LATEST ADDITIONS

News
Music Matters 2023 Dazzles
Jason Victor Serinus  |  Mar 13, 2023  |  1 comments

Music Matters, the mostly annual audio showcase from Definitive Audio in Seattle, made a welcome return March 8–9 after a two-year pandemic-imposed hiatus. Divided into two two-hour sessions, the 16th edition of the private, ultra-concentrated audio show in miniature saw invitees moving between 20-minute presentations in four rooms, with ample time left for visiting systems in two others and schmoozing with industry legends.

Between several national and regional product premieres, presenters at Music Matters 2023 emphasized the importance of Definitive Audio (with locations in Seattle and Bellevue) to their brands. As if to underscore the dealership's centrality, star presenters include David Steven, CEO of Cambridge, England–based dCS, audio legend Dan D'Agostino of Arizona-based Dan D'Agostino Master Systems, Mike Latvis (aka Mr. HRS) of Buffalo, New York's Harmonic Resolution Systems), and Garth Leerer of Musical Surroundings, which imports and distributes Clearaudio.

Continue Reading »
Revinylization
Revinylization #40: Beck & Croz
Robert Baird  |  Mar 13, 2023  |  4 comments
Turns out rock stars are human after all. Which means music fans should prepare themselves for the coming toll. The next few years are certain to be brutal: Bob Dylan, 81; Paul Simon, 81; George Clinton, 81; Brian Wilson, 80; Carole King, 80; Keith Richards, 79; Jimmy Page, 79; Sly Stone, 79; Rod Stewart, 78; Neil Young, 77; Pete Townsend, 77, and the inexorability rolls on. The news is even worse among the pre-rock era stars, where it's a matter of any day now: Tony Bennett, 96; Burt Bacharach, 94; Sonny Rollins, 93. Even the ageless one, Willie Nelson, is 86.

January 2023 was a particularly cruel harbinger of the reckoning to come as guitar legend Jeff Beck and folk rock icon David Crosby died within eight days of each other.

Continue Reading »
Analog CornerTonearm ReviewsTurntable Reviews
Analog Corner #259: Audio Union Döhmann Helix 1 turntable and Schröder CB tonearm
Michael Fremer  |  Mar 10, 2023  |  First Published: Mar 10, 2017  |  7 comments
The ability to fine-tune a vinyl playback system is part of what makes it possible to combine an archaic technology with modern thinking and materials to create musical magic, and take listeners to new heights of ecstatic musical pleasure. It's why so many young people are tuning in to vinyl, and helps explain why just today, as I write this, it was announced in the UK that, for the first time, revenues from sales of vinyl exceeded those from downloads.
Continue Reading »
Music and Recording Reviews
March 2023 Jazz Record Reviews
Robert Baird, Thomas Conrad, Kurt Gottschalk  |  Mar 09, 2023  |  0 comments
The Necks: Travel; Arild Andersen Group: Affirmation; Ahmad Jamal: Emerald City Nights: Live at The Penthouse 1963–1964; Benjamin Lackner: Last Decade; Simona Premazzi: Wave in Gravity.
Continue Reading »
Music and Recording Reviews
March 2023 Classical Record Reviews
Jason Victor Serinus, Stephen Francis Vasta  |  Mar 09, 2023  |  0 comments
Rimsky-Korsakov: Scheherazade; Schubert: Piano Trios • Notturno • Rondo • Arpeggione Sonata; Elgar: Viola Concerto & Suite for Viola & Orchestra; Johann Sebastian Bach: The Well-Tempered Consort—III.
Continue Reading »
Music and Recording Reviews
March 2023 Rock/Pop Record Reviews
Robert Baird  |  Mar 09, 2023  |  0 comments
Margot Price: Strays, Loma Vista Records (16/44.1 WAV download; also available on CD, LP, cassette tape)
Continue Reading »
InterviewsMusic and Recording Features
Rachael and Vilray: Carrying a Torch
Tony Scherman  |  Mar 08, 2023  |  6 comments
As Vilray Bolles marched down Manhattan's Second Avenue on a rainy afternoon late in 2014, participating in a demonstration against police brutality, he slipped on the wet pavement, fell hard on his right hand, and broke his pinky. For a guitarist, a broken finger can be a major, if not catastrophic, setback. But the gods were smiling on Bolles. He was, in fact, a lapsed guitarist, having all but abandoned hopes of a musical career, and the universe was giving him a nudge, not just back into music but into a collaboration with Rachael Price, one of contemporary pop's great vocalists, who, when she isn't singing cabaret jazz with Bolles, fronts the headlining rock band Lake Street Dive.
Continue Reading »
Budget Component ReviewsHeadphone Reviews
Apple AirPods Pro 2 noise-canceling, wireless, in-ear headphones
Rogier van Bakel  |  Mar 07, 2023  |  16 comments
You won't see many Apple products in these pages, and for good reason. As Stereophile Editor Jim Austin wrote to me recently in an email, "Apple may have the best acoustic-design facilities in the world, but its products are designed by engineers who don't seem to respect perfectionist sound—which is appropriate for a company that aims for the vast middle of the bell curve." Has that changed?
Continue Reading »
CanJam NYC 2023
NYC CanJam Report #3
Herb Reichert  |  Mar 06, 2023  |  2 comments

I mentioned in my CanJam NYC intro that CanJams offer more than just networking and headphone auditions. (You can read part 2 here.) They are also good places, I noted, to access the house sound of virtually every good DAC and amplifier that will fit on a tabletop.

Continue Reading »
Tube Power Amp Reviews
Zesto Bia 200 Select power amplifier
Ken Micallef  |  Mar 03, 2023  |  9 comments
Like many other industries, audio has its power couples: behind-the-scenes movers-and-shakers who shape the trajectory of the industry and who also happen to be, well, together. Angela Cardas and Josh Meredith of Cardas Audio come to mind, as do Dave and Carol Clark of Positive Feedback, Eli and Ofra Gershman of Gershman Acoustics, Luke Manley and Bea Lam of VTL, Carl and Marilyn Marchisotto of Nola Speakers, Edwin and Gabi van der Kley-Rynveld of Siltech and Crystal Cable. George and Carolyn Counnas of Zesto Audio are a hi-fi power couple I'm especially fond of; I'm always happy to see them at shows, catch up with them on the phone, or exchange emails with them. Their sweet demeanor and good vibrations always lift my spirits.

George designs Zesto's preamplifiers, power amplifiers, phono stages, and step-up transformers, while Carolyn, a talented fine-art painter, gives Zesto's products their unique organic curves...

Continue Reading »

Pages

X