Issue 134

APRIL 12TH, 2021

With Copper’s new format, long “Opening Salvo” intros take up a lot of space when viewed on a phone, so we’ll keep them short from now on.

This line from Gary Wilson from his song “I Wanna Take You On A Sea Cruise” seems appropriate for the times: “Hey baby, there’s only two more days till tomorrow!”

In this issue: Anne E. Johnson offers retrospectives on cinematic storyteller Randy Newman and on troubadours ancient and modern. Tom Gibbs reviews new releases from Frank Zappa, Charles Lloyd and Dr. Lonnie Smith. J.I. Agnew begins a series on historic tape recorders with a look at the Studer A80 and interview with Paul Gold of Salt Mastering. Roy Hall has memories of "Hey Jude.” Wayne Robins digs Rita Indiana. Steven Bryan Bieler realizes it’s all about the bass. Ken Sander celebrates Thanksgiving at the Fillmore East. Jay Jay ponders streaming audio quality.

What’s it like to suffer from electromagnetic hypersensitivity? We ask Dav Bedi of RadiAsian.London to find out. Stuart Marvin interviews groundbreaking music promoter Eppy Epstein of My Father’s Place, Russ Welton interviews Yamaha UK, and Ray Chelstowski wraps up his talk with keyboardist extraordinaire Chuck Leavell. Alón Sagee gets high at Mount Everest. Don Kaplan tells us about more favorite recordings. John Seetoo interviews iconoclastic producer/engineer Sylvia Massy. Adrian Wu continues his series on open reel tape. James Whitworth loses ground, Peter Xeni avoids social stigma, Audio Anthropology is on the beam and our Parting Shot looks further on. Living With Electromagnetic Hypersensitivity: Davinder Bedi of RadiAsian.London

FRANKLY SPEAKING Written by Frank Doris

Electromagnetic fields (EMF) are all around us. We’re constantly bombarded by low-level EMF from computer screens, Wi-Fi, cell phones and other devices. However, since EMF is invisible, most of us never give it a second thought.

But what if you were not only aware of low-level electromagnetic radiation, but physically reacted to it, to the point where it made you feel ill? This is known as electromagnetic hypersensitivity, or EHS. It’s also categorized as idiopathic environmental intolerance attributed to electromagnetic fields, or IEI-IMF.

While EHS isn’t an accepted medical diagnosis, and pooh-poohed in some studies or attributed to other environmental factors, there are those who will tell you it’s real, from experience.

Davinder Bedi knows it first-hand. He’s the host of online radio station RadiAsian.London, “The No. 1 Station for the Asian Invasion.” The channel plays a wide range of music from around the world. He also lives with EHS. We asked Dav to talk about his experiences.

Frank Doris: What is electromagnetic hypersensitivity and what are its symptoms?

Dav Bedi: PubMed.gov, which is part of the National Library of Medicine, does a decent job of defining EHS (excerpted; click here for the full article):

“Electromagnetic hypersensitivity (EHS), known in the past as ‘microwave syndrome,’ is a clinical syndrome characterized by the presence of a wide spectrum of non-specific multiple organ symptoms, typically including central nervous system symptoms, that occur following the patient's acute or chronic exposure to electromagnetic fields in the environment or in occupational settings.”

I find the work of Alasdair and Jean Philips extremely informative. They provide a more detailed list of symptoms at the Powerwatch website.

FD: How does it affect you?

DB: For a long time it made my days unbearable. I would get sharp headaches, and would feel pains in my heart. However, nowadays I have found methods to minimize the impact on my body.

FD: When did you first think you had it, and how was it diagnosed?

DB: Twenty years ago I was in the car with a female friend. I was in the passenger seat with my eyes closed with the car doing between 50-70 MPH, and I told her where I felt the mobile phone towers were, judging by the pain in my head.

Time after time I was correct and she was amazed. And back then the mobile phone towers were nowhere near as powerful in their emission of radio frequencies (RF) as they are today.

A ten-minute conversation on a mobile telephone would give me a headache which lasted hours, ruining my day. I just knew something wasn’t right.

Diagnosis was another matter. I saw my general practitioner, who tried to downplay it to stress and dehydration. He wouldn’t even refer me to some kind of specialist. Back then, a diagnosis for EHS was out of the question.

FD: We live in a world where we’re bombarded with wireless and electromagnetic radiation. How has it affected your functioning in the modern world?

DB: People of my age group look at me as a bit odd or behind the times, especially when they ask for my mobile phone number and I give them a land line number. However, they are the ones glued to their smartphone or tablet. I appreciate the birds in the trees and the clouds in the sky, as I’m not constantly looking down at a screen.

I tend to avoid built-up areas, especially those in close proximity to mobile phone masts. I don’t visit other peoples’ houses much, and if I must, they may find me odd in that I ask them to switch off their Wi-Fi router temporarily. That really starts a conversation!

Being in a car with somebody with a mobile phone results in me getting out of the car if possible, especially during a call. Bluetooth audio connectivity is not an option. Bluetooth really gives me headaches quickly.

I avoid most people who I know can’t live without their tech. I have walked out of jobs where the RF levels were too high.

At home I have a hard-wired landline. I don’t use cordless phones.

There was no Wi-Fi near my house, until recently when a new couple moved in next door with their high-speed Wi-Fi. They kindly agreed to switch it off at night. Regardless, I was feeling pains my head and heart while it was on during the day. I found it difficult to focus. I ended up wrapping myself in special RF sheeting just to minimize the pain. I was dressed like a sheikh, which family and friends found hilarious initially, but they soon accepted it. Thanks to the understanding and kindness of my landlord, I painted the dividing wall between the apartments with a special carbon-based paint which I grounded by connecting via a wire to the ground pin of an AC wall plug. Don’t try it this you don’t know what you are doing; call a qualified electrician. Over the window I have an enhanced version of a net curtain, which reduces frequencies by up to 36 dB at 40 GHz. It is actually an EMF radiation-protection fabric, which can be used to shield windows, your bedding or even your body. These sheets have silver and copper in them, which can block EMF and RF. That very same sheet formed my sheikh outfit. I made a video demonstrating the effectiveness of this sheeting: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fEYZa_hhw5s

The Alasdair and Jean Philips study raises an interesting point, which I also have personal experience of. To quote: “Many electrically sensitive people seem to have quite dry skin and can carry high electrostatic charges on their body. Not only can other people experience a ‘zap’ when touching the person, but the electrostatic charges can also be transferred to electronic equipment causing equipment to malfunction. If you experience these problems, then you should wear clothes and shoes made of natural materials or even special conductive clothing and footwear that is made for workers in the electronics semiconductor industry. You need to have flooring that is made of natural material, as you build up static charges every time you move your feet.”

I have literally shocked my partner a few times but nowadays I wear a silver chain around my neck and silver bracelet on my wrist. Luckily, I haven’t frazzled any equipment as of yet.

During my daily walk, I place my hands on the bark of an old oak tree before I head home. My partner, Claire, thinks it’s a bit odd, but is used to it by now.

FD: You’re a radio broadcaster. How can you work in an environment where EMF must be prevalent?

DB: I am tactical in the sense that I only switch on what I need for the show and switch if off straight after the show is done.

One of the biggest culprits in the studio which caused a painful burning sensation in my hands was a MacBook Pro. So, I can only use it with an external wired keyboard and mouse. I use a wired Ethernet connection.

The studio is full of transformers, but I only switch on what is needed, for a limited duration. Headphones always have to be wired, not wireless. In the studio I usually use a set of AKG K271 MKIIs which give me a reading of 3 mG (magnetic) and around 100 V/m (electric) on the EMF meter. My Beyer DT150s measure significantly lower at 1 mG (magnetic) and around 30 V/m (electric). To minimize exposure while listening to music, I much prefer to use an old speaker system here at low volume.

What also helped was installing an EMFields DE2 Dirty Electricity (AC) Filter. I was a little dubious when I purchased it but within the first few minutes of plugging it into the wall, I felt more relaxed. I keep my cables as short as possible and always opt for the shielded and grounded variety. I am lucky in the sense that I feel the effects of RF way more on my body than EMI.

After twenty years of dealing with skeptical family and friends, I spent a bit of money, which would have gone towards studio gear, and invested in accurate metering. For around £310 I bought two meters, an EMFields Acousticom 2 to measure RF and an EMFields PF5 Pocket Power Frequencies Meter, which is an EMF detector. You need to understand the significance of the day the meters arrived. It was my day to prove people who doubted me wrong.

FD: What about microwave ovens? I had one that would interfere with Wi-Fi reception when it was on.

DB: I rush straight out of the kitchen when someone switches one of those horrid contraptions on. The hilariously poor shielding used in microwaves to stop the RF leakage is in no way up to the job. My partner Claire taunted me one day by putting her head near the blasted thing while watching her food being nuked. I could literally feel the tension in my heart. Check out the following video on the RadiAsian YouTube channel. I rest my case. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mcfxzmh67Ps

FD: Is there anything else that alleviates EMF for you?

DB: The importance of getting out to a rural area can’t be stressed enough. One which is densely populated by trees, such as a forest, is even better. Going to the forest for me was the equivalent of someone releasing a tight grip around my skull. My headaches vanished.

Buy yourself some decent RF and EMF metering; don’t cheap out and try and use a mobile phone app. That will help you locate the RF and EMF danger spots you encounter throughout your day. Plus, you will also be able to test the effectiveness of shielding should you decide to try that.

I avoid walking anywhere near electrical substations which house huge transformers. Don’t even get me started on SAR, (Specific Absorption Rate), which is a measure of the amount of RF energy absorbed by the human body according to its weight. SAR standards have been breached long ago.

I have tested orgonite material, but not shungite yet. Orgonite is weak compared to a physically- grounded barrier between you and the device emitting the RF.

I know the locations of most mobile phone masts and try and work out routes to avoid the main ones. I do wrap that radiation sheet around me, also covering my head, like a cloak, then put my coat over the top. The first time I did this, the pain was significantly reduced being near the main cell towers. I will invest in a hoodie made of similar material. To my knowledge, the material used to make this clothing doesn’t provide the same level of protection as the sheeting material I have. However, it is still very good.

Trees are your friends (and also some of the biggest enemies to the communications industry). Don’t complain if you have a poor mobile phone signal at home; it’s a good thing.

You need to be sleeping in the most RF-dead spot of your house, if practical. You can purchase or make a bed canopy from EMF material. Switching off Wi-Fi and mobile phones helps too, or get a wired landline, but I’m not sure many people could go back to my 1980s communication methods. Cook using the stove or oven as opposed to the microwave. As I noted, carbon paint works wonders, especially two layers, and if the paint is grounded to your electrical system and the walls and doors are all connected to each other. You can apply a top coat of decorative paint.

FD: Is there a threshold where one type of equipment might just be mildly annoying and some other type of equipment is unbearable?

DB: The MacBook Pro is intolerable without an external wired keyboard and wired mouse. Slightly annoying equipment can result in headaches after a few hours. Switching off computer screens when not in use helps a lot. However, I would only really feel them if I was right up close.

In the past I had many days where I couldn’t work due to headaches. Those days are gone because I invested in metering, screening materials and carbon paint. Bluetooth exposure for just 15 minutes gives me the most severe headaches.

I can feel powerful hazards from maybe 250 meters away depending on whether we are in a built-up area or not. It feels like a dull ache in my head and heart.

I guess I need to stop treating it as a disability and look at it as a blessing, as my body’s defense mechanism is warning me of nearby hazards.

FD: Are you bothered by things like airport scanners, tanning lights or the kind of ultrasound used in medical diagnosis?

DB: Airport scanners are a major hazard so I avoid flying. And if you try rushing though the scanners, security will collar you like some sort of narcotics smuggler. On the bright side, I’m brown-skinned, so I’ve saved considerable money on tanning sessions. Couldn’t resist a bit of humor there.

I avoid X-rays and ultrasound, so much so that I had a fractured elbow last year but let it heal naturally without visiting the doctor in order to avoid the X-ray machine.

FD: Are there any medications or homeopathic remedies that help?

DB: I think a healthy diet with good natural healthy greens is paramount. Think about it, chlorophyll is a transducer. It converts light energy into energy to be utilized by plants to grow. Chlorophyll is similar to the way melanin works for us. Spend time in the sun, as a lack of sunlight over time can lead to a myriad of health conditions. Learn to cook – I mean, really cook, from raw ingredients. Avoid processed foods and drink distilled water. Your level of hydration has a correlation to your conductivity and energy levels too.

FD: Do you know anyone else with this condition? Are there support groups?

DB: My housemate also suffers from EHS. It affects his sleep, so he has painted and treated his whole room, including installing a special gold membrane over the windows so his room is RF-dead. It feels even better than my room to be in. Now he sleeps amazingly well and is happier and less tired. In August 2019, eleven American claimants filed a class action lawsuit against Samsung and Apple for problems related to RF exposure from mobile phones. I’m not sure of the outcome of the case as of yet. If in favor of the claimants, it will be a landmark decision. I’m not holding my breath, as there is way too much money tied up in the telecommunications industry and the Internet of Things infrastructure.

These webpages are useful: for shielding products and meters, EMF Protection, https://emf-protection.co.uk. For a wealth of information on the subject go to https://www.powerwatch.org.uk/library/.

There are community pages on social media, but be careful not to be branded a conspiracy theorist, and take what practical information you can from these pages.

FD: What would you say to skeptics? No definitive studies exist, at least according to Wikipedia as of this writing. What about people who would say it’s all in your imagination?

DB: For almost two decades I dealt with the criticism of skeptics, many my own family and friends. I’ve heard the most hilarious statements, such as, “they would never release a product which wasn’t safe for humans.” Above everything you hear from everyone, including me, trust your own body. And trust a good-quality meter. Skeptics, even the most vehement deniers, stay quiet when a meter is in operation showing actual readings. Of course, there are those who will say that what the meter is measuring doesn’t really affect you. I disagree.

If you must use a mobile phone, use the hands-free facility and limit your conversation time. Texting is better than calling, and voice calling is better than video chatting, which has the highest data transfer rates.

Don’t take chances with your health, or especially where children are involved. They won’t like it, but see if you can temporarily swap your children’s iPads for real books for a few hours a day.

I’ll conclude on a lighter note. For those of you who are fans of Stranger Things and such: who knows, this electro smog may even be inhibiting your psychic ability.

I hope this interview has provided some useful information or at least mere food for thought, regardless of which side of the fence you sit on.

Header image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons/SuperManu. Rita Indiana and Her Magic Blender

WAYNE'S WORDS Written by Wayne Robins

My obsession with Rita Indiana began when I read a profile of her by Daniel Alarcón in The New Yorker. It seems like I read the article years ago, because Indiana's music and writing have taken over so much of my life, I feel like she's been part of it forever. But the essay only appeared a few months ago, in the October 19, 2020 issue.

In "Rita Indiana's Songs for the Apocalypse," Alarcón is assessing his own anxiety coping with the COVID era, looking at the larger picture of environmental disaster, western wildfires, truth in tatters, science suspect, and the accelerating impact of universal dread while we were isolated and unable to imagine a new normal, or what it would be like:

"It all happened so fast, or at least it feels that way, speed being an essential feature of this bewildering era we’re staggering through – the relentless, furious acceleration of it all. Surely this is part of the reason that, for the past several weeks, I’ve been listening to the Dominican novelist and musician Rita Indiana’s masterly new album, Mandinga Times, on repeat."

I was soon listening to Mandinga Times on repeat, despite the fact that I could barely understand a word of it. I thought my weak grasp of Spanglish was at fault, but have since discovered otherwise. I reached out to Sydney Hutchinson, the ethnomusicologist and scholar who translated Indiana's most recent novel, Made in Saturn (published in Spanish, 2018, English, 2020) into English. It's a wonderful book, about a young Dominican artist whose wealthy father sends him to Havana to be treated for heroin addiction. He becomes addicted to the substitute drug Temgesic, and I had the strangest reaction: I wanted to wander the streets of Havana in a Temgesic daze, no matter how unpleasant the cravings or side effects.

Hutchinson is affiliated with Syracuse University in New York, but is teaching at Humboldt University in Berlin this semester. She told me that even Spanish speakers who don't come from the Dominican Republic may have trouble with the specific colloquialisms and pronunciations Indiana uses.

So I stopped worrying and let the sounds wash over me, allowing Indiana's rich, expressive voice to be just another instrument in the mix. It is a dominant instrument, and she knows how to play it: her great aunt was a renowned Dominican opera singer and voice teacher. Indiana never over-emotes: she lets the heady rhythms, electronic instruments, guitars and keyboards, and an avenging army of percussion attack as they will; her voice, enunciating clearly even at warp speed, stays at the center. Yet there's a tenderness to her timbre that's both addictive and seductive. Producer Eduardo Cabra of the Puerto Rican group Calle 13 presents the voice and songs with clarity and presence.

Many of the songs move fast, tempos steeped not only in merengue, the Dominican Republic's proud native musical contribution to the world of mainstream Afro-Caribbean dance music. There is also dembow, a more recent development, which features frantically rapid beats and hip-hop posturing, an easy reach for a musician attuned to punk rock, heavy metal, speed and death metal, rap, bachata, boogaloo, and reggaeton: the entire range of both heavy rock and music of the Afro- Caribbean diaspora. Indiana is far beyond genre, absorbing what she once described to Hutchinson as a multitude of styles that "are inside me like a blender." https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jvyZEEGCYRM

She also is beyond gender, and is openly gay in a Latin American culture where such candid expressions of love can still be dangerous. Indiana lives in Puerto Rico with her wife and artistic partner, Noelia Quintero, and their three children.

But researching Indiana, one recurring style was unfamiliar to me: gaga, the Dominican variation of Haitian rara. The notes to the Smithsonian Folkways album Caribbean Revels: Haitian Rara and Dominican Gaga describes the music as "wildly festive sounds, featuring unusual percussion sounds and wind instruments...played on the streets, squares and cemeteries" of the two countries; though accepted in Haiti, where vodou is part of the daily spiritual life, gaga has been frowned upon in the D.R. for the same reason: the succession of corrupt Dominican dictatorships have good reason to fear the potency of vodou.

