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Happy <I>Kind of Blue</I> Day!

On August 17, 1959—50 years ago exactly—Columbia Records released Miles Davis’ Kind of Blue, which became not only the best-selling jazz album of all time but also one of the best jazz albums, period, the spearhead of the “modal” revolution.

For an elaboration of why Kind of Blue is such a great and revolutionary recording, see my column in Slate today (with illustrative sound clips included).

But for you readers of Stereophile blogs, most of whom know a lot about that sort of thing anyway, let’s deal with the important question: which LP and CD pressings of this album are the…

Happy Birthday, <i>Kind of Blue</i>

I now own it on vinyl, too, of course, but four years ago, John Atkinson presented me with the SACD/CD dual-disc. It quickly cured my headaches and has remained one of my very favorite albums. Listening to it at least once a month keeps my mind and body healthy.

The Jazz Messenger informs us that today is Kind of Blue's 50th birthday. The album was released on August 17, 1959. (Fred Kaplan knows just about everything there is to know about 1959, by the way.) Happy birthday, Kind of Blue.

For last year's 50th Anniversary set, Legacy Recordings put together this nice…

A Few Things, Quickly, Then:

The sky over Madison Avenue is a sliver of summer blue. Steam sighs and whirls up and out from the old street like a thin white curtain in the wind. A few things, quickly, then:

1. We're working on the Buyer's Guide. By around 7pm tonight, I will be blind with numbers and bullets, "Y"s and "N"s and dollar signs spotting my vision like black and white floaters. Times like this, I really need an assistant.

2. Our summer intern, Ariel Bitran, left us a few months ago. Got a full-time job out in Brooklyn somewhere, doing something surprisingly similar to what he used to do…

Computer Audio @ SSI

The Computer Audio 2010 seminar on Saturday was very well-attended—I barely managed to get a seat. The presentation was by Steve Silberman of Ayre Acoustics, with technical commentary by John Atkinson. Silberman took an admirably generic and non-partisan approach, barely mentioning Ayre products, and refusing to answer the question "Should I get a Mac or a PC?" I've taken a wait-and-see approach to the whole computer audio subject, and Silberman did not convince me it's time to introduce a computer into my audio system, but I must say that he did an excellent job of describing the…

Roast The Editors

The Stereophile Ask the Editors session at Shows—in which John Atkinson (left), Art Dudley (center), Stephen Mejias, and I fielded questions from the audience at SSI—in something that I enjoy a lot, and so, I know, do JA, AD, and SM. Through the years, I've learned that it's almost impossible to anticipate what the questions will deal with. And that was certainly true this time. The questions covered a wide range of topics: why are there so few active speakers on the market; why doesn't Stereophile review more vintage equipment; what system that we've heard (at the show or elsewhere)…

Monitor Audio's RX8

The affordable Monitor Audio Silver RS6 has been a long-term recommended loudspeaker at this magazine since Bob Reina reviewed it in March 2006. The English manufacturer recently replaced its "S" series with "X" models, which feature revised drive-units, better internal bracing, and lacquer finishes. The benefits of the changes are said to be better low-frequency definition and deeper bass extension. Being demmed at SSI was not the replacement for the RS6 but the larger Silver RX8 ($1750/pair in standard finsih, $2000/pair in black or white gloss). With the RX8s driven by a Simaudio…

Bauer-Ayre-Sonus Faber

The smaller room operated by Montreal retailer Son-or-Filtronique was a little on the small side for the bass perfomance of the Sonus Faber speakers, driven by a pair of Ayre's mighty MX-R monoblocks, the midrange and highs were sweet and musical -sounding, whether the source was the MacBook seen in the photo driving the Ayre QB-9 USB DAC or the acrylic-plattered Bauer dps turntable that Art Dudley favorably reviewed in the Show (April) issue of Stereophile.

Acrylic platters are much misunderstood, Ayre's Steve Silberman explained to me. Acrylic offers a good match to the vinyl LP'…

Son-or-Filtronique

Son-or-Filtronique was celebrating its 41st year of being in business at SSI and the retailer's larger room featured Verity Sarasto Mk.2 speakers driven by Audio Research Reference 210 tube monoblocks—love those green power meters—and the relatively new Audio Research Reference Five preamplifier. Source was the fully-loaded, four-box dCS Scarlatti SACD/CD player that Michael Fremer reviewed last August. (My apologies S-or-F, but I didn't note the cables being used.) This was the last room I visited at SSI and all my notes said was "Wow!" So that's all I have to say here.

dCS-Nagra-Verity

Take a dCS Scarlatti digital front end ($68,000), combine it with a pair of Nagra VPA tube amplifiers ($20,000/pair, pictured), and a pair of the new Verity Audio Amadis loudspeakers ($29,995) and you'll have a pretty good-sounding system, right?

No! You'll have a great-sounding system—at least Verity Audio did at SSI 2010. Having a good-sized room certainly helped; in any case, this was one of the best-sounding systems at the show. When I was there, they were using a recording made at the Montreal Jazz Festival, played back through a hard drive-based Nagra VI six-channel digital…

Regardezpas des câbles avec Micromega's Airstream

I had been impressed by Micromega's Airstream, the WiFi-connected DAC ($1595), when Jason Serinus and I heard it at Axpona at the beginning of March. But it was the French company's new owner, Didier Hamid, who caught showgoers' attention with the Airstream at SSI. Holding his MacBook Pro in his hand and playing songs from iTunes, Hamid dramatically demonstrated the benefits of doing away with wires. (The rest of the system included Focal 1038Be speakers driven by Micromega amplification; control of volume was provided by the iTunes level control on the laptop.)

The Airstream…