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On a bright, warm day in September, at the memorial gathering for our colleague Wes Phillips, I overheard John Atkinson, in pre-ceremony conversation, discussing men's fashions: "What's popular these days," he said, with a degree of puzzlement that stopped short of disapproval, "is very long hair on just the top, with nothing on the sides and back." Then he added, this time with disdain, "What I don't understand is this trend where men wear dress shoes without socks—which I have actually seen!" The fact that we were in Park Slope, Brooklyn—the very jaw of the hipster possum—may have triggered…
The second great discovery took longer to unfold, but began before I'd even made it all the way home with the speakers. I paused for lunch at a rest area on the New York State Thruway, where I also opened the Tiguan's hatch, photographed the Flamencos—lying face up, side by side, taking up virtually all of the car's interior, from the rear window to the backs of the front seats—and attached the photo to a text to my wife. Within seconds, she texted back:
"Holy shit—gorgeous "
Naturally, I thought she was being sarcastic. That impression persisted until the end of the day, when…
I took another look at the blog I posted on December 21 ("The Best Jazz Albums of 2016"), a few more thoughts came to mind.
With one exception (#5, Brad Mehldau Trio, Blues and Ballads, on Nonesuch), the big labels (or even labels big by jazz standards) are absent from the list. Mainly that's because they're all but absent from jazz, or at least newly recorded jazz. Verve still has Diana Krall; Sony/Columbia has revived its Okeh' label, mainly for the likes of Bob James, but they've also signed Bill Frisell and The Bad Plus; even Nonesuch, such a thriving creative label that once recorded…
With 2016 almost behind us, there's just enough time to speak of two of the many recordings issued this year to commemorate the 400th anniversary of the death of William Shakespeare. Equally commendable, albeit radically different in the way they honor the Bard, are Shakespeare Songs (Warner Classics) from tenor Ian Bostridge and pianist Anthony Pappano (available in 24/96 from HDTracks), and Take All my Loves: 9 Shakespeare Sonnets (Deutsche Grammophon) from Rufus Wainwright and friends (available in 24/44.1 from HDTracks).
As well you might expect, Bostridge and Pappano's is the more…
Aloha, Stereophile Readers! I write to you from my childhood home on the tropical island of Oahu—my birthplace and present vacation spot until the start of CES. As Stereophile's resident Hawaii-native, I felt inspired to make a list of Hawaiian music albums. Here's a quintessential mix of five old and new favorites from the 50th state, in no particular order:
1. Israel Kamakawiwo'ole: Facing Future (1993)
This is a good place to start if you've never checked out Hawaiian music before. (Or if you're looking for something that'll sound great on your electrostatic speakers!) You…
Roughly half the size of a breadbox—remember those?—the Trenner & Friedl Sun ($3450/pair) is arguably the smallest stand-mounted loudspeaker presently available for serious home listening: only 8.5" high by 6.25" wide by 5.5" deep and weighing just 7.5 lbs. The Sun is the entry-level model from this Austrian loudspeaker manufacturer, and its ported, solid-birch cabinet is designed and built to golden-ratio proportions (footnote 1) It has a single, coaxial driver from SEAS and a crossover made by Mundorf. The Sun boasts a frequency response of 55Hz–25kHz, +0/–3dB; friends of mine have…
Bob Clarke had noted that the Suns "start to get fun at about 50Wpc. Beyond that, the more [power] the better, given equal sound quality of the amps." My Shindo Haut-Brion puts out a maximum of 22Wpc. How would the Suns fare with a lower-than-optimal amount of power?
Listening: Kuzma, PS Audio, Shindo
Could these little wonders go deep with few watts to spare? Yes and no. The Trenner & Friedl Suns cleanly produced bass notes of substance when present on the recording, and with apparently fewer watts than Clarke had said they needed. Time after time, playing everything from New…
Sidebar 1: Specifications
Description: Two-way, ported stand-mounted loudspeaker. Coaxial drive-unit: 1" (254mm) fabric-dome tweeter, 4.7" (120mm) black-anodized, aluminum-cone mid/woofer. Crossover frequency: ca 2500Hz. Frequency response: 55Hz–25kHz, +0/–3dB. Sensitivity: 82dB/2.83V/m. Impedance: 4 ohms. Recommended amplification: 30–200Wpc.
Dimensions: 8.3" (210mm) H by 6.3" (160mm) W by 5.5" (140mm) D. Weight: 7.5 lbs (3.2kg).
Finishes: Walnut nature, Walnut amaranth, Walnut mocca; others on request.
Serial numbers of units reviewed: 505A & B.
Price: $3450/pair.…
In 1999, when I first heard a Super Audio Compact Disc, I felt certain that the new format was destined for commercial dominance. Ten years later, when I first played PCM music files through a USB DAC, I felt certain that the SACD was deader than Julius Caesar's dog.
In 2016, it's apparent that I'm not qualified to predict how anything will perform in the marketplace. In my defense, I'm not the only industry bigwig who's made those mistakes; on the other hand, one happily notes that technology and commerce, those inseparable sweethearts, carried on anyway, heedless of our thudding…
Sidebar 2: Associated Equipment
Analog Sources: Kuzma Stabi S turntable & Stogi tonearm, Music Hall MMF-7.3 turntable; Denon DL-103, Goldring Elite MC, Ortofon 2M Bronze cartridges.
Digital Sources: Apple MacBook computer running Audirvana Plus; Halide DAC HD, PS Audio NuWave DACs; Western Digital T2 Mirror Drives (2).
Preamplification: Auditorium 23 A23 moving-coil step-up transformer, Heed Audio Quasar phono stage, Shindo Laboratory Allegro preamplifier.
Power Amplifier: Shindo Laboratory Haut-Brion.
Integrated Amplifier: Heed Audio Elixir.
Loudspeakers: DeVore…