On Sunday October 15, 2017, the Los Angeles and Orange County Audio Society held its monthly meeting at the beautiful Weinhart Design audio emporium in Bel Air, CA. The main draw for this meeting was an opportunity to audition the Carver Amazing Line Source (ALS) Speakers from the Bob Carver Corporation. But, not only would... Read More »
Chopin's Last Waltz, Robert Silverman pianist, Kimber Kable ISOMIKE 5606, LP. Producer: Ellen Silverman Editing: Aaron Hubbard Mastering: Chad Kassem, Aaron Hubbard Recording Engineers: Aaron Hubbard, Ray Kimber Mastering Engineer: Kevin Gray, Cohearent Audio, LLC Recorded using the ISOMIKE RECORDING TECHNIQUE recorded at DSD256 and edited in that format without any compression or equalization other than... Read More »
John Marks of The Tannhauser Gate favors us with some reflections upon Bernadettes, Leonard Cohen of remarkable memory, the exceptional Jennifer Warnes, and a certain haunting song. This is a bracing little essay, taking across time and space to one of the great tandems of recent decades: Cohen and Warnes. He's gone now, to my heart's... Read More »
This is the sixth and final installment of John Marks series on putting together a system to digitize your LPs. Republished from his blog site, The Tannhauser Gate, John's comments are a useful introduction to the process of going digital with your analog records. The links to the entire set of articles is referenced below, should... Read More »
Audio Note Music – ANM 1601 (UK) (2017, March) Format: Vinyl (2x180 gram LPs at 45 rpm) Named official 'musical ambassador' for Audio Note Music, Canadian cellist Vincent Bélanger is part of an all too rare breed: an authentic audiophile/musician. Dedicated to raising awareness around his beautiful bicentennial or so instrument, the busy 38-year-old is on... Read More »
Yuko Mabuchi Trio; Yuko Mabuchi piano, Bobby Breton drums, and Del Atkins bass; Yarlung Records 80161 CD, pressed in Germany on high definition special composite materials. Available in PCM and DSD on HDTracks, and NativeDSD.com up to DSD256 (Quad DSD). 2017. Recorded before a live audience at the Brain and Creativity Institute’s Cammilleri Hall. Yuko Mabuchi plays a Steinway Piano. Recording... Read More »
Sizing Things Up Straight out of the box, the new Von Schweikert Audio Unifield 2 Mk III Loudspeakers (a replacement for the highly regarded Mk II version that came out several years ago) remind you that they are no ordinary compacts. For starters, these hefty beasts tip the scales at just over 50 pounds—each. Speakers in... Read More »
Technics is on a roll. Leave it up to the brand which helped define consumer HiFi in the 70s, to continue delivering the goods in 2017. That's quite the stretch, in a competitive industry like the entry level consumer HiFi market. Looking though their luxe, visually bold website, nay, experience portal, one can't help reminisce... Read More »
AVM30 – the new entry-level line which AVM Audio introduced 2016 in Germany with three models as a limited edition to mark its 30th anniversary. This Autumn of 2017 we will be bringing this exciting range, with some very new models, to the rest of the world, as AVM30 goes global this year. All AVM30... Read More »
October 6-8, Denver, CO Furutech Co. Ltd., Tokyo, Japan, manufacturer of ultra-refined analog, digital, video cable and accessories, invites you to the Elite AV Distribution Room 566. Furutech debuts new phono cables, a new power distributor and the ultimate Cable and Connector damping solution featuring Furutech's revolutionary NCF sound enhancing material. NEW Furutech's NCF Booster – Cable... Read More »
Experience, Direct Witness, Astonishment What It Is Across more than forty years I've recorded live jazz in many locations. The list of venues and places has grown long. The number of musicians—great, very good, extraordinary, iconoclastic and, on occasion, startling—has grown even longer. Jim Merod with Ornette Coleman (photograph courtesy of BluePort Records) Early on,... Read More »
Boulder, CO 10/1/2017: PS Audio, originators of power regeneration systems for home audio, is proud to announce the debut of the new P20 Power Plant at this year's Rocky Mountain Audio Fest. PS created the category of home power regenerators with the release of the P300 in 1997. Since that time, the company has continued to pioneer... Read More »
