System 5: Elegant sophistication: $25,000
Aerial 8B loudspeakers: $7000/pair in hardwood veneer with "kickstands"
Jeff Rowland Design Group Concentra II integrated amplifier: $6500
Marantz SA14 SACD player: $2900
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Marantz's SA-14 acquits itself so well with regular CDs that you can regard its SACD playback capability as having been thrown in for free. Nordost's Blue Heaven remains the "great cheap Chardonnay" of speaker cables, while their Red Dawn is a worthwhile upgrade. The CPCC power cord is the price/performance leader, and RPG Skylines will transform your life.
"There, that's where you should put the microphone—5" from the end of my bow."
Holding his bow up at an angle, world-famous violinist Pinchas Zukerman was helping me set up my mikes to record the final concert from the 1998 Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, where he was to lead an ensemble in a performance of the Mozart G-Minor Piano Quartet. Pinchas Zukerman has been recording for 30 years, so I'd asked him if there was a mike position he'd recommend. He has found that the best position for a microphone to capture the sound of his violin is always the same: "If it works, why change it?"…
For the close mikes, environmental noise would not be a problem, as it would be suppressed in comparison with the direct sounds of the instruments and voice. The piano was a magnificent New York Steinway D, its soundboard autographed by all the pianists who had performed on it, from Vladimir Ashkenazy to András Schiff. I picked up its sound with an ORTF pair of cardioid mikes placed about 15" above the piano strings and looking at the width of the soundboard. The outputs of these microphones were panned in the mixdown to full right and 20% left, so that their piano image coincided with that…
The Music
Quartet No.1 in G Minor for Violin, Viola, Cello & Piano, K.478 (1785)
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791)
In 1785, Mozart began work on a set of six piano quartets, to be brought out by Anton Hoffmeister, an eager young composer who made his money publishing music. The first of the cycle, K.478 in G Minor, was completed by mid-October of that year; a sequel in the key of E-flat followed in June.
Mozart never composed the four remaining works, and thus we have one of music's great unanswered questions. Some would have it that Hoffmeister begged off after…
Quintet in A Minor for Two Violins, Viola, Cello, & Piano, Op. 84 (1918-19)
Edward Elgar (1857-1934)
In 1918, it seemed to Elgar that the world was crumbling. Four years of war had left him—as it had so many others—weary and numb from the crush of events. Many of his friends of German ancestry were given a bad time in England; others were killed or maimed in action. Socialism was on the rise in Britain, and the 61-year-old Elgar believed his beloved Edwardian world was drawing to a close. Surgery to remove his infected tonsils cured the problem of his unsettled health, but did…
Edward Elgar (1857-1934)
In 1918, it seemed to Elgar that the world was crumbling. Four years of war had left him—as it had so many others—weary and numb from the crush of events. Many of his friends of German ancestry were given a bad time in England; others were killed or maimed in action. Socialism was on the rise in Britain, and the 61-year-old Elgar believed his beloved Edwardian world was drawing to a close. Surgery to remove his infected tonsils cured the problem of his unsettled health, but did…
The Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival Artists
The artists on this CD are some of the finest chamber musicians performing in the US. Featured are: Heidi Grant Murphy (soprano) and Marc Neikrug (piano) in Marc Neikrug's Pueblo Children's Songs; Pinchas Zukerman (violin), Cynthia Phelps (viola), Eric Kim (cello), and Marc Neikrug (piano) in the Mozart G-Minor Quartet; and Jaime Laredo and Daniel Phillips (violins), Robert Rinehart (viola), Sharon Robinson (cello), and Joseph Kalichstein (piano) in the Elgar Piano Quintet.
The artists on this CD are some of the finest chamber musicians performing in the US. Featured are: Heidi Grant Murphy (soprano) and Marc Neikrug (piano) in Marc Neikrug's Pueblo Children's Songs; Pinchas Zukerman (violin), Cynthia Phelps (viola), Eric Kim (cello), and Marc Neikrug (piano) in the Mozart G-Minor Quartet; and Jaime Laredo and Daniel Phillips (violins), Robert Rinehart (viola), Sharon Robinson (cello), and Joseph Kalichstein (piano) in the Elgar Piano Quintet.
Pinchas Zukerman and his longtime collaborator, Marc Neikrug…
Eric Kim (cello) was born of Korean parents in New York City. He grew up in Illinois, where he began his music studies at age 10 with Dr. Tanya L. Carey. He received his Bachelor and Master of Music degrees at the Juilliard School, where he studied with Leonard Rose, Lynn Harrell, and Channing Robbins. At age 15, he made his solo debut with the Chicago Symphony.
Now principal cellist with the Cincinnati Symphony, Kim has performed extensively throughout the US, Europe, and the Middle and Far East as a recitalist, chamber musician, and soloist with orchestra. He has appeared as soloist…
Phillips studied at Juilliard with Ivan Galamian, and has coached with Sándor Végh. He is a founder of the Orion String Quartet (which recently recorded Wynton Marsalis' first string quartet for Sony), and is presently professor of violin at Purchase College, and at the Aaron Copland School of Music at Queens College.
Robert Rinehart (viola), a native of San Francisco, studied violin at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music with Isadore Tinkleman, and at the Curtis Institute in Philadelphia, where his teachers included Ivan Galamian, Jaime Laredo, and Felix Galimir. He was a founding…
Sidebar 1: The Music
Bravo! The Best of the 1998 Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival STPH014-2
Bravo! The Best of the 1998 Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival STPH014-2
The Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival, Marc Neikrug, Artistic Director
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: Piano Quartet No. 1 in G Minor, K.478 26:03
Pinchas Zukerman (violin), Cynthia Phelps (viola), Eric Kim (cello), and Marc Neikrug (piano)
[1] Allegro 11:00
[2] Andante 7:34
[3] Rondo (Allegro) 7:29
Marc Neikrug: Pueblo Children's Songs 11:42
Heidi Grant Murphy (soprano) and Marc Neikrug (piano)
[4] "Naming Chant I" 2:51
[5] "Chipmunks" 2:14
[6] "Naming Chant II…
Sidebar 2: Who Did What, Where, & When
Production: Marc Neikrug (Elgar, Neikrug) & Philip Traugott (Mozart), with Matthew S. Snyder (Neikrug)
Executive Director, Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival: Erich A. Vollmer
Engineering/Editing/Mixing: John Atkinson
Assistant Engineer: Wes Phillips
Piano Technician: Michael Blackwell
Page Turner: Kent Williamson
Production: Marc Neikrug (Elgar, Neikrug) & Philip Traugott (Mozart), with Matthew S. Snyder (Neikrug)
Executive Director, Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival: Erich A. Vollmer
Engineering/Editing/Mixing: John Atkinson
Assistant Engineer: Wes Phillips
Piano Technician: Michael Blackwell
Page Turner: Kent Williamson
Recorded at St. Francis Auditorium, Museum of Fine Arts, Santa Fe, New Mexico, July 30 & 31, August 13, 16 & 17, 1998
Recording equipment: two Shure SM-81 ½" cardioid microphones (piano ORTF pair,…