2nd Edition
Ortofon Xpression pickup head
I listen to music in all formats, but my most ecstatic home listening experiences have always involved vinyl. It's probably something to do with the fact that, like most people my age and older, I grew up listening to LPs--in my case, played on a Technics SL-210 turntable, and through an Aiwa receiver with beautiful green tuner lights and a pair of early Polk Audio studio monitors.
Van the Man
The dingy green-and-ochre poster on the subway-station wall, advertising events at Queens's Forest Hills Stadium, didn't draw attention to itself. But what else is there to do on a subway platform but look at posters? I looked at it. There, near the bottom of the left column, I read: "SEPT 12: VAN MORRISON AND WILLIE NELSON & FAMILY."
A Big Surprise Among Three American Symphonies
How many of us, when asked to name great American symphonists, typically start and stop with Copland, Ives, Bernstein, Barber and, among living composers, Glass and Adams? In doing so, we often ignore a host of others from the mid-to-late 20th century, including Schumann, Piston, Diamond, Cowell, Hanson, Harris, and Hovhaness (to name but a few).
Kalista DreamPlay One CD player
Some of my reviewer colleagues would have you believe that negative reviews are the most difficult of all to write, and that positive reviews fairly write themselves. What nonsense!
Recording of Septenber 2018: Part: The Symphonies
Arvo Part is now so popular that it's no longer necessary to explain him. His piety is approachably beautiful and welcoming. He was not born composing his airy, contemplative, trademark "tintinnabular" (bell-like) music; up to the early 1970s, he cut his teeth on the 12-tone scale.
The 2018 EISA Hi-Fi Citations
In 2017, Stereophile was accepted into the Expert Imaging and Sound Association (EISA--the E back then stood for European), as the exclusive US member of the EISA's Hi-Fi Expert Group. (At the same time, our sister magazine Sound & Vision was inducted as the exclusive US member of the HT Video Expert Group.)
Zen & the Art of A/D Conversion
In a series of recent feature articles for Stereophile, Jim Austin has examined how the controversial MQA codec works: "MQA Tested, Part 1," "MQA Tested Part 2: Into the Fold," "MQA Contextualized," "MQA, DRM, and Other Four-Letter Words," and, most recently, "MQA: Aliasing, B-Splines, Centers of Gravity." I doubt there is a Stereophile reader who is unaware of the fracas associated with MQA, and I have been repeatedly criticized on web forums for describing its underlying concept as "elegant."
"You love your audio more than you love me!"
The blowout happened as I climbed the stairs from the basement, where I'd just spent two hours listening to musi on my hi-fi. Standing rigidly in the archway, a wet sheen of hurt trembling in her eyes, my wife shouted: "You love your audio more than you love me!"
Escape into Reverie with Stephen Hough
Inveterate news junkies of the world, your way out has come. For at least one good hour of your otherwise doom-laden day, you have a reason to turn off Fox or CNN and drift on feathery clouds to a far sweeter place.
1st Edition
From The J. Gordon Holt Archives: Recording of May 1966: Music to Listen to KLH By
Don't be misled by the title of this. It's fine for listening to KLH by, and it is also fine for listening to any other top-notch reproducer by. It is, in fact, the best, and most musical, stereo demonstration disc that's come along to date.
New York Audio Laboratories Futterman OTL-1 power amplifier
Few people in the high end know the difference between glorious excess and wretched folly as well as Harvey Rosenberg (footnote 1). Harvey's audio equipment always strives towards the glorious folly of providing the most romantic sound possible with modern technology.
Transcendent Bridges Continents and Consciousness
There is music so new, so original, so contemplative, and so deeply felt that it makes you want to listen, and then demands that you listen again. It's music whose layers peel back over time, as it draws you deeper into its mysteries.
Threshold T-200 power amplifier
Founded by Nelson Pass in 1974, Threshold is one of those companies audiophiles tend to take for granted. Best known for the much-imitated Stasis (sliding bias) amplifier designs, Threshold became one of the industry leaders during the early 1980s.
From The J. Gordon Holt Archives: dbx Soundfield 1A loudspeaker
The unsung sage who first observed that high-end audio is a solitary vice was probably not implying that audiophiles are antisocial; he was merely acknowledging the fact that a decent stereo stage is usually only audible from one place in the entire listening room--the so-called sweet spot. Stray from that spot, and the whole soundstage shifts to one side, spaciousness collapses, and images become vague and unstable.
AV Tech Media Review Policy
Due to a number of recent unauthorized solicitations to high-fidelity manufacturers, distributors, and media-relations personnel for review equipment, we feel it necessary to post this policy reminder.
Four Outstanding Choral Recordings
We who love recordings of massed voices have learned the hard way that some succeed in blending vocal clarity with acoustic resonance, while others deliver echo-muddied jumbles. Happily, some very fine choral recordings have come my way in the last six months.
Musicians As Audiophiles: David Smith
Arriving at David Smith's comfortable Queens apartment, he walks me into what was once a small dining room. Standing upright like a pair of wood-grained phone booths are the biggest speaker cabinets I've ever seen in anyone's home--anytime, anywhere. What?
Moon by Simaudio 888 monoblock power amplifier
Not everyone needs a power amplifier that can deliver 888W RMS into 8 ohms or 1776W into 4 ohms. You could say that no one needs one of these--or two, if you want to listen in stereo. Most household AC systems can't even provide enough current to deliver all that power.
Pass Laboratories XA200.8 monoblock power amplifier
It was almost seven years ago that Nelson Pass, whose talks and exhibits I'd covered at many a Bay Area Burning Amp DIY event and audio show, surprised me with a loan of two Pass Laboratories' XA 160.5 class-A monoblock amplifiers.
Source Stereophile
