What are you listening to right now?

[tmazz]

Lee Morgan ~ The Sidewinder

One of my favorite Blue Note albums. 

[pumpkinman]

Mark Knopler ~ Shangri-la

[tmazz]

The Dave Brubeck Quartet: Their Last Time Out

Columbia Legacy 2 CD Set

A recording of The Dave Brubeck Quartet's last concert together on Dec 26, 1967. Released in 2011 I think there is a reason this sat in the vaults for 44 years. While it is musically interesting and certainly historical the sound is very meh. IMO this recording was never originally intended for public release. It sounds more like just a stereo mike that was thrown up to simply capture the performance for a musician's sound check. Not particularly bad in any respect, but not very good either. Listenable if you want it for the historical aspect, but there is much better sounding Brubeck recordings out there if you are really looking for the music.

[tmazz]

The Best of David Benoit 1987-1995

   GRP CD

[tmazz]

Barbara Streisand: Timeless -  Live in Concert

  Columbia 2 CD Set

[tmazz]

The Best of Madeline Peyroux - Keep Me in Your Heart For a While

  Rounder CD

[tmazz]

For My Love

Decca CD

Another one for the Decca For Your Life series, this one featuring all solo piano pieces.

[tmazz]

For Evening Passions

  Decca CD

This time Opera selections.

Not quite sure how this title works for the music. Having a fat lady scream in the background is not exactly my first choice to help set the mood for romance???? 

[tmazz]

Dave Brubeck: Just You, Just Me

  Telarc Jazz CD

A collection of solo piano pieces. I don't know if it was just my mood, but in spite of the fact that I generally like Dave Brubeck, this one kind of bored me.

[tmazz]

The Sunday Brunch Album

CBS CD

I saw this at the Crack House and since we are hosting a Holiday Brunch next Sunday I figured what the heck.

A collection of small group Baroque pieces chosen to be used as background music at a gathering. Part of the CBS Masterworks Dinner Classics series.

As much as I usually don't care much for Columbia recordings is one is actually pretty good  and usable even as a "sit down and listen" CD.

[tmazz]

Fourplay - Between the Sheets

   Warner Bros CD

Typical Fourplay. If you like them, you will like this.

Hey maybe I should use this instead of that opera CD. 

[tmazz]

Kodo: Mondo Head

Red Ink CD

A number of years back Kodo did a recording for Sheffield Labs (Heartbeat Drummers of Japan)that got some attention in audiophile circles. This is just more of the same and it quite frankly gets kind of redundant after a while. Another CD I am glad I paid less than a buck for at the crack house. 

[tmazz]

The Who Hits 50

 

Nothing new and exciting, just a pretty much plain vanilla greatest hits collection with just average SQ. OK id you own nothing by the Who, but I see no e\reason to grab this one if you aready have a decent amount of Who music in your collection.

[tmazz]

Dave Brubeck - The Music of America: Inventing Jazz

Sony Masterworks 2 CD Set

A while back I said that the "Their Last Time Out" was not the place to start if you were trying to add some Brubeck music to your collection, well this set is.

From Amazon:
"During his long and prolific career, Dave Brubeck (Time magazine s 1955 Man of the Year ) often veered away from his jazz roots to branch into long-form instrumental compositions, mixing the classic sounds of his renowned quartet with symphonic orchestras. What has always been unique with Brubeck, a former student of Darius Milhaud, is that he straddled easily both worlds, exploring with avidity the endless possibilities of both when blended together, as evidenced by some of the selections in this 2-CD collection for The Music Of America series."

This set give you a really good idea of what Dave Brubeck is all about and a good overview of what  he has done over the course of his career. And you can find it starting at 99 cents for a used copy on Amazon, and only $5.99 for a brand new one.  

http://www.amazon.com/Music-America-Inventing-Dave-Brubeck/dp/B005DTCN5S/ref=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1418780214&sr=1-1&keywords=the+music+of+america+dave+brubeck

[tmazz]

Tchaikovsky 1812: Erich Kunzel/Cincinnati Pops

  Telarc CD


Not the the infamous 1978 woofer blowing Telarc recording, but a new one , recorded in 1998 using DSD technology.

A big improvement over the '78 recording. Much better sense of the hall and the addition of the Keiv Symphony Chorus adds a lot of dimensionality. I would like to say that this is because it is a DSD recording but I think it is more than that . This is the 71st album that Telarc has recorded of this orchestra in the same hall. I think in addition to the technology advances the Telarc team has simply used there experience to fine tune the recording and put out a better product. But all that aside, for me the biggest improvement is the reduction in dynamic range. Reduction???, yes you heard that right. I always felt that the biggest shortcoming of the "78 release was that in the quest to make the recording hi-fi spectacular they made the canons so loud that if you tried to listen to the music at any kind of reasonable level you risked damaging your equipment when the canon shots came along. In the DSD version the canons and much closer to the overall volume of the music so you can now enjoy the music without having to jump out of the chair and lower the volume before the canons came in.