I hear the influence of gaga most clearly on the cornucopia of drums and wind instruments on Indiana's 2010 single "No Ta Llevado el Diablo." Mandinga Times is only Indiana's second album since her 2010 debut El Juidero; she has spent most of the last decade writing fiction including Papi, which looks at an influential and powerful Dominican player like Rita's father through the eyes of an eight year old. The movie version, directed by Quintero, was released last year.

"El Zahir," one of the key tracks and videos from the new album, may have a gaga undercurrent, with a powerful literary connection. The song is named after one of Jorge Luis Borges short stories, about a coin, El Zahir, that becomes the mind-destroying obsession of anyone who possesses it: an interesting way to offer a critique of capitalism and greed. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ds8mBapJGUY

Of course, there is another way to look at Indiana and Gaga: that is, Lady Gaga. The American pop star affectionately calls her fans "little monsters"; Indiana has embraced the nickname "La Montra," (sometimes rendered "La Monstra") which, like everything she touches, has layers of meaning. Her music and her novels show an astute appreciation for horror movies, Latin American speculative fiction, David Bowie's gender-bending, and dystopia, even Armageddon, as a kind of joyous entertainment.

She is six feet, three inches tall; in her videos, she wears face makeup masks with lightning bolts, and ghostface. And "monster" is also a somewhat archaic music business term for a hit record or star; marketing and radio execs of a certain era would refer to a breakout hit as "a total monster."

Mandinga Times is a monster record. The singer created an alter ego called Mandinga in the music and videos, "a demon monster, a sea creature, whatever you want to call her," she told the website Remezcla.

The album is both unrelenting in its power and varied in its approaches, musical, visual, and literary. "Como un Dragón"" opens with a burst of dembow speed and intensity: the music cooks along like a Ramones song with an extra chord. A good introduction to Mandinga Times might be the three song video After School performed in an abandoned classroom, one of hundreds of closed schools in Puerto Rico, after budget cuts and the devastation of 2017 Hurricane Maria. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=veKgSh_9UYc

In her book, Tigers of a Different Stripe: The Performance of Gender in Dominican Music. (University of Chicago Press, 2016), Hutchinson devotes a chapter to Indiana, and so focuses on her earlier books and recordings, especially the only previous full album, El Juidero (2010) by Rita Indiana y Los Misterios. Her first internet viral hit, "El Blue de Ping Pong" (which begins with the sound of paddles knocking a table tennis ball back and forth, until the musicians pick up that beat) is here, as is "Dulces Sueños," a conventionally beautiful cover of the Eurythmics' "Sweet Dreams (Are Made of These)." The Ping Pong song began as music Indiana wrote and performed for a Dominican cellphone commercial.

The earworm from which I can't escape at the moment is the 15-minute finale to El Juidero, a jam called "Equeibol." When I ran the word through Google translate, I found nothing: equeibol was defined as equeibol. My friend Pepe, my grandniece's father, retired to the Dominican Republic last March, and soon died of COVID. Pepe, who was always dressed as if prepared for a merengue emergency to break out, would have told me that the word was Dominican for skateboard. Knowing that, I began to think of "Equiebol" as a 15-minute skateboard ride. The chord structure at the beginning of the song, and Indiana's parsing of Patti Smith's tone and timbre, build to the climactic "G-L-O-R-I-A" of the garage/punk rock standard from the Patti Smith Group's Horses. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T9rf3Cqghaw

After the "Gloria" pinnacle at around four minutes, the song keeps moving, a loose improvisation controlled by Indiana (listen for her to simply say, "solo" and the guitarist takes a low-key spotlight). Then the bass player does a powerful salsa vamp that reminded me of the strutting break in Johnny Colon's "Boogaloo Blues," and as the keyboards take more control, I'm thinking of one of the longer Doors songs, like "The End," or "When the Music's Over." Meanwhile, Indiana is delivering a recitation. Somewhere, I found a translation (unofficial: I would suggest all translations of Indiana's songs are "unofficial"), and I think she was skating through a neighborhood where a leading opponent of whatever dictatorship was in power at a particular time was shot to death in front of his family by police; what I've read is that the cover-up story was preposterous even by Dominican standards.

But then again, life is preposterous, precarious, and precious, and the work of Rita Indiana is about all that, and so much more.

Header image courtesy of Eduardo Martinez. Open Reel Tape: The Ultimate Analog Source? Part Three

DEEP DIVE Written by Adrian Wu

In Part One and Part Two (Issue 132 and Issue 133), this series discussed the rationale for listening to open reel tapes in the current digital music era, and surveyed a number of renowned models that are no longer in production. The series concludes with a look at currently-available open reel tape decks.

There are now two manufacturers that I am aware of that are selling tape decks based on completely new designs, and another that has a working prototype ready for commercial production. The first to release a brand new machine recently was Roland Schneider, a German engineer who made his name designing an award-winning table lamp. This man must be a genius, being able to design and build a new tape machine from scratch without any prior experience. His high-end Ballfinger M063 machine has three direct-drive motors, three selectable speeds, and both NAB and IEC1/CCIR equalization. The machine is modular, which means it can be configured for full function, playback only, or without any record or playback electronics. An extra 4-track playback head can be installed as an option. The advantage of this new machine is its more up-to-date electronics for the control logic and for audio, compared to legacy product redesigns. It is a conventional-looking, but very well-designed and built machine and I look forward to auditioning it at some point.

Ballfinger has just released a lower cost, drive-only machine called the M002P for use with external playback electronics. It also has three direct-drive motors and operates in two speeds. The deck is very compact and space-saving. Thorens has licensed the player to be sold under its own brand.

The second manufacturer to release brand new tape recorders is Metaxas & Sins. Kostas Metaxas has been using Stellavox tape machines for his recording work for decades, and his new recorders are a tribute to these legendary designs. All his audio products have a very distinct visual style that reminds me of the Terminator movies, and the Metaxas & Sins Papillon studio tape machine certainly looks unique and, in my opinion, quite beautiful. It reminds me a bit of the Transrotor turntable of the late 1960s that pioneered the skeletal record deck. He also designed the T-RX portable recorder, which looks like a modern reiteration of the Stellavox SM8, optimized for the purpose of location recording. The machine is jewel-like, and quite an object of desire for me!

Analogue Audio Design is a French company that planned on debuting a functioning prototype of their TR-1000 tape machine at last year's Munich High End Show, which was unfortunately cancelled. They have recently put up a YouTube video of the deck playing a tape. It is a conventional- looking machine, but most of the controls are on a touch screen. On the video, it sure looks like a smooth operator.

One criticism of studio tape recorders is that the quality of their playback electronics is often not up to audiophile standards. It therefore makes sense to bypass the stock electronics and use an external tape head preamplifier. Some vintage preamplifiers from the 1960s, such as those from Marantz, McIntosh, Harmon Kardon and even Audio Research (the SP-2) came with tape head inputs. These only had NAB equalization, and were optimized for the high inductance heads of the day. With a bit of work, they can be made to work well with a wide variety of tape heads and are worth exploring.

Several modern manufacturers have released preamplifiers designed specifically to work with tape heads. For those lucky enough to own a Cello Audio Suite preamplifier, there is the option of installing the P603 tape head preamplifier module, if you can find one. Charles King produces a tape head preamplifier based on the Cello design, called the King Cello preamplifier. It is a made-to-order custom design, and can include potentiometers to make fine adjustments to the equalization curves, as well as switchable input sensitivities and custom input loading. I often use this to make tape transfers, which allows me to correct problems with equalization.

Manley Laboratories produced a dual-mono tube tape head preamplifier with external power supply for a number of years, but this has sadly been discontinued. The preamplifier has continuously adjustable equalization, bass boost and polarity switch, all features mastering engineers find useful. Not many of these were sold to mastering studios and they are therefore rarely sighted on the secondary market. I called EveAnna Manley to ask if it would be possible to resume production on a custom order basis, but she told me she has so much work backlogged that this would not be possible, at least not in the foreseeable future.

Another option is to modify a phono preamplifier. The equalization needed is simpler than RIAA equalization for LPs, and designs that use a passive RIAA network are the easiest to modify. This is exactly what I did, and since I built the preamplifier from scratch originally, it was not difficult. The values of the components in the network can be worked out by calculation, but it is necessary to fine tune the performance with a reference tape. The input loading also needs to be fine-tuned to get good high frequency response and extension. You can read about what I did here.

One of the earliest dedicated tape head preamplifiers still in production is the Bottlehead Tube Repro. This was developed by tube amplifier designer Dan Schmalle, one of the founders of The Tape Project, to use with his Nagra TA. For anyone looking for a tube-based preamplifier, this is a very reasonably-priced option.

Another popular choice is the Doshi V3.0 Tape Stage. This has a differential input stage for superior noise performance, along with a continuously adjustable EQ and adjustable loading.

The Merrill Audio Master Tape Head Preamplifier is a solid-state unit that is available with either one or three inputs. It has an external power supply and is operated by touchscreen controls. The preamp offers all the commonly-used EQs and is fully balanced. It is highly praised by audiophile and professional users alike for its excellent sound quality and ease of use.

Analog open reel tape looks to be more than just a passing fad, with manufacturers of new tape machines and preamplifiers investing their effort and resources in this format. It offers a path to "perfect analog sound forever" for those of us who treasure the recordings of yesteryear and are willing to invest in some maintenance and upkeep, even if it’s simple, occasional head cleaning. This format offers something for every budget; it is possible to pick up an old tape machine for a couple of hundred dollars, or even for nothing (keep an eye on your local dumpsters), to play the 4-track tapes that you picked up at the local flea market or from your dad's collection. If the machine is in good mechanical condition, you can upgrade by wiring the playback head to a separate tape head preamplifier. Those who are less adventurous can buy professionally-refurbished machines or even new ones, with a price ranging from around $4,000 to $35,000.

Once critical mass has been reached, we should see many more new pre-recorded tapes becoming available. One thing is for sure, once someone has experienced good analog tape playback, it is hard not to become totally enchanted.

Header image: Doshi Audio V3.0 Tape Stage. Chuck Leavell: World-Class Keyboard Player, Part Two

DISCIPLES OF SOUND Written by Ray Chelstowski

In Part One (Issue 133) Copper interviewed keyboard player extraordinaire Chuck Leavell about the making of The Tree Man, the new documentary about his life, and his work with the Rolling Stones, Sea Level, The Allman Brothers Band and more. The interview continues here.

Ray Chelstowski: What’s been the hardest body of work to get your arms around?

Chuck Leavell: David Gilmour. We all know Pink Floyd but I hadn’t really studied their music that deeply before. Also David had a lot of solo songs off his records that he wanted to have in the show. So he sent me a live concert that he had done fairly recently in South America. I studied that thing in my little rehearsal place every day, making chord charts and practicing until I was on a plane headed over there. It was extremely helpful to me because it was a lot of information to absorb.

RC: I never knew that Gilmour had you sing the Roger Waters’ vocal part in “Comfortably Numb.” I consider that to be one of the most difficult vocal parts in rock n roll. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LTseTg48568

CL: Well, David gave me a great piece of advice. He told me to curl my lip a little bit when I sing it and that really helped me to understand the character. You have to kind of put yourself in that character’s shoes and imagine how he would sound in delivering that message he delivers. So it was really helpful for him to give me that small piece of advice.

RC: I was also surprised to see Bonnie Raitt appear in the film. When did you both work together?

CL: Well with Bonnie it was really more of a casual jam “sit in” relationship. I’ve never officially been in a band with her. But in the days when I was working with the Fabulous Thunderbirds we had a lot of concerts together with Bonnie. Then of course she has been a special guest [in] Stones shows as well. She’s just such a lovely person. By the way, we even did shows together with Sea Level. So there have been a lot of exchanges with her through the years. I’m so glad and grateful that she agreed to be interviewed for the film.

RC: You famously joined George Harrison’s last tour. Did you ever get the chance to record at (Harrison’s studio,} Friar Park?

CL: Yes! We did. Oh my heavens. That place was is so incredible. Like all of us, that photograph on the front of All Things Must Pass always intrigued me. Then, having the opportunity to be there was something. I remember when we were rehearsing around Thanksgiving and Olivia (Harrison) said, “why don’t we have all of the guys over for a Thanksgiving dinner at Friar Park?” We had the dinner and then went back a few more times after that. The gardens, topiary garden, the Japanese garden, the rock garden, the grotto, the interior of the house….it was all absolutely fantastic. I didn’t record there but obviously saw the studio, walked about it and got to touch everything. But we never did actually record there.

RC: The Gregg Allman’s solo album Laid Back was really your foray into joining the Allman Brothers and in many ways launched this amazing career. Did you realize at the time how big this moment was?

CL: Not really. It was more a matter of how the cards were falling. I would listen to Duane and Gregg when they were the Allman Joys back in Tuscaloosa. They would play at a place called the Fort Brandon Armory. I was a big fan back then and understood how powerful their presence was. So after coming to Macon and making my way up I would get these sessions mainly through Johnny Sandlin. He was the one who called me in on the Laid Back record. He felt like I could contribute something. I actually had gone back to Tuscaloosa to see my mom for a little bit and the phone rang and it was Johnny. He said, “here’s what’s happening, do you want to do it?” I said, “hell yes I wanna do it!”

That was a really strong little group. We had Tommy Talton, Scott Boyer, and Charlie Hayward played some bass on the record. Then of course we were embellished by Ed Freeman’s string parts here and there. I was barely twenty when that went down so those songs like “Queen of Hearts” and “Multicolored Lady” were great vehicles to express myself. After hours there were these jam sessions that would occur and often times the rest of the Allman Brothers would come too. We might play a blues song or an Allman song or just pick a key and go. These things started to feel very interesting. To contrast what used to be a twin-guitar band with now a twin-keyboard [band] and a great guitar player started to take the music in a different direction. I would like to think that it came as a relief to the band because you can imagine how mentally and physically exhausted they were at that time. When Duane died they had something like ninety shows that they did as a five - piece band in order to fulfill obligations. There was a lot of pressure on Dickey (Betts) to do those slide parts, because he had never really played slide up to that point. So I think what happened by accident was that by me being there and taking things in a slightly different direction it kind of became a release valve for those guys. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vTOozRAJ8dU

RC: You host a video series called In The Green Room, where you interview celebrities about their work with the environment. Whose work has really amazed you?

CL: Chevy Chase. Of all people! With his wife Judy they do some environmental things for schools in their area. I thought it was really cool that they would take the time to engage in that kind of thing. So he was a bit of a surprise. My friend Greg Gumbel, the sports announcer, talked with me about what the NFL was doing to help “green” their world. Then there’s Usher. I interviewed him about some things he was doing in the Black community to help people better understand how to be more environmentally sensitive. Those are three that stood out to me as very interesting and a bit surprising.

RC: You also have become involved in education with IROCKU. What’s your approach to teaching music?

CL: Well you know here in “COVID world” I’ve engaged in several opportunities to sort of express myself in those terms. I did one seminar for IROCKU from my office here with a keyboard that I have. Having the opportunity for people to ask questions not strictly about musical things but also about the business of music or how to become known provides a holistic approach. It’s not just about what you do with your hands on the keyboard, but what you do across a career. It’s also about working with other musicians and how important it is to listen to their parts so that you can enhance them as best you can.

When you are doing a session it’s important to pay attention to the lyrics of the song and the musicality of the song and ask yourself the question, “what is this song wanting me to do?” Does it want me to step out and solo or is it asking me to paint some colors here and there? What instrumentation is it requesting me to play? Is it a keyboard or an organ or a piano? So when I talk to people on that level about making music and having a career in music those are the kind of things that I like to discuss.

RC: On Eric Clapton’s Unplugged, during “Old Love” when you are lighting things up on the solo, Eric Clapton and Andy Fairweather Low look at each other and smile, almost as if it even caught them off guard. It was as if how you approached it in rehearsal was more tame. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qv63M6XXgGE

CL: Well what happened was we went through the rehearsal for Unplugged and that song was on the list. Then Eric for some reason discarded it. Maybe it was one slow song too many or it didn’t click for him. I was kind of disappointed because I love the song. So we do the set and we go through everything we had rehearsed except “Old Love.” We had jammed on an encore and I don’t know why Eric turned to me but he asked, “hey man, we’re out of songs what can we play?” Immediately I said “Old Love.” So that’s the way it came about. It wouldn’t have happened otherwise. And you’re right. I was kinda like a coiled spring. I couldn’t wait to have that one.

RC: At your planation have there been any infamous or not so infamous jams that have occurred with overnight guests?

CL: Hahahaha. Well you know sadly I haven’t had as many of my musical mates out here as I would have liked. But I can tell you this. In addition to forestry, one of the things that I do on the side a little bit is traditional southern quail hunting on a commercial basis. As you can imagine a lot of the clients who come here are fans and many are amateur musicians; some are actually quite good. And so there are jam sessions that go down over at what we call “The Lodge” where I’ve got a really nice Yamaha piano. In fact I’ve got a group over there right now and one of the guys called me up and said, “hey we learned ‘Grand Larceny’ by Sea Level. You think we can do that tonight?” So I get a lot of that kind of thing and the way I put it to people is that obviously we get quail hunters in the woods and we have a traditional Southern outdoor experience. It’s more about watching the dogs work than is about anything. But at the end of the day when the cocktail time comes I go sit with the guys and do some songs on the piano. Sometimes it’s better to bring the audience to me than for me to go to the audience, especially in [these] COVID [times].

RC: Last year’s Madison Square Garden Allman Brothers 50th Anniversary show on March 10th was one of the last live shows I got to see. You all outdid yourselves. Is there any chance of taking this on the road once the COVID-19 restrictions are lifted?

