tas 179, The Absolute Sound
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
the
rocky MountAin AuDio fest
S T E R E O • M U L T I C H A N N E L A U D I O • M U S I C
V
3
AMAzing
Universal
Player
of MUsic
reviews
Dozens of new ProDucts froM
Act!
Magic
MAgico’s
Marantz
18 Pages
Contents
FEBRUARY 2008
TAS JournAl
31
Rocky Mountain
High
Great new gear from the
Fourth Annual Rocky
Mountain Audio Fest.
64
Crystal Cable
Piccolo Speaker
Cable and
Interconnect
NG on a thin cable and
interconnect that deliver big
sound.
72
EquipmEnT
rEporTS
55
Audience Adept
Response aR1p AC
Line Conditioner
Neil Gader on a single-outlet
AC conditioner.
66
Magic Act!
Magico V3 and Mini II
Loudspeakers
Robert Harley and Jonathan Valin
on two speakers that may redeine
the state of the art.
Plus:
Interview with Magico’s
Alon Wolf.
66
Balanced Audio
Technology VK-
42SE Preampliier
Jacob Heilbrunn on a solid-
state preampliier from a
company known for tube
electronics.
55
56
Canton Chrono 502
Loudspeaker
Steven Stone listens to a $1000
two-way from Germany.
102
60
Simaudio Moon
Evolution
SuperNova CD
Player
NG on yet another winner
from Canada’s Simaudio.
102
HP’s Workshop
HP’s best-sounding CDs and
SACDs.
60
February 2008
The Absolute Sound
Contents
6
Letters
www.theabsolutesound.com
muSiC
founder; chairman,
editorial advisory board
editor-in-chief
executive editor
acquisitions manager
and associate editor
music editor
proofreader
art director
Harry pearson
robert Harley
Jonathan Valin
128
RECORDING OF THE
ISSUE
Carla Bley:
The Lost Chords Find Paolo
Fresu
.
neil Gader
Bob Gendron
mark lehman
Torquil Dewar
14
From the Editor
16
Industry
News
Inside the Vienna Acoustics
loudspeaker factory; Seattle’s Deinitive
Audio hosts the third annual Music
Matters extravaganza.
senior writers
John W. Cooledge, Anthony H. Cordesman,
Wayne Garcia, robert E. Greene, Chris martens,
Tom martin, Dick olsher, Andrew quint,
paul Seydor, Alan Taffel
117
Classical
Tippett’s Complete Music for Piano,
Angela Hewitt’s Schumann Piano
Sonata No. 1, Gabriela Imreh’s
Piano Transcriptions
, a new Vivaldi
Atenaide
, Cecilia Bartoli’s
Maria
,
Pieter Wispelwey’s new Dvorák Cello
Concerto, Sarah Chang’s interpretation
of
The Four Seasons
, Shore’s
Lord of the
Rings
cycle, and a Jascha Heifetz LP
reissue from Cisco. Plus, 2007’s Best
Classical Albums.
reviewers and
contributing writers
Soren Baker, Greg Cahill, Aaron Cohen,
Guido Corona, Dan Davis, Andy Downing,
Jim Hannon, Jacob Heilbrunn, Sue Kraft,
mark lehman, Ted libbey, David mcGee,
Bill milkowski, Derk richardson, Don Saltzman,
Steven Stone
hp’s equipment setup
Danny Gonzalez
AVguide.com
Managing Editor
web producer
monica Williams
Ari Koinuma
22
126
Jazz
Coverage of hot releases from Ron
Blake, Paul Bollenback, Stanley Clarke,
Bloodcount, Trio M, Valerie Joyce, and
a New Orleans-themed box set. Plus,
2007’s Best Jazz Albums.
Absolute Multimedia,
Inc. chairman and ceo
vice president/publisher
advertising reps
Thomas B. martin, Jr.
mark Fisher
Cheryl Smith
(51) 891-7775
marvin lewis
mTm Sales
(718) 5-880
22
iTAS
WG reports on a unique tabletop audio
system from—get this!—Meridian
Audio
and Ferrari
.
