High-Fidelity-1963-0

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www.americanradiohistory.com "Over -all, I would rate the XP 4A as one of the best, most truly musical reproducers available today."

JULIAN D. HIRSCH

* Noted equipment reviewer, in a lab report r published in the December, 1962, HiFi /Stereo FREE! $1.00 VALUE! The new 1963 edition of The Fisher Handbook, a FI43HER Review. Writes Mr. Hirsch: "Inside...the XP -4A 40 -page illustrated guide to stereo, HANDBOOK is quite unlike any of the other speakers it complete with specifications on an all Fisher components, including resembles externally... proved to be unusually loudspeakers. ALSO: Free reprint wide -range, smooth system...the response was of the Hirsch report on the XP -4A. virtually flat from 5,000 cps to beyond the limits FISHER RADIO CORPORATION of audibility...Tone -burst tests showed very good 21 -25 44th Drive, Long Island City 1, N. Y. transient response... In listening tests, the Please rush free Handbook and free reprint. XP-4A almost neutral in character, very ...was Name smooth and natural- sounding... had an especially fine and satisfying presence... a healthy Address amount of undistorted output in the 30- to -40- Larger photo shows speaker with grille cloth removed; City lone State cps range...The XP -4A is priced at $199.50. "t smaller photo with grille cloth in place. 01416 THE XP -4A LOUDSPEAKER BY FISHER EST. EXPORT: ii,NEN RA010 INTENNATIONAL, INC.. LONG ISLAND ,TV I. N. r. CANADA. TP. rFL ASSOCI ATES, LTD., WILLOWDALE, ONT.

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APRIL 1963 1

www.americanradiohistory.com This is the exclusive "floating stylus" in the Stereo Fluxvalve *, by Pickering. This stylus has so little mass it actually floats on water...so light it "floats" over the surface of your records at an amazingly low tracking force of 1 to 3 grams. At the merest suggestion of undue pressure on the arm or head, it retracts immediately into its Go den SAFE V- Playing Protecting GUARD soft plastic body. The Pickering " floating stylus" action protects NEW! Goloen SAFE V -GUARD your diamond and increases the life of your record while it plays. Stylus 03807ATG - $17.00 Play it perfectly, play it safely with the Golden SAFE V -GUARD "floating stylus" by Pickering.

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01963 Pickering & Co.. Inc.. Plainview- N. Y . CIRCLE 71 ON READER-SERVICE C %RD 7 HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

www.americanradiohistory.com Page 44

Page 51

high fidelity Page 48

Music and Musicians

51 Project Boris: Mussorgsky's opera recorded in stereo Roland Gelati 57 A Second Look at Manfredini Paul Henry Lang 18 Notes from Abroad -London, Paris, Gütersloh 34 Henryk Szeryng: an interview Shirley Fleming 69 Music Makers

Sound Reproduction

41 High Fidelity Newsfronts Norman Eisenberg 43 An Inquiry Into Psychoacoustics: an editorial 44 The Origins of Psychoacoustics S. J. London, M.D. 48 The Prospects for Psychoacoustics Irving M. Fried 61 Equipment Reports Pilot Model 654MA Tuner -Amplifier Pickering Stanton 481A Cartridge; Model 200 Tone Arm EICO RP-100 Series Tape Recorder Audio Dynamics Model ADC -18 Speaker System

Reviews of Recordings

71 Feature Record Reviews Wagner: Siegfried (Nilsson, Windgassen; Georg Solti, cond.) Biber: Fifteen Sonatas and Passacaglia for Violin (Sonya Monosoff, et al.) Beethoven and Mozart Sonatas; Chopin and Franck Piano Works (Ivan Moravec) 75 Other Classical Reviews 97 The Lighter Side 105 Jazz 106 Duke Ellington Without the Band John S. Wilson 111 The Tape Deck

A P R I L 1 9 6 3 VOLUME 13 NUMBER 4

of High Fidelity Magazine are fully protected by copyright and must not be reproduced in any manner. Second -class postage paid at Great Barrington

and at additional mailing offices. One year subscription- anywhere on Earth $7.00. Indexed in the "Reader's Guide to Periodicol Literature." Change of

Address notices and undelivered copies (Form 3579) should be addressed to High Fidelity, Subscription Dept., 2160 Patterson St., Cincinnati 14, O.

www.americanradiohistory.com hih fidelity _..

A. new world of sound .. .

Cover Drawing: by Leonard Boden Boris Christoff as Boris Godunov

Roland Gelatt Editor in Chief Joan Griffiths Executive Editor

Norman Eisenberg Audio Editor

Sue Severn Managing Editor

Shirley Fleming Assistant Editor

H. C. Robbins Landon European Editor

Roy Lindstrom Art Director

Nathan Broder John M. Cooly R. D. Darrell Alfred Frankenstein John F. lndcox Robert C. Marsh Contributing Editors NEW Stereo Tape Recorder! in the all Roberts `1055' Claire N. Eddings This is the tape recorder "for everyone ". Its pure, high fidelity recording Director of Advertising Sales its simplicity of operation qualities are applauded by the professional - and Walter F. Grueninger makes it the ideal instrument for the amateur as well. Never before has there Circulation Director been a tape recorder like this. It's compact, lightweight, portable, as easy to operate as turning on your radio! You can use it as a complete unit or as an Warren B. Syer integral part of your hi -fi system. As remarkable as the design and perform- Publisher ance of the ROBERTS `1055' is the astonishingly low price -$ 9 6 9,95 -a value unmatched by any other tape recorder. A D V E R T I S I N G THE ROBERTS `1055' IS AS VERSATILE AS SOUND ! Main Office * 4 -track stereo and 4 individual quarter tracks Claire N. Eddings, The Publishing House * Famous Roberts proven transport - -. Great Barrington, Mass. Telephone 1300 * Perfect size for custom installation New York Horizontal or vertical operation 1564 Broadway, New York 36 * Telephone: Plaza 7 -2800 * VA and 71/2 ips (15 ips available I Seymour Resnick, Andrew Spanberger Chicago The Billboard Publishing Co. Roberts Electronics, Dept. HF -4-V 188 W. Randolph St., Chicago 1 ROBERTS 11 5978 Bowcroft, Los Angeles 16, Calif. Telephone: Central 6 -9818 Please send me complete literature on Roberts Tape Jerry Taylor and handling. ELECTRONICS, INC. Recorders. I enclose 25 for postage 16, CALIF. Los Angeles LOS ANGELES Name_ -- 434 So. San Vicente Blvd., Los Angeles 48 CANADA: J. M. NELSON SALES CO. Address Telephone: Olive 2 -2100 Robert J. Friedman 7725 ADERA ST.. VANCOUVER 14, B.C. City- __ _Ione - State_ CIRCLE RO ON READER- SERVICE CARD HIGH FIDE1.1TY MAGAZINE

www.americanradiohistory.com How do you know when you're ready for the EMPIRE TROUBADOR

