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But when I installed the dual-regulated power supply, the preamp was transformed. Bass lines just bounced out of the BUFs, deeper and tighter than I'd ever heard them over the mighty Muse subwoofer; the sense…

I The chapel is quiet. Early morning sunlight, tinted by stained glass, glares through the gloom. Golden dust-motes leap up at our entrance, flashing crimson, then cerulean as they dance among our rattling footsteps.

Silence is not emptiness, I muse, sitting in the deserted sanctuary. Even when still, the space is full of itself. The walls and roof are but a skin; what they contain is the thing itself.

II Hyperion Knight, drawn to the Steinway, begins to play, and the…

The chapel, even when quiet, is filled by its own sound. The rustling pops from the cooling boards pierce through it, simultaneously transforming and defining it. Is this what John Cage meant when he said, "There is no silence?"

VIII What sounds more hopeful than a stage-full of musicians honking, climbing scales,…

As can be seen from the diagram (fig.1), the piano and orchestra were laid out for the Rhapsody and Preludes sessions much as if we had been recording a Mozart concerto. This was appropriate, as pianist Hyperion Knight was directing the musicians—some of New Mexico's finest—from the piano for these performances. The 9' Steinway D piano had had its lid removed and was placed with the performer's back to the microphones. (Listeners should note that the bass notes of the piano will appear to come from left of center and the treble notes from the right, the…

As George Gershwin relaxed with a game of pool at the Ambassador Billiard Parlor on Broadway in January 1924, his brother Ira browsed through the New York Tribune. Ira's attention was captured suddenly when he read "George Gershwin is at work on a jazz concerto"—and the advertised premiere was scheduled for February. As it turned out, George was just as surprised by the announcement as his brother. He had discussed the possibility of writing a "serious" concerto utilizing jazz idioms for a Paul Whiteman concert, but the budding composer had no…

"They Can't Take That Away from Me" started out as a simple repeated-note rhythm, but when Ira suggested the lyric "…

As you will have gathered from Wes Phillips's comments, in addition to making a traditional two-channel recording sampled at 44.1kHz for release on CD, we also captured a surround-sound version sampled at 96kHz. This was the idea of Steven K. Lee of Canorus Inc., who distributes dCS and Focus Audio products in the US. With the cooperation of dCS Ltd. and Nagra USA, Steve assembled an array of four dCS 902D 96kHz/24-bit A/D converters and three Nagra-D, each fitted with the v2.0 version of the control software, which allows the machine to be…