134
Rock
Reviews of new CDs and LPs from
Drive-By Truckers, Alicia Keys, Levon
Helm, The Eels, Sigur Ros, the Hives,
Os Mutantes, and Eagles. Fresh
reissues and collections from Aretha
Franklin, U2, David Bowie, Stevie
Ray Vaughan, David Byrne, Simon &
Garfunkel, Allman Brothers Band, and
ZZ Top, and critiques on books and
compilations concerning Eric Clapton
and Nick Drake. Plus, 2007’s Best Rock
and Pop Albums.
Jennifer martin, Wrights reprints
(877) 65-595,
:
(81) 19-575,
jmartin@wrightsreprints.com
subscriptions, renewals, changes of address:
(888) 7-165 (u.S.) or (815) 7-58
(outside u.S.), or write
The Absolute Sound
,
Subscription Services, po Box 69, mt. morris,
il 6105. Ten issues: in the u.S., $6; Canada $5
(GST included); outside north America, $71 (includes air mail).
payments must be by credit card (ViSA, masterCard,
American Express) or u.S. funds drawn on a u.S. bank,
with checks payable to nextScreen, llC.
address letters to the editor,
The Absolute Sound
, po Box 1768, Tijeras, new mexico 87059,
or e-mail
rharley@nextscreen.com
classiied advertising:
please use form in back of issue.
newsstand distribution and local dealers:
Contact ipD, 7500 riverview Center Blvd., Suite 00,
Bonita Springs, Florida 1, (9) 99-50
publishing matters:
contact mark Fisher at the address below
or e-mail
misher@nextscreen.com
publications mail Agreement 0600599
return undeliverable Canadian Addresses to
Station A / p.o. Box 5 / Windsor, on n9A 6J5
info@theabsolutesound.com
nextScreen, llC.
5 S. lamar, Bldg. G-00
Austin, Texas 7875
(51) 89-868 fax: (51) 891-075
tas@nextscreen.com
24
Start Me Up
Wayne Garcia on the Epos M16
loudspeaker, Music Hall Trio CD
Receiver, and Marantz DV6001
universal player.
24
154
TAS Back Page
We talk with Peter Gansterer, Founder
and Designer, Vienna Acoustics.
101
Manufacturer Comments
110
The TAS Short List
Our top equipment picks in every
category and price level.
©008 Absolute multimedia, inc., February 008.
The Absolute Sound
(iSSn#0097-118) is published ten times per year, $ per year for u.S. residents.
nextScreen, llC, 5 S. lamar, Bldg G00, Austin, Texas 7875. periodical postage
paid at Austin, Texas and additional mailing ofices. Canadian publication mail account
#1551566. poSTmASTEr: Send address changes to
The Absolute Sound
, Subscription
Services, po Box 69, mt morris, il 6105. printed in the uSA.
February 2008
The Absolute Sound
Letters
e-mail us:
rharley@absolutemultimedia.com
or write us a letter:
The Absolute Sound
, po Box 1768, Tijeras, new mexico 87059
Bravo!
The article on page 12 in Issue 176 by
Robert Harley was magniicent. It is the
best piece I’ve read about hi-i in 40 years.
Bravo.
upon your magazine’s recommendation
that it was the best-under-$1000 machine
for CD playback. It was quite a good
player at the time. I have since replaced
all of the capacitors in the analog and the
power stages with Black Gate types, and
the player still compares favorably to ma-
chines sold a couple years ago for $1600.
Certain undesirable qualities in the ren-
dering of music by the CD medium still
remain, and I thought that these qualities
were intrinsic to the medium itself until
I read your review of the Cambridge
Azur 840C player. I was surprised by this
comment: “This player is amazingly free
from midrange glare (often manifested
on the leading edges of piano notes).”
You also mention that it is free of metal-
lic hardness in the treble, but I think that
almost all current high-end CD players
are. The reproduction of the piano is def-
initely a weakness that I attributed to the
CD medium itself. That this player is free
from this weakness is cause to rejoice and
to reconsider whether the CD medium is
perhaps closer to perfect than we thought
it was.
another CD-R, the edges of which I
had coated with green ink, then print it
out again at work. The improvement is
amazing
. After all of these years of being
taught that reproduction degraded quality
(wasn’t I dumb?), it is very rewarding to
know that we now have a medium that
not only doesn’t degrade quality, but
actually improves it.
