You're Surrounded & Chesky Records Special Deal For Stereophile Readers

We've worked out a special deal for readers to celebrate the new Chesky You're Surrounded release.

From now until September 7, 2015, readers of this website will get a 25% discount on the new 24-bit high resolution You're Surrounded album and/or anything in Chesky's hi-res catalog on HDTracks.com.

To Get Your Discount:

Click on this link and then use STEREOPHILEHD25 for the offer code when you check out.

[This offer has expired.]

Some of the Other Releases Available in the Deal:

Anything from Chesky qualifies for the 25% off including these current best sellers:
- Rebecca Pidgeon - The Raven
- Paquito D'Rivera - Portraits of Cuba
- McCoy Tyner - New York Reunion

You're Surrounded: Track List:

Track 1) "Doundounba" - Mangue Sylla and the All-star Drummers of Guinea
This is one of the greatest African percussion groups playing today. The speed and precision with which they play is startling. I was in awe at the sessions by their innate sense of time. You should hear on the left and right channels the two large Djun Djun drums (these should be at 90 degrees to the side), and the Baliphone should be in the center. In the back of the soundstage, you should hear the female singers, one on each side (left rear and right rear).

Track 2) "Wafairing Stranger" - The New Appalachians
We invited some wonderful young bluegrass players up from the Appalachians to visit our studio/church in New York and put them around the mic. The bass is 90 degrees to the right; the guitar is on the opposite side at 90 degrees to the left. The mandolin should be in the right rear of the soundstage, and vocals should be in the center. The female vocalist plays the violin as well, and she should be a little right of center.

Track 3) "Rejoice in the Lord Always" - The Cerddorion Vocal Ensemble
You will hear a four-part choir around the mic. You should be enveloped by the sound and hear all the voices coming from various places. The female sopranos should be in the left front and the female altos should be in the left rear. The male tenors are in the right front and the male basses are in the right rear.

Track 4) "Shh Peaceful" - POWERHOUSE (Wallace Roney, Bob Belden, Oz Noy, Kevin Hays, Daryl Johns, and Lenny White)
Legendary jazz producer and saxophonist Bob Belden assembled an all-star fusion band of Lenny White on drums, Oz Noy on guitar, Bob Belden on soprano sax, Wallace Rooney on trumpet, Darryl Johns on bass, and Kevin Hayes on piano. We wanted to recreate Miles Davis’ classic album "In A Silent Way" in surround. You will hear the electric guitar coming out of the right rear and the sax coming out of the left rear. Bass is 90 degrees to the right and the piano is 90 degrees hard left opposite the bass, while the drums are in the center and the trumpet is on the front right.

Track 5) "Soli" (Dunnun Kan) - Mangue Sylla and the All-star Drummers of Guinea
Once again you will hear the power and virtuosic playing of these master drummers from Guinea, Africa. The players are in the same place as track 1. Listen to the Djembe player in the left front channel.

Track 6) "Blues For Lars" - Javon Jackson and Billy Drummond
Two great jazz players exchange riffs. The drums are in the front and the sax is in the rear, a little to the left.

Track 7) "Central Park Morning" - Manhattan Brass Quintet
This is an older composition of David Chesky's that was featured on Mr. Rodgers, a children's television show in the United States. You will hear the brass quintet around you and from right to left. The first trumpet is in the right front channel and the tuba is in the right rear. Trombone in the left rear, the second trumpet is in the left front, and the French horn is in the front center.

Track 8) "John Henry" - The New Appalachians
Once again we experience the excitement of this young Appalachian band performing the classic tune "John Henry". You will still hear the players in the same place, but this time we added a banjo player that sings. Right front is the female violinist and vocalist, left at 90 degrees is the bass, right rear is the mandolin, left 90 degrees is the guitar, right front is the male banjo player and vocalist.

Track 9) "Kyrie" - The Cerddorion Vocal Ensemble
We kept the choir in the same places around the mic. You are in the center of this beautiful lyrical Acapella choral work.

Track 10) "Toccata and Ritornelli from L'Orfeo " - Manhattan Brass Quintet
This showstopper is for brass quintet and drums. You will hear the drummer in the center surrounded by the brass quintet in the same places. Right front, trumpet 1, rear right tuba, rear left trombone, left front trumpet 2 and the middle is the French horn. You will hear the sound bouncing all over the church when the drums build in volume. The ambiance should come from all around you.

Track 11) "Walking In Circles" - Javon Jackson
This is a solo work for tenor sax. You will hear Jackson walk around the binaural mic. Can you hear the sax when Jackson is behind you? You should be able to locate him in all the positions around your head as he walks around the mic, starting in the left front to left rear, to right rear and then right front and circles again.

