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Recording of August 1985: Mozart: Eine Kleine Nachtmusik

Mozart: Eine Kleine Nachtmusik, Posthorn Serenade
Prague Chamber Orchestra, Charles Mackerras conducting.
Telarc CD 80108 (CD). Robert Woods, prod., Jack Renner, eng. DDD.

Holt's First Law of Recording states: "The better the performance, the worse the recording—and vice versa." It's true; really fine recordings of superb musical performances are so rare that the discovery of one such gem is cause for rejoicing. Well, you can rejoice: this is one of them.

Although Charles Mackerras has recorded a number of major works, including operas, especially by Janácek, he is best-…

The 2014 Jazz Awards (and mine)

The Jazz Journalists’ Association announced its 2014 awards this week. I don’t think I’ve disagreed with so many of its picks. In most cases, I’d simply rank others higher than the JJA balloteers; in some cases, though, I part from their judgment pretty vigorously. Here are some of the JJA winners, followed by my choices:

Record of the Year:
(JJA) Wayne Shorter, Without a Net (Blue Note).
(Me) Darcy James Argue & Secret Society, Brooklyn Babylon (New Amsterdam). (I’m in a minority here, but I think Shorter’s latest is overrated: the band is great, but Shorter noodles too much…

Now on Newsstands: Stereophile Vol.37 No.5

The May 2014 issue of Stereophile is now on newsstands. With High-Resolution Audio poised to go mainstream, the issue features Sony's $2000 HAP-Z1ES file player on its cover. Kalman Rubinson takes the Sony through its paces summing up that the "audiophile quality" Sony "has the potential to become a gateway product for the mass market of portable-player users."

In a related review, John Atkinson spends some serious time with NAD's "Masters Series" combination of M50 Digital Music Player, M51 D/A processor, and M52 RAID array Media Store. Yes, this exquisitely engineered system sounded…

20,000 Facebook Fans

It's been getting closer and closer the past few days. But this morning, Stereophile's Facebook page got its 20,000th "Like."

Woo hoo!!!!

Rotel RCD-955AX and RCD-965BX CD players

On the mantel sat a stuffed Culo snake from Nuevo Laredo, with a red rubber tongue in freeze-frame flick. Above the bookcase hung the mounted head of a wild poi dog, killed in self-defense in Sri Lanka with only a Phillips-head screwdriver. A table-lamp made from a shellac'd, puffed-up frog wearing a sombrero and playing the contrabassoon bathed the room in a soft cream glow.

But the only living thing in this pack of once-proud beasts was the young man sitting at the kitchen table, slowly pecking at the keys of a rundown Bondwell laptop and blowing soap bubbles out of the antique ivory…

Rotel RCD-955AX and RCD-965BX CD players Page 2

To go into more depth with the 955 would be to step all over Señor Lipnick's toes, as he's already told you everything you need to know about the sound of the 855/955 in his July 1990 review. In short, the 955 is still a best buy in the sub–$500 CD player range, and one of the better values in all of audio period. The two years since the 855's release have dated the player's sound surprisingly little; only in comparison with the much-improved upper-echelon gear does the 955 show the rings around its trunk.

For instance, Lew Lipnick found the gap between the 855 and the original Theta DS…

Rotel RCD-955AX and RCD-965BX CD players RCD-955AX Measurements

Sidebar 1: RCD-955AX Measurements

Beginning with the multi-bit Rotel, the frequency response (fig.1) was virtually flat across the audible range, with only a small amount of ripple in the upper octaves—ripples characteristic of machines using Philips digital filters. The 1kHz squarewave in fig.2 is also typical of players using linear-phase digital filters, and although pre-emphasized CDs are in the distinct minority, the virtually flat de-emphasis response (not shown) guarantees that they will be properly balanced in playback.

Fig.1 Rotel RCD-955AX, frequency…

Rotel RCD-955AX and RCD-965BX CD players RCD-965BX Measurements

Sidebar 2: RCD-965BX Measurements

As in the RCD-955AX, the 1-bit Rotel had a rather typical Philips-chipset frequency response, with a trace more HF ripple than in the multi-bit player (fig.9). The ripple in both machines should be audibly insignificant, however, and the relative frequency responses of the two Rotels do not—at least in spectral terms—explain CG's relative reactions to the two players. The squarewave in fig.10 is a near-clone of that from the multi-bit Rotel, including the obvious presence (from the shape of the "ripple" on the horizontal portions of the waveform) of a…

Rotel RCD-955AX and RCD-965BX CD players Specifications

Sidebar 3: Specifications

Rotel RCD-955AX: 16-bit CD player. Output voltage: 2V RMS. Output impedance: 200 ohms.
Dimensions: 17.3" (440mm) W by 3.6" (92mm) H by 12.5" (316mm) D. Weight: 5.8kg.
Price: $449 (1992); no longer available (2014).

Rotel RCD-965BX: 1-bit CD player. Output voltage: 2V RMS. Output impedance: 200 ohms.
Dimensions: 17.3" (440mm) W by 3.6" (92mm) H by 12.5" (316mm) D. Weight: 5.8kg.
Price: $549 (1992); no longer available (2014).

Both: Approximate number of dealers: 200 (1992).
US distributor: Rotel of America, 54 Concord Street,…

Book Review: Kansas City Lightning

Kansas City Lightning: The Rise and Times of Charlie Parker by Stanley Crouch (New York: Harper, 2013), 365 pp. Hardcover, $27.99.

A section of this biography, which documents the early life of the dazzling bebop saxophonist Charlie Parker, starts with a four-page meditation on "the truth and myth of railroads" in America: the figurative underground railroad that comprised a web of escape routes for slaves fleeing the South; the "black-smoke-puffing iron horse" that galloped into the West and "would eventually carry the brutal and legendary Apache chief Geronimo and his people . . . to…