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John Marks is a lover of fine music videos. In our generation, a major new blessing has been the marriage of high-quality audio with high-quality video to provide us with both the sights and sounds of major performers presenting us with their artistry. It started with videotape and NTSC resolution, but progressed to DVD, and... Read More »

In this continuation of his assessment of the artistry of Sergey Schepkin, John Marks spends a few minutes with him discussing how his ongoing maturity as a performer has affected and deepened his understanding of Bach over the years. Every musician must decide the point at which it's worth recording a new set of performances... Read More »

In this week's cross-published installment of "Vault Treasures" from his site, The Tannhauser Gate (http://www.thetannhausergate.com), John Marks shifts his attention to one of the lesser-known (today) singers of the 1950s, Julie London. Her story is a Hollywood-classic "I was discovered while doing something pretty mundane, and then I became a star." But her natural singing ability, unschooled... Read More »

This week, John Marks touches on one of the truly great popular singers of the 20th Century, Frank Sinatra. Where Are You? comes to us from the later 1950s, and shows Sinatra maturing in his mastery. It also shows us just how great the recording arts had already progressed by this time. With his "Vault Treasures"... Read More »

For this week's "New Music" selection, John Marks shares with us Sergey Schepkin's Bach:  The Six Partitas. I agree completely with John when he writes "Familiarity with at least some of Bach's masterworks is a matter of core Cultural Literacy..." Amen! Think of it as a matter of "cultural critical mass"...the truly worthy things that you... Read More »

For John Marks' initial cross-publication to Positive Feedback of his Tuesday offerings on great recordings from The Tannhauser Gate (http://www.thetannhausergate.com), we offer the first of his columns:  Clifford Brown with Strings. As usual, John enriches our lives with recorded gems that we should all be aware of...and this time is no exception. Read on! Dr. David W. Robinson... Read More »

Delmoni & Martorella: Chopin/Milstein One of the categories of music reviewing and commentary that John Marks brings to Positive Feedback from The Tannhauser Gate is that of music videos. With the global explosion of online videos driven by YouTube, music lovers and audiophiles have been given a great opportunity to see as well as hear great performances, and... Read More »

John Marks' first cross-published music review from The Tannhauser Gate (http://www.thetannhausergate.com) is of a composer near and dear to my heart for many years now:  Ottorino Respighi. I have many of his recordings various formats, including LP, CD, and SACD, but am always pleased to find a new recording that renews my delight with his creative... Read More »

Yes, what you see is what you get (if Santa Claus really likes you, that is): A Bricasti M1 Digital-to-Analog Converter with gold-plated casework. United States Manufacturer's Suggested Retail Price, $15,000. (Why do I hear echoes of Auric Goldfinger gloating, "No, Mr. Bond; I expect you to die!") Bricasti is a Massachusetts, USA company that... Read More »