CL: There was a good bit of discussion between some of us who participated, to say, “hey, could we take this one the road and do a little tour?” I felt like it went so well. I mean Warren (Haynes) knocked it out of the park. He always does anyway. The others that contributed for the first time like Duane Trucks and Reese Wynans helped make for a powerful performance. I think it really did the Allman Brothers justice and its such great music. It’s a logistical challenge with everyone’s schedules but there was such a special feeling that night. I think we could replicate that if we could just get everybody together. It just all fell together and felt very natural. It didn’t feel forced by any means. There were a lot of smiles going around the room both at rehearsals and at the show itself. Fingers crossed. Maybe we can figure it out!

RC: As you consider your legacy, what do you most want to be known for?

CL: As the film depicts, it’s really three things. The music, the environment, and of course family!

Photography by © Allen Farst. Thanksgiving at the Fillmore East

TRUE-LIFE ROCK TALES Written by Ken Sander

Halloween had just passed and now it was turning cold. I went to a second-hand antique clothing store and bought a West Point cadet’s winter coat for $15. It was wool and heavy. The darn thing must have weighed 13 pounds and was so bulky you couldn’t even fold it over your arm, but in true military tradition it was warm enough for those cadets to stand in the freezing cold in parade formation for hours at a time. I did not get to keep the overcoat long. By February Paul Jabara from the original Broadway cast of Hair (and later a Grammy award winner for writing “Last Dance” for Donna Summer) liberated it from me. Even through the coldest months of winter the heavy West Point cadet coat and I did not connect on an emotional or serviceable level. A fact that allowed Paul to take possession of said coat.

Back to November of 1969 – Thanksgiving was coming up in a few days and my sister Ellen (the famous rock writer) called and asked if I wanted to have Thanksgiving with her at the Fillmore East. They were having a Thanksgiving dinner for staff and some guests, and she could bring me along.

Thanksgiving came and Ellen and I walked into the Fillmore East’s main entrance on Second Avenue. Ellen introduced me to Bill Graham and he briefly shook my hand. I got the sense that Bill was a gruff guy. He had a reputation for being volatile and explosive. Anyone who has been to any Bill Graham concert has likely seen Bill out front denying access and threatening undesirables, potential gatecrashers, or dealers. When annoyed, he used a tactic of standing a bit too close, leaning in with the apparent threat of violence (a threat only) while cursing in a loud and intimidating manner. He also had an opinion of certain creative aspects of the music business and the people involved and history did not always prove him right. However, I think we could assume his motives were not vindictive. An example would be his first entertainment job in 1965 as manager of the San Francisco Mime Troupe.

When the San Francisco Mime Troupe was denied permits by the city, Graham and Haight Ashbury promoter Chet Helms, who founded Family Dog Productions, came up with the idea for a benefit concert at the Winterland Ballroom. “When somebody said, ‘Let’s put some talent together,'” as Bill told to journalist Ralph J. Gleason, “I started calling around. But the most significant thing about the beginning was that I really did not know about the scene. I heard about these groups and I called everybody. One of the acts that is listed on my first handbill is the Family Dog. Somebody said, ‘You should call them.” Great! I wanted a dog act! When they came, I said, ‘What do you do?’ They said, ‘We hold dances, man!'” They were rival promoters.

A short time later Graham and the Mime Troupe were in conflict about the act’s performance. The troupe felt that the business manager should have no say in the creative process. In protest, Bill resigned, but before leaving he held another benefit for the Troupe, and that was the start of his career as a concert promoter.

Frank Barsalona of Premiere Talent Agency (sold to William Morris Agency in 2002) called him “painfully honest” – but not many had found him consistently pleasant to deal with. On one occasion, a famous Hollywood actor called him the Rod Steiger of concert promoters.

Years later when Alice Cooper played the Fillmore West on their first tour (this is a story shared by an insider) Bill’s “goons” ripped them off the stage. It seems he was horrified; he thought he had booked a girl band. Bill’s management company struggled to keep acts on his management roster because he was a buttinsky about creative aspects, performance, personal schedules, and even details like the group’s wake up times.

We walked into the Thanksgiving dinner and down the right aisle toward the stage. It was a low key affair with a long catering-type table set up onstage with plenty of food. Carved turkey, potatoes, cranberry sauce and all the other Thanksgiving holiday foods and desserts were spread out. It was self-service with folding chairs sprinkled about the stage, though many of us took our food into the audience seats. There were about 130 people milling around with paper plates in their hands.

A mixture of musicians, (anyone who was touring and happened to be in town was invited) office staff and stagehands came. Everyone was friendly and after I ate, I wandered around the theater. Theaters, bars, and night clubs do not look the same in the daytime and they smell different too. I was walking backstage, and ran into Janis Joplin. She knew me (by sight) and we said hello. We chatted mostly about California and made other small talk for a minute or two, and then she said she wanted to go to Bill’s office.

One of the people I met at the party was the box office manager. She told me the box office was usually open seven days a week and for 10 hours a day, but was closed Thanksgiving day. We talked for a bit and then I asked her if I could buy some tickets. Sure, she said, and we walked out front to the box office. She unlocked the door and we went inside. Seeing the upcoming concert schedule, I picked out two concerts I wanted to see: the Byrds and the Doors. I think my total expense for both tickets was $7.50. Back in the day tickets were accessible and people could afford them. Yes, shows often sold out but usually if you wanted to go to a concert you had a chance to buy tickets. Then I hooked back up with Ellen and we left. It was an understated event, but I thought it was gracious of Bill Graham to hold a Thanksgiving dinner for industry people.

A week later was the Doors concert. My seat was in the orchestra, probably Row G and sightly off center toward stage right. Jim Morrison came out dressed in black leather. He looked great and the girls went crazy. He wrapped himself around the microphone stand like he was making love to it. A commanding figure, totally into the show, and Jim and the Doors – Ray Manzarek on keyboards, John Densmore playing drums and Robby Krieger on guitar – kicked butt. Great presence and powerful vocals, tight band. I would say I was seventy feet from him, so I had a good view, and the sound system was on point.

On a side note, Bill Graham was possibly the first rock concert promoter to understand the need for and use of quality sound and lights. At the time most other promoters felt this was an area where they could save money, so they skimped on the sound and lighting systems. Another great thing about concerts back then was that everyone stayed in their seats, which really enhanced the whole experience. You could really get a sense of the band and the music by watching and listening. If you want to dance then go to a festival.

The Doors really brought it, they were really on their game. It had to be one of their best shows, exceptional. Jim Morrison was dark, dangerous, and powerful. The girls found him hot. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CKw9JA66H-A

A few weeks later I went to see the Byrds, and I was sitting a little further back, maybe Row R, and more stage left. The Byrds were good, seasoned with hints of country music twang combined with the smoothness of the West Coast sound. Great guitar and vocals with flowing harmonies. It gives me a pause just to think of the great musicians that passed through that band over the years – Roger McGuinn and people like Gene Clark, David Crosby, Clarence White, Gram Parsons, Chris Hillman and other incredible singers and players.

When I got home to my apartment the place had been robbed. I had metal gates on the window. They were accordion-like metal gates and the bottoms were like Vs extending to an inch above the inside window ledge. Being New York City, the six-story building had a fire escape. One of the bottom windowpanes was smashed in and behind the small window one of the Vs on the bottom part of the gate behind the window was bent back and up into the apartment. The space that it made was about nine inches by nine inches. How could anyone get through that? Maybe the robber had a small kid with them, and the kid wiggled in and then unlocked the door. Or maybe a trained monkey; I know that sounds ridiculous, but really, I could not see any adult, even a small one, squeezing through that little opening. They took the TV and the cash I had in the apartment, about $80, and some other things. I had a locksmith fix the gates and replace the broken windowpane with a bar across the bottom of the gate, so that avenue of entrance was then sealed. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HH8QWHIOjuE

The year was coming to an end and I ran into Michael Foster in the subway. Michael was a friend from California who had previously owned a head shop on Las Palmas Avenue in Hollywood. He invited me to join him and a group of his friends for a New Year’s celebration at the historical Luchow’s restaurant (est. 1882) on East Fourteenth Street and the corner of Irving Place, located in the almost farthest northwestern part of the East Village. Just a few doors west of the (former) Academy of Music. Luchow’s stretched from Fourteenth Street through the block all the way to Thirteenth Street. We were in a medium-size room seated at a table for eight. There were five such tables in the room so doing the math there were 40 people there. This was one of many rooms and banquet halls in Luchow’s – it was a big building. Seated at the next table was Judy Collins with her friends. New York being New York, nobody bothered her or went over to her table and tried to talk to her.

A year and a half later I was working for Elektra Records and the record company had an occasion to hold a big party for Jim Morrison. It was at the Hilton on 54th Street and the Avenue of the Americas (Sixth Avenue] in the penthouse ballroom on the top floor of the hotel. Big room and easily 300 attendees. There was an open bar, finger food and music. It seemed like a happy party, but Jim Morrison, who had gained some weight, stayed in the corners of the ballroom. The crowd was having fun and people were on the dance floor. Suddenly, I saw a chubby bald guy, maybe 45 years old, get punched in the face so hard that it sent him sprawling flat on his back, landing with a loud thump. He got up, standing not far from the dude that punched him, and started dancing again like nothing happened. I looked at my watch and it was almost 11 pm, time to leave.

As I am walking out of the ballroom toward the banks of elevators, I pass by Jim Morrison all alone, sitting there with his arms crossed and a scowl on his face. Our Staff

MASTHEAD Written by Frank Doris

Staff Writers: J.I. Agnew, Ray Chelstowski, Cliff Chenfeld, Jay Jay French, Tom Gibbs, Roy Hall, Rich Isaacs, Anne E. Johnson, Don Kaplan, Don Lindich, Tom Methans, B. Jan Montana, Rudy Radelic, Wayne Robins, Alón Sagee, Ken Sander, Larry Schenbeck, John Seetoo, Dan Schwartz, Russ Welton, WL Woodward, Adrian Wu

Contributing Writers: Ivan Berger, Steven Bryan Bieler, Robert Heiblim, Ken Kessler, Stuart Marvin, Bob Wood

Cover: “Cartoon Bob” D’Amico

Cartoons: James Whitworth, Peter Xeni

Parting Shots: James Schrimpf, B. Jan Montana, Rich Isaacs (and others)

Editor: Frank Doris

Publisher: Paul McGowan Advertising Sales: No one. We are free from advertising and subscribing to Copper is free. Streaming Audio and Other Rants

TWISTED SYSTEMS Written by Jay Jay French

First off, I hope many of you are listening to my new Podcast called The Jay Jay French Connection: Beyond the Music (available on Spotify, Apple Music and Podcastone.com)

Great topics, great guests, and my new book, Twisted Business: Lessons From my Life in Rock n Roll is coming out in September.

Among the many fun things one can do to while away the hours in this pandemic exile is nonstop net surfing.

The fact that our phones now know our inner thoughts to the degree that all we have to do apparently is think of something and then...poof, the subject magically appears in the Google search engine is eerie, to say the least. So terrifying is this Big Brother aspect that the fact that it happens is a rant all to itself.

I will however, hold back on that in favor of commenting about all the various “expert” opinions about speaker cables, turntables, digital vs. analog, and my current pet peeve, hi-res streaming.

Perhaps I've been in this game too long.

I know what I know and I know what I hear.

When the “experts” tell us on their YouTube channel that there is no difference in cables, or that digital is better because it just has to be, I still watch, to see how wrong they can be. I get that audio can be confusing, but such opinions are about as valid as someone saying that “all rap music sucks” or, “all country music sounds the same,” or all the other well-worn cliches that we hear that are now given greater exposure thanks to the internet.

There simply is no alternative to actually experiencing things to know all you need to know.

The latest truism, as far as I'm concerned, is the myth that if you listen to music streamed over TIDAL or Qobuz (for example) and you have the ability to listen at higher bit rates (assuming that your D/A converter is capable) then the higher bit rates must sound better.

Well, after much listening and comparing, I will say that that is not always the case.

One of the enjoyable aspects of this kind of high-end streaming is that you can pick the version you want to listen to – hi-res at various sample and bit rates, CD-quality, or various formats.

It even gets a little crazier if you have TIDAL and Qobuz because they don’t even sound similar, track-for-track and bit rate-to-bit rate. It is a little crazy, I know; but if you have spent serious dosh on gear, wouldn't you want to feel better about your investment? And I’m not even talking about how the way the music is sent from your streamer to your D/A converter – the actual cable and interface connections -- because using a USB cable versus a digital coax cable and making comparisons can also cause one to reach for the Prozac!

Here is the point. If you listen to enough streaming and you know that the source was mastered at 44.1 kHz/16-bit, I don't care if the version that you are streaming at is 88, 176, 192 or 386 kHz at 24 bits. The playback at 44.1 kHz/16-bit, at least to my ears, sounds best.

What is even more confounding is that the streaming services say that all they do is stream what the record labels send them. In theory, then, there should be no difference between the sound quality of the various services if, in fact, that is the case.

Why then, do they sound different?

And what about FLAC files?

I had a producer friend come over to my house to listen to The Beatles “Apple” USB stick box set. It contains all the Beatles’ studio albums, in their UK configurations. For the first time, all the Beatles’ music is now available in two modes, standard “Red Book” CD, and all the albums are also on FLAC files. I can easily go back and forth. As I can decode both, it made for a very interesting exercise.

While the FLAC files sounded “hotter,” they didn't sound better.

The only digital medium so far that has consistently sounded better then Red Book audio to me is SACD. That is probably why SACD ain’t dying too soon!

After you read this, if you have the option to play back streamed digital music, please try all of these options on your systems and report back to me.

In a recent interview, Michael Fremer of Analog Planet and Stereophile was asked about hi-res digital files being used to press vinyl. Wouldn't the hi-res digital file sound better than the vinyl? However, Michael stated that vinyl cut from a hi-res digital master can sound even better than listening to the digital file via digital playback electronics, and I agree, having many recordings I’ve used to make the comparisons.

When I interviewed Giles Martin several years ago about the 2017 remixed and remastered version of the Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, he also confided that he prefers the sound of the vinyl to digital-only playback of the hi-res digital files it was made from, and most importantly, he can’t explain why other than, “it just does!”

The point is: when it comes to digital, not all digital files are equal (even when it says they are) and not all hi-res files sound better than standard CD-quality.

Please chime in on this. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o4AzXrL0uk4

Header image: Cambridge Audio DacMagic 100. Hey Jude

MUSIC'AL NOTES Written by Roy Hall

Music can bring you back to a certain time and place.

I recently dug out and played Marche Militaire No. 1 by Schubert. This was my first record. I had heard it on the radio and asked my father to buy it for me. I was nine or ten and fell in love with its melody, pace and rhythm. I played it constantly on our gramophone, which allowed you to stack four or five records on top of one another. If you left the stabilizing arm off, the record would automatically start playing again and again. This drove my parents crazy but I didn’t care. I was lost in Schubert. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PKUPBr0eY6Y

Around this time, I found a raw loudspeaker and after wiring it to the output on the back of the gramophone I created an ersatz “stereo effect.” Was this the beginning of half a lifetime in the stereo business?

One day, while driving, listening to the Beatles channel in my car, “Hey Jude” started to play. As the song built up to the singalong chorus, “Nah, nah, nah, nah, nanananah…,” I remembered a day long ago in Scotland.

It was one of these beautiful Scottish summer’s days, that are so rare that they should be bottled and preserved to counteract the dreariness of rest of the year. The Scots have a word for these approximately 300 cold, grey, tedious damp and wet days. They are called “Dreich.” That morning in August 1968 we drove up to the Trossachs, an area of woodlands, glens, braes and lochs, about an hour north from Glasgow. In the car apart from myself were Ivor Tiefenbrun (ex. Linn Products), his fiancé Evelyn, and a good friend, Rosalie Rawson, whom I was somewhat dating at that time.

The single “Hey Jude” had just been released and the radio played it often. In those days there were few stations available so most everyone listened to the same programs, which greatly contributed to the success of new (and established) music groups. Nowadays, the proliferation of so many different types of media make it harder to be heard. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A_MjCqQoLLA

Having passed through Aberfoyle on our way to Loch Katrine, which is stunningly beautiful and is the main reservoir for Glasgow’s water supply, Rosalie, a woman with a normally bubbly personality, suddenly when pale and said,

“Something terrible has happened.”

I pulled over.

“What has happened?” I queried.

“I don’t know,” came the answer.

She was sullen and (unusual for her) withdrawn. She wouldn’t say anything else.

We stopped at Loch Katrine and ate lunch. Rosalie wouldn’t eat anything and no matter how hard we tried, conversation lagged and although the sun was shining and the loch was shimmering, the beauty of our surroundings lost its luster as if a cloud had passed over us.

We decided to cut the trip short and start for home. The radio was playing “Hey Jude” when the song was interrupted by a news bulletin. This was unusual because BBC Radio Scotland rarely did this.

“In England, a bus carrying members of a youth group from Glasgow went on fire this morning. Many of the youths suffered burns and have been ferried to a local hospital.”

All of us went pale. We all had been members of a Zionist youth movement in Glasgow called Habonim. The bus was full of people we knew who had been returning from a farm in England.

Over 30 had been burned when the driver of the bus had decided to pour gasoline directly into the engine, which was in the front of the bus near the driver. Apparently, the engine was having problems so the driver opened the cowling and poured gasoline from a can directly into the carburetor. On hitting the hot engine the gasoline burst into flames and he reflexively threw the burning can down the aisle of the bus, spraying fire everywhere.

No one died but about 10 people were quite badly burned.

I do not believe in the supernatural so I don’t have an explanation for Rosalie’s behavior but it was eerie that she felt something at the exact moment the fire occurred 200 miles away.

A few of our close friends were burned quite badly. Sadly, some of the worst victims were scarred for life.

Header image of the Trossachs courtesy of Wikimedia Commons/John Mason. Getting High, Part Three

NEW VISTAS Written by Alón Sagee

In Part One (Issue 132) and Part Two (Issue 133), Alón embarked upon his quest to scale the heights of Kala Patthar near Mount Everest in Nepal. The story concludes here.