Would you abuse your hi fi components? Would Have you heard sound without wow and flutter you drop your amplifier Have you thought about ... say less than .05 percent Critics say there is no your records -we mean their money value too . . . better -that is all man can invent Even has no when you put them on a player -loaded up in audible rumble ... better than minus 65DB Well scratchy stacks When they're dropping to the plat- beyond professional standards . . . precision ma- ter with an awful sound of clatter -Do you shudder chining for all to see Here is stereo recreation, or just mutter Then you're ready for an EMPIRE world's best there is no doubt If you think top per- TROUBADOR. formance is something you should never be without Do noisy mechanisms jar you ... parts compli- Then you're ready for an EMPIRE TROUBADOR. cated and fragile Hard to service ... short of life, Do you ask your friends and neighbors to listen with levers to unravel Hate to wiggle through to your sound Have them admire the beauty of center post latches- broken records are your foils your precision in the round Here's part of your And you say, you like Empire's Dyna Lift, which has ultimate system ... matchless components built to no trips or coils Then you're ready for an EMPIRE last The world's most perfect record playback TROUBADOR. unit, well within your grasp Reproducing the great sounds as they were meant for you to hear At a Are you careful with your stylus when you set it cost of less than $15 a year.* So if you want per- on a record -Do you watch your gram force too fection and then some more for you tell when tracking Then you're ready Can error makes your records the EMPIRE TROUBADOR. sound distorted -even chattering and skipping part way through Do you suffer acoustic feedback -that Empire 208 Turntable. Push button power control . . continuous flexible belt drive -perfectly ground to constant thickness soul disturbing howl ... it may even sound like ±.0001. No intermediate idlers -only two moving parts (motor thunder with a rumbling sort of growl Did you and turntable platter). Each individually adjusted to dynamic balance -total vibration is limited to less than one/millionth of an know it comes from lack of stiffness ... of your inch -Constant speed, heavy duty, hysteresis synchronous motor. record playback arm If you want your Acoustic isolation motor suspension. Double rim flywheel turn- arm full table with optimum distribution of mass; 6 lb. heavy machined rigid ... if you care about inertia -warp wow and aluminum. compliance too. Then you're ready for an EMPIRE Empire 980 Playback Arm. More perfect dynamic balance assured by offset pivot design. Precise calibrated dial stylus force ad- TROUBADOR. justment from O to 8 grams ±0.1. Maximum vertical and lateral compliance with precision ball bearings. Lowest fundamental Do you adore the sound of silky violins ... of un- resonant frequency. Stylus overhang adjustment -quick release assuming bass If you hate the clang of cymbals bracket -mount permits the maintenance of optimum stylus to pivot - distance, regardless of cartridge make. Easy plug in installation - with a transient peak that's clipped or the screech no wiring, no soldering. of clarinets from a cartridge undamped peak Do Empire 880 Mono -Stereo Cartridge. World's most rugged stylus. Lowest dynamic mass. Less than .5x10 -3 gins. Widest per- you care about your decibels-and your separation formance range 6- 30,000 cps (well beyond the range of human hearing). too Want a cartridge that is rugged with perform- Razor sharp channel separation . more than 30db. Amazing "Elasto Shear "suspension, virtually eliminates distortion. ance that's quite new Then you're ready for an The Empire Troubador costs $222.50; its average life is 15 years EMPIRE TROUBADOR. or $14.83 per year. TROUBADOR For complete literature on the "World's Most TABLE OF CONTENTS Perfect Record Playback System" write: Empire 208 3 -speed "silent" turntable ... Empire 980 dynamically balanced play. back arm with the sensational Dyna.Lift* ... and the E new Empire 880p mono. LIEN IFIC stereo cartridge featuring the EMPIRECORP 845 STEW,, AVE GARVIN CITY L I NY. virtually indestructible Dyna Life' stylus...Complete with handsome walnut base: 5222.

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CIRCLE 39 ON READER- SERVICE CARD APRIL 1963 5

www.americanradiohistory.com AUTHORitatively Speaking

Dr. S. J. London is only one of many physicians we know who find in music a constant source of refreshment, but he is rare among medical men of our acquaintance in pursuing his avocation with the same spirit of scientific inquiry that his professional role demands. As medical director of a pharmaceutical company, The new Koss Dr. London is actively engaged in research in physiology, pharmacology, and clinical medicine; as student of music, he follows a similar course, in an endeavor professional to discover and explain causes and effects. We were therefore not at all sur- prised to learn of his intense interest in headset is designed the work of the nineteenth -century physicist and physician Hermann von Helm- holtz, who contributed so much to the to meet rugged, art we call high fidelity (see "The Origins of Psychoacoustics," p. 44). Dr. Lon- don is currently working on a book on sensitive listening the biology of music, to be written along classic Helmholtzian lines as a "personal tribute to Helmholtz for the transcen- requirements of dental scope and beauty of his thinking." Our investigation of psychoacoustics moved quite naturally from its origins to the pros. Not its prospects. The latter question we assigned to Irving M. Fried, and his prog- nosis appears on p. 48. Most HIGH FI- everyone needs it, DELITY readers are probably aware that Mr. Fried is the founder of Lectronics of City Line Center, Inc., an audio sales and consulting firm, and thus vastly ex- but you've never perienced not only with the mechanical and electronic components of music systems but with the intellectual and emotional complexities of the people who buy them. That he can cope with the problems is perhaps due to a liberal edu- e like it cation and a broad experience. Mr. Fried studied international relations as a Har- vard undergraduate, later entered that university's business school, and still later before. Ask for attended its law school (he is now a member of the Pennsylvania Bar). War- time service in the Navy, marriage, and a demonstration. paternity have also marked the years. Lectronics, he tells us, is his alter ego.

