The Allman Brothers Band: Manley Field House, Syracuse University, April 7, 1972
ABB Recording Company (auditioned as CD). 2023. The Allman Brothers Band, prods.; Jason NeSmith, eng.
Performance *****
Sonics ****
In 1971, the Allman Brothers Band was mourning the passing of guitarist and leader Duane Allman. They decided that the best place to properly grieve was on the road, moving forward with the musical vision he had created. As a five-man band (Gregg Allman on vocals and keyboard, Dickey Betts on guitar, Berry Oakley on bass, and drummers Butch Trucks and Jaimoe), they…
Jim Snidero: For All We Know
Snidero, alto saxophone; Peter Washington, bass; Joe Farnsworth, drums.
Savant SCD-2215 (CD). 2024. Snidero, prod.; Kent Heckman, eng.
Performance ****½
Sonics ****
Jim Snidero is a veteran of the jazz wars. Arriving in New York in 1981, at age 23, he was a sideman in important bands and produced 26 recordings as a leader. But until For All We Know, he had never made a saxophone trio album. That's surprising given that Snidero is known as both a master and a scholar of the alto saxophone. No format can shine a light on the instrument like a…
Dr. Feickert Analogue's top-of-the line turntable, the Firebird ($12,500; footnote 1), is a generously sized record player designed to easily accommodate two 12" tonearms. Its three brushless, three-phase DC motors, arranged around the platter in an equilateral triangle, are connected to a proprietary controller in a phase-locked loop (PLL); according to the Firebird's designer, Dr. Christian Feickert, a reference signal from just one of the motors drives all three—thus one motor is the master while the other two are slaves. (Man, today that is politically incorrect, however descriptively…
Smooth Sound: The Firebird's sound gave me a sensation of gliding smoothness and a sophistication of leading-edge transients. It avoided rough, hard edges as well as oversmoothed transients, but it definitely leaned toward the latter.
Tonally, the Firebird had a pleasing neutrality, and excelled in the midrange, which was particularly rich and full bodied. High- and low-frequency extension were very good, but in my opinion, well-damped metal platters produce more crystalline, more precisely drawn highs, and a more concentrated and impactful bottom end, with decays that plunge faster into…
Distributor Aldo Filippeli of the Luxury Audio Group sure knows how to get the press’s attention. Schedule a room in the Convention Center that he can set up beforehand, invite the press to hour-long sessions before the show begins, and ensure that we come away fulfilled. When Alexander Vitus Mogensen, CEO of Vitus Audio, quipped, “This is the best sounding room at the show right now!” he was telling the truth. In all honesty, if it doesn’t turn out to be one of the top five best sounding rooms at AXPONA 2024, if not the very best, I’ll be surprised.
Last year, the total cost of…
It felt so strange to arrive at the Schaumburg Hotel and Convention Center outside Chicago on Wednesday evening, 38 hours before AXPONA (Audio Expo North America) was set to begin. For the largest audio show in the United States, things were unusually quiet. While a few exhibitors could set up early in the Convention Center, most everyone else couldn’t start until Thursday morning. Which left the first-floor hotel lobby, the gateway to the bar, Starbucks snack area, and large restaurant strangely empty. Hence my camera’s ability to focus on crystal and shine rather without the faces of…
On Thursday night, Chris Shaw, one of Focal’s setup men, was having a tough time. He’d almost finished dialing in the 584-lb Focal Grande Utopias EM Evo speakers, but their bass (–6dB at 14Hz) caused a ceiling light fixture in the large Focal/Naim room to rattle. Shaw pushed a printed show banner out of the way to make space for a ladder. A few minutes later, thanks to some sticky tape, the distracting noise was gone. But annoyingly, something else now sounded off. The music’s soundstage had partially collapsed.
Shaw took a deep breath and a 15-minute break. Surveying the room…
Meeting up with Tone Imports’ Jonathan Halpern and Pitch Perfect Audio’s Matthew Rotunda was like a family reunion for me. Along with John DeVore and Twittering Machines’ Michael Lavorgna, Halpern is one of my oldest friends and audio guides. His east coast (or Midwest) appearances are rare since he restationed himself in the sunny California desert. His and Rotunda’s ability to assemble a beautiful sounding system remains the same as it ever was.
An Audio MusiKraft MC Phono Cartridge / Bronze ($3650) was mounted on a Dynavector DV507mkII Tonearm ($7250) on a DV500 Turntable ($…
The amiable and loquacious Jason Zidle is a product manager at Lenbrook, the Canadian company behind NAD and Bluesound. Lenbrook also imports Denmark’s storied DALI speakers. At the Renaissance hotel in Schaumburg, the star performers in the Lenbrook space are a handsome pair of just-launched DALI Epikore 11 floorstanders ($60,000/pair). The Epikores were flanked by two K-14 F subwoofers ($2200 each). A couple of bridged NAD M23 stereo amplifiers ($3749 each) were fed by an NAD M66 streaming DAC and preamp ($5499). All was connected with AudioQuest cables.
The Epikores…
What better way to start the first day of an audio show than with some light joyful music? In this case, it was with a 1974 LP, Heinz Holliger: Famous Oboe Concertos, on which the famous oboist joined players of the Dresden State Orchestra under Vittorio Negri for, among other works, Leclair’s Concerto in C for Oboe, Strings, and Continuo, Op. 7. In the first movement, the lively presentation complemented equally lively music, which cheerily zipped along. Holliger’s oboe sounded delightful, the instrument’s glowing timbres unmistakable. The balance may have tilted toward the top, but it…