The air was getting colder and thinner with each step. A few of our climbers complained about having difficulty breathing. It started snowing…

The near-loss of our porter Dorje to altitude sickness was a sobering experience for our expedition…any trace of hubris dissolved, and no one questioned anything our leader Wang Chuk said ever again. Except, maybe…me.

We plodded upwards quietly on our way to Everest base camp, waiting for us at almost 18,000 feet.

This final embarkation point welcomed a confluence of expeditions with colorful flags representing many countries’ bids for the summit. This was the last place for mountaineers to acclimate and prepare mentally for the scaling of glaciers, snow and icy rock on their way to their chosen peak. The Nepalese Army had a team there, but was hurdled by the discovery of two of their young conscripts having had a few toes turn black and break off in their boots on the way up. Once again, the reality of where we were and what we were doing found deeper purchase on the slippery slope of our consciousness.

We spent the morning at base camp, taking a short trip across Khumbu, the glacier that dominates the local landscape. The scariest part of the journey so far had been the 8-foot aluminum ladder spanning a 7-foot crevasse – basically a vertical crack in the ice, that plummets down and tapers in. If you fall off the ladder and the anchors don’t hold, you’re going down fast…until you stop abruptly at the bottom, being squeezed between two walls of ice. These stress fractures in the glacier’s slow- moving body are a part of its journey and can be a few dozen feet in depth, or so deep that if you did go down, you’d never be seen again. Rope rescues do happen, but are very dangerous, requiring one of the Sherpas to rappel down and attempt to extract you from the grip of that icy vise.

Our next stop was a settlement named Gorak Shep, which at the time consisted of a single small stone building. We would stay overnight in this empty rectangle of rock and in the morning ascend to our destination peak, Kala Patthar.

Kala Patthar, which translates to “Black Rock,” lives up to its name, sporting dark ice-glazed boulders all the way to the top at its 19,501-foot elevation. It is known to have the best view of Everest. It would take us about three hours of climbing to reach the summit.

At nightfall, we all slipped into our sleeping bags, excited that we were so close to our goal.

Then, early morning. Most of us woke up bleary-eyed.

Wang Chuk waited patiently for everyone to awaken before announcing that a storm was coming in and that we were not going up to the peak. We would stay in Gorak Shep that day and start heading back down to Lukla in the morning. It was a judgment call based on experience and safety for his clients.

Not going…what? I hadn’t come half way around the planet to not go! I was devastated. Then, with some self-cognitive disbelief, I heard my mouth say: “I’m going.” A hushed silence blanketed the room. Wang Chuk responded by saying he couldn’t stop me, and neither could he assign me a Sherpa. It was then that Tikka, an experienced guide who became an expedition friend, volunteered to go with me. Soon after, Dan the Dutch guy joined this rogue contingent on a three-hour climb to the top.

Off we went.

After about a half hour, a light snow started. Tikka turned back. A few steps further and Dutchman Dan was done – joining Tikka in returning to Gorak Shep.

Checking in with my gut feeling: was I crazy go it alone for hours with the threat of a snowstorm? My practical mind made it clear that one could easily get lost and freeze to death trying to find the way back to the safety of a small stone building with a warm hearth. There was nothing else out there – no trails, no roads, no people…nothing but rock and ice. But surprisingly, every intuitive faculty I checked in with gave me an unequivocal green light to proceed. I rely on my intuition and I trust its guidance in difficult situations. This may seem reckless…but I felt I had plenty of, uh…reck! My gut said “Go!” So I went.

The hours of focused climbing passed quickly in the quiet belly of the impending storm. With intuition purring alongside me, I broke through an inversion layer and just as I reached the summit found myself above the clouds in hazy sunshine. I sat on the peak stone, resting, while realizing that on every side except the one I came up, it was thousands of feet down to the next plateau. The heights were dizzying and I was holding on to the rock with all I had.

Surprisingly, at nearly 20,000 feet, I wasn’t alone…Birds? Birds! I had no idea birds could live at that altitude and they seemed to be just as confounded as to what I was doing visiting them, unannounced, alone, and without proper wings. They came very close to me, unafraid and curious.

I couldn’t stay long; I had to find my way back before the storm and before sunset. So I indulged in a couple of photos, the first being a “selfie” taken with a small film camera with a timer (remember those?). Above my head to the right you can see the last ridge and the summit of Everest. The other photo captured one of the curious birds hanging out with me.

I was on fire. Adrenaline surging and happy hormones racing through my system. I felt so alive, but also realized that if I wanted to stay that way, I still had to make it back.

I practically flew down the slopes, being careful not to lose footing on the rocks, which, out there, would likely be fatal. Everyone has gifts…one of mine is a good sense of direction. I traveled fast with a singular focus – and near sundown, with the storm having waited graciously for my return before getting serious, I opened the door to the warm interior of the one house in this “town” of Gorak Shep.

My arrival precipitated a palpable silence. The card games stopped, conversations too. They all stared. No one returned my hello or seemed happy to see I was alive and well. No one would talk to me. So – unforgiven for having gone and making it back, I had some warm food and tea and quietly crawled into my sleeping bag and closed my eyes.

The morning was no different – I had been summarily estranged. Wang Chuk did look relieved that I was safe, and shook my hand without saying anything. All the Sherpas were also very nice to me, but I would not spend time babysitting the disappointments of those who stayed behind and spent the entire day confined to that small building.

There was only one main path for the descent back to Namché Bazaar and I felt confident I knew the way. As I slipped on my day pack, I told Wang Chuk that I would wait for them at our hotel, and I flew. Luckily, altitude sickness doesn’t occur on the way down, and I was so energized I was practically running. The sun was shining brightly which made for very pleasant downhill trekking, but I was getting hungry – with nary a power bar left – I had to refuel.

At the time, there were no restaurants or markets along the cold mountain path, but the Nepali and Sherpa people have a great tradition of hospitality. A tired and hungry traveler can pop his head into a doorway of a private home and ask the matron, “Yaha ko keh kanna, pa in cha?” Which should translate roughly to “Excuse me, ma’am, is there food available?’

The front door of the simple abode was ajar and inside was a short, elderly woman milling about in her small home. So, with a deep breath I knocked and addressed her with this phrase. She almost passed out laughing when she heard me intone something that I hoped resembled her language – to which she enthusiastically replied “Pa in cha! Pa in cha!” Yes, I’ll make some food for you! While she was preparing my meal I plied her with other phrases and pictures that had her clutching her belly in mirth. The meal was simple and delicious and while finishing up I tried to pay her for it, but she would have none of that – this was just how it is done here.

While I was eating, word got around that there was a foreigner having a meal at grandma’s house. I think she telepathically paged her family to join in the fun. Soon, I was swarmed by a half dozen smiling children about 10 to 12 years old who were as fascinated with me as I was with them. My trusty Lonely Planet phrasebook got a workout that day. I said my goodbye and thanks to grandma and set off downhill.

The cadre of kids surrounded me as I hiked down the mountain while they tried to teach me their favorite song.

It’s been 31 years and I still remember the catchy tune. Each lilting verse in the song ended with the repetitive refrain of three words, “ban ko pat!” delivered loudly by my new friends. They were so pleased that I sang along with them. It was a sublime moment. Then, having ventured far from their home, they bade me well and as a unit, ran laughing back up the hill the way children are wont to do.

Fed and re-energized, I pushed on, encouraged by the sun as it warmed the green earth below the tree line.

****** As I powered down the mountain, I noticed a “store” of sorts where travelers could get a steaming plate of Momos and a beer before embarking on the last leg down to Namché Bazaar.

I didn’t need much convincing, as I had done what I came here to do. I was ready for a meal and a beer or two. As I sidled up to the wooden bar and ordered refreshments, an older traveler next to me noticed the Canadian flag patch on my backpack and proudly showed me the maple leaf embroidered on his cap. I shared that I was currently living in Toronto and that was enough for him, dubbing me a “fellow Canuck” with the clink of our beer bottles. I think his name was Harold…

I asked Harold what he was doing there and he relayed that in the year previous, an important and beautiful monastery burned down to the ground, taking with it hundreds of works of art, priceless ancient scriptures, scrolls, and statues. He was there to help restore it with funds that were coming in as donations from all over the world.

Finishing his beer, Harold said, “Come, I want to introduce you to someone…” He then opened the door to a private room where his friends were relaxing and said, “Alón, meet Sir Edmund Hillary.”

Nothing could have prepared me to hear words introducing me to the first man to reach the summit of Mount Everest in 1953! His wife June was with him.

Sir Edmund Percival Hillary was 70 when we met. He moved slowly with the support of a cane, but graciously got up to shake my hand like the gentleman he was. Wow.

I don’t know how it happened that his wife June and Harold were staying behind…but Sir Edmund asked me if I would accompany him on his slow hike down to his next destination.

It was just the two of us. One arm of his working the cane, the other in mine to steady himself. We didn’t talk much. No paparazzi-style questions. Just there. Just then. One step at a time. A quintessential moment, etched forever into my memory.

In 2008 I read that both he and his wife June had passed on peacefully, which brought tears to my eyes – honored to have known them.

******

That’s my story, which is true to the serendipity factor and intuitive guidance I mentioned in Part One – and which has led me to myriad remarkable opportunities and saved my ass many times while traveling in some scary places.

Having made it down to Lukla and saying farewell to Sir Edmund, there was one last, terrifying goodbye kiss from Sagarmatha, the watchful Goddess of Everest: taking off from Lukla Airport’s short, downhill, and at the time, unpaved gravel runway. If your plane was carrying too many people or too heavy a load and couldn’t get to a certain speed when the short bumpy runway disappeared underneath the wheels, you went down, adding to the scrapyard of twisted metal strewn across the mountainside and becoming another sad entry in the historic chronicle of the world’s most dangerous airport.

Our group of climbers, strapped into our seats, watched in horror as the plane ahead of us wrestled a crosswind and dropped out of sight when it ran out of runway. A few frozen seconds later it became visible again, fighting to stay airborne and thankfully, succeeding. Once again, my gut said we’d be fine…and we were, taking off without plummeting and less than an hour later, landing easily on the flat tarmac of Kathmandu’s Tribhuvan International Airport.

“Tashi Delek!” (Hello, goodbye and “wassup?” in Nepali)

Alón Sagee is Chairman and Chief Troublemaker of the San Francisco Audiophile Society.

Header image of Gorak Shep courtesy of Wikimedia Commons/McKay Savage. Randy Newman: Cinematic Storyteller

OFF THE CHARTS Written by Anne E. Johnson Randy Newman’s uncles Lionel, Andrew, and Emil Newman were all composers of Hollywood movie scores. As opposed to their sweeping, cinematic sounds, Randy became known for understated, sardonic lyrics with simple harmonies, performed at the piano with his unremarkable but expressive voice. Yet he has always been able to get to the heart of any topic he tackles, making him an award- winning film score composer in his own right. Add to that his 11 studio albums, and you have one of America’s hardest-working, widest-ranging composers.

Newman, born in Los Angeles in 1943, spent a lot of time with family in New Orleans while he was growing up. A southern spark and a jazz sensibility are important elements of his style, both inspired in part by his love of Ray Charles. His ambition to be a performing artist was temporarily dashed when his first single, “Golden Gridiron Boy,” didn’t sell. But he already knew he had a gift for songwriting, and also had the connections and determination to convince other artists to record his works. That effort has succeeded stunningly over the decades, with dozens of A-list singers making hits out of Newman songs.

At first he was active in the recording industry primarily as a session pianist, largely thanks to his friendship with record producer Lenny Waronker. He made his debut album, Randy Newman (1968), on Reprise Records. Critics were intrigued, and the songs – “I Think It’s Going to Rain Today,” “Love Story,” and “Living Without You” in particular – took on a life of their own through other singers. Sales, however, were not stellar; the record never entered the charts.

This might have been the fault of the arrangements, which force Newman into a stylistic corner that doesn’t suit his actual or metaphorical voice. Rather than just accompanying himself on piano with a couple of other instruments as support, he is swimming in the restless ocean of a large orchestral sound. The personnel list is nearly 80 strong.

If you listen past that overly busy sonic atmosphere, the album offers a clear view of Newman’s quiet darkness, the challenges of everyday life served up with off-beat humor. Take “Davy the Fat Boy,” for example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B3m0MlBZuY8

Producer Waronker took a markedly different approach to the album 12 Songs (1970), using a tight little band, which lifted up Newman’s singing and piano playing instead of burying them.

In “Mama Told Me Not to Come,” the slide guitar, played by the great Ry Cooder, has a conversation with Newman. The lyrics are jam-packed with detailed imagery and snide attitude, characteristic of Newman’s unique approach to songwriting. He’s describing that awful, stultifying party we’ve all been to and regretted the moment we set foot in the door. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wR0D6HJms8w

Newman’s universal success as a songwriter has had an unusual effect on the function of his studio albums. Unlike most singer-songwriters, who introduce strong material in their albums and might expect royalties from covers as a result, Newman has often provided songs to other artists before he has a chance to record them himself. On Sail Away (1972), for instance, the single “Simon Smith and the Amazing Dancing Bear” had already sold well in recordings by Alan Price and Harry Nilsson.

A lesser-known gem on that album is “Lonely at the Top,” a sarcastic look at celebrity that clearly contains a large kernel of truth. Newman’s connection with New Orleans flavored the arrangement of tuba, banjo, snare, and mournful trumpet. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TeC5-5idyzY

The commercial floodgates finally opened when Good Old Boys was released in 1974 and entered the No. 36 spot on the Billboard 200, by far Newman’s best sales at the time. It’s hard to say whether the original concept for the album, a portrait of a Southern man named Johnny Cutler, would have fared quite so well. Although Newman changed his mind and held back those thematic songs, he did release them in a special-edition CD in 2002 called Johnny Cutler’s Birthday.

What did get released as Good Old Boys includes some rich string orchestrations; Newman had by now figured out how to balance that sweet sound with his intimate, introverted style. “Mr. President (Have Pity on the Working Man)” – a plea to Richard Nixon – is a good example of that balance. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JIlad66IcHw&ab_channel=RandyNewman-Topic

The commercial success grew with Little Criminals (1977), which charted at No. 9 and included the hit single “Short People.” Born Again followed in 1979, its cover famously featuring Newman with dollar signs painted over his face in KISS-like fashion. You’d think that photo and the first track’s title, “It’s Money That I Love,” would have been a clue that the underlying theme was capitalism in the music industry, but critics didn’t get it.

Track 2 takes on the topic of fandom in “The Story of a Rock and Roll Band,” presented as a biography of ELO (Electric Light Orchestra) that gets its facts a bit wrong. It’s that gentle Newman satire, fun to admire in retrospect but apparently puzzling at the time. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FtbKch8x37o

Trouble in Paradise (1983) is mainly known for its big horn sound as well as the duet with Paul Simon on “The Blues.” Residents of Southern California still appreciate “I Love L.A.” The album Land of Dreams (1988) is unique for being autobiographical rather than presenting the perspectives of fictional characters as Newman usually does. The songs focus on his own childhood in New Orleans.

Although “It's Money That Matters” was a single, it did not make much of a splash. Unlike the earlier “It’s Money That I Love,” which is aggressively comical in its criticisms, this song is an empathetic observation about the unfair distribution of wealth and what it does to society. The distinctive guitar sound is provided by Mark Knopfler. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wEdnd8hQA30

After Land of Dreams, Newman took a long hiatus from the studio to work full-time in Hollywood. His Oscar-nominated film scores of that period included Avalon, Toy Story, and Pleasantville. Pixar Animation decided Newman had exactly the right touch for their stories. In 1999 he released the album Bad Love before taking another break to score Monsters, Inc. and Cars.

Although Newman’s studio output has slowed to once every nine or ten years, his skill as a songwriter for his own purposes – as opposed to the needs of a film – has not diminished. Harps and Angels (2008) includes some of his best work, including the song “A Few Words in Defense of Our Country.” Only Newman could have combined a genuine concern for his fellow citizens with such a hilarious satire on the history of world leadership. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8x3UW2EamSY&ab_channel=RandyNewman-Topic

The 78-year-old Newman continues to work, both in the studio and in movies. His most recent album is Dark Matter (2017), recorded with a streamlined band comprising his own piano plus four other musicians. Waronker is still his producer, this time sharing the load with David Boucher and keyboardist Mitchell Froom.

The wistful “Wandering Boy,” full of hushed emotion and wonder, is the perfect ending to this retrospective. Here’s hoping for lots more songs down the road. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I2s1WNagdA0

Header image of Randy Newman courtesy of Wikimedia Commons/Rob Bogaerts (ANEFO).

The Giants of Tape, Part One

REVOLUTIONS PER MINUTE Written by J.I. Agnew

Tape machines have been made in various shapes, sizes, forms and formats, for all kinds of applications. Magnetic tape recording in its present form came many decades after the original invention of magnetic recording in 1898 by Valdemar Poulsen in Denmark. The modern version of magnetic tape recording was developed as a political propaganda tool in Germany during the Nazi era. The first generation Magnetophon had a brief career in German broadcasting during World War II, which ended, along with most of German industry, at the end of the war. The technology was rescued by John T. “Jack” Mullin, who brought the Magnetophon to the United States and later commercialized the technology through Ampex, changing the recording industry forever.

Since then, magnetic tape recorders have ranged from miniature machines made for James Bond- esque espionage operations, to massive industrial tape duplicators. Their applications have included recording music and voice, logging the output of radio stations, recording radio commercials and programs to be broadcast at a later time, storing computer software and data, industrial process logging, storing and providing automation signals for industrial machinery, logging aircraft flight data, storing video signals, and more. [I once owned an Oberheim OB-8 synthesizer that used cassette tape as a backup – Ed.]