MERGING+ Range in Rocky Mountain Audio Fest 2017, Room # 7025 The MERGING+PLAYER, MERGING+NADAC and MERGING+POWER will be featured in a dedicated room at The Rocky Mountain Audio Festival in Denver. This late decision to take a room at the show was predicated by a change in US distribution and the desire to show the... Read More »
MoFi Distribution proudly announces the addition of the Primare brand to their product lineup. Known as "the sound and vision of Scandinavia", for over three decades Primare has been renowned for products with award-winning sound quality combined with advanced technologies that together offer a unique and appealing level of simplicity – and a high level of customer satisfaction.... Read More »
Below you'll find part five of John Marks' six-part series describing one method for digitizing LPs. John, he of the blog site The Tannhauser Gate, gives our readers a cost-effective and reasonably simple method for transferring your albums to PCM files for archiving and playback functions. As he points out in his footnote, this method does... Read More »
The Bybee iQSE (photograph courtesy of Bybee Technologies) iQSE Disks or Quantum Signal Enhancers by the legendary Jack Bybee is quite a tweak at an affordable $150 per 4 inch x 2 inch disk. You can read a full report on these from Larry Cox in Positive Feedback. I found all new uses for these that I feel... Read More »
Passion, that one word sums it all up and answers many questions. Why collectively spend decades evolving a simple table radio into a complex collection of boxes and wires? Passion, to advance the state-of-the-art in home music reproduction chasing an absolute ideal of fidelity. Why spend hundreds of hours designing a product line of HiFi... Read More »
Hello audio friends! Fall is here, and Rocky Mountain Audio Fest is right around the corner. Brian and Shellissa are joining George Cardas himself in Denver this year. We'll have a booth at CanJam, showing our A8 Ear Speakers & headphone upgrade cables. In addition, Steven Ambrose will be in our booth, doing demos of... Read More »
Los Angeles, CA - 20 September 2017. In 2017, CanJam Global hosted thousands of enthusiasts, music-lovers, and mobile technology consumers at its headphone audio shows in North America, Asia, and Europe. The 2018 schedule expands on its annual events in New York City, Singapore, Los Angeles, London, and Denver with the addition of a new and exclusive event, the Shanghai Headphone... Read More »
(Allasso in Greek means to change or transform one thing to another) Thousand Oaks, CA, September 21, 2017 - Zesto Audio is pleased to announce their first audio accessory, the Andros Allasso Step Up Transformer. The international debut will take place at the X-FI Audio Show in Holland on September 30th and the US launch will be at... Read More »
Starting from 299USD inc. shipping. Shipping from the 15th of October, 2017 Pre-order now open: Type foreplay at the checkout to receive 15% off (ending 30th, September, 2017) Please visit us for more information. https://www.bursonaudio.com/products/play/ Play Music: It's a high power headphone amplifier with over 2W per channel into 16ohm It's a reference class DAC feature the ESS9018 DAC chip... Read More »
This is Part 4 of John Marks six-part series on digitizing LPs. This series is re-published from John's blog site, The Tannhauser Gate. In this set, he is providing his readers and ours with a solid and reasonably-priced way to archive their precious vinyl to digital format. I commend John's care and attention to detail. Read... Read More »
Gold Note—the Italian High-End manufacturer based in Firenze, Italy—is introducing the IS-1000, an innovative all-in-one source designed to deliver high quality audio combining analogue and digital technology, available at a MSRP of 4200,00€ (USD $5000) worldwide through Gold Note retailers in October 2017. IS-1000 is an advanced fully integrated amplifier that redefines the way music... Read More »
Back in Issue 92 of Positive Feedback, Bob Levi did a review of the Unique Innovations Technology (UIT) Perfect Music Purifier Series of audiophile cables that he had recently discovered. According to Bob, the UIT cables provided quite a substantial percentage of top-notch performance at sub-$1000 pricing. In his summary, he stated, "The Unique Innovation Technology... Read More »