The Editor in Chief of this journal is markedly averse to any celebration of his own activities in this column. He says it's obvious what he's doing-getting out the magazine every month and sometimes writing a feature article for it (see "Proj- ect Boris," by Roland Gelait, p. 51). We anticipate an acerbic word in our direction on the score of even the following brief announcement: summer will see the publication, by Lippincott, of a new and revised edition of the Editor in Chief's book The Fabulous Phonograph.

Practically everybody is aware that Paul Henry Lang is Professor of Musi- cology at Columbia University, Music Critic of the New York Herald Tribune, and Editor of the Musical Quarterly. He is also, it appears, one of those HIGH FIDELITY readers who were somewhat exercised by the appearance in these pages (June 1961) of H. C. Robbins Landon's article entitled "A Pox on Manfredini." For "A Second Look at Manfredini," turn to p. 57. We take great pleasure and pride in noting that Nathan Broder, Contributing KOSS Editor and long -time member of HIGH FIDELITY'S reviewing staff, has recently ELECTRONICS, INC. been elected President of the American M usicological Society. Congratulations 2227 NORTH 31 ST STREET are in order to Mr. Broder-and to MILWAUKEE 8, WISCONSIN everyone concerned. CIRCLE 57 ON READER -SERVICE CARD 6 HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

www.americanradiohistory.com First ... you catch a werewolf

.r CLASS Of .SERVICE L= Night Letter Thls is fast message WESTERN (4-60) unless Its deferred char- SF-1201 !^11fr Thgtlm *cm Is Indicated by the TELEGRAM prop+ eymboL W. P. MARSHALL. P.se o.r de receipt is LOCAL TIME at point of TIME si pomi of origin. Time of line on domestic telegrams is LOCAL The Ming urne shown in the date BA 106 1208P EST JAN 14 63 oF4ti tiJ NY 14 1144A ES7 EXTRA AR NEW YORK F< B NB 15 1 LONG PD 7 .k, KLH LABORATORIES N ík 9 CROSS ST CAMBRIDGE MASS 30 HOURS THROUGH ITS FIRST SIX PUT OUR NEW MODEL 11 JUST OF BA S,\,. A PHONOGRAPH, IT S A VINDICATION VIVALDI ET AL. -- THAT ISN'T EXCLAMATION POINT WITHCRAFT RDHA'THAT SOUNDS NOT SALEM? NO MERE HUMAN UR^NE THE $750. CUSTOM NO --IT DOESN'T MATCH GOOD FOR SO LITTLE. WITHIN THE INCREDIBLE. TRANSISTORS, BUT IT APPROACHES IT TO RIG ROOT AND EXPLANATION BUT MANDRAKE FIDDLESTICKS - NO POSSIBLE ADVISE TOOTH. RIGHT? PLEASE 4 WHEREWOLFIS CITY 40 CABRINA BLVD NEW YORK ROBERT AND NANCY HELD 340

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Although we did not solicit this telegram, we hope you will share its enthusiasm.

III1IlI1I11iI i ¡ i f

KLH RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT CORPORATION

30 CROSS STREET. CAMBRIDGE 39, MASSACHUSETTS

CIRCLE 56 ON READER -SERVICE CARD APRIL 1963 7

www.americanradiohistory.com You haven't seen this kind of tuner and amplifier engineering on one chassis

75 WATTS total music power output (IHFM Standard) from new stereo power 4 wide -band IF stages amplifier section

3 stages of limiting New GOLDEN SYNCHRODEt (including wide -band ratio detector) front end for 1.8 µv FM sensitivity Multiplex section of the (IHFM Standard) superior time -division type

T Ii F 1 1 S Ií I. 4,

New professional -type d'Arsonval tuning meter Exclusive Fisher STEREO BEACON t for instant indication of Multiplex broadcasts and automatic switching Fisher modes Exclusive between mono and stereo DIRECT TAPE MONITORt system New four -position speaker selector switch New front -panel earphone jack

tPATENT PEN DINO CIRCLE 40 ON READER -SERVICE CARD 8 HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

www.americanradiohistory.com ...until you see the new Fisher all -in -one stereo receivers.

(THE NEW 400, THE NEW 500 -C AND THE NEW 800-C)

The new Fisher 400 The new Fisher 500 -C The new Fisher 800 -C with FM only, $329.50 with FM only, $389.50* with AM -FM, $449.50*

"Everything you need -on one compact tion, just as free from overheating or The FM sensitivity is equal to that of chassis" has always been a famous other life- expectancy problems as it the remarkable 500-C and 800 -C. systems Fisher specialty. As a matter of fact, would be if it were sold as a separate Just connect a pair of speaker re- integrated single- chassis stereo receivers component. That in itself is an achieve- to any one of the new Fisher stereo Fisher outsell all other high fidelity ment that no other manufacturer has ceivers and you have stereo reproduction by And that, components in the world today. thus far equaled. of the highest Fisher quality. But the completely new stereo receiv- The unit shown in detail at left is as you know, is the highest quality ers shown here set a new standard even the new Fisher 500 -C. It is completely there is. -C except that for Fisher. Never before have so much identical to the new 800 FREE! $1.00 VALUE! The amplifier power, such high tuner sensi- the latter includes, in addition, a high - new 1963 edition of The Fisher Handbook, a lavishly illus- DMA tivity, so many advanced control features sensitivity AM tuner section with adjust- trated 40 -page reference guide, able (Broad /Sharp) bandwidth plus a idea book and component and such a degree of over -all engineering catalogue for custom stereo. sophistication been offered on a single built -in ferrite rod AM antenna. chassis only 171 inches wide, 53/4 The new Fisher 400 was designed to FISHER RADIO CORP. make Fisher stereo receiver quality 21 -25 44th Drive, Long Island City 1, N. Y. inches high and 131 inches deep. (Only Please send free 40-page Handbook, complete 13 inches deep in the case of the 400.) available at an unusually moderate with detailed specifications on all Fisher What's more, each section of these re- price. It is in all essentials comparable stereo components, including stereo receivers. ceivers - the tuner, the Multiplex con- to the 500 -C, except for slight differ- Name verter, the stereo control -preamplifier, ences in FM circuitry, indicator features Address the stereo power amplifier is just as and control functions. Its music power City lone State - -J ruggedly built, just as reliable in opera- output is 60 watts (IHFM Standard). L' LONG ISLAND CITY 1, N Y. CANADA TRI -TEL ASSOCIATES, LTD., WILLOWOALE, ONT. *CABINET IN WALNUT OR MAHOGANY, S24.95. PRICES SLIGHT, HIGHER IN THE FAR WEST. EXPORT, FISHER RADIO INTERNATIONAL, INC., CIRCLE 40 ON READER -SERVICE CARD APRIL 1963 9