Out of the vast number of makes and models of tape machines intended for audio, very few were truly purebred professional machines, designed with the professional audio facility in mind. Out of these few, several were rather crude and primitive, especially in the early days. As the technology developed and matured, more refined tape machines began to appear. Their performance improved and the machines became more rugged and reliable.

The peak, or Golden Age, was reached in the 1970s, when some of the finest tape machines ever made were introduced. They were big. They were heavy. They were reliable workhorses. They sounded good. They were used in the recording of almost every major album of this era in your collection. They often cost more than the buildings they were housed in.

Sadly, the peak did not last long.

While the designs of the Golden Age of tape machines were clearly led by talented engineers, the models that followed in later years were primarily led by economic considerations, aimed at an ever more price-conscious market, which was also starting to develop a fear of screwdrivers. The later machines probably sold better, but they certainly didn’t sound better. They didn’t last longer either and their mechanical transports left a lot to be desired.

In this series, I’m going to be taking you along for a ride to discover the best of the best, the crème de la crème of tape machines, the true giants of tape.

Ladies and gentlemen, please fasten your seat belt and let us embark on a little time travel:

The Studer A80

Introduced in 1970, the Studer A80 was to become one of the most popular tape machines on both sides of the Atlantic.

Manufactured in Switzerland by a company already long established in the field, the A80 featured one of the finest mechanical transports in existence. The transport was rugged and stable, yet extremely gentle with tape. The tube-era C37 and J37 that preceded the Studer A80 already had quite a reputation, but the A80 with its superior transport rightfully earned its place in many of the world’s finest recording and mastering facilities. The A80 featured solid-state electronics throughout. The control electronics were smartly designed and extremely reliable.

The audio electronics were decent-sounding and were certainly of professional quality, and also reliable. The electronics came in the form of boards that could be easily plugged and unplugged for maintenance. Calibration was accomplished by means of readily-accessible trim pots, using a screwdriver.

The amplifier cards of the Studer A80. The holes are for inserting a screwdriver to adjust the trim pots. Photo courtesy of George Vardis.

The machine was heavily constructed on a massive frame that held the three motors and various other components. The assembly was mounted on a trolley, which allowed the heavy machine to be easily wheeled around.

The transport featured two tensioners that are unmistakable to the A80, which were symmetrically arranged left and right, each with two bearing roller turrets.

The tape head block was massive and contained the erase, record and reproducing heads of the required format. Some A80s had a meter bridge, while other versions didn’t.

The A80 was widely adopted by recording studios, broadcasting facilities and even disk mastering houses, as it was one of the very few tape machines offered in a special “preview” version, which provided control signals to the pitch and depth control electronics of a disk mastering lathe.

To do this, the A80 employed a second reproducing head, located in advance of the normal playback head that provided the audio to the cutting amplifiers that drive the cutter head. To achieve the appropriate time relationship between the preview signal and the program signal, the transport had a number of additional rollers that the tape could be threaded around, to increase or decrease the time it took for the tape to travel between the two heads. This was a mechanical delay system, achieved entirely by analog means.

Paul Gold at Salt Mastering in Brooklyn, New York operates a Neumann disk mastering system and still regularly cuts excellent-sounding masters directly from tape, entirely in the analog domain, using his collection of Studer A80 machines with preview heads.

The 1/2-inch stereo format was far less common, and Paul has both.

But he didn’t stop there. Paul pushed it all the way, by putting together the world’s only 1-inch stereo preview tape machine!

This setup allows him to cut lacquer masters from 1-inch stereo tape, all-analog, while still utilizing the pitch and depth automation system of his VMS66 lathe! But I’ll let Paul tell you more about his A80 machines.

J.I. Agnew: Where did your A80 machines come from?

Paul Gold: Soon after I got my first [disk cutting] lathe in 2000 I decided I wanted to set up an all- analog cutting chain. I had my work cut out for me learning cutting, so it went on the back burner for a while. In about 2005 I had cut a bunch of sides for another mastering studio that had sold their lathe. They were taking a long time to pay [for my work]. I knew they had a Studer A80VU preview deck. I said I would take it in trade [instead of payment]. This deck became the 1/2-inch deck I use now. It originally came with both 1/4-inch and 1/2-inch heads and rollers.

The next machine came from [the former] Sony Studios in New York City. They had an auction when they closed, and I picked up a complete 1/4-inch A80VU preview deck and another partial deck for parts. By this time it had become apparent that changing over the deck from 1/4-inch to 1/2-inch was less than ideal. To get the best performance out of the decks, they needed to be set up for the tape width they would play.

Enter Dan Zellman, who is a factory-trained Studer technician. I had him go over both decks with instructions to make them like new. He restored the electronics and did some judicious upgrades. Nothing too crazy. He put modern low noise op amps in and made a few circuit modifications he had come up with over his decades of experience with these machines.

They were mechanically restored as well [with] all new bearings, dash pots and brake bands. The capstan motors were all rebuilt by Athan.

The machines really sang after he was done with them. It was then I decided to put together a 1-inch two-track preview deck. It’s the only one in existence as far as I know. There aren’t many 1-inch recording decks around. It is a non-standard format. I figured anyone who went to the trouble of recording to 1-inch tape would probably like the option of an all-analog (master disk) cut.

I had the 1/4-inch parts machine from the Sony auction. I found a 1-inch video layback deck [that was used] for striping audio onto video tape. Dan Zellman was able to put together a 1-inch preview deck [using parts] from both decks. John French from JRF Magnetics made the head block using Sprague heads.

JIA: Quite a process! So how are they performing?

PG: I’ve been quite happy with the decks in use. They are very reliable and sound great. I have used other types of tape machines over the years but the Studers stand out. There weren’t many choices for preview decks. I had only ever seen Studer decks in New York mastering studios so I figured those were the ones to get.

Besides [their] sound, there are many things to like. They are very reliable. After restoration I’ve had very few problems with them. You turn them on and they work. Parts are still available. There are still factory-trained Studer technicians around for service. The transport is a thing of beauty. It’s extremely gentle with tape, and also forgiving. Other tape machines will hiccup with a sticky splice or poorly-slit tape. The Studers just sail right through it. I handle a lot of historical tapes, so gentle tape handling is a must.

I am a technician for the Neumann lathe but I leave the tape machines to either Dan Zellman or Bob Shuster. I don’t know tape transports like they do, so I leave it up to them. I watch and pick up what I can so I can take over when they are no longer available.

******

The versatility of the big tape machines allowed the operator to not only configure their transport in any way they liked, but also to use different audio electronics. Tape machines are very much like turntables in this respect. It is a mechanical transport with a head, and you can hook the head up to any “tape stage” (as in phono stage) you like, even though tape machines typically come with a built- in tape stage. One could use custom tube electronics with an A80 to make a machine that would beat the Studer C37 in every respect.

The Studer A80 remained in production until the late 1980s, when the next generation of Studer machines came about, such as the A807. These were smaller, lighter units, in which the screwdriver- adjustable trim pots had been eliminated. Instead, calibration was accomplished via a digital interface with plus and minus buttons, a concept which was to remain until the Studer Group was purchased by Harman International and the company eventually pulled out of the tape market.

Many A80 machines are still in regular use around the world. They were sturdy enough that many are still in excellent condition, and parts are still obtainable to restore them and keep them running.

Second-hand A80s currently sell for between $7,000 and $14,000 US dollars, depending on version and condition. However, this is only a small fraction of what you would have paid for one in the 1970s, which has enabled many audiophiles to acquire such machines for their home listening systems.

Whether for professional or home use, the Studer A80 is quite a bargain in terms of quality for your dollar. It is really a machine for a lifetime and with minimal maintenance, it will give many more years of excellent recordings and listening satisfaction.

The A80 is equally popular in the US, Europe and Asia, with good availability of parts and knowledgeable techs in every region. Many recordings are still being made on A80s or mastered from them, over 50 years after their introduction, despite the massive changes in the audio industry. In fact, industry trends are shifting in favor of tape again, and there are even software emulations of the Studer A80 available. (I’d still take the reel thing any day over an emulation!)

Seek them out but be warned: prices are currently trending upwards! All About That Bass

FEATURED Written by Steven Bryan Bieler

When I moved to Seattle in 1980 I lived in the Jensen Block on Eastlake Avenue, in a neighborhood of aging wooden houses, aging people, and industries that made things that few people wanted anymore, like rubber stamps that said JOB COMPLETED, READY TO BILL and kits to install your own seat belts. The building was brick and flat-topped and even today, with shiny glass storefronts at curbside and with the Amazon campus nearby, it looks tired. The Jensen has been standing at the corner of Eastlake and Mercer, downhill from the freeway, since before there was a freeway. Or cars. It needs time off.

I lived with my typewriter and books in a furnished room with a shared bath above a tavern. They had a jukebox, but I could only hear the bass lines of the songs. I couldn’t tell what the songs were. The shifting, muffled thump was the background to my life in that building, where people came and went but a hard core of hard-luck cases lived on year after year.

On Friday and Saturday nights the bar stayed open until 2 am, with plenty of people and music, all of which sounded like grad school for bass players to the kid upstairs pounding out another science fiction story on his Smith Corona. I usually fell into bed, exhausted, between 1 and 2. Around 2:30, after half an hour of silence, the jukebox came on again. It was louder than before, possibly because the music was no longer being soaked up by all those drinkers. The jukebox played one song. Someone, probably the guy who’d been hired to swab out the place and was in there alone, yelled “Whooooooh!” about 20 seconds in. The bass and the “Whooooooh!” always woke me up. Five minutes later, the song ended, silence reigned, and I went back to sleep. It was comforting, I guess because I’d embarked on a new life and this was one of my few routines. Whatever “this” was.

One night the tavern closed at 2 and when it did the after-hours music was over. Like those of us who could, the cleaning man had moved on. Soon I did, too. I was happy to leave that treeless, hopeless street. I don’t know where anyone went or what happened to the people who stayed until the ’90s when the building was closed and remodeled and reopened. I doubt that any of us went on to form Pearl Jam or a dot-com.

A couple of years later, at a dance, the DJ put a record on the table and a familiar bass line spilled into the room. I was so surprised that I laughed: The cleaning man’s favorite song was “Emotional Rescue” by the Rolling Stones, from the album of the same name. I hadn’t known that Mick had a speaking part near the end or that the whole thing was influenced by Marvin Gaye or that this was the only song in the English language that includes the words “pet Pekingese.” I hadn’t known anything at all except that the beat went one-two, THREE-four, five-six, SEVEN-eight. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9iw_BE_X9sA

By that point in my life I was losing track of the Stones. That was easy to do, because the band that had ended the 1970s with the triumph of Some Girls spent the 1980s trying to become the Christmas fruitcake of popular music: ubiquitous and indigestible. It’s a sad state of affairs when the World’s Greatest Rock ’n’ Roll Band could go head to head with Spandau Ballet but not Duran Duran. Listening to the Stones of the ’80s yields very little satisfaction, except for “Start Me Up” from Tattoo You. My AARP membership requires that I dance to “Start Me Up” at every dance I go to. I’m feeling generous, so I’ll throw in “Emotional Rescue” and maybe “Undercover of the Night” from Undercover. A few years ago, I set out to listen to every Rolling Stones record in chronological order. After I listened to Undercover, I was so annoyed that I dropped the whole project.

Dressing up like the B-52’s on the cover of Dirty Work in 1986 didn’t help. Or did they think they were the Bangles? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F8_vTt9oNBs

It’s easy to make fun of a band that played its first gig in Boston during the British Invasion of 1775. But let’s jump ahead. How many musicians in their 70s can turn out a decent album of blues covers, as the Stones did in 2016, with Blue & Lonesome? Sure, it didn’t break any new ground, and in fact they had already done this in 1964. But could you repeat whatever it was that people liked you to do 52 years ago and do it just as well today?

I wrote this because I was driving to what passes for an exciting place in a pandemic (Costco) when I switched from our alt rock station to one of the local college stations. The DJ, who was born long after the 1980s had receded in our rearview mirror, said, “You guys gotta hear this!” I heard the opening bass notes of “Emotional Rescue.” I finished listening in the Costco parking lot. The music had transported me back to the Jensen Block, and to my typewriter and the endless thump thump thump from downstairs, and yet after 40 years the song was still fresh. You see, I only really knew the bass line.

Header image of the Rolling Stones' bassist Bill Wyman courtesy of Wikimedia Commons/Jacco Barth. Troubadours, Trouvères, and Minnesingers

SOMETHING OLD / SOMETHING NEW Written by Anne E. Johnson

The word “troubadour” gets tossed around in the modern world to mean a performer, often a singer/songwriter who travels a lot. That’s not wrong, but when the word was invented in the Middle Ages, it had a much more specific meaning. In early-music studies, troubadours are often grouped with two other species of medieval poet composers, the trouvères and the minnesingers. A handful of recent recordings give us a glance at these compelling traditions.

The troubadours and trouvères were historically consecutive and based in different regions of France. In fact, the 12th-century troubadours were so far south that much of their territory is now called northern Spain. A century later, the trouvères flourished in northern France. The minnesingers were in Germany throughout that whole period. (And their art came back again after a few centuries: Wagner’s opera Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg deals with the Renaissance revival of the medieval minnesingers’ style.)

Troubadours wrote poetry in a dialect known as langue d’oc, a fact that eventually led that region of France, Italy, and Spain to be called Occitania. The trouvères, a century later in northern France, used the language called langue d’oil. This dialect would develop into modern French, whereas langue d’oc was closer to modern Spanish.

It wasn’t always the troubadours themselves who sang their own poetry, or even composed the music for it. They hired jongleurs for that, from which we get our word “juggler.” We have very little music surviving for the troubadour songs; that element seems to have been more of an oral tradition, whereas the poetry itself was valued in writing.

Bernart de Ventadorn (1135-1194) was a famous troubadour during the Middle Ages and one of the few who left behind poetry and music with his name on it. A recent recording celebrates some of his work, Chantador de joi d’amour: Six Songs by the Troubadour. Released on the label Quintessence BVBA, the record features the singer Paloma Gutiérrez del Arroyo, accompanied by Manuel Vilas on medieval harp.

Gutiérrez del Arroyo has about ten years’ experience in medieval music, singing and playing psaltery (similar to a zither). Her mezzo-range voice has the frontal placement and vibrato-free clarity considered essential for this repertoire. On this recording she leaves the instrumental backing harmonies to Vilas’ imagination. None of the surviving troubadour manuscripts give any clues as to what the accompaniment might have been. The songs’ melodies weren’t even written with exact rhythm in the notation, so there’s always a lot of guesswork required.

The duo approaches Bernart’s “Be m'an perdut en lay ves Ventadorn” with a relaxed, malleable rhythm, as if the singer is reciting a poem on sustained pitches. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OEGvTTfzDH8

The rhythmic contrast between harp and voice is interesting on the song “Can vei la lauzeta mover de joi sas alas.” While Gutiérrez del Arroyo lets the natural meter and accent of the poem shape her declamation, Vilas maintains a steady jig-like 6/8 time signature in counterpoint, apparently layering an entirely separate tune against the vocal melody line. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oV9bDZEj8Rk

This repertoire is rarely recorded these days. A handful of groups attempted it in the 1980s and ’90s, the heyday of the early-music recording industry (although the increasing viability of self-publishing records is likely to have a good effect on esoteric genres like this). If you’re interested in a different take on the style, I recommend the old recordings by baritone and musicologist Paul Hillier with lutenist Stephen Stubbs. Here that pair is joined by portative organist Erin Headley on hurdy-gurdy in 1989: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RkmZDeg0FIM

Among many masters with whom Gutiérrez del Arroyo studied medieval performance practice is the French singer, conductor, and scholar Brigitte Lesne. Best known for founding the all-female medieval vocal group Discantus, Lesne also started the ensemble Alla Francesca, which has recently turned its attention to the trouvères.

Variations amoureuses: French Love Songs from the 13th Century is the group’s first release for Paraty Records, and its 19th recording overall. It includes 26 songs by a variety of composers, only about half of them anonymous. Unlike the troubadour tradition, the trouvères typically created both text and melody and were more intent on preserving their work on the page. Therefore, much more survives and has accurate attributions to composers.

One interesting aspect of this collection of “love songs” is how Lesne sets sacred and secular works side by side. Indeed, during the High Middle Ages, the practice of singing almost romantic songs to the Virgin Mary grew out of the rich tradition of courtly love songs aimed at ordinary, mortal women.

“Haute chose a en amor” was composed by Gillebert de Berneville, a prominent trouvère in the mid-13th century. Manuscripts of this later repertoire do include a lot of musical notation, much of it with rhythmic symbols on the pitches. Alla Francesca adds inconspicuous, drone-like accompaniment, allowing the soprano and tenor voices to shine sweetly. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I-09Gaq4RSw

Medieval fiddles, their phrase-endings deftly ornamented, offer a more active line to accompany the solo vocal on “S'amour dont sui espris.” The unstructured rhythm coalesces into triple meter at the 2:00 mark as a drum, bells, and other voices join in. The arranging of medieval music is an underappreciated art – few listeners understand how little information we really have about each piece – and Lesne has long been a master at it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MJbbsMIXCsc

Meanwhile, over in Germany, the Minnesingers were writing their own secular poetry and songs. Minne meant “love” in medieval German, although they wrote about other things too. The venerable Ensemble für frühe Musik Augsburg, an early-music group that has been around since 1977, recently made an album on Christophoros Records called Die Weisheit des Alters: Ars moriendi im Minnesang. During the Middle Ages, there was kind of an obsession with how to die well, or in Latin, ars moriendi (the art of dying). Beyond writing about love, the minnesingers took this on as a favorite philosophical topic.