Thanks for the enlightenment.
David
Sanford
D. plante
8-Track Tape
Better than
SACD?
A CD is ive-inches in diameter and
holds 60 minutes [sic] of music. For the
same amount of recording and playback
time an analog disc must be ten inches
in diameter simply because it has more
signal and music. No wonder CDs are
cold, sterile, and unmusical—there’s not
enough music or signal on the disc. The
“bigger is better” rule is still true—digital
does not change this. Eight-tracks and
cassettes are vastly superior to any digital
format.
RH replies:
It’s unfortunate that you choose
to ridicule an idea because it lies in the face of
conventional wisdom rather than to perform the
experiment yourself. Among those who have
actually listened to CDs and CD-Rs copied
from those CDs, the debate was settled long
ago—CD-Rs sound better.
Mercury SACD
Mix-up
Thank you [HP] so much for your
“Workshop on SACD,” and particularly
for your endorsement of SACD as the
medium for the future [Issue 176]. What
a pity so many of your colleagues still
don’t get it. [
See Mr. Mankiewicz’s letter
(“Grotesque”) in Issue 176
,
as well as his letter
below
.]
There is one thing in your piece I must
ask you to clarify, however. Did you mean
to suggest that there is a difference in
quality between the early Mercury SACD
discs and those which are now available?
In short, should those of us who gobbled
up the earliest SACD pressings of the
Mercury discs when they were issued,
including Paul Paray’s terriic Chabrier,
now go out and purchase the latest ones
because they are in some ways superior?
Christopher
mankiewicz
Tim
Coop
nick
Cotsarelis
Robert Harley replies:
Just wait,
Mr. Coop, until we have solid-state storage
of hundreds of hours of multichannel
192kHz/24-bit digital audio on a device the
size of a postage stamp.
More Than a Hint
of Sarcasm
I found the letter in the November issue
[CD-R Conundrum] so intriguing that I
decided to test it on an original sketch
that I had made of my wife several years
ago. I scanned it into my computer, saved
it onto a CD-R, then sent it from the CD-
R to the printer at my ofice. Surprisingly,
it came out looking
better
than the original
sketch. In fact, it looked so much better I
decided to run it through a Xerox machine
to see if I could improve it further. To
my disappointment I saw little difference.
At this point I decided to scan the Xerox
copy back into my computer, save it onto
A Hint of
Sarcasm
For years, audiophiles (myself included)
have been ridiculing the idea that the
CD medium is “perfect sound forever.”
However, as time went on, the problems
with the CD have been found to be limi-
tations in the playback process and in the
CD machines themselves. Years ago, I
bought a Panasonic A110 DVD player
6 February 2008
The Absolute Sound
HP in Hiding?
Where has HP been hiding? The Mercury
SACD of Paray playing Chabrier was
issued in 2004 and was one of the initial
releases of the Mercury Living Presence
SACDs. This is not a second-generation
disc but one of the irst.
I agree with his assessment of the quality
of the recording, but the delay in even
reviewing these discs underscores your
magazine’s bias against SACD and sur-
round sound. Once one has heard SACD
either in 3-channel or surround, stereo in
the Red Book format becomes unsat-
isfactory. Moreover, the best all-DSD
surround recordings, some of which HP
reviews, truly achieve the goal of the
Ab-
solute Sound
. Your magazine should focus
every month on SACD surround releas-
es and feature a majority of equipment
reviews of SACD surround hardware.
See www.sa-cd.net for the latest releases.
If the goal of audiophiles is to reproduce
real sound in one’s living room, then CD
Red Book and LP recordings are inad-
equate. It is only in all-DSD surround
discs that the illusion becomes reality
Dennis DeSantis
there are some individual titles that still don’t get
the sound right. For example, take a listen to the
Leroy Anderson compilation of Volumes I and
2 of the original LPs. On SACD, Volume 2
sounds spectacular, just like the original. Volume
1, however, had all the faults I complained about
in the irst-generation set. So go igure.