www.americanradiohistory.com now.. a Norelco `Continental' Tape Letters Recorder for every application The Case of Anton Bructzner

SIR: The provocative article on Bruckner by H. C. Robbins Landon [HIGH FIDELITY, February 1963] began on a sour note- '200' Bruckner's name is misspelled in the heading. I suppose that the average American knows no more about the Fraktur alphabet than a hog knows of predestination (to quote H. L. Menck- en), but editors who choose special effects should be familiar with the characteristics and properties of those effects. It was reasonable to set Bruckner's name in Fraktur, as he was an old- fashioned person and Fraktur is definitely old - fashioned in German printing. But who is the Lump who is not able to distinguish between a lower -case "k" and the ligature "tz "? CONTINENTAL '401' (EL 3534) William D. Lynn Four -track stereo and mono recording and playback Falls Church, Va. 4 speeds fully transistorized completely self -contained, including dual recording and playback pre- Who, indeed, but the entire editorial amplifiers, dual power amplifiers, two loudspeakers staff? Collectively we offer our shame - (second in lid) and dual element stereo dynamic micro- faced apologies. At least, we'll now know phone can also be used as a quality hi -fi reproduc- better than to run an article on Hans ing system, stereo or mono, with tuner or record Pfikner. Mr. Lynn goes on to point otri player frequency response: 60 to 16,000 cps at 71/2 another error: the first Bruckner sym- ips wow and flutter: less than 0.4% at 71/2 ips phony to be recorded complete was signal -to-noise ratio: -40 db or better. not the Seventh as played by Ormandy and CONTINENTAL '300' (EL 3542) the Minneapolis (1935) but as played by Horenstein and the Berlin Philharmonic 4 -track stereo playback (tape head output) self - contained 4 -track mono record -playback 3 speeds (1928 -for Polydor /DGG). Our cor- .mixing facilities dynamic microphone ideal for respondent then proceeds to berate schools, churches, recreation centers, etc. H.C.R.L. for preferring the original versions of Bruckner symphonies to the later CONTINENTAL '200' (EL 3541) ones. He makes some telling points, and 4 -track stereo head output direct to external stereo we wish we had space to print his re- preamp for portable high fidelity tape -deck applica- marks in full. It's a pleasure to a tions completely self- contained for 4 -track mono edit record and playback mixing facilities lightweight, magazine for such exigent readers. compact, rugged dynamic microphone. SIR: CONTINENTAL '100' (EL 3585) The article on Anton Bruckner is an ex- transistorized, 7 lb., battery portable records 2 citing and stimulating commentary on a hours on 4" reel, from any source plays back thru much neglected and underrated master. self- contained speaker as well as radio, TV or record Glenn R. Miller player response: 100 -6000 cps tapes interchange- Washington, D.C. able with other 2 -track 17/s ips machines constant - speed operation complete with dynamic microphone. SIR: It was good to see an Compare the special features article about Anton .. Look at the low Bruckner in your February issue. Bruck- prices... Listen to the matchless quality... Choose ner and Bach the 'Continental' most suitable for your require - were the culmination of ments...Write for complete literature and conven- their eras. Bruckner's music asks only ient location for free demonstration to Dept. B -4 oreko® that it be accepted for itself, for what is ORTR AMERICAN N PHILIPS COMPANY, INC., High Fidelity Products Division, 230 Duffy Avenue, Hicksville, L.I., N. Y. Continued on page 12 CIRCLE 70 ON READER -SERVICE CARD [o HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

s www.americanradiohistory.com I. Others 2. Others don't have don't have Others this. this. 3. can't have this.

Three points of superiority of the Fisher KX -200 Si :rataKit over all other single- chassis stereo control -amplifi er kits:

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www.americanradiohistory.com LETTERS Continued from page 12

the chorus master named in the brochure and the one named on the label. If you will check a copy of this recording, you will find that Wilhelm Pitz is mentioned as chorus master in the brochure and that Reinhold Schmid (who is chorus master of the Vienna Singverein) is named on the record. I'd like to know where credit is due. Barbara J. James La Verne, Calif.

Our reviewer must be absolved from responsibility, since he listened to un- labeled advance pressings. A query to Angel Records reveals that Schmid is the responsible chorus master in this performance, but the chorus is definitely the Philharmonia (normally under the direction of Pitz) and not the Singverein. A revised brochure has been printed with the error rectified. TV Picture, FM Sound