“Winter deine mail” is by Neidhart von Reuental, who died in about 1236. More minnesinger melodies are attributed to him than to anyone else. The ensemble’s arrangement is emotive and thoughtful. The singer embraces the theatrical nature of the minnesingers’ performance tradition, nearly speaking some of the words to give them dramatic weight. It’s a captivating style that seems natural, not forced. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oiVUkgBJRxI&list=OLAK5uy_l32i6XmgwEk4HvnV6sawmGuQMT 8KJBtek

To avoid ending on a grim thought, here’s an Estampie, a dance type popular in the Middle Ages. The Augsburg ensemble includes it on their album as a lusty-rhythmed palette-cleanser, welcome in the midst of all that Teutonic darkness and pondering of death. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W3o3Vvhg4l0&list=OLAK5uy_l32i6XmgwEk4HvnV6sawmGuQM T8KJBtek&index=4

Header image of Bernart de Ventadorn courtesy of Wikimedia Commons/public domain. More of My Favorite Things

FEATURED Written by Don Kaplan

In addition to the recordings I included in the first part of “A Few of My Favorite Things” (Issue 129) there are many other recordings I enjoy having in my collection. If for some reason my first group of LPs and CDs spontaneously combusted, the following selections would do nicely as desert island picks. (YouTube references are provided.)

Various: Ninna Nanna ca. 1500-2002/Montserrat Figueras, vocals (AliaVox SACD) An unusual album of lullabies from a variety of sources and time periods performed by early music vocalist Montserrat Figueras accompanied by period instrument ensemble Hesperion XI. The first track draws me into the program not only because of the attractive music but the way it shows off Figueras' lovely, clear voice. The album is (appropriately) a family affair: it includes Figueras' husband Jordi Savall playing viola da gamba (“leg viol” – a precursor of the modern cello) and daughter Arianna Savall playing the triple harp (a Baroque harp with three rows of strings) as well as singing. “Whether sacred or profane in their theme, whether flowing from the living tradition of diverse peoples and cultures or from the pens of great composers, lullabies continue to this day to hold a universal fascination for us all. While they form part of our everyday lives, they nevertheless often plumb unfathomable depths; they are ancient and yet continue to live through the ages, are astonishingly simple and yet endowed with an intensity of expression which strikes the most secret chords of our hearts and minds, perhaps because we recognize in them a glimmer of our own individual beginnings.” (Liner notes.)

And in Figuerras' own words: “From ancient times, the lullaby has been one of the most intrinsic musical forms, present among all human communities, without exception. Its characteristic emotion and sensitivity make it the oldest expression of affection and tenderness known to music.”

Excellent production as usual from this group of musicians, with notes provided in several languages.

"José embala o menino" (“Joseph Rocks the Infant,” anon., Portugal): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pvP90062QJY

Brahms: Clarinet Sonatas and Trio/Martin Fröst, clarinet (BIS SACD) While almost anything composed by Brahms is worth listening to, the pieces on this disc are especially noteworthy: The music features a clarinet which is much less common in Romantic chamber music than the usual strings. The second movement from the second sonata is superb: energetic, rhythmic and melodic – one of those “earworms” that sticks in your mind long after the piece has ended.

Sonata No. 2, Second Movement: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sYffG-LOWvk

Various: Fred Hersch at Jordan Hall: Let Yourself Go/Fred Hersch, piano (Nonesuch CD) Years ago one of my English teachers told the class we should never describe something as “beautiful” because the word is too vague. It can mean so many things it's basically meaningless.

I'm not so sure about that. Jazz pianist Fred Hersch's performance of the traditional “Black is the Color” combined with Alex North's love theme from the film Spartacus is, quite simply, “beautiful” however you want to interpret the word. The music builds nicely and is so moving I have my CD remote handy so I can hit replay as soon as the final note has finished sounding. This was Hersch's first full evening solo concert (a faculty recital at the New England Conservatory of Music that was never planned as a release) after a hiatus of more than six months and represents what he cares about most: playing songs he loves and letting himself go.

"Black Is The Color — Love Theme From 'Spartacus'": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uwZ0B4DfdUQ

Mendelssohn: String Quartet No. 6 Op.80/ Quatuor Èbène (Virgin Classics/EMI CD) Unlike the composer's enchanting A Midsummer Night's Dream, this is angry and anguished music composed after Mendelssohn's sister Fanny died. The siblings had an extraordinarily close relationship and Mendelssohn referred to this quartet as his “Requiem for Fanny.” There's nothing gentle about the second movement of his sixth quartet. Some ensembles play it in a more measured manner but the Quatuor Èbène performs it with energy and heavily accented, syncopated rhythms...just what the music needs.

String Quartet No. 6, Op. 80, Second Movement: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=68w0usB_9Ko

Various: Orquesta Nova/Orquesta Nova chamber ensemble (Chesky CD) Some time ago producer David Chesky of audiophile label Chesky Records became interested in recording classics of Latin American popular music performed by a classical chamber ensemble. Orquesta Nova was the first of these efforts. The disc presents a variety of music originally carried out in dance halls, brothels and silent-movie houses, played here on instruments including the usual suspects (violin, viola, cello, bass) along with flute, saxophone, clarinet, guitar and harp. The entire disc is striking but the syncopated and rhythmically driven “Wapango” (a Mexican folk dance) is my favorite.

"Wapango" (Paquito D'Rivera): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2dlbxyUVsAM&list=PLoWZS1QXMgF1vhOz05Z4FJqP6FJCdl2nE &index=16

Various: Entre Amigos/ Rosa Passos, vocals/guitar and Ron Carter, bass (Chesky SACD) In addition to being rhythmically driven, Latin American music can be soothing and understated with flexible rhythms that create an ebb and flow...a style typified by the Brazilian bossa nova popular in the 1960s. The bossa nova may be out of fashion but Entre Amigos presents a different approach to this genre. Of course “The Girl From Ipanema” makes an appearance and the popular “Desafinado” is on the program along with lesser known Brazilian songs – all performed with simplicity and grace rather than glitz. For example, the tall and tan and lovely “Girl from Ipanema” walks at a slower pace here than in the famous Getz/Byrd version which is suave and more pop-styled; “Desafinado” is gentler than Getz/Gilberto's outgoing, more heavily rhythmic take.

Passos' phrasing and timing along with Carter's accompaniments make me feel like I'm in a cafe listening to quiet jazz rather than preparing to samba. The performances are more intimate than what we heard during the bossa nova wave, and just what I'm looking for when I'm in the mood to relax.

"Desafinado" (Antônio Carlos Jobim ): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EPLy9Gtrr8E

Partch: Delusion of the Fury/Harry Partch, cond. (Columbia LP) Harry Partch was famous for inventing his own unique instruments and integrating his musical compositions with art, drama and dance. He has been described as an eccentric ex-hobo, a pioneer, a philosophic renegade and a ground-breaking instrument builder. His instruments are works of art tuned to a micro-tonal scale of 43 notes per octave instead of the standard 12 notes. Partch used these extra notes to create unusual sounds and express subtle feelings and emotions.

Delusion of the Fury is a stage work based on a Japanese Noh drama and an Ethiopian folk tale concerning the reconciliation of life and death. The original 3-LP album is a treat: It includes a complete performance of Delusion..., an extra LP describing the instruments and the sounds they make, and a large-format booklet showing the instruments.

In addition to the musical selection indicated below, a demonstration of some of Partch's instruments (“The Harry Partch Instrumentarium”) can be found on YouTube at this link.

Act 1, Chorus of Shadows: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bmIH6a7W6L0

Various: Music from the Morning of the World – The Balinese Gamelan (Nonesuch LP) The bargain-priced Nonesuch label produced many albums that reflected their low price but also excellent recordings like those in their Explorer Series. The highlight of this LP is the Balinese monkey dance (ketjak) with its polyrhythms and yes...monkey-like chatter created by chanting the word ketjak (pronounced “yak”) quickly.

“As dusk falls, 200 men gather at the village meeting place, squatting close together in a circle on the ground. Silence falls, and then suddenly they begin the thrilling chant of ketjak, or monkey dance – a re-enactment of the Ramayana episode in which the monkey king Hanuman and his subjects helped the noble King Rama defeat the evil King Ravana.” (Liner notes.)

The cross rhythms and accents are so complex I hear something new every time I play the chant – complexities that would challenge Western musicians but come easily to many people in non- Western cultures.

"Ketjak Dance" (excerpt): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dPG67_Y02cM

Sara K.: Closer than they appear/Sara K., vocals (Chesky CD) I came across Sara K. when I was listening to the Chesky jazz sampler/audio test album I described in my previous “Favorite Things.” Sara K. caught my attention because of her distinctive, angular sound: a combination of folk, blues and pop with abrupt shifts, fragmented rhythms and odd phrasing. I enjoyed the selection so much I bought the entire album and have played this track many times while both checking sound quality and listening for pleasure. The rest of the songs on the CD, all written by Sara K., are just as interesting and entertaining.

"Miles Away" (Sara K.): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8nURv22o9RA&list=PL0emVwtw4R9UW1QsL3Dtq57AE4NgIXe_ P

Various: Divertissements: Fantasies and Impromptus/Lavinia Meijer, harp (Channel Classics SACD) Got harp music for depicting angels in heaven? For performing Pachelbel's “Canon” at weddings? That's almost all I thought harp solos were for until I discovered Divertissements. I was suspicious at first (20th century classical music written specifically for the harp?) but this is impressive. The superb resonance and remarkable flexibility of the instrument are qualities I wasn't aware of before. And the compositions are as satisfying as music written for any other instrument. This is a great disc!

Trois Morceaux: Variations sur un thème dans le style ancien (Carlos Salzedo) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ta82yTsVMQM

Glass: Metamorphosis/Lavinia Meijer, harp (Channel Classics SACD) Same artist as above performing transcribed music by minimalist composer Philip Glass in a selection that's haunting and somewhat mysterious...far from heavenly but other worldly nevertheless.

Metamorphosis Five, Moderate: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K3ZQEhehViQ

Jenkins: The Armed Man – A Mass For Peace/ Karl Jenkins, cond. (Virgin Records CD) Here's another of those guilty pleasures I shouldn't enjoy but do. It isn't very challenging or complex. Some of it sounds like the score for a biblical movie or Battle of the Titans – a popular music element not surprising because Jenkins used to be a jazz instrumentalist (playing oboe) and belonged to a rock band. But The Armed Man is also melodic, tonal and catchy when Jenkins hasn't gone overboard. Most critics thought the piece was derivative and eclectic but admitted they liked it anyway. “Good” or “bad” music aside, whenever I listen to it I'm glad I did.

"Kyrie" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C5BfirqTqm8&list=PL292A2AE7B9FD983A&index=4

Nino Rota, others: Fellini Jazz/Enrico Pieranunzi Quintet (CAM CD) Nino Rota composed the scores for several well-known movies including Franco Zeffirelli's Romeo and Juliet and two of The Godfather films. He also wrote the scores for almost every film directed by Federico Fellini. Here, in Fellini Jazz, Pieranunzi leads his group in relaxing interpretations of music from a handful of Fellini films including some of my favorites (like the theme from La Strada) but missing some others (like the theme from 8 ½). Rota also wrote orchestral and chamber music but I don't find the pieces I've heard as memorable as his film scores, which are always distinctive.

"Amarcord" (Nino Rota, from the film of the same name): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FK0L6Uy9kzQ

Various: Dancing in the Isles/Musica Pacifica (SOLIMAR CD) Not the Olympic airways ad from the 1960s where passengers listening to Greek music were told “please, no dancing in the aisles.” These selections of Baroque and traditional music from England, Scotland and Ireland are performed on period instruments by the early music group Musica Pacifica, a terrific ensemble I've heard many times at the Berkeley (CA) Early Music Festival – one of the largest early music festivals in the world. Every track on this recording is appealing so do clear the aisles...just remember to dance six feet apart.

"English Country Dances – Newcastle" (traditional): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tt1R9W9alcE&list=OLAK5uy_kKrlVDStkbWbAkqp5c5VA4SkgCxJ bfhDw&index=2 Small Town Charm, Big Town Music: My Father’s Place

FEATURED Written by Stuart Marvin

Bruce Springsteen frequently sings about the grit and hardships of growing up in Freehold, NJ. His emotional writing makes it easy to visualize the life experiences he encountered in a small, blue- collar town.

Conversely, my hometown of Roslyn, NY was mostly white-collar and definitely lacking in “grit.” Nonetheless, it didn’t insulate my friends and I from experiencing our fair share of adolescent transgressions, challenges and insecurities. As in many towns, there was plenty of mischief, alcohol and drugs. The hope is that over time, the maturation process to adulthood will tilt the scales between right and wrong. It did for most, but not for all.

Located on the north shore of Long Island, the Old Village of Roslyn has a rich history dating to 1643. George Washington spent five days visiting the area in 1790. In his diary, he noted dining at the home of a gristmill owner named Hendrick Onderdonk, who died in 1809. Well over a century later, an entrepreneur turned the Onderdonk residence into a restaurant, calling it, what else, the George Washington Manor. The centerpiece of old Roslyn village is a beautiful clock tower built in 1895. The village also has a large, tranquil duck pond, a popular gathering place in the 1970s, 1980s and beyond for Frisbee, music and assorted illicit activities.

One the very best things about the village during my youth, however, was a small music club located on the east end of town called My Father’s Place (also known as MFP). The club operated from 1971 to 1987 and featured artists from a wide range of genres, including rock, reggae, jazz, soul, country, punk and fusion.

A forward-thinking entrepreneur named Michael “Eppy” Epstein ran My Father’s Place. Eppy was and still is a combination of storyteller, promoter, marketer and, well, a character, and I mean that in a charming and endearing way.

MFP booked both established artists and up and comers, a cast of then-unknowns on the cusp of unimaginable success. Those early performers included Bruce Springsteen, Madonna, Aerosmith, the Police, U2, Billy Joel, Linda Ronstadt, Lou Reed, Stevie Ray Vaughn, Tom Petty, The Runaways, Rush, The Ramones, Blondie, Talking Heads and many more. Artists from the comedy world included Billy Crystal, Eddie Murphy, George Carlin and Andy Kaufman.

That’s right, while in most towns it was a five-minute drive to the nearest 7-Eleven, for Roslyn-ites it was a five minute drive to hear some of the greatest music or comedy ever produced, if you had the foresight (or luck) to catch one of these great “new” artists live.

The club’s bookings were quite diverse. One night you could be entertained by blues great B.B. King, the next night comedian Henny Youngman, and the following night, drummer Buddy Rich. It was a kind of musical circus that only added to the club’s mystique.

Early on Eppy smartly created a partnership with a local and somewhat fledgling radio station, WLIR-FM. It became a symbiotic relationship. Eppy and WLIR first began broadcasting live concerts from a nearby recording studio, before migrating to hosting “Live From My Father’s Place” in 1973. The relationship with the station expanded the club’s reach, appeal and notoriety. Record labels, looking to showcase and develop their stable of young artists, gravitated over time to the integrated club and radio model that Eppy and his partners had created. (Note: In 1982 WLIR re-formatted into a groundbreaking New Wave radio station, the subject of a 2017 documentary New Wave: Dare to be Different.)

A Bruce Springsteen concert was the first live broadcast from My Father’s Place, roughly two years before the Born to Run album made Springsteen a superstar. Legend has it Eppy and “The Boss” smoked a joint backstage before the concert to calm some nerves, mostly Bruce’s. When Springsteen hit the stage, still feeling quite anxious, he looked out at the crowd and said, “Well, here we are, on the radio. Damn, radio’s a nervous business.” Bruce and his E Street brethren then delivered the kind of tight, sweat-dripping set he soon would be famous for.

MFP also presented Billy Joel’s first show after the release of his debut LP Cold Spring Harbor. The club’s Reggae Night shows were pretty special, too. Artists such as Peter Tosh, Toots and The Maytals and Burning Spear performed. The Stones’ Keith Richards and Ronnie Wood would frequent the club’s Reggae Night, dancing it up with other concertgoers and joining the bands onstage.

When I asked Eppy if he did all of the club’s bookings from the very beginning, he said, “Yeah, and I didn’t know what the f*ck I was doing. One time I was walking past The Bitter End (a Greenwich Village music club). I see that Carole King is playing there for seven nights, doing two shows a night. So I call up Lou Adler (King’s agent, and a Hollywood music and film legend). I didn’t know Lou, or really even knew who he was (reputation wise), but I knew My Father’s Place was a larger club than The Bitter End. ‘Hi Lou, my name is Eppy, and I have a club on Long Island. I want to make you an offer. I’ll pay Carole King whatever she’s getting for the week (at the Bitter End), and I can do it in one night, two shows.’ Adler laughed hysterically, and then there’s a click. He hung up on me.”

Attending a show at MFP was definitely a no-frills type experience. The venue held 400 patrons seated in long, cafeteria style tables, so the shows had a communal atmosphere, though the patrons were unquestionably there for the music.

The building also had a rich and eclectic history. At one time or another, it was a car dealership, a funeral parlor, a bakery and a bowling alley, which changed its name from Roslyn Bowl to My Father’s Place when the ownership began booking live concerts with a few folk and country artists, a precursor to Eppy and his partners reimagining it as a progressive music club.

As is the case with many businesses, the glory years didn’t come early or easy. MFP’s beginnings were humble and inauspicious. As Eppy shared, the former bowling alley owner, Jay Linehan, was having a difficult time making a successful conversion to a music club. So, Eppy asked him, “What’s your slowest night of the year? If I can fill the place on the worst night of the year, will you give me 49% of the club for $1.00?” Linehan was on board.

Eppy then approached his good friend Richie Havens and asked if he would do the gig. This was about two years post-Woodstock. Havens accepted and the first Eppy-led show was on Memorial Day 1971. “Richie wouldn’t take any money,” said Eppy. “Tickets I think were $7 or $8, a lot of money in those days. We ran posters in music stores and clothing shops all over Long Island, and we sold out the show. It was a great night. I then got 49% ownership for $1.00.” This was Eppy’s opening salvo in a long journey of hard work, perseverance and eventual success.

Parking for the club was located under an adjacent viaduct. If you were fortunate enough to avoid the broken glass, the pigeons roosting under the viaduct might leave a parting gift on your windshield. Warts and all, My Father’s Place unquestionably had its unique appeal, as many small clubs often do.

