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Pressed to guess which manufacturer had the greatest number of products on display at High End 2014, I'd name Pro-Ject Audio Systems, who apparently brought with them a different record player for every day of the month: different styles, different prices, different colors, different (apparent) points of view. More tightly focused was Britain's Funk Firm, whose chief designer, the genial Arthur Khoubesserian—a person I've wanted to meet for ages—showed me his new Vector 4 turntable (below), which features the Funk Firm's Strata platter design. The Vector 4 is projected to sell for £1400…
High End 2014 drew over 18,000 audio enthusiasts and record lovers to the historic city of Munich, a corner of whose Marienplatz district is seen in the photo above. It presented the wares of 452 exhibitors, representing over 900 distinct brands. I was in attendance every minute of its first three days; I went home on its fourth and final day, bringing with me the certainty that High End 2014 was, in almost every meaningful way, the finest audio show of my experience. This wasn't a show about old men dodging furtively in and out of over-dark, over-loud rooms in a down-on-its-luck hotel: High…
The man pictured above is Joe Roberts, who does consulting work for Silbatone—in whose deservedly, lavishly praised exhibition room I took this photo. Joe published the deservedly, lavishly lamented magazine Sound Practices, which was one of my influences when I started Listener Magazine 20 years ago. In his public speaking as in his writing, Joe is all about passion, honesty, style, and fun. (You can't see it in this photo, but Joe was holding in his left hand the largest spanner I've ever seen. I think it was yellow.) To paraphrase Stephen Stills: It made sense that he was there.
Funny…
The Bad Plus: The Rite of Spring
Sony Masterworks 88843 02405 2 (CD). 2014. The Bad Plus, Darryl Pitt, prods.; Pete Rende, eng.; Ian Cassel, asst. eng.. DDD? TT: 39:24
Performance ****
Sonics ****½
Sony Masterworks 88843 02405 2 (CD). 2014. The Bad Plus, Darryl Pitt, prods.; Pete Rende, eng.; Ian Cassel, asst. eng.. DDD? TT: 39:24
Performance ****
Sonics ****½
The link between jazz and the works of Igor Stravinsky is well known. In Conversations with Igor Stravinsky, his landmark 1959 collaboration with Robert Craft, the composer mentions jazz artists like Art Tatum and Charlie Christian. The fact that Stravinsky was captivated by the improvisational freedom of jazz and its insistent, inventive rhythms makes all his work, especially Le…
Why does music matter so much to so many of us? Some, like Stereophile's readers, go to great lengths to reproduce it in their homes with accuracy and impact, and build libraries of their favorite works. Others, like my daughters, don't care much about equipment, but find it hard to spend more than five minutes in a car without listening to music. We go to concerts, play instruments, hum tunes, sing. Why? Why does music seem to speak to so many more of us than do, say, painting, sculpture, poetry, architecture, or even literature?
Maybe we shouldn't even ask the question; maybe writing…
The long overdue rediscovery and re–enshrinement of Harry Nilsson that began with the 2010 release of the film, Who is Harry Nilsson (And Why is Everybody Talkin’ About Him?) shows no signs of abating which is a good thing for fans of the man’s songwriting and most of all, his peerless voice.
Before we get to the most recent Nilsson releases there’s one from last year that deserves special mention. Last September, the German reissue label Speakers Corner Records, released a fabulous LP re–pressing of Nilsson’s quietest masterpiece, 1970’s Nilsson Sings Newman. Listened to against the…
Wilson Audio Specialties' Sasha Series 2 loudspeaker ($29,500/pair), which began shipping in March, celebrated its formal California debut on Saturday, May 24, at Music Lovers Audio in San Francisco. Handsomely accompanied by recording engineer Peter McGrath (above), Wilson's Director of Sales for North America, and Rich Maez of Boulder Amplifiers, whose electronics joined a dCS front end and cabling from Shunyata, Transparent, and Synergistic Research, the Sasha Series 2, aka Sasha 2, more than lived up to its promise in a less-than-ideal room whose set-up included Synergistic Research’s…
No sooner has the Munich Show ended than T.H.E. Show Newport Beach is set to commence. Running from May 30 through June 1 in the Hilton/Atrium hotel complex that lies directly across the street from Orange County's John Wayne Airport, Southern California's installment of T.H.E. Show promises well over 300 exhibitors in 180 active sound rooms, 40–45 additional headphone exhibits scattered over two Headphoniums and other locations, and at least 15 vendor booths crammed with goodies galore.
"We're sold out," veteran organizer Richard Beers declared by phone. "Believe it or not, I actually…
Ten years ago, the average consumer was unaware that he or she needed an e-book reader. Since that time, neither those people nor the authors whose books they consume have changed very much. But the people in between have grown restless and unsatisfied, and it is they who call the tune. Consequently, many of you have gone from owning books to sort of, kind of owning books (and sort of, kind of not).
Just as the publishing industry has devised a new way to empty your wallet, so has the record industry found a new way to entice you into buying Kind of Blue for the umpteenth time (footnote…
Indeed, I was impressed with the Lector's ability to convey touch. To listen, through the Halide DAC HD, to "Scarlet Town," from Gillian Welch's The Harrow & the Harvest (ripped from CD, Acony ACNY-1109), was to hear the various sonic cues associated with a stringed instrument played with varying degrees of force; to hear it through the Digitube was to hear that force. And through the Lector, plucked strings in the scherzo of Mahler's Symphony 2, with Gilbert Kaplan conducting the London Symphony Orchestra (ripped from CD, MCA Classics MCAD 2-11011), were much more physical. On that…