SIR: Like Charles Tepfer [ "In Video Est Audio," HIGH FIDELITY, November 1962], I have witnessed the gradual im- ask the provement in TV audio, and also have become increasingly frustrated with the shortcomings of same. To my mind, the music lover only real solution for the perfectionist is the complete separation of audio from video. A TV audio front end, terminating who owns one in a 10.7 IF, can be coupled to any FM tuner IF strip with very superior results. Furthermore, the picture quality will be greatly improved when the sound take- off is removed from the TV tuner. The VELOCITONE sound bar interference is eliminated and CARTRIDGES the picture can be fine -tuned without re- While the famed Velocitone series has received acclaim gard to sound. Also, intercarrier buzz from leading high fidelity critics we're and other video interference is removed and editors, from sure the comments by owners of Sonotone Velocitone the sound. The FM tuner's oscillator must be disabled when the TV cartridges are of greater significance to you. To wit: without sound is received, to prevent interference. "... doubt the best cartridge buy for the years money -excellent. Am well pleased." A few back there were a couple of TV audio tuners on the market but "Bass response better than (present cartridge). they failed Has crisp, clear sound. I like it." to get much buyer support. However, I believe the time is much "Sonotone cartridge produces very noticeable improvement certainly worth riper now for the reintroduction of such ... the price." a device. The very appearance of your "Bravo!" article seems to support this contention. "Sounds smoother than my old cartridge, which had I. Pushkin irritating peaks ... main advantage seems to be its Hempstead, N.Y. ability to track at 2 grams and still be an inexpen- sive cartridge." IJ"Am very pleased with the reproduction High Fidelity, April 1963. Vol. 13, No. 4. ..." Published monthly by The Billboard Publish- "Separation is unbelievable ..." ing Co., publishers of Billboard, Vend, "I am very pleased with this cartridge -it has very Amusement Business, and American Artist. clear response." Telephone: Great Barrington 1300. Member "I am well satisfied with it ... your separate equal- Audit Bureau of Circulations. izers are a very good idea." Editorial Correspondence should be addressed to The Editor, High Fidelity. Great "As soon as I plugged in my Velocitone, I noticed Barrington, Mass. Editorial contributions an instantaneous and vast superiority to (present will be welcomed. Payment for articles cartridge). accepted will be arranged prior to publica- The Mark III is the newest in the Velocitone series. It tion. Unsolicited manuscripts should be represents the latest advance in cartridge design. accompanied by return postage. Subscriptions: Subscriptions should be ad- Try it yourself and become a satisfied music lover- dressed to High Fidelity, Great Barrington, Velocitone Mark III, dual diamond styli, $22.25; dia- Mass. Subscription rates: Anywhere on mond sapphire, $19.25; dual sapphire, $14.75. Earth, 1 year, $7; 2 years, $12; 3 years, $16. Single copies 60 cents. Change of address notices and undelivered copies (Form 3579) should be addressed to SONOTONE°C0RP0RATI0N High Fidelity, Subscription Fulfillment De- ELECTRONIC APPLICATIONS DIVISION ELMSFORD, N. Y. partment, 2160 Patterson Street, Cincinnati In Canada: Atlas Radio Corp., ltd., Toronto Cartridges Speakers Tapa 14, Ohio. Heads Microphones Electron Tubes Batteries Hearing Aids Headphones CIRCLE 87 ON READER -SERVICE CARI) 14 HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

www.americanradiohistory.com ... a straight wire with gain. "A major breakthrough in the application of semi- conductors to high- - fidelity sound ... Citation A literally has flat response to beyond 1,000,000 cycles and distortion that is non- measurable...Superb response characteristics not matched by any known preamplifier... A unit that should meet the demands of the most critical listener and audio perfectionist... I t suggests that. .. a sound path could be set up that approaches the classic goal of amplifier design ... a `straight wire with gain:"

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CIRCLE 47 ON READER- SERVICE CARD APRIL 1963 5

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Trouble with cheap tape with an unknown name High potency oxides in "Sancti" Recording Tapes make is simply this: You can't see much difference between it and possible thinner, more flexible coatings that assure intimate fine -quality tape. But you sure hear the difference when tiny head -to -tape contact for sharp resolution. Exclusive Silicone imperfections are magnified into shattered sound ... a danger lubrication that lasts the life of the tape assures smooth tape greater than ever with today's four -track stereo, where each travel. It protects against recorder head wear, extends tape life. track of recording takes less than a quarter of the tape's width. So for genuine "money's worth" in performance, step up to Surest way to record sound crystal clear, enjoy the tape professionals prefer: "ScorcH" BRAND. maximum performance from your equipment is On SCOTCH® BRAND Recording Tape, to rely on "SCOTCH" BRAND Recording Tapes. Scott you hear it crystal clear! They are required by 3M to pass more than 100 11,:1g,s, 31©1©. `SCOTCH' AND THE PLAID DESIGN ARE REGISTERED TRADEMARKS OF MINNESOTA quality tests to ensure inch -after-inch uniformity. MINING & MANUFACTURING CO.. ST. PAUL 19, MINN. EXPORT: 99 PARK AYE., NEW YORK. CANADA: LONDON. Result: identical recording characteristics -full ONTARIO. ®19.3. 3M CO. frequency sensitivity, wide dynamic range - throughout each reel, reel after reel. Magnetic Products Division COMPANY CIRCLE 67 ON READER -SERVICE CARI) 16 HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

www.americanradiohistory.com The new Weathers "66" weighs 96 ounces

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The Weathers "66" is the finest achievement in uncompromising The Weathers "66" is suspended on 5 neoprene mounts which design and performance. The low mass of the Weathers "66" makes it produce an isolation from floor vibrations of more than 500 to 1. Paul the proper turntable for today's high compliance stereo cartridges and Weathers calls this system a "seismic platform" (implying that only tonearms. In appearance alone, the "66" is radically different. It is 16" a violent earthquake could cause any vibrations or feedback). long, 14" deep, but only 2" high, including the integrated base. It is On Pitch -The speed constancy of the Weathers "66" is so accurate a achieves ideal the closest approach to rotating record on air. It this that a special test record had to be made to measure its 0.04% wow through unique engineering design and precision manufacturing. and flutter content. It reaches 33/3 rpm immediately, and will be accurate within one revolution in 60 minutes. Most heavy turntables The Weathers "66" uses two precision hysteresis synchronous will usually deviate 4 or more revolutions in 60 minutes -a painfully motors mounted on opposite sides of the deck. Virtually vibration -free, obvious inaccuracy to anyone with perfect pitch. You hear only the they directly drive two soft rubber lathe- turned wheels which in turn music rumble, no wow, no flutter no feedback, no noise of any kind. drive against the inside rim of the platter. This is the quietest, most -no accurate and dependable drive system yet designed. Its -60 db. rumble The "66" is a strikingly beautiful turntable that you can use is the lowest of all turntables. anywhere, without installation. And you need not buy a base -it's an part of the turntable! Turntable- $75.00 net. With viscous- Eliminates Feedback Problem- Because the new high compliance integral cartridges and tonearms track at extremely light pressures, they can damped arm -$99.50 net. Turntable and Arm with new Weathers pick up floor vibrations which are transmitted into the music as audible LDM Pick -up- $129.50 net See it at your high fidelity dealer, or write: distortion. The "battleship" type of turntable more easily picks up room vibrations and transmits them with greater amplitude. When a WEATH Ei high compliance pickup system is used with the heavier turntable, Corp. acoustic feedback is apt to occur. And there is no practical, effective Division of TelePrompTer way to acoustically isolate these heavier units. 50 W. 44th St., N.Y. 36, N.Y. re CIRCLE 102 ON READER-SERVICE CARD