During this period, Roslyn Village was transforming into a “hip” destination, attracting visitors both near and far, while maintaining its historic charm. What lured Eppy to Roslyn to begin with? “I went to a school in Boston. I was studying to be a musician,” he said. “The whole Boston-Cambridge culture scene became my life. We wanted to make Roslyn like Harvard Square, or like parts of Boston that had boutique after boutique. Really cool places to hang out. Roslyn was so different than the other communities on (Long Island’s) North Shore. I thought, this is a cool place to build a little community. There were little antique shops, but nothing to speak of as far as a subculture.”

Other businesses in Roslyn Village (which were there either before or during the time My Father’s Place was active) included a head shop, a record store, a tattoo parlor, a wine and cheese shop, a candle shop, and clothing and shoe stores, in addition to a few bars and restaurants. The town projected a very cool vibe, though in time local politics began to permeate the ether. As development pressures from the village accelerated, and some small businesses continually flouted local laws – reflecting poorly on the entire counter-culture business community – local bureaucracy contributed to My Father’s Place’s closing in 1987. On the music industry side, disruption was also taking place with record label consolidation, while promo dollars were being diverted to MTV-style videos, not touring.

Though never too far removed from the music scene, some thirty-one years after the original club closed, in 2018 Eppy opened a “new,” smaller My Father’s Place as a supper club in the ballroom of The Roslyn Hotel. The club is a more upscale version of the original, though the music biz these days is a far cry from the heyday of the 1970s and 1980s (COVID-19 notwithstanding).

Reflecting on today’s music industry, Eppy experienced firsthand how well legacy music business models had worked for numerous artists. The old paradigm of A&R vetting, record label signings, radio support, promotion, touring, etc., in his eyes was a proven success, albeit for a limited number of artists. Today’s ease of production and distribution for artists unquestionably “widens the pipe,” but without strong means of discovery, via radio and/or other forms of promotion, for example, he questions how many well-deserving artists will get broadly noticed.

I recently caught up with Eppy for a little Q&A about the origins of My Father’s Place. He also shared an amusing story about first meeting John Belushi. Check it all out below:

Stuart Marvin: Tell me more about the beginnings of the “Live at My Father’s Place” broadcasts.

Eppy Epstein: So we opened the club with Havens in ’71, and then we sat there with a bunch of local folk and country singers. We didn’t have enough of a PA system, so we couldn’t put on any real shows (at MFP). We didn’t have any money at all to build anything, because the money coming in was needed for liquor and beer. I mean, we were so undercapitalized that it was impossible. I’m frustrated. But I had bought some radio ads on WLIR-FM, which just changed format two or three years before. So I asked John Rieger (the station’s co-owner), “what if we get a sponsor and start doing live radio broadcasts?” “How are we gonna do that?” Rieger asks. Well, there’s a recording studio (Ultrasonic Studios) just down the street, 1/10th of a mile away. WLIR’s sales manager, a heavyset guy with a big cigar, then says, “I’ve got a meeting set up next week with Dr. Pepper, some new beverage.” Dr. Pepper then agrees to sponsor us for $500 a week, plus free soda. For $90 a month, we put in a set of (phone) lines to carry a signal from Ultrasonic (where the broadcasts began before moving to the club) to the station. We then connected the line to the board, so we could mix in stereo.

SM: What about booking talent?

EE: I start calling record companies. I’m already talking to booking agents. I had a club (MFP) and now we had a New York radio station (WLIR), [in] the biggest market in the world, even if it is a Long Island thing. Every record company had a slew of acts, and we had one hour of promo time (on WLIR). It was all about timing. So the acts we broadcast on WLIR were based on whether we got money from the record company, which would pay us $500 for air time, on top of the $500 we got from Dr. Pepper. All of a sudden, local clubs and merchants all wanted to advertise (on WLIR), and we had sponsored concerts (with Dr. Pepper).

SM: Who were the early up and comers who played My Father’s Place who you thought were going to be enormously successful?

EE: Don’t go by me, because I was a musician, I have very left-of-center taste. So, the acts that I thought were gonna come up, didn’t come up, in most cases. So, I’m the wrong guy to ask ‘cause I’m not an A&R guy, and the music I liked was different. I was into hardcore reggae, ska and punk.

SM: I know you have tons of great stories, but just share one with me?

The Set Up:

EE: In 1973 or 1974 we do a show (at My Father’s Place) with the touring company of National Lampoon, a magazine that’s part of Harvard University. They played the club on a Saturday night. The trains back to Manhattan stopped at 12 am. They just stopped running. So after the show, there’s a blizzard, it’s snowing pretty hard, and these “kids” are now stranded (on Long Island). So I get in my car and I drive these three kids back to the city (Manhattan). We drive in, but I first take them for a great (early morning) dinner at my favorite restaurant in Chinatown, Wo Hop. It was just a really, really fun night with these three unknown comics.

(End of story, or so I thought.)

The Payoff: (1976):

EE: I had booked the James Cotton Blues Band at MFP. George, the owner of U.S. Blues (a good local bar in Roslyn) calls me up and says, “I hope you’re not gonna be pissed, but I invited Matt ‘Guitar’ Murphy (James Cotton’s legendary blues guitarist) to come over (to U.S. Blues) after your show to teach the guys from Saturday Night Live, the Belushis, the Aykroyds, etc., how to play the blues. Everyone (from SNL) is coming out, and Matt Murphy is gonna teach them the blues.” Matt Murphy is from Chicago, and he’s the real deal.

(Note: Matt “Guitar” Murphy later joined the Blues Brothers Band and had a prominent role in the iconic film, The Blues Brothers (1980).

EE: So I head over to U.S. Blues around 3 am, as they’re just starting out. George brings me over to Belushi and we shake hands. I remember his hands were so clammy. George then says, “Eppy owns that place around the block, My Father’s Place.” Belushi then says, “Oh man, I did your club, and you turned me on to my favorite Chinese restaurant when we moved here from Chicago” (imitating Belushi’s strong Midwestern accent). Somewhat confused, I say, “Mr. Belushi, not only did I never have dinner with you, but you never played my club. I would know if the great John Belushi played MFP.” Belushi then says, “No, no, no, I was in the Lampoon show.”

Then it dawns on me. I realize Belushi was one of the three “kids” I drove into New York City that night, including dinner at Wo Hop. All I had remembered was a girl, a guy, and a fat kid. Funny, nerdy kids. So I start piecing together what he’s telling me and I ask, “who were the other kids in the car with us that night?” Belushi says, “It was me, Radner and Murray” (as in Gilda and Bill). Now I’m totally blown away. I spent an evening (and early next morning) with these three “kids,” who are now world-famous comics. Belushi then excitedly tells me, “during breaks in SNL rehearsals, the entire cast frequently cabs it over to Wo Hop.” They all had become regulars.

Header image of My Father's Place in 1977 courtesy of Steve Rosenfield. An Audiophile By Any Other Name

AUDIO STATIC Written by Peter Xeni Two Classic Albums from Jazz’s Elder Statesmen, and a Zappa High-Res Remaster

TO BE DETERMINED Written by Tom Gibbs Charles Lloyd & the Marvels – Tone Poem

83-year-old saxophonist Charles Lloyd has actually had several careers as a musician. Born and raised in Memphis, Tennessee, he grew up surrounded by blues, jazz, and gospel musicians, but left Memphis in 1956 to study classical music in Los Angeles at the University of Southern California with noted Bartók specialist Halsey Stevens. He spent his days at USC, but occupied his nights moonlighting with jazz luminaries such as Ornette Coleman, Billy Higgins, Scott LaFaro, Don Cherry, Charlie Haden, Eric Dolphy, and Bobby Hutcherson. And he became a member of Gerald Wilson’s big band – all while earning a degree at USC. Afterwards, he became the musical director for Chico Hamilton’s band, where his musical leanings started moving towards jazz fusion. In 1966, he formed a quartet that featured a 21-year-old Keith Jarrett on piano; their album Forest Flower had cross-cultural appeal, and Lloyd was named Downbeat’s Jazz Artist of the Year in 1967. His music appealed to jazz purists and hippies alike.

In the early seventies, Lloyd virtually dropped out of the jazz scene; he’d become a disciple of transcendental meditation, and he played regularly with the Beach Boys, both in the studio and as a member of their touring ensemble. He also appeared on several side projects with Beach Boys Mike Love and Al Jardine, and on albums from Roger McGuinn, and The Doors (Full Circle, post-Jim Morrison). After nearly a decade away from the genre, Lloyd returned to jazz, but was diagnosed with a nearly fatal condition that sidelined him for much of the eighties. Returning to music in 1988, he soon signed with ECM, recording a string of sixteen albums for the imprint with musicians as diverse as Brad Mehldau, John Abercrombie, Larry Grenadier, Billy Higgins, Geri Allen, and Jason Moran. In 2016 Lloyd signed with Blue Note Records. Tone Poem is his sixth album for the label.

Tone Poem also marks the third outing from Charles Lloyd and the Marvels. The album consists of six covers and three originals, and is the first record from the group that doesn’t have a vocalist on any of the tracks (previous Marvels albums featured vocals from Willie Nelson, Norah Jones, and Lucinda Williams). Alongside Lloyd on saxes and flute, jazz superstar Bill Frisell appears on guitar; Frisell became a fan of Lloyd’s when as a teenager he first saw Lloyd in concert. The Marvels are rounded out by pedal-steel guitar player Greg Leisz, bassist Reuben Rogers, and longtime Lloyd drummer Eric Harland. The playing style of Charles Lloyd and The Marvels has been described as "Americana Jazz," because their tunes typically blend elements of jazz, blues, country, and Americana. https://youtu.be/uOOLeTUdsDw

The album contains a diverse mix of covers and originals. It kicks off with a contemplative reading of Ornette Coleman’s “Peace” that features exhilarating solos from both Charles Lloyd and Bill Frisell. A second Coleman tune, “Ramblin,” picks up the pace significantly, with a propulsive, driving bass and drum vamp from Reuben Rogers and especially drummer Eric Harland, who pounds away as though he’s leading a New Orleans parade line. Frisell and pedal steel player Greg Leisz bounce riffs off each other; you almost get the impression that the Southern Crescent train is barreling into the NOLA station. The mood again becomes more subdued with a pensive reading of Leonard Cohen’s “Anthem”; Lloyd’s tenor solo provides a moment of rapt meditation for the listener. Lloyd switches to flute for “Dismal Swamp” – a jazz-funk original which is far less dismal than the title would suggest.

The classic Thelonious Monk composition “Monk’s Mood” features extensive interplay between Lloyd, Frisell, and Leisz’s pedal steel, and a pair of tunes that stretch all the way back to Lloyd’s days with Chico Hamilton provide the album’s summation. “Lady Gabor” – the Gabor Szabo (Lloyd’s bandmate and guitarist with Chico Hamilton) original – features Lloyd again on flute, and is punctuated ecstatically by frequent bursts from both Frisell and drummer Harland. It provides a thrilling taste of the jazz fusion Lloyd initially gained notoriety for. The closing “Prayer” is another Lloyd original that dates from the same time period, and while it begins with a ruminative sax solo, it soon extends beyond the tune’s ballad framework with alternating bursts from both Lloyd and Frisell. Bassist Reuben Rogers gets the opportunity to step outside his normal boundaries with a very nicely played solo.

The sound quality of Qobuz’s 24/96 digital stream was nothing short of superb; Tone Poem is the first release this year in Blue Note’s Tone Poet series, which has been previously reserved for classic albums from the label’s back catalog. This marks the first album in the series chosen from a new release – that alone should be a telling indicator to anyone of the quality of this record. I’ve heard nothing but raves for all the albums (especially the LPs!) that have been released thus far – and the LPs tend to sell out very quickly. I plan on trying to grab one, but no worries; the high-resolution streamed files are remarkably good. This is essential listening, and comes very highly recommended!

Blue Note Records, CD/2 LP (download/streaming from Qobuz [24/96], Tidal, Amazon, Google Play Music, Pandora, Deezer, Apple Music, Spotify, YouTube, TuneIn) Dr. Lonnie Smith – Breathe

“Dr.” Lonnie Smith is easily regarded as the Zen master and current guru on his instrument among Hammond B3 organ aficionados. The title “Doctor” isn’t a degree he’s earned or been awarded; it’s more of a sign of respect from the many players he’s appeared with throughout his lengthy career that spans more than seventy album appearances. These include several dozen albums as a leader – apparently, Lonnie Smith likes to “doctor” his Hammond B3 parts with his often quirky and eccentric improvisational stylings. Smith first gained acclaim for his work with George Benson’s quartet in the mid-sixties, and followed that experience with a series of excellent albums for the Blue Note label running from the late sixties into the early seventies, which helped form the foundation of the “groove/funk” school of B3 playing. Despite many appearances on a multitude of labels over the decades since, he returned to the Blue Note fold in 2016, and Breathe is his third album on the classic jazz imprint since rejoining the label.

Breathe showcases Lonnie Smith’s core trio of guitarist Jonathan Kreisburg and drummer Johnathan Blake; the trio is expanded to a septet on some of the tunes with a horn section that features trumpeter Sean Jones, John Ellis on tenor sax, Jason Marshall on baritone sax, and Robin Eubanks on trombone. And none other than Iggy Pop (!) adds vocals to the album’s two studio recordings. The remainder of the record was recorded live at a 2017 session at The Jazz Standard in New York City. Lonnie Smith has always felt that his live recordings get much closer to the essence of his artistry with the Hammond B3. That 2017 live date yielded the excellent 2018 album All In My Mind, but the good doctor felt that there was too much great material still unreleased from the session to not incorporate some of it into Breathe. https://youtu.be/ZL-Za6G-gAo

On Breathe, Dr. Lonnie Smith proves that despite being 78 years old, he’s one of the few artists of his generation who can still create the same level of excitement and intensity that were the hallmarks of his youthful recordings. The live tunes alternate between trio and septet settings, and consist mostly of Smith originals, with the lone exception of Monk’s “Epistrophy.” The twelve-plus- minute “World Weeps” starts with a slow dirge of a drum roll from Johnathan Blake, which slowly segues into a nearly six minute guitar solo from Jonathan Kreisburg that alternatingly wails and screams. Ultimately, it gives way to a subdued B3 vamp from Smith that’s absolute ear candy. The twelve-minute runtime seems over far sooner – I could listen to this all day! Vocalist Alicia Olatuja sits in on one tune, offering a soulful rendering of “Pilgrimage”; Smith raved about her performance here, and altered his B3 comping to get out of the way of her beautiful singing.

Lonnie Smith lives in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, and he frequently performs with his trio at Arts Garage in nearby Delray Beach. Iggy Pop started showing up regularly at the performances, and had many conversations with Smith about getting together in the studio. It finally happened, and Smith was excited to include two of the studio takes featuring Iggy Pop to bookend the live tracks. Timmy Thomas’ “Why Can’t We Live Together” (included by Sade on her 1984 debut record, Diamond Life) opens the album and features a droll but nearly perfect performance by Pop. And the record closes with what Lonnie Smith describes as a "funkified joyride" with a boogaloo-influenced take of Donovan’s “Sunshine Superman.” Breathe is an interesting and joyful album that demands repeat listening sessions.

I simply marveled at Lonnie Smith’s ability to energize these performances, making Breathe easily one of the most essential jazz releases of 2021. And the Jazz Standard tracks had some of the best live sound I’ve heard in a very long time – this is an exceptional recording! I’m hoping that an LP will be released, but till then, the 24/96 digital stream from Qobuz was outstanding, and this album comes very highly recommended.

Blue Note Records, CD (download/streaming from Qobuz [24/96], Tidal, Amazon, Google Play Music, Pandora, Deezer, Apple Music, Spotify, YouTube, TuneIn) Frank Zappa – Apostrophe(’) (24/192 High Resolution Digital)

A first wave of Frank Zappa remasters have just appeared this week on Qobuz in both 24/192 and 24/96 high resolution versions. I thought it would be at least instructive to take a listen to one of the titles I’m infinitely familiar with to see how I thought it compared to the CD-quality version. I know that I haven’t always been particularly happy with the Rykodisc versions that are the only thing currently available, feeling that perhaps they’re a bit strident (and perhaps somewhat steely) sounding to a certain extent. At least in the case of the discs that I own and have ripped to FLAC for my music server.

I’ve only been able to find references to these remasters in two places; on Qobuz for streaming and download, and on the HDtracks download site (I’ve temporarily suspended my Tidal account, so can’t really comment about the availability there). There’s no available information I’ve been able to find on any internet website that references the remasters or where they’re sourced from, and the record label is simply listed as “Frank Zappa Catalog,” which, again, generates zero hits on the internet. So where these FZ remasters come from, and exactly how available they are going to be – at this point, I have virtually no idea.

So how does the 24/192 file – which is generally considered in digital file terms to be “studio master” quality – for the album Apostrophe(’) sound? My comments are based on my experiences with my current digital streaming setup, which retails for a tad over $10K USD (this only includes music server/streamer/DAC/galvanic isolation), and is, in my opinion, fairly revealing. Honestly, I wasn’t completely blown away.

I’ve purchased quite a few high-resolution digital downloads. An example I’ll use here that I feel is fairly representative of what’s out there are the high-res downloads from the band Yes. I own most of their catalog titles in one format or another, and many of their albums in multiple spinning disc, and digital file formats. In my experience with multiple purchases of high-resolution 24/192 digital downloads of this material, I’ve been mostly, and unfortunately — underwhelmed. For example, I recently purchased DVD-Audio discs of both Fragile and Close To The Edge, and both the Steven Wilson remix/remasters and the ripped 24/96 versions simply blow away the 24/192 competition. Now, I willingly admit that a greater degree of loving care was put into the Steven Wilson remasters, but I was just shocked that the 24/192 high-resolution downloads were so underwhelming in comparison — especially when we’re constantly told that they’re supposed to be “studio master” quality. In my opinion, even the 16/44.1 rips from the Steven Wilson discs sound much more organic than the high resolution 24/192 digital downloads, which sounded somewhat sterile to me. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-p2z8TLRNUQ

I’m finding some of the same things with the 24/192 files on Qobuz for Apostrophe(’), although without the same level of sterility present in the Yes albums. I find greater clarity in the 24/192 FZ files, but I didn’t hear enough of a difference to justify purchasing the downloads (roughly $25 USD each). If anything, the greater level of clarity made the 1974 recording sound a bit more dated than I remembered it — and the rip of my Rykodisc CD sounded much more like the 24/192 file than different from it. That’s not what you usually hope for with a new, high-resolution remaster; you hope for greater clarity and improved detail, but sometimes there’s an unpleasant tradeoff. At least with Qobuz, you can try it before you buy it. YMMV, but it might be instructive to take a listen to these new FZ high-res remasters before deciding.