RH replies:
Although CD sound quality
has improved considerably, it still isn’t as good
as SACD or DVD-A, in my experience. This
is especially true with pure DSD recordings (not
SACDs remastered from 48kHz PCM origi-
nals) and with DVD-As sourced from high-res
masters (titles on the AIX label, for example).
Keep in mind that CD is still a 44.1kHz/16-
bit format, with all the limitations those speciica-
tions dictate.
Far from being dead, SACD is showing re-
markable staying power, particularly in classical
music. Take a look at www.sa-cd.net. Starting
next issue, we’ll be publishing a regular column
by Andrew Quint highlighting the best classical
multichannel SACD titles.
The Bodies of
SACD and DVD-A
are Beginning to
Smell
I was mystiied by Harry Pearson’s No-
vember Workshop and his insistence that
SACD sounds superior. I also was hoping
that it would be a great medium along
with DVD-A, but after hearing both, I
think it’s about time we pronounce the
corpses dead and have a proper funeral.
The bodies are beginning to smell!
I’ve heard some of the new CD record-
ings with 20- and 24-bit resolution and
that seems the way to go. Perhaps you
could publish an article on these and also
on electronic devices that upsample. Right
now I have a Rega Planet and a Channel
Islands 96kHz/24-bit upsampling DAC.
The sound quality far surpasses anything
I’ve heard on SACD or DVD-A, which
is really sad.
So perhaps Christopher Mankiewicz
[Letters, Issue 176] will join me at the
grave sites as we say our fond farewells,
and afterwards I’ll take him to an audio-
phile store to listen and toast the great
$1500 [
now $1599—RH
] Cambridge Azur
840C CD player. I’ll even help him carry
it out of the store after he buys it.
Hugh V. Duggan Jr.
It’s Time to
Move On
Every month people write in to bitch
and complain about the lack of budget
product coverage and the general integ-
rity of the publication. Enough already!
As far as I’m concerned, you have given
your best effort to address both issues,
and if these morons were going to get
it, it would have already happened. The
horse has been dead for some time now;
let it rest in peace.
Oh, and speaking of the deceased,
can someone please tell Christopher
Mankiewicz (Letters, Issue 176) that the
general public buried SACD a couple of
years ago? I know you’re still grieving Mr.
Mankiewicz, but it’s time to move on.
Gonzalo mena
HP replies:
I inadvertently caused much
confusion in my update on the improved sound
from Mercury SACD issues, but not on the point
raised by Mr. DeSantis.
The recordings released in the irst Mercury
SACD issue were: Bach: The Complete Solo
Cello Suites; Rachmaninoff: Piano Concerto Nos.
1 & 2; Respighi:
Ancient Airs & Dances
;
Stravinsky:
The Firebird
; Suppé & Auber:
Overtures.
The second Mercury SACD issue includes:
Hanson: Symphony No. 1 and No. 2 and
Song
of Democracy
;
Fennell Conducts Sousa
;
Chabrier:
España
; Rodrigo: Guitar Concerto;
Rimsky-Korsakov:
Capriccio Espagnol
.
What I didn’t know, at the time, was that there
were two more sets released after the second. Those
who read carefully correctly noted that I had se-
lected the best-sounding issues of the most recent
Mercurys I had been sent for review. I should have
just left it at that. But, no. The change between
the irst-generation issues and the sound of many
(but not all) releases that followed led me to believe
the folks doing the transfers had gone back to the
drawing board and captured the gestalt of the
original releases. I still think that, but, as I said
Erratum:
in issue 177, we reported that mark
levinson no.5 ampliier, debuted at CEDiA,
was a Class D device. it is not. According to
levinson, it uses a new proprietary ampliication
technology yet to be named.
upCominG in
iSSuE 180
• GuangZhou show report
• Analog Extravaganza!
• 7 turntables
• 5 phono cartridges
• Simaudio’s $499 phonostage
• Archiving LPs to double-speed DSD
• Top LPs from Nova
• The Blue Note reissue project
• MartinLogan’s amazing $2k
electrostatic hybrid
• Esoteric G-0Rb rubidium clock
• Magnum-Dynalab’s new tuner
8 February 2008
The Absolute Sound
Letters
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]