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Details: Download music

May 2021

Pi 88
Format: 24-bit/96kHz FLAC download

Musical Performance

Sound Quality

Overall Enjoyment

The term “art music” is one of the least specific attempts to categorize music. Most broadly, it is applied to all western classical music, while at its least precise it has been used to describe everything from 12-tone serialism to the music Kurt Weill composed for the Berlin stage. Most flagrantly, art music has been used to define any music that is not popular, which runs counter to the enormous success found by Weill, to say nothing of older composers like Beethoven or Bach. The term is also used in opposition to music that employs any type of folk idiom—a snobbish dismissal of anything created by someone who lacks formal training.

Details: Pulse!

May 2021

In March, I detailed one way you could set up a fully functional home recording studio for a total cost of under $5000 USD. This month’s column is the first installment in a companion series about how to effectively plan and use such a low-cost home studio. While I made sure the products recommended in my original article were of good quality, and refer to them again here, that piece was more a proof of concept than a shopping list.

Details: Music Everywhere

May 2021

Incorporating extra storage space into a portable Bluetooth speaker is nothing new for EcoXGear, but their EcoJourney offers the most room yet. The 65W amplifier that serves its three drive units also makes it one of the most powerful speakers of its size. And while its list price of $199.99 USD is already a lot lower than that of any competitor, I found it for sale online for as little as $178.

Details: Art+Tech

April 2021

Dear Audiophile: If you’ve slid over here from SoundStage! Hi-Fi or even SoundStage! Ultra, welcome. But, listen, perhaps you should skip ahead a couple of paragraphs; I’m going to reveal something sacrilegious.

Details: Music Everywhere

April 2021

JBL is sticking with its original models, tweaking them and assigning them new version numbers. A recent example is the Xtreme 3, the latest version of the original Xtreme, a medium-size Bluetooth speaker primarily designed for partying. It has USB-A and USB-C ports for charging USB devices, and an improved adjustable strap. Specified IP67, it’s waterproof and dustproof and, with one big caveat, has robust, well-balanced sound. But it’s pricey at $349.95 USD. (However, JBL’s website often offers even new models at 50% off.)

Details: CD music

April 2021

ECM 2702
Format: CD

Musical Performance

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I’ve never completely bought into the idea of a distinctive “ECM Records sound,” by which is meant an austere, spacious, dry soundstage developed by label head Manfred Eicher for the artists he records. For one thing, the ECM catalog is far too broad, and the studios and engineers they employ far too diverse, for there to be any such uniformity. Another argument against the concept is that Eicher is too much a believer in capturing the true nature of artists to impose a soundstage on anyone. That’s not to say that he isn’t known for imposing his opinions on his artists, but they are more about artistry itself and not sonic aesthetics.

Details: Blu-ray movies

March 2021

A City of Eight Million Stories

The Criterion Collection 380
Format: BD

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“There are eight million stories in the Naked City. This has been one of them.”

Details: SoundStage! Encore

March 2021

In November 1987, Canada’s Cowboy Junkies recorded the tracks for The Trinity Session, which, when released one year later, received worldwide critical acclaim. It was recorded in The Church of the Holy Trinity, located in downtown Toronto, Canada.

Details: Art+Tech

Note: for the full suite of measurements for the Clarus Cable Coda DAC-preamplifier from the SoundStage! Audio Electronics Lab, click this link.

March 2021

Everyone has songs in their memory bank they can call forth at will—tunes that relate to special moments, or just pieces they’ve heard so often they can hum them note for note.

Details: Pulse!

March 2021

Hi—I’m glad you’re back. In this month’s column I share the results of the thought experiment I teased you about last month.

Not very long ago, the cost of the gear needed to effectively record a band or any kind of small music group would be prohibitive without your having to take out a loan. But with today’s powerful computers and the increasing sophistication of hardware modeling, working entirely “in the box”—that is, not using a traditional mixing console and such analog processing hardware as compressors and equalizers, but their software equivalents—is not only feasible but is increasingly the norm.

Details: CD music

March 2021

Intakt 354
Format: CD

Musical Performance

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Overall Enjoyment

There’s a truism in music that well-trained classical musicians can’t improvise or swing enough to play jazz, and that jazz musicians who read well can perform the classics but can’t sound authentic playing folk music like country or blues. It’s not really a knock against musicians; you wouldn’t want a brain surgeon to replace your hip, either. The fact is, the deeper you go into a specialty, the more constrained you are.

Details: Music Everywhere

March 2021

With this innovative product, EcoXGear takes another step toward making sure you have music wherever you go. Their EcoLantern ($129.99 USD) gives you sound or light or both—perfect for campers, it can also be used in the back yard.

Details: Blu-ray movies

February 2021

Alan J. Pakula’s Masterpiece of Paranoia on BD

The Criterion Collection 1064
Format: BD

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The Parallax View (1974) is the second of what has been called director Alan J. Pakula’s Paranoia Trilogy, bracketed by Klute (1971) and All the President’s Men (1976). Although each film deals with a conspiracy, only the last is based on historical events.

Details: Art+Tech

Note: for the full suite of measurements for the Music Hall a15.3 from the SoundStage! Audio Electronics Lab, click this link.

February 2021

In opera, musical theater, the blues, country music, and, of course, in pop music, the human voice is an essential instrument. The skilled application of breath, glottal manipulation, timbre, tone, and other singing techniques can touch our hearts, draw a tear, raise a smile. It’s straight from human throat to human ear; there is no more elemental communication.