Frank Zappa Catalog, (download/streaming from Qobuz [24/192])

Header image of Frank Zappa courtesy of Magnolia Pictures.

Sylvia Massy: Pushing Sonic Boundaries With a Rock and Roll Attitude

THE COPPER INTERVIEW Written by John Seetoo

From her punk and hard rock roots as a musician, Sylvia Massy has risen to dizzily lofty heights and accolades as an innovative and highly-sought producer and engineer. Her work with Rick Rubin, Tool, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Johnny Cash, Lenny Kravitz, Aerosmith, Queens of the Stone Age, Tom Petty, Prince, Seal, and many other artists could fill an entire music library. She has also conducted workshops and taught both in the US and abroad, and her 2016 book, Recording Unhinged, led to her subsequent acquisition of the largest microphone museum in the world (an article about the collection is in Copper Issue 128).

Sylvia Massy graciously took the time from her busy schedule for an interview with Copper.

John Seetoo: You have stated in your workshops and lectures that you have used old crystal, dynamic, and condenser mics or even carbon mics from your museum collection on sessions (see article in Copper Issue 128). Do you prefer to record a unique sound from the get-go as opposed to manipulating it afterwards? And this is completely opposite the “conventional wisdom” of using the best mics possible. Why do you sometimes like to do this?

Sylvia Massy: I like to record with the end result in mind. As close to the final sound I can get is where I want to start. That means committing the EQ, compression, levels and amplification at the time the parts are being recorded. I do this for several reasons. First, it is easier to envision the final production if all the parts are in a finished form as you build them. Next, as the players are performing, the closer to a finished sound they have in their headphones [the more it] will inspire a better performance from them. Next, if tracks are committed with all EQ and compression, I am ensuring that any future mixer can't f*ck it up too badly.

JS: Your roots as a musician are in punk and metal. As a producer and engineer, you’ve recorded the sound of a piano being pummeled with sledgehammers and blown to bits with a shotgun on Tool’s Undertow, and you’ve also recorded a guitar being tossed off a cliff. Did the final results match the sound you had in your head when you originally envisioned them, and did bands like Wendy O. Williams and the Plasmatics influence that element of aural destruction being incorporated into your music production?

SM: I like to approach music production with a punk attitude, and I'll try to find the most extreme sounds to add into recordings. Sometimes these punk ideas work and are fantastic. Sometimes they don't work or are not appropriate. Smashing pianos was out-of-control and the sounds became the final song "Disgustipated" on [Tool’s] Undertow. On another project, tossing a screaming guitar off a cliff was wild...crashing, sproinging. That was on Machines Of Loving Grace’s Gilt. But alas, the cliff guitar did not fit anywhere on their album and we did not use it. No regrets.

If you want to do this kind of crazy stuff, you need to carefully budget the time so you are not stealing a day or two away from recording your main, foundational tracks. I usually wait until the end of a project for the punk reward. And when the actual "punk" recording doesn't fit on the record it's still okay because it is incredibly fun and sometimes a bit daredevil. One time we snuck into an art museum in Dresden with a hidden load of recording equipment and recorded creepy vocals in front of Raphael's giant "Two Angels" painting. That was Lucy Luvs Fur and it worked. Another time we recorded in an Etruscan tomb with bats outside of Rome. That was [for] Spiritual Front and that one worked too.

JS: You have stated in the past that you often like to change the environment for an artist in order to get a different kind of performance. This type of “performance shaping” is reminiscent of techniques used by film directors like Alfred Hitchcock or Roman Polanski. Was this something you learned from someone else or something you developed on your own?

SM: Most singers respond to the environment you put them in. Think of this. Record a singer in a vocal booth, then record the same singer, same part in a cathedral. You will get a vastly different performance. Some singers will be inspired, others may be very shy. Either emotion could be useful in the delivery of the song's message.

JS: You have mentioned in your book, Recording Unhinged: Creative and Unconventional Recording Techniques, of experimenting with processing sound through light bulbs, household appliances, and even food. Can you elaborate a bit more about that and what the results were like?

SM: Cheese sounds best. Especially if you are going for a bluesy tone. But not necessarily bleu Cheese, ha ha. Actually I think Gouda has a killer tone. For realz. JS: I understand that one of your teaching tests is to challenge a student to match a mix done on an SSL (Solid State Logic) console with an analog Trident console. Having an engineer do it all in analog is a great way to make someone mix with their ears, as opposed to staring at a screen display. Can you comment on this? (note: Sylvia Massy’s SSL console is a vintage J series wraparound 96 channel model.)

SM: This is a very surprising exercise. I ask a new engineer to listen to one of my finished mixes, then I give them the files and ask them to duplicate my mix using an entirely different studio. Hehe. We learn who is actually listening. The song I give them was mixed on an SSL, and they would do the test on a Trident 80 Series. Some contenders were very, very close. Others made a good mix, but ignored matching my mix. Those contenders showed me they don't listen to instructions or take direction. I would never be able to give them a critical job.

JS: You have stated that you and Rick Rubin share an affinity for left-center-right (L-C-R 3-channel) mixing. How did this develop, and what are the advantages and drawbacks for you in using that approach? And how would you mix this to stereo?

SM: I learned to love the L-C-R approach while engineering Johnny Cash's Unchained for Rick Rubin. Rick wanted to give the album a roots feel. Organic and real. Because older analog consoles had no panning, [and] only had a left and right and center selection [for placing sounds in the mix], we used that technique to keep it vintage-sounding. Johnny's backup band was Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers. Some songs were dense with two electric guitars, Hammond B3 [organ] or piano, acoustic guitars and John's vocals, yet the hard-left, hard-right or in the middle panning approach never felt compromising.

JS: Some producers, such as Tony Visconti (see the interview in Copper Issue 96 and Issue 97) have been known to overdub instruments themselves surreptitiously or to fix a track that drifted in tempo too widely after the band was finished cutting tracks, in order to finish the record to the label’s satisfaction. Have you ever felt the need or been tempted to do that as well, and if so, on which instruments?

SM: Sometimes I will surprise a mix client with string arrangements, harmonies, choirs, piano, synth, acoustic. Whatever the song needs and is appropriate. But the best results come from [a] collaboration of ideas. I have corrected drums, flown bass and guitar parts, comped and copied parts by editing tape, using ancient samplers and slicing and dicing in Pro Tools.

JS: How has the pandemic affected the way you, the artists and the studios in the way you have been working over the past year?

SM: 2020 was a big mix year for me. COVID kept me grounded in my home studio, giving me a great excuse to build a new Dolby Atmos mix rig for immersive mixing. Hehehe!

All images courtesy of Sylvia Massy. The Yamaha Influence, Part One

THE COPPER INTERVIEW Written by Russ Welton

Is a music instrument manufacturer that also makes home audio gear, such as Yamaha, uniquely poised or best equipped to faithfully reproduce music to a high quality in their stereo and perhaps even their home theater equipment? After all, they make some of the finest-sounding pianos, basses, drums, strings, brass and woodwinds on the planet. Does this musical expertise translate to their hi- fi and audio/video gear?

In this two-part series, I put some of these questions to Yamaha’s UK Customer Services and to Yamaha Technical UK in searching out their answer to this theory.

Russ Welton: Yamaha audio and A/V products are sold under the “Natural Sound” imprint. How would you describe the Yamaha sound for stereo and A/V? Is there an overlap between any of your products, and in what way?

Yamaha UK: The term “natural” is interpreted in many different ways by many different people. The best way I can explain Yamaha’s “Natural Sound” is that it’s an attempt to remove the equipment sonically. Whether it’s a stereo amplifier, surround sound amplifier, set of speakers etc., preserving the sound of [for example], a particular bass guitar even down to the brand of strings installed on it intact, in the reproduction and listening experience, is the ultimate goal.

The biggest challenge is to not get in the way of the original recording. Evidence of our sound can be found throughout our range. Consider our flagship loudspeakers, the NS-5000s that sit at £15,000 a pair, [and then] if you would then listen to our NX-N500 active loudspeakers at £649, that Yamaha Natural Sound or signature can still be heard despite this massive price difference.

At Yamaha we strive to achieve natural sound. With the development of so much digital music it’s important that we produce a sound that is not too clinical or hard. We don’t want to produce something that is fatiguing for the listener but we do want to keep all those details that make for a high-definition sound. We go for no-holds-barred at any price point.

Digital sound comes from 0 or 1. Yes or no. But at Yamaha we are fully aware of how to have the correct [desirable] “distortions” and balance in the [musical] signal. We achieve this through our component choices, such as our capacitors. We use [everything from] tiny capacitors on some of our [circuit] boards, [all the way] through to large roll-sized units. Some of these may be exclusive to our flagship models but then trickle down through the product range. The accuracy of the component “leniency” [also] contributes. Our more expensive units employ 0.5% tolerances and this small [leeway] for error makes for a more consistent product.

RW: What have been the linchpin products in the development of Yamaha’s current stereo and A/V lineup?

Yamaha UK: Our flagship 5000 Series hi-fi products (which include the (C-5000 preamp, M-5000 power amp and NS-5000 speakers) and A/V components (CX-A5200 AV Processor and MX-A5200 11- channel power amplifier), push the boundaries of what’s possible in terms of performance. Once we discover improvements to our designs, we attempt to share this new-found expertise with the rest of our product line up. Our new line of hi-fi amplifiers (A-S3200, A-S2200, A-S1200) have been tweaked and share techniques first seen in our C-5000 and M-5000 [high-end] preamp and power amp system. The [development of the] NS-5000 uncovered new methods of cabinet design, which are shared with the baby NS-3000 speakers. Similarly, our MX-A5200 11-channel power amp features a high slew rate amplifier circuit, which has [also] been applied to our most affordable surround sound amplifier. If the same idea/improvement can be scaled to fit lower price points, we always try to offer this across as many products as possible.

Originally, Yamaha started out fixing reed organs before going on to making instruments. In more recent decades our NS-10 nearfield studio monitors have been notable. They became an industry standard for a lot of recording engineers and you will still find them in use in many studios to this day. They were launched in 1978 and ran until 2001, after which time they were discontinued, but they had made a name for themselves as a benchmark [for use] in studio recording.

In the home cinema arena, our DSP-A1 surround processor/amplifier was a great success. This was a flagship surround sound digital signal processor utilising 24-bit A/D and D/A converters with 18 different DSP modes. It had a programmable Cinema EQ function and supported stereo subwoofer outputs, Dolby Digital and DTS.

We also make projectors for home cinema, and sound bars, which effectively are speaker-array AV receivers but in sound bar clothing. If we look at our YSP5600 top of the range sound bar, for example, it has 44 speakers in it. To make it produce the sound as if it is coming from behind you, we can reproduce a frequency of, say, 1,000 Hz, and then by measuring the distance and timing the delay between the speakers to fire off of the rear wall, you [will] then hear that signal at a different time. This [creates] a virtual surround sound speaker effect. Although this isn’t for everyone, where there are [significant] space limitations in a listening room it can be a good help.

RW: How do you cater for different international markets and what people enjoy hearing?

Yamaha UK: Products that are sold internationally will be tuned differently per country. Largely this is a result of the construction of [the] houses [in the region]. Timber frame vs solid brick, for example, causes significant changes in sound and overall character. The room you listen in is part of the system, so this needs to be taken into account.

We take into account what the different markets have a preference for. In the UK someone may like the tonality added [by] the use of valves (vacuum tubes) making a traditional British sound. This may have [a] minimal [degree of] harmonic distortion and on its own can sound a little unnatural. Whereas the Asian market likes the “clinical sound” and the lowest [distortion] values on spec sheets. The two tonalities are different. Then the American market likes to hear a low-end swell, with bass that isn’t necessarily the tightest and cleanest-sounding. Knowing these characteristics and being able to measure the correct type of “distortions” when reproducing sound is key to making our products available worldwide.

RW: What are the benefits of Yamaha being a both music instrument maker and an A/V components manufacturer?

Yamaha UK: We hear and understand music from start to finish. This gives us great insight as to what the product needs to achieve at each stage [in the music creation and reproduction chain. Whether [in the areas of] performing, recording or reproducing [music], we have products that specialize in all areas. This gives our engineers a unique perspective, the ability to collaborate with a much wider field of expertise versus if we were solely creating home audio and A/V equipment.

Shared resources play a big part of our ability to create products to such a high standard. For example, the factory that finishes and polishes our most expensive grand pianos also finishes our NS-5000 and NS-3000 loudspeakers and GT-5000 turntable.

There are a lot of cross-divisional benefits between Yamaha’s products. When a musical instrument produces a sound wave, whether it’s from a piano, a guitar or [musical instrument] pickups, each component of the instrument has an effect on the overall sound.

Understanding what should be happening at the output of the instrument is important. For example, when recording live instruments and [then] you play it back, the recording does not sound the same. Something is missing in the audio signal and so only a music instrument manufacturer knows what to add back in. An example is in our sample packs (software downloads with sampled sounds of musical instruments) for digital piano.

RW: You know what source information is needed to make realistic musical-sounding tones. Yamaha UK: We make a product called the SILENT guitar using our SRT Studio Response Technology. Typically, a guitar produces sound reflected from the rear of the soundboard.

Similarly, with a piano you generate sound as the strings vibrate the soundboard. With our Silent Piano system, the notes played no longer hit the strings. Instead, the pressure-sensitive keys can take the impulse from the hammer and send that signal direct to headphones. Alternatively, [the instrument can be used as a regular piano and sound] can be produced on the soundboard, [or the two can be blended together].

Using this system, Elton John performed in the UK while simultaneously linking between London and America. Everything [he played] was transferred – how hard he hit the strings, the timbre through the soundboard, any trills and so on. Using this technology, you could effectively have the artist perform in your home.

Another example is our THR [portable guitar] amplifiers. They have a lot of signal processing technology built into them [to create different guitar tones].

RW: How does this influence the type of DSP and surround-sound processing you use in your A/V preamp-processors and receivers?

Yamaha UK: Our connection with music in [multiple] areas has given us the opportunity to gain access to more music venues, which then shape [the [way we create] our DSP modes. Although some consider our A/V receivers’ Cinema DSP programs a gimmick, and created digitally from no reference, we actually capture the acoustics of real locations. A real jazz club (The Bottom Line mode), a real cinema (Standard mode), a real concert hall in Vienna. This is done using a 3-D microphone to accurately record the acoustics of that environment, so our customers can be transported to that very place from their living room. The exact shape (response pattern) of the 3-D microphone used to capture these environments is also [incorporated into] our high-end Aventage A/V receiver lineup.

Our DSP profiles can be thought of as building blocks that you can stack up on top of each other for your desired use. Because they are stackable, you can listen to each and use what you want. Yamaha likes to give you options and not take anything away. For example, your 2-channel stereo signal can be reproduced upsampled in a 5.1 format [but] without our Cinema DSP [surround-processing] option turned on. Or, you could take your Dolby 5.1 signal and upscale it to 7.1 in Sci Fi DSP mode for a different [dramatic] feel.

When it comes to room acoustics, certain rooms are known for having an excellent sound. An example could be a certain cinema such as the state-of-the-art Odeon Luxe in Leicester Square of London. Yamaha can sample information from that venue and measure the room size values, and the impulse [response] and early reflection times across the whole frequency range. We can measure the bass wavelengths coming into contact with different materials in the room. By measuring these frequency responses accurately, we can make a perfect blend of the best room attributes and sonic qualities based on the data taken from the world’s best-sounding cinemas. Then when you choose your room size for playback, you get the correct delays reproduced. [There is also a lot of psychoacoustics involved.]

RW: Please explain the Yamaha Parametric room Acoustic Optimizer (YPAO).

Yamaha UK: In simple terms, YPAO is a room correction technology that removes [the effects of] room modes. These are peaks and dips in frequency response caused by the room, [the result of cancellation and reinforcement of certain frequencies]. These [modes] can often distort or exaggerate certain frequencies; this can make hearing certain parts of the music or movie difficult. YPAO corrects these dips and peaks, giving the listener a more accurate presentation of the recorded material. In addition, YPAO will detect the distance the speaker is away from the listener, how big the speaker is, and when the subwoofer needs to take over (the crossover point from the main speaker) to play the lowest of bass frequencies. YPAO will also adjust how loud each speaker needs to play. But there’s more: YPAO’s Reflected Sound Control (R.S.C.) function will apply an impulse response correction, meaning [that the] treble, mid and bass frequencies coming from each speaker in your system will arrive at your ears at the same time. This helps improve the focus of all frequencies (it's very noticeable in bass notes), which vastly improves the perceived “speed” of your system.

Part Two will explore fine-tuning a surround-sound audio system, wireless technology and more.

Header image of Yamaha MusicCast system and all other images courtesy of Yamaha. Beam Me Up, Scotty

AUDIO ANTHROPOLOGY Written by Frank Doris The chic way to rock out! Circa 1960s ad for the French Teppaz Oscar portable record player.

We guess he knew how to turn it on. AKAI ad, 1970s.

You know you want it! The Marantz Model 7C tube preamplifier. The 7C was the same as the Model 7 with the optional wood cabinet and was made for 12 years from 1958.

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