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The Fifth Element #41 The Results Are In! July 2007

The Cultural Results Are In

In my April 2007 "Fifth Element" column I invited readers to submit their lists of 12 works or recordings that exemplify American musical life—music that people should be aware of, if they aspire to cultural literacy in American music.

The response was very gratifying—just about 65 entries. It was wonderful to see how many readers really know and passionately care about music! The overall quality of the lists was very good. Picking 12 winners was not easy. At all.

I must stress that my judging was entirely subjective and idiosyncratic. I gave…

The Fifth Element #41 5 & 4-Star Lists of Recordings

FIVE STARS

List No.1:

David Lovell, Basingstoke, Hampshire, UK

Dear John Marks, You have set a fascinating challenge. You state that the ability to engender a passionate response means more to you than other more intellectual justifications. I suggest that both attributes are needed to whittle the list down to mere 12. Writing from across the pond may I give you an outsider's take on US musical culture that is significant in terms of impact, enjoyability and accessibility? I agree with many of your choices; some with modifications, but feel that you have omitted some…

The Fifth Element #41 3-Star Lists of Recordings

THREE STARS

List No.3:

Peter Aizupitis
Dear Mr. Marks, As to compositions/recordings that would give, in your words, " an idea of what American musical life was about," I just have not been able to rank them according to importance, and after the first three entries, which are in response to your choices, they are given more or less in chronological order. I also mention alternate versions. In any case, like yours, my list would also include:

1. Roy Harris: Symphony No.3
(I continue to enjoy the old Leonard Bernstein Columbia LP; maybe it is time to investigate the…

The Fifth Element #41 2.5-Star Lists of Recordings

2.5 STARS

List No.9:

Eugene Fedushenko, Baltimore, MD

Dear John, Without a doubt, you will receive plethora of e-letters; thus, to save your time, my list below is devoid of any protracted comments. I'll be happy, however, to write few lines (why each recording was chosen), if you like. Here's my, very subjective, list.

1. Gershwin: Porgy and Bess
Original Motion Picture Soundtrack, Andre Previn cond.
Bitter-sweet music; great performance; a classic.

2. Take 6: Take 6, Reprise, 1988
Best vocal band in the whole universe.

3. Sarah Vaughan with…

The Fifth Element #41 Special Walter Pater Memorial "Burn With a Jet-Like Flame" Award

Special Walter Pater Memorial "Burn With a Jet-Like Flame" Award
List No.12:

Ron Ramsey, Eugene, OR
America: The Prequel
"We will shoot some arrows into the white man. If he truly has medicine, he will not be hurt. If he has no medicine, he will be dead."—Wind In His Hair

1. Johnny Preston: "Running Bear"
"Now they'll always be together, In the Happy Hunting Ground."

In 1989, I was in Montreux, Switzerland, attending the jazz festival. The concierge at my hotel was a young woman, Native Parisian, spoke five languages. Because of her language skills…

Listening #52

"Men must eat, though angels be their guests."
—William Laird, "Träumerei at Ostendorff's"

A few months ago, when an audio newcomer asked what I use for a music source at home, my first, casual answer fell short. When I responded by saying "a Linn"—which to me is the same thing as saying "a small Scottish record player"—my young friend was no less in the dark. I hadn't considered that, to an audiophile who came of age after the 1980s, "a Linn" could mean just about anything, ranging from a music server to an in-wall loudspeaker.

At least one precedent comes to mind:…

Listening #52 Page 2

The high-tension line, which has dark stripes on a silvery yellow background—the yellow may have been from age, of course—was shorter. I desoldered one end from the point on the tag board where it connected to resistors R2, R3, R5, and R6 (footnote 1), and clipped the other end from terminal 3 of the Jones plug. All that remained was to desolder the input signal wire from terminal 2 of the input socket—I left the other end connected to the control grid of input tube no.1—and Mr. Jones was made redundant.

Now came the hard part: fashioning a mounting plate for a newfangled phono socket.…

Upward Mobility: From 2 Channels to Surround

When the brief flowering of quadraphonics began in the early 1970s, I was still at school. As a nascent but impecunious audiophile, I therefore had a ringside seat at the audio industry's first attempt to go multichannel—and, even for the disinterested onlooker, it wasn't a pretty spectacle.

The first problem was that the technology just wasn't ready: the QS and SQ matrix systems worked by combining the four source channels into the two available from LP, whence they could never be independently recovered, while JVC's ambitious CD4 discrete system multiplexed two channels into…

Upward Mobility: From 2 Channels to Surround Page 2

A block diagram of the Trifield circuit is shown in fig.1. First, the left and right channels are passed through an MS matrix to convert them into sum (M) and difference (S) signals. In the Bell-Klipsch scheme, the M component was fed directly to the center speaker, with appropriate gain correction, whereas here it is first divided into two overlapping frequency ranges by complementary low-pass and high-pass filters, their corner frequencies set at 5kHz or above. (Gerzon's listening tests showed that the exact corner frequency and the filters' rate of rolloff were uncritical, although the…

Sumo Polaris II power amplifier

What's in a name? Quite a bit, when you stop and think about it. Would you rather have prostate surgery by Dr. Steadyhand or Dr. Whoops? Names imply a lot, even if we don't consciously make the connection; that's why your Polo shirt was made by Ralph Lauren instead of Ralph Lipshitz.

Which brings us to the amp in question: the Sumo! Now, what picture pops into your head at the word "Sumo"? For me, it's two words: BUTT CHEEKS. I see huge, rolling, shuddering butt cheeks spilling out of black cotton Pampers while two Japanese Michelin Men alternately hug and gut-slam each other out of the…