Recording of the Month

James Boyk has become something of a phenomenon. Not only is he a Professor of Music (at Cal Tech) who teaches how to listen to reproduced sound and writes articles about sound reproduction (for New West magazine), he is also a virtuosic pianist who produces perfectionist-caliber recordings of his own recitals. This recording, Mr. Boyk's third LP (footnote 1), is of one of Prokofiev's later works, and is a magnificent piano recording. Much credit must be given to both Mr. Boyk and his recording engineer, Michael Fraser. The instrument seems to be right in front of one, with as accurate a sound as any piano reproduction I have heard. It is interesting to note that the recording was made with ribbon mikes (the legendary Coles 4038s, perhaps?) and all-tube electronics "from mike to grooves."

This is another winner. Michael Murray's superior performances are or should be well known to all by this time. This recording of Encores in the French style covers a wide gamut of registration and mood, ranging from the large and full-blown sonorities of Franck's Pièce Héroique, the Toccata from Widor's Organ Symphony 5, and Vierne's Final from the Symphony 1 in d to the light and nimble Scherzo of Eugene Gigout and the technically demanding Musette by Marcel Dupré.

Originally released on London Records, then re-released with better sound on a Mobile Fidelity disc (now a cutout), these are stunning performances of these popular film scores, rivaling the composer's own performances of them. (Composers aren't always the best conductors of their own music, but John Williams is one who is.)

Sonically, this is simply a tour de force: Without a doubt the best commercially made cassette I've ever heard (and I've heard a lot of them). Last month, I expressed some doubt that the high end on any cassette could rival that of a half-speed LP and, indeed, there is a softening at the top on this cassette, when compared with the Mobile Fidelity disc. But the truth of the matter is that the cassette's high end is substantially more natural than that from the disc, which was one of Mobile Fidelity's first and had a slightly steely edge to it.

This is a very hyped, contrived recording, but then nobody ever pretended that this kind of musical construction was supposed to approximate the sound of a live performance. The strings are quite steely on this but, in all other respects, the recording is is stupendous—unctuously rich, smooth and limpidly clear, with some awesomely taut low end and cuttingly crisp percussion sounds.

One of Crystal Clear's earlier releases (1978), this has very distant, directionally vague sound, but the sound (stupendous by standards of only a few years ago) cannot stand in the way of two of the most exciting performances of these potboilers that have ever been committed to disc.

I must say I'm getting a bit bored with the 1812 Overture, but as long as there are audiophiles, it will be recorded due to the stringent demands it can make upon one's playback system. This version produced by Telarc is going to be hard to beat. The cannon fire is unbelievable.