Track 12) "Counting" - The Cerddorion Vocal Ensemble
This is a very crazy piece of music. You are in the middle of a choir and they are all counting randomly. You should really feel the room all around you as well as the singers. This track is very dynamic. The louder it gets, the more you will hear the ambiance filling the room.

Track 13) "Basketball" - Dr. Chesky and Mor Mezrich
Yes, we put you in the middle of a pick-up basketball game in New York with Dr. Chesky and his engineers. You will be in the middle of the game and hear the ball bouncing all around you. The quick impact of the ball should really give you a precise 360 location of where the ball is at all times.

Track 14) "When the Saints Go Marching In" - Wycliffe Gordon
This is a great one to end with. You will hear the Dixieland band march into the church from the rear right. Slowly they will march down the right aisle (the sound levels will increase as they approach the mic) and then walk around the front of the microphone from right to left. The band stands there for a while as they play and then exits via the left rear of the church.

COMMENTS
dalethorn's picture

I've bought a number of things from HDTracks, but I rarely go there for anything except a really unusual album I don't mind paying a lot for, when I want all or nearly all of the tracks. But they sell way too many albums loaded with "album filler"* for top price, where each track's price says "Album Only". I can buy any of their tracks from iTunes** for $1.29, and I'd be perfectly happy to give Sr. Chesky double that for a track he has that I want, but no - he won't sell individual tracks in most cases. Maybe, if his contracts with the record companies penalize or restrict him this way because he's a low-volume seller, he could reveal that information to Stereophile. Otherwise it seems like he's gouging.

*Album filler is a term I first ran into in one of the hi-fi mags of the 1970's - Audio, High Fidelity, Stereo Review, or Stereophile.

**The reason why iTunes is often preferable anyway is because you can usually compare several release versions of the same recording, from different albums, and find one that's superior to the others, where HDTracks most often has one choice only. The sonic differences between many such tracks on iTunes is usually greater than the sonic differences between 256k and high-res.

Frans's picture

Sounds a bit gimmicky since it's still a standard stereo recording albeit mixed in an exaggerated way to sound good on headphones. Does this translate to non-headphones as well, or not?

I must admit I got excited for a second when I saw the word "Surround" then to have my hopes dashed by the "binaural" prefix.

I'd love to see actual 5.1 surround recordings on HDTracks. I'd love to see some of the Audio Fidelity and Mobile Fidelity SACD (stereo and surround) releases on HDTracks. I'd subscribe to those in a heartbeat.

John Atkinson's picture
Frans wrote:
Sounds a bit gimmicky since it's still a standard stereo recording albeit mixed in an exaggerated way to sound good on headphones.

No, this is _not_ a "standard stereo recording." A binaural recording, if made with care, will give a full surround experience on headphones.

John Atkinson
Editor, Stereophile

Frans's picture

Thanks for the clarification. Looks like I was correct to assume it would not translate well to non-headphone use.

However, this has piqued my interest and I'll grab the tracks to experience this for myself!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Binaural_recording

John Atkinson's picture
Frans wrote:
Thanks for the clarification. Looks like I was correct to assume it would not translate well to non-headphone use.

If you can calibrate an individual listener's HRTF (Head-Related Transfer Function), measured at the ear-canal, you can get very effective surround sound from a stereo pair of speakers with a binaural recording, using digital signal processing. See our report on such a system at the 2015 CES at www.stereophile.com/content/bacch-sp-3d-sound-experience.

You can also find examples of binaural recordings I made at an air show at www.stereophile.com/content/meridian-audio-prime-da-headphone-amplifier. Although the image to the front remains close to the head, you do get out-of-the head imaging to the sides and behind you with headphones.

John Atkinson
Editor, Stereophile

Dr. AIX's picture

Hi John...very good explanations. Part of my Ph.D. work at UCLA all those years ago was on binaural recording. I did a bunch of projects using the Neumann "Fritz" KU-81 and my portable Nagra IV-S reel to reel machine. Getting binaural to work right in speakers is challenging...even the BACCH system is problematic in my listening.

In recording and mixing in 5.1 surround, I use lots of stereo pairs of microphones (for a more intimate sound) and then mix them into surround mixes (stage or audience). With new devices like the Smyth Room Realizer, it is possible to prepare these 5.1 mixes for delivery through standard headphones. Readers can check out "Eleanor Rigby" on YT by searching for Headphones[xi].

mlundy57's picture

While this binaural recording is for headphones, Chesky also produces recordings they call Binaural+ which provides the binaural experence over speakers as well as headphones.

I have some of the binaural+ albums and enjoy them.

X