search

Book Review: Norman Granz: The Man Who Used Jazz for Justice

Norman Granz: The Man Who Used Jazz for Justice
By Tad Hershorn. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2011. 470pp. Hardcover, $34.95.

One night in 1942, Billie Holiday was singing at a Los Angeles nightclub. Between sets, she crossed the street to have a drink with Norman Granz. She was in tears because some black friends who had come to hear her had been turned away.

Granz was then 23, on the cusp of a career that would make him one of the jazz world's most important concert promoters and record producers, as well as an effective advance man for racial integration. He…

The Entry Level #16

"How many new records did you buy today, Stephen?"

It was New Year's Eve, and our large group of friends occupied the entire ground floor of our favorite restaurant, Jersey City's Satis Bistro. We had already been presented with a beautiful buffet of meats, cheeses, and breads, and now more appetizers were being served. A waiter placed before me the world's most delicious date, stuffed with gorgonzola, wrapped in bacon, and baked to perfection. I immediately stabbed it with my fork and popped it in my happy mouth. I chewed, savored, silently wished that I could make this moment last…

The Entry Level #16 Page 2

She handed me the record. It was one of the strangest things I've ever seen, and it was clearly awesome: Wilderness Road's Sold for Prevention of Disease Only, from 1972 (LP, Warner Bros. MS 2125). The cover shows four hairy men—the band, presumably—dressed in suits of metallic silver, black, and gold. They're standing at the counter of a futuristic pharmacy, I suppose, and I guess they're shopping for condoms. (As I write these words, I've got the album in front of me; it defies description.) I pulled the record from its gatefold jacket and noticed that it was a white-label promo. It was…

The Entry Level #16 Contacts

Sidebar: Contacts

Audio Intelligent Vinyl Solutions
Osage Audio Products LLC
PO Box 232
Hallsville, MO 65255
Tel: (573) 696-3551
Web: www.audiointelligent.com

Vinyl Flat LLC
PO Box 524
Rose City, TX 75189
Tel: (469) 426-8554
Web: www.vinylflat.com

Happy Record Store Day 2012

Today is officially Record Store Day. Go out and visit your local record store. Here's a short film to get in the mood.

April 2012 Record Reviews: Streamed Selections

Stereophile is not all about reviewing hi-fi, and thanks to our all-knowing and thrill-seeking Music Editor, Robert Baird, we cover exciting new releases in each monthly issue for you to consider on your hi-fi escapades. In this post, I listen to all records we reviewed available on streaming services MOG and Spotify from our April 2012 issue, provide my own two-cents, and link to the playlists from the two services. With a premium account, one can stream at 320kbps Ogg Vorbis files from Spotify, and MOG users can stream 320kbps MP3s for free!

******

Links:
The MOG April 2012…

P.S. and a Correction on the Vijay Iyer Trio

I saw the Vijay Iyer trio at Birdland in midtown Manhattan two weeks ago. It was a great show. Most of the songs were from the band's new CD, Accelerando (which I raved about in my March 31 blog post), some were from earlier albums; all were riveting. The trio weaves in and out of patterns with a swinging agility. Iyer plays piano with precision yet gusto; he could have been a master interpreter of Liszt or Ligeti, had he chosen that direction. If you have a chance to hear this group live, take it.

But my main purpose here is to correct something I wrote in that earlier post about the…

Now on Newsstands: Stereophile, Vol.35 No.5

Wabaam! Another month, another Stereophile. My how time flies when you are reviewing hi-fi.

Compared to the enormous April issue that hosts our chunky Recommended Components listing, May is petite but still packs a powerful punch loaded with insights and audio enhancers. Enhancers you ask? What might those be? Well how about bell bronze gongs! And magic fuses! And audio to make you cream…I mean, P.W.B.’s Electret Cream, which according to AD, just might work if you rub it in the right place.

In the office, we were expecting the April issue to really cause a hubbub on our…

"If it sounds good..."

"...and measures bad, then you're measuring the wrong thing!" If one motto could sum up this magazine's philosophy, this would be it. Too many times we have discovered components that sounded musically fabulous while offering measured performance that was, at best, merely competent. Yet recently, I'm starting to lose confidence in that old saw.

On a number of occasions, I or another of Stereophile's reviewing team has heard a product sounding flawed in ways later revealed by measurements. A closed story, you might think—but consider the NEAR-50M loudspeaker reviewed by Dick Olsher in this…

Recording of January 1988: Renaissance

Branford Marsalis: Renaissance
Branford Marsalis, tenor & soprano sax; Kenny Kirkland & Herbie Hancock, piano; Bob Hurst & Buster Williams, bass; Tony Williams, drums
CBS FC 40711 (LP). Dennis Ferrante, Bob Margoleff, Howard Siegel, engs.; Delfeayo Marsalis, prod. DDA. TT: 57:09

These are heady days for those who believe that jazz may have reached its height in the mid- to late '60s, before its disastrous 15-year romance with fusion. With such strong new talents as the Marsalis and Brecker brothers and Chico Freeman embracing the spirit of that time, and fusion-…