Description: Six-channel solid-state line preamplifier. Harmonic distortion at 1V: 0.003%, 20Hz-20kHz, A-weighted. Frequency response: 10Hz-100kHz, +0/-1.0dB. S/N Ratio: 115dB (20kHz LPF, A-weighted ref. 1.3V input level). Input sensitivity: 150mV. Input impedance: 20k ohms.
Price: $700. Approximate number of dealers: 500. Warranty: 5 years for original purchaser, non-transferable.
Manufacturer: Sony Electronics, 1 Sony Drive, Park Ridge, NJ 07656. Tel: (800) 222-7669. Fax: (201) 930-1000. Web: www.sel.sony.com.
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Sidebar: Specifications
"When you read...that an electronic recording has 'excellent' sound it does not mean you can use that record as a system evaluation tool," wrote J. Gordon Holt in October's "As We See It." Yet, if you are a regular reader of Stereophile, you will be aware that the magazine's equipment reviewers do make use of a considerable number and variety of recordings, including many which would appear to be totally electronic, to reach value judgments about hi-fi components.
"The pursuit of realism," Gordon continued last month, "requires that the pursuer make certain value judgments about the…
To thus allow the listener to tamper with a recording's virginity is anathema to the audiophile creed. As Keith Yates says in this issue when promoting the Gould-like vistas opened by the advent of digital signal processing, "Playback hardware is currently properly judged by how little it does to the signal rather than how much; that nothing you can do to 'enhance' a signal will be as musically compelling as just getting out of its way and letting it unfurl itself, unhindered by 'enhancers' and unsmudged by the latest 'miracle processor'."
When it comes to the music, however, George…
But when an earthbound individual takes the same amount of liberties, as in the case of the 1974 John McClure/Leonard Bernstein/LSO Mahler 2, recently reissued on CD (CBS M2K 42195), then the continuous procession of seemingly arbitrary decisions about instrumental levels and balances detracts from the musical whole rather than enhancing it, places stumbling blocks in front of the listener's ears, and must be condemned.
If it is possible, then, to make valid value judgments concerning a recording-as-art, then, even if there is no absolute reference (you don't know ultimately what the…
Yet there was something lacking. I can best categorize it as the "sense of scale," the feeling of unlimited dynamics possessed by something like the Infinity IRS V or Wilson WAMMs. Like the vista unfolding before our aerial voyeur, the image may be apparently unlimited in terms of resolution, but it is perfection in miniature. You are looking through the wrong end of a telescope.
We went out to dinner: Beijing Duck. Excellent.
The next evening I went to pay my respects to Ricardo Franassovici and his wife Francoise. Ricardo, a friend for nearly 10 years and who, like me, came to…
Even though she calls her new band, 4x4, a "small" group, it's a big band—almost too big for the stage of the Knitting Factory on the night of October 11, 2000, as it makes its first American appearance. Bley's piano is so far to stage left, she has to lean against the wall and stoop under a hanging monitor speaker to address the audience. Four music stands dominate the rest of the apron—her front line of tenor saxophone, alto saxophone, trumpet, and trombone stand shoulder to shoulder, blocking the audience's view of Larry Goldings and his Hammond B3, drummer Billy Drummond, and bassist…
"Yes, there is: Sonny Rollins! That would be incredible. I thought I had it lined up at one point, but it turned out that the group commissioning me thought I knew him and I thought they knew him and I just didn't feel I could call him out of the blue."
Bley's art depends on powerful solo voices, so a project with Rollins would, in all probability, have successfully preserved both artists' strengths. Bley writes perfect tunes for extended improvisation—long melodic lines that are seldom tricky or involve convoluted chord changes. She modestly attributes this to a lack of ability on her…
Sidebar 1: Carla Bley Recommendations
Carla Bley has been particularly fortunate in the recorded sound she has achieved through the years. Part of this stems from her grabbing the means of production early on by founding her own record label, WATT. As a result, she has been able to oversee all of the aspects of production—and, since she has her own studio installed in her upstate New York home, she has the luxury of working on a project until she deems it right.
"People don't realize that Steve Swallow has been the producer of every recording I've ever done. He knows the sound we…
Sidebar 2: A Carla Bley Discography
WATT/30: 4x4
WATT/29: Are We There Yet? (Bley/Swallow)
WATT/28: Fancy Chamber Music
WATT/27: Carla Bley Big Band Goes to Church
WATT/26: Songs with Legs (Bley/Swallow/Sheppard)
WATT/25: Big Band Theory
WATT/24: Go Together (Bley/Swallow)
WATT/23: The Very Big Carla Bley Band
WATT/21: Fleur Carnivore
WATT/20: Duets (Bley/Swallow)
WATT/17: Sextet
WATT/16: Night-Glo
WATT/14: Heavy Heart
WATT/12[1/2]: I Hate to Sing
WATT/12: Live!
WATT/11: Social Studies
WATT/09: Musique Mecanique
WATT/08: European Tour…
In the September 2001 Stereophile (Vol.24 No.9), I wrote very favorably about Polk's RT25i loudspeaker ($319.90/pair). That bookshelf model impressed me with its open, neutral midrange; its pristine, extended high-frequency response; and its low-level dynamics. On the minus side, the RT25i was fairly limited in low-bass extension and high-level dynamic slam. At the time, I was seeking a new speaker for my home computer music-composition system, and I bought the review samples—the only time I've done that since I began to write for Stereophile some 20 speaker reviews ago.
Shortly…