Hi-Rez Highway: Re: Water Lily Russian Recordings and turning the other cheek.... by Chris from Lafayette New high resolution SACD releases, players and technology.

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Posted by Chris from Lafayette ( A ) on July 26, 2005 at 00:45:52

In Reply to: Water Lily Russian Recordings and turning the other cheek.... posted by music@waterlilyacoustics.com on July 24, 2005 at 22:40:40:

So I get home a little late from work (busy day!). . . and here’s yet another post from Kavi waiting for me. I guess I have to slog through these things. (Excerpts from his post are in quotation marks.)

“In all my postings where the issue of reality has been raised, I have been very clear that the "view" projected is mine. Read the third posting, wherein I discribe the mike placement, that posting ends with the words "per my ears".”

Here I’m giving Kavi the benefit of the doubt, and will make a distinction between what he posted (however far down it was) and what his minion : - ) posted in the first post. Again, any reader can see what the sequence of posts was.

“I may have not been clear, so I will delineate: I find the orchestral recordings that the audiophiles venerate for great sound, the offerings from Mercury, RCA and Decca, to be highly unrealistic, yet I do activly seek them out and buy them (used and reissues). Why? because I enjoy great music making. I never said that the recordings from Mercury, RCA and Decca were BAD, only that their sound was nowhere near the real thing.”

Nowhere near the real thing? Still seems like an extravagant statement to me. I suppose it depends on what your frame of reference is. In absolute terms, all recordings are nowhere near the real thing.

“I still love the Brahms violin concerto on RCA and own an original pressing that I enjoy for the sheer brilliance of the artistry and the way that music moves me. But sadly, the image of the violin is five feet wide and the violinist is not well integrated with the orchestra, due in effect to spot miking. In contrast the EMI recordings of the "Lark Asending" portray the violin in realistic size and the violinist better integrated within the orchestra. I find the EMI recordings to be far closer to the real thing, not as bombastic as the Mercurys and Deccas and not as cold and bright as the RCAs.”

I’m assuming Kavi is referring to the Heifetz performance. A more loaded example couldn’t be found – not only is the image five feet wide (while not optimal, I can certainly live with that), but the balance is so skewed in favor of the solo violin (apparently to cater to Heifetz’s enormous ego) that you find yourself smiling involuntarily at how absurd the balance gets. So while, in my opinion, this recording could never be a first choice, there’s still some mighty fine fiddle playing to be heard here. I’m also still confused that RCA, Mercury, Decca, and EMI recordings are “nowhere near the real thing”, and yet EMI recordings are “far closer to the real thing”. I guess EMI recordings are “far closer to the real thing” even though they’re still “nowhere near the real thing.”

“Same thing applies to many of the older jazz LPs I buy, again both used and reissues. Often ping pong stereo with hard right, hard left images, but to hear Prez blow his sax or the Duke lead his big band into a great arrangment is to forget about the mockery that most recordings really are. I am a music lover first and formost.”

I like to think we’re all are music lovers too, even though much of our discussion is about audio. I know I like to flatter myself that I’m a music lover.

“Yes, I am stubborn and doctrinaire, because if you do not passionately belive in what you do, you might as well not do it.”

Actually, I agree with Kavi’s statement here, at least as far as one’s own products are concerned. I’m just troubled by his cavalier dismissals in previous posts of the efforts other recording companies – the very ones who advanced the state of the art and deserve criticism the least.

“Mercury stared out as a country/pop lable and I am sure Bob Fine had Pultec (some of the best made) EQs.”

Robert Eberenz says they used a Pultec amplifier, not an equalizer. (See one of my other posts from tonight.)

“The booklet you quote says that no controls were touched once the recording began. Nowhere dose it say no EQ was applied.”

No, but Eberenz says this. (Again, see one of my other posts from tonight.)

“And what if the EQ had been set during the mike set up?”

Yeah, but there wasn’t, according to Eberenz.

“I listen mainly to LPs and thus have only Mercury LPs. I can only speak about the things I know and have experienced. The Mercury LPs were certainly EQed and compressed during mastering.”

OK, fine. But then why are you so certain that EQ was applied during CD and SACD mastering if you haven’t even heard them? BTW, why don’t you give the new SACD’s a try? For one thing, the pitch stability is way better than on LP.

“Some of the tube mikes used by Mercury, Decca, RCA and EMI are still sought after and daily used in stock form in the pop and rock world for their "rich", "fat" sound. Often as vocal mikes. This is a fact.”

See my comments regarding the Telefunken/Schoeps 201, the main mike (often the only mike) used in all Mercury stereo recordings, in another post tonight.

The comment "the sound of one had slapping" reffers to Teresa's posting that my Svetlanov recording "was a slap in the face..."

Darn! – And I was looking forward to cavorting around in the desert with you and Teresa!

-Chris Salocks
(Take my opinions with a grain of salt – everything else being equal, I prefer DVD-Audio!)

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