Motzart, Eine kleine Nachtmusik - Academy of St. Martin-in-the-fields - Neville Marriner,

I agree with much of the music you list BUT this sort of a list simply does not work as an answer to the question. By that I mean that there are scores of different recording of Miles out there and some sound magic while others sound like they were recorded on a Walkman.

More info is needed, like this from my references

Govi, 'Andalusian Nights', Higher Octave Music, HDCD, 1999

At least that tells folk which version of the music I consider both good and well recorded.

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I agree with much of the music you list BUT this sort of a list simply does not work as an answer to the question. By that I mean that there are scores of different recording of Miles out there and some sound magic while others sound like they were recorded on a Walkman.

JIMV - not to change the focus of the thread, but what recordings of Kind of Blue do you think are particularly good (or those that are bad/mediocre)?

I'm just really getting into Jazz, so I'm trying to figure this stuff out. It'd be nice if I had a decent "reference" recording of it.

I hate to admit this heresy, but I only have one copy

Miles Davis 'Kind of Blue', Columbia 1997 by Sony.

This is what they advertise as 'definitive'. I find it to be a good copy but not my best recorded jazz record. There may be better out there.

I'm sometimes baffled by what audiophiles consider to be "audiophile quality" CDs/LPs/SACDs/whatever.

Kind of Blue is fantastic music but I've never considered any version I've heard to be audiophile quality (LP and various CD incarnations). To me, a true audiophile quality Miles CD from that era is Someday My Prince Will Come. The LP was my sound quality reference when I was a youngster in the early 1970s. The CD I have is the Mobile Fidelity version, and it sounds fantastic. Aside - if the bass of this CD sounds boomy to you, you have a room mode problem. I was initially fooled by that with the CD.

Another "audiophile reference that shouldn't be" IMO is Dark Side of the Moon. To me, this is just a muddy-sounding mess, and there is audible analog tape flutter in the piano part of Us And Them. A Pink Floyd album that I think has fabulous sound is Wish You Were Here.

YMMV of course .

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Joshua Judges Ruth--Lyle Lovett

Yes!

Flora Purim and Airto "Humble People."

Mick Fleetwood's "The Visitor" has some great cuts.

Haydn 88 and 89 on Deutsche Grammophon vinyl from the 70's, Vienna Philharmonic conducted by Bohm. There was something special about that pressing. It was the annual catalog LP that had the DG catalog inside the gaterfold, and I think they made it an extra nice pressing.

Well, for "reference" quality, I think it should be a combination of something that sounds great and with which you have a lot of familiarity. Even if it has flaws, how those sound in the system being auditioned/tested is informative.

Of course, if you have something that sounds perfect AND you're familiar with it - that's helpful too.

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I agree with much of the music you list BUT this sort of a list simply does not work as an answer to the question. By that I mean that there are scores of different recording of Miles out there and some sound magic while others sound like they were recorded on a Walkman.

JIMV - not to change the focus of the thread, but what recordings of Kind of Blue do you think are particularly good (or those that are bad/mediocre)?

I'm just really getting into Jazz, so I'm trying to figure this stuff out. It'd be nice if I had a decent "reference" recording of it.

Kind of Blue is an odd bird even on CD. The original Columbia release on CD (CK 40579) is grainy and noisy, and sounds worse than the 1980's cassette tape I have of the album. I dug out my copy to see what the catalog number was, and note it hasn't been played since I moved into my present house-- in 2003. It's the sort of CD that made people hate digital.

The CD reissue, circa 1998, sounds much, much better (and has bonus tracks, which are damn good themselves), but shares an issue that all modern versions of the album do-- the tape speed. The original Kind of Blue album was recorded on a tape machine which was not running at the right speed, and on the one hand, this is the version Miles, and all the members of the band but Jimmy Cobb (who's still alive) knew about. On the other, it's not "reality" in that it's not the speed at which it was played in the studio, and it's also a pain in the ass if you want to jam along to the record, because nothing's in an A=440 key as a result of the deck. (And if you play an instrument and have even the slightest interest in jazz, you *will* jam along to the album at least once-- the modal structure of the music makes it the easiest jazz to improvise to that isn't prewar) To my knowledge, all of the post-1998 releases of the album, audiophile or no, use the "corrected" speed, which is slightly disconcerting to anyone with a decent sense of pitch who grew familiar with the recording during the first forty years of its existence (or even me, and I was 26 or so when the reissue came out).

That said, there have been at least 20 vinyl pressings of the album in the last 20 years, and at least a couple of audiophile CD releases as well. It's an album you tend to accumulate copies of-- I have two CDs, a prerecorded cassette tape, and I think two different LPs of Kind of Blue. I'll probably buy it again in whatever high-resolution format comes next. It's just that good. (Though I'm surprised to see it on a list of recordings by sound quality-- it's a solid 50's recording job, but not what I'd call demonstration quality. For "realistic sound" in 50's Miles, try Miles Ahead or Porgy and Bess, or the Prestige albums.)

I agree...my point was not about the choice of this music but that most classic jazz sources have multiple recordings and some are far better than others so simply saying "Kind of Blue" is not to say enough if one is talking 'reference recordings'....

I've got about 5 versions of this .. An LP bought in the 70s, a CD, and SACD (with the speed corrected), the 50th Anni box set, and the Classic 200grms LP. By far, the best sounding one is the Classic LP.