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For its recording of Benjamin Britten's War Re- for only LONDON complex quiem (Latin liturgi- cal text interlaced with Wilfred Owen's First World War poems), Decca- London brought Galina Vishnev- I O t, PER HOUR? skaya over from Moscow for a delayed debut in the soprano part. The score had been written with Vishnevskaya, Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, and Peter Pears specifically in mind, but at the time of This question, and many other the Coventry Cathedral premiere last about tape quality, tape use, and year Vishnevskaya was unable to under- Britten, Vishnevskaya, Culshaw tape recording for fun, education, take the assignment. Apparently, this study: and profit, are answered in Tarzian gave her all the- more time for Tape's she arrived for the Kingsway Hall ses- to balance the score's three main dy- new booklet, "Lower sionsnote- perfect. The work as a whole, namic levels and groupings. The liturgi- the Cost of Fun With Tape Re- however, was new to her, and she was cal part of the text was rendered by cording." obviously deeply stirred by its majesty Vishnevskaya, the London Symphony and compassion. At the playback of the Orchestra, and an adult chorus com- It's free when you retail the coupon great "Libera me" ensemble she exclaimed prising eighty amateurs from London's below. that she had never heard anything more Bach Choir and fifty professionals, tremendous in her life, and in her en- mostly from the BBC. A second group- thusiasm embraced Britten in the Rus- ing was of the two male soloists, who sian manner. sang Wilfred Owen's words with com- Fischer -Dieskau was similarly moved mentaries by a chamber orchestra, the by the music's sweep and emotional com- Melos Ensemble. Third was a remote, Sarkes Tarzian, Inc. pulsion. At one time his participation had angelic choir of sixty boys from High- Dept. HF -1 seemed almost as problematical as Vish- gate School, who sat in the balcony Magnetic Tape Division nevskaya's. "Dietrich's contracts with alongside a small supplementary organ. East Hillside Drive EMI and Deutsche Grammophon made At one point the boys lost pitch when Bloomington, Indiana life difficult for a while," said a Decca required to sing in a different key from man, "but in the end he got his release the soloists' ensemble. Britten rapped Please send a free copy of "Lower the for us, and we breathed again." for silence and said: "Listen to the organ Cost of Fun With Tape Recording" to: accompaniment and stick to that. What Britten's Requiem. The recording is ex- you are singing up there isn't at all pected to be in the shops in September, like what the soloists are singing down Name after many months of work on the part here. Don't forget, this is hideous, hor- of all concerned. John Culshaw, the rible 'modern' music!" At another point

- company's director of classical record- he asked the boys to sing with abandon, Address ings, had consultations with Britten on giving all the tone they'd got. He made artistic and technical points long in ad- it clear that he had no use for the vance of the actual recording sessions. church music tradition which refines the City State That Culshaw and others should have life out of treble voices. prevailed upon Britten to conduct in per- In this and other tactics, Britten proved I Have Have Not used Tarzian Tape son rather than from a back seat was highly professional. Very few sections of I Own Plan to Buy A Tape Recorder something of a coup. Although Britten is the score required more than two takes I Buy Blank Recording Tape From: intolerant of sloppiness, once he gets on -which, considering the special acous- the rostrum he is self -possessed and tical and inter-gearing problems entailed, good- humored. Knowing precisely what is a good tally. Britten himself refused Name he wants and how to get it. from musi- to accept any compliments. Taking a cians of all kinds, he usually inspires his characteristically self -deprecatory attitude forces with the sort of security that alone towards his own proficiency on the po- Address leads to authoritative and exciting per- dium, he laid down his baton and ex- He Does Does Not Stock Tarzian formances. claimed: "A conductor? Me? I'm noth- The recording was completed in eight ing but an amateur." Tape. sessions, after much preliminary po- L sitioning of performers and microphones Continued on page 20 CIRCLE 84 ON READER -SERVICE CARD 18 HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

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the light, gentle touch

Nothing, short of experiencing it yourself, can better describe the feather - The Miracord also plays stacks of up to 10 records in automatic sequence touch ease with which the Miracord responds -the way it operates and But, unlike other automatic units, the Miracord is a demonstrably high performs to bring out and preserve the best in your records. quality instrument, with design -features and performance characteristics you For with the Miracord, you needn't handle the arm, and therefore, it usually associate with quality turntables that can only be played manually. can't be dropped. In fact, most Miracord owners rarely use it manually. They The Benjamin - Miracord is equipped with a solid, one -piece, 12 inch, dynam- prefer to play even their single records automatically. ically balanced turntable, a mass -balanced transcription arm, and a choice motors: model 10H with Papst hysteresis motor is priced at $99.50, They put a record on the turntable, and simply push the button. Automat- of two ically, the arm rises from its rest, moves inward over the record and then and model 10 with 4 -pole induction motor is priced at $89.50. Cartridge gently lowers the stylus into the starting groove. When the record is finished, and base are priced extra. the arm automatically lifts off, and returns to its rest, or you can do this Make it a point to see the Benjamin - r BENJAMIN in the middle of play by simply pressing the 'stop' button. The Miracord Miracord at your hi -fi dealer soon. I performs these functions more gently and more precisely than by hand. Write for free descriptive literature. M RACORri