Introducing POLARIS by Campfire Audio An Exciting NEW Hybrid Design! Polaris is Emotionally Engaging and Highly Resolving. Designed and Hand Built in Portland, Oregon USA. Powerful Pairings: Campfire Audio is proud to introduce a new innovation to our dynamic driver design; Polarity Tuned Chamber™. Our 3D printed tuned chambers in front and behind the driver allow us to optimize the... Read More »
The GamuT Lobster Chair in the sweet spot at the PF listening room in River City. "And now," said Monty Python, "for something completely different!" When planning, setting up, or upgrading their listening rooms, audio folks don't usually spend too much time considering furniture. After all, loudspeakers. Electronics. Turntables. DSD. RTR tape. Racks. Cables. For... Read More »
Johann Sebastian Bach, Cantatas for Bass. Matthias Goerne, baritone. Freiburg Baroque Orchestra. Gottfried von de Goltz. Harmonia Mundi HMM 902323. If dark power is what you want in Bach's cantatas for bass—and you surely should—then Matthias Goerne is the answer to your prayers. Eloquent darkness is not always what we get from true basses, but... Read More »
The coincidences were uncanny. Exactly a year ago to the date we first visited Distinctive Stereo. Plus two weekends before that we had gone to Mezzrow, a small jazz club in the West Village, to hear clarinetist Ken Peplowski. Guess where we were and who we saw two weekends before this year? The outing was... Read More »
PrimeSeat Presents the NHK Orchestra in DSD 11.2 MHz (Photo: PrimeSeat Software) While many were celebrating Independence Day this 4th of July, a different celebration was happening in Japan and on the Internet. July 4, 2017 was the launch date of 11.2MHz DSD (also known as Quad DSD or DSD 256) Streaming Audio from PrimeSeat. ... Read More »
A Press Release sent out to Exhibitors on 7/6/17 Hello Exhibitors, It is with deep regret that I must report to you that I have decided to postpone T.H.E. Show @ Anaheim for 2017 and move it to a new date in 2018. This was not an easy decision for me and the great team... Read More »
No. 2, Op. 19; No. 3, Op. 27 ("Song of the Night"). Ewa Marczyk, violin; +Ryszard Minkiewicz, tenor; Warsaw Philharmonic Orchestra and +Choir/Antoni Wit. Naxos 8.570721. TT: 60.49 The symphonies of Polish composer Karol Szymanowski effectively arrived in the West with the start of the digital era; the musical press was effusive, but I didn't... Read More »
September 6, 2017- The new 700 Series develops the ethos of the CM Series it replaces, adds technology from the 800 Series Diamond and new, bespoke acoustic innovations to produce the best-performing range of loudspeakers in its class. The new Bowers & Wilkins 700 Series delivers exceptional performance from a wide-ranging, comprehensive collection of loudspeakers. The... Read More »
A gift, a sudden gift from audio compadre John Marks, proprietor of The Tannhauser Gate blog site. John is also the driving force behind John Marks Records, which was active in the 1990s but is now lamentably no longer producing recordings. His work moved me so much that he was featured on the cover of one of... Read More »
Just in time for the IFA start, Audionet rolls out the first version of the Control App for celebrated new über-pre-amp STERN of ULTIMATE-Series fame. The App runs on all mobile Apple hardware with iOS systems. With the App, the audiophile user can control volume with a rotating sweep function designed by legendary Esslinger to... Read More »
London / Berlin, 31 August 2017 – Music technology company, MQA, announces a breadth of partnership news at the IFA consumer electronics show in Berlin. Developed for convenient delivery and unmatched audio quality, MQA technology will now be embedded in LG’s new V30 smartphone, the first globally available MQA-enabled handset. MQA music playback will also... Read More »
London, 4 September 2017 – Following major partnership unveilings at IFA technology show in Berlin, MQA is announcing a key new agreement with global music streaming platform Deezer, which will significantly expand MQA's music offering and audience reach. The deal will enable MQA's technology to be integrated into Deezer's platform, as well as across the service's ecosystem of hardware... Read More »
Anyone with any level of appreciation for great cello performance should check out Elinor Frey at once; an immensely talented and virtuosic player, she's also a seriously gifted researcher and scholar of all things cello, with a special appreciation for the Baroque period. Although she plays both modern and period instruments, it's pretty clear that... Read More »
