Steve Earle was born in 1967. Well, that's not exactly true. Earle was in fact born on January 17, 1955, in Fort Monroe, Virginia, but the singer, songwriter, and master interpreter's musical awakening came in 1967, when he was 12 years old, growing up in his acknowledged hometown of San Antonio, Texas.

Prism IV: Bach, Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Mahler: Symphony No.4, Žibuoklė Martinaitytė Ex Tenebris Lux and Consolations: Music by Bach, Chopin, Dushkin, Handel, Kreisler, Liszt, Massenet, and others.

Steve Cardenas/Ben Allison/Ted Nash: Healing Power: The Music of Carla Bley, Matthew Shipp Trio: World Construct and Tyshawn Sorey Trio: Mesmerism.

Madison Cunningham: Revealer, Black Midi: Hellfire and Porridge Radio: Waterslide, Diving Board, Ladder to the Sky.

In a recent answer to a reader's letter, I somewhat bluntly stated that Stereophile's reviewers use "hi-fi" adjectives to describe loudspeaker sound because even good loudspeakers are too far removed from sounding "real" to be compared directly with live music. Upon reflection, this may have sounded too dismissive, so I will elaborate a little in this short essay.