BENJAMIN ELECTRONIC SOUND CORP., 80 SWALM STREET, WESTBURY, L. I. SOLE U.S. DISTRIBUTOR FOR ELECTROACUSTIC (ELAC)B RECORD PLAYING COMPONENTS CIRCLE 20 ON READER -SERVICE CARD

www.americanradiohistory.com NOTES FROM ABROAD

Continued front page 18

Less Amateurish Amateurs. That the adult chorus in the War Requiem should have been given a professional stiffen- ing may, one hopes, set a significant nnur°or precedent. In general it is true to say that the fame of amateur choirs in this tile country tends to outstrip their prowess, lot especially in scores of wide dynamic and tt expressive range. There is. however, at ranrteur of n,'yreat v tote least one signal exception to this rule. I have been listening to tapes of the Quattro pezzi sacri, fourfold fruit of Verdi's extreme old age, as sung for EMI -Angel by the Philharmonia Chorus (with the Philharmonia Orchestra, under Carlo Maria Giulini). The Philharmonia Chorus is 240 strong, and for this recording, plus two widely spaced public performances. underwent forty rehearsals spread over fifteen months. The rehearsals were under the direction of Wilhelm Pitz, the Bayreuth chorus master who, for five years or move, has been flying over from Aachen for weekly rehearsals and practice sessions. "An expensive business." concedes Walter Legge, founder of the Chorus (as well as of the Philharmonia Orchestra. of course), "hut this is a hobby of mine, and one may be excused for spending a bit of money on one's hobbies." Intensive rehearsal is, of course, only half the battle. The other half is picking the right voices and firmly replacing them when they are right no longer. On these points Mr. Legge said: "The death of every chorus is when you get senti- mental about faces you know. faces that have been there from the start. I re- solved that this should not happen in All Bozak Loudspeakers work together. The robust basso B -199A .. . our case. The average age of our singers incisive baritone B -209A or B -800.. , join the sweet B -200Y soprano is a little over thirty, say thirty -two. In in perfect harmony to re- create The Very Best in Music. For the women's sections, the average is down to twenty -eight. I feel that with your Bozak Speaker System a Bozak -built enclosure stages the sound women's voices youth is rather more im- to perfection. Or, if space is limited, you can build your Bozaks portant than with men's. No woman is accepted over the age thirty into a wall, cupboard, or treasured cabinet. Whatever its size of -five. and they are all reauditioned at forty. Tenors and mounting, teamwork in your Bozak Speaker System assures are accepted up to forty and reaudi- you The Grandeur of Great Music in your home. Write for our tioned at forty -five; baritones and basses Bozaks Bozak Dealer. up to forty -five and reauditioned at fifty. illustrated catalog, and hear the at your In five and a half years we have had seven thousand auditions. Applicants are warned that unless they have special abilities they will not be considered. Even so, we reject fifteen or so applicants for every one we accept." CHARLES REID

The end of winter is the end of the musical PARIS year, here as elsewhere, and thus perhaps an appropriate time to risk a few gen- eralizations and judgments of a kind which the short perspective in these notes usually prohibits. From the point of view of the average musical consumer, how have things been going in France lately? Well, the past season did not DARIENJCONNECTICUT seem unusual while it was under way,

Continued on page 22 CIRCLE 22 ON READER -SERVICE CARD 20 HIGH FIDELITY ]MAGAZINE

www.americanradiohistory.com COIL LEADS COIL(S) TERMINALS

MUMETAL CASING

REPLACEABLE STYLUS ASSEMBLY

DIAMOND CANTILEVER RESILIENT MAGNET STYLUS CANTILEVER SUPPORT

COMPLIANCE: can there be too much of a gooc thing?

Have you any idea of the quality you would The mass of the stylus itself is virtually ideal is evident from its performance. hear from a record if the cartridge produced fixed by the radius of the tip. Further Specifications offer some clue. But, num- a perfect waveform of the sound groove? Yet, reduction of the magnet mass is limited bers can never convey the emotional ex- from all the talk you hear, you'd think by minimum output requirements. But, perience in quality, the personal grati- stylus compliance were the only criterion the mass of the cantilever can be reduced fication that comes with hearing good of cartridge performance. by using less material. This, however, en- music and good sound. tails the risk of making it thinner, more The new Elac 322 reproduces all fre- Admittedly, high compliance is essential flexible and more prone to bend during quencies from 20 to 20,000 cycles, ± 2 db, if the stylus is to follow or 'track' the stylus excursions.This flexibility is often complex course of the record groove with and with less than 2% intermodulation mistaken for compliance. It will, in fact, distortion. Interchannel separation reasonably low force. But, how high is produce 'false' higher readings in com- high enough, and how much is too much? measures better than 25 db at 1000 pliance measurements. cycles, and over most of the spectrum. It While 'tracking', the stylus performs As stylus compliance is increased, the measures 20 db at 10,000 cycles, and an complex movements set up by the sound tone arm also plays a more critical role. incredible 12 db at 20,000. pattern pressed into the groove. But, the If arm friction is high with relation to movement of the stylus doesn't produce the compliance of the stylus or- putting The stylus has a compliance in the order the sound or the sound waveform. This is it another way -if stylus compliance is of 14 x 10 -6 cm /dyne. Recommended accomplished by the movement of the mag- so high as to be greater than the arm's tracking force with most arms ranges net which, as you can see from the cross - own compliance or responsiveness to the from 1.5 to 3 grams. It will, however, sectional view, is at the other end of the spiral action of the groove, the resultant track at 1 gram with some arms. A mag- cantilever to which the stylus is affixed. 'drag' will prevent proper tracking. And nesium cantilever is used because of its if stylus force is increased to correct for lighter weight and greater rigidity than If magnet and stylus do not execute iden- this condition, the greater force is likely aluminum, the material most often used tical motion patterns, due to the slightest to compress or decenter the cantilever. in stylus assemblies. flexibility in the cantilever, an altered In either case, distortion is inevitable. Price of the Elac 322 stereo cartridge or distorted waveform will result. Qual- The new Elac 322 is the culmination of an with .52 mil diamond stylus is $49.50. ity and fidelity will suffer. intense, year -long engineering program Also available: Elac 222 compatable This problem becomes most acute with concerned primarily with improving car- mono /stereo cartridge with .7 mil dia- increased stylus compliance. For, in tridge performance. The ultimate objec- mond stylus at $39.50. At your hi -fi reaching for higher and still higher com- tive was to achieve a cartridge without dealer. For further details, write to: pliance, it becomes necessary to reduce distortion, without crosstalk - a car- BENJAMIN ELECTRONIC SOUND CORPORATION the dynamic mass of all the moving com- tridge capable of reproducing a perfect 80 SWALM STREET, WESTBURY, NEW YORK ponents of the stylus assembly to the waveform replica of the sound groove. Sole U. S. distributor for Electroacustic' lowest possible magnitude. How close the Elac 322 has come to this (Elac) g Record Playing Components. 13 EN)AMIN THE NEW FLAC MODEL 322 STEREO CARTRIDGE E1-AC L J CIRCLE 20 ON READER -SERVICE CARD

www.americanradiohistory.com BOGEN's new stereo components receive highest praise from HIRSCH- HOUCK, leading independent consumer test laboratory.

RP60 Receiver "The stereo performance of the RP60 was exceptional. Separation was more uniform with frequency than we have ever seen on a multiplex tuner. In particular we were pleased to see that the separation was nearly 20db at 10KC and 17db at 15KC. This is sub- stantially better than we measured on a number of quite expensive FM multiplex tuners. "Also the frequency response was more uniform than that of any other FM tuner we have ever measured, being better than -!- 0.5db from 20- 20,000 cps. The hum level of the tuner was -59db, which approached the residual hum of our Boonton generator. We have never measured hum less than -60db. "From a functional standpoint, the RP60 is well conceived and executed. The styling is attractive, and complete control facilities are obtained without excessive cluttering of the panel with controls. The phone TP250 Tuner jack on the front panel is an excellent idea and worked "The simplicity and functional design of the well. We particularly liked the fact that the listening TP250 are exemplary. This is a tuner which any volume with low impedance phones was comfortable, layman or housewife can operate without diffi- and the series resistors in the phone circuit eliminated culty. It is difficult to criticize its performance, the background hiss and hum which so often plague since it proved to be an exceptionally listenable the user of phones with a power amplifier. tuner. It was noticeably superior in sound (on "The Stereo Minder works well. This, or some stereo broadcasts) to some much more preten- equivalent, is an absolute necessity in a stereo tuner tious and expensive tuners. This may be attrib- or receiver, and some otherwise excellent tuners are utable to the low distortion, excellent separation rendered nearly useless for stereo broadcasting condi- and non -critical tuning. tions by the lack of an indication of the presence of a "Stereo separation is excellent through the stereo transmission. midrange, being 25db or better from 500cps to "The RP60 (or RPF60) is a basically excellent 9KC. It is better than average up to 10KC, unit." where it is most needed." HIRSCH -HOUCK REPORT #EFGMP -451 -FF HIRSCH -HOUCK REPORT #FG-450-FP

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www.americanradiohistory.com even the picture tube is revolutionary

SONY MICRO -TV -THE TELEVISION OF THE FUTURE

The handful shown above is a television picture tube. A rather special tube, actually- conceived, designed and manufactured by SONY. It is the picture tube in the remarkable new Micro -TV, the 25- transistor set that makes ordinary TV as outdated as the regenerative receiver. Picture quality high fidelity-sharp as a razor, with blacks that are truly black and whites that are white, and no distracting scanning lines to intrude as you view from arm's length, with all controls handy. But that's only part of the picture. Micro -TV weighs only 8 lbs., and operates anywhere -outdoors on its own rechargeable battery, in a car* or boat on a 12v system, and ONTY) indoors on AC. $189.95. Re- PESERCN MARES T,.E OIEfERERCE chargeable battery extra. *Before installing or using a TV set in an automobile, check with your Motor Vehicle Bureau to verify permissibility. _...... --_.. 1

s,,,1 in for your personal copy of "Randy, the transistor radio ", a delightful ,hadren's book in full color. Please enclose 25¢ for postage and handling.

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www.americanradiohistory.com When choosing stereo equipment... LISTEN FIRST to Henryk Szeryng BELL From a classroom in Mexico City to the international concert circuit, the path has taken many turnings.

IT IS MORE THAN LIKELY that a number in the full tide of world-wide concertiz- of American music lovers first met the ing after a relatively quiet ten years violinist Henryk Szeryng in the same spent mainly in teaching. "From 1943 way I did -through an exceptionally to 1953 I directed the string department lyrical and full -toned performance of the at the Mexican National University in Mexico City and twenty Bell's exciting 2445 -S2 Bach Solo Sonatas and Partitas on an played, perhaps, Odéon recording which found its way concerts a year. At the end of that time 44 -watt stereo receiver to this country in 1955. The set won a I was able to step into a concert career, even offers a great new look on the out- Grand Prix du Disque (the first of four after so long an absence, be- side- professional- quality sound since bestowed on Szeryng albums), but cause I had learned a great deal from in spite of this distinction no one over teaching." on the inside. FM sensitivity of 1.2 here seemed to know much about the There is, however, considerably more uy for 20 db quieting. Integrated artist himself, beyond the fact that he to the story. Szeryng began studying Multiplex. Exclusive FM "Stereo had been born in Poland and was a piano with his mother in Warsaw when Sentry ". Tape monitoring switch. citizen of Mexico. Two years later the he was five, and after switching to the Hi and lo filters. Separate bass mystery lifted when Mr. Szeryng came violin he was able, at the age of seven, and treble controls on each chan- to Carnegie Hall in company with the to play the Mendelssohn Concerto for nel. Switched AFC and variable Cleveland Symphony, and proceeded to Bronislaw Huberman. Two years later, loudness control. Plus all normal play the Brahms Concerto in a manner on Huberman's advice and recommenda- function selection switches. proclaiming a violinist of stature. It tion, Szeryng was packed off to Berlin then came to light that a source of in- to study with the famous teacher Carl formation about this artist had existed Flesch. "I studied with Flesch until I in New York all along-the source being was thirteen, and everything I know, none other than Artur Rubinstein, who violinistically speaking, I learned from had in a sense "discovered" Szeryng and him. Mind you, I say violinistic -not was indirectly responsible for his first musical or interpretative. It was later, American tour. in Paris, that I learned a great deal As every devotee of chamber music musically, from Georges Enesco and now knows, the friendship between Jacques Thibaud. They were simply Rubinstein and Szeryng reached a musi- friends -I never actually studied with cal climax with a series of notable col- either of them, though I did record the laborations (for RCA Victor) on sev- Beethoven Concerto with Thibaud con- eral Beethoven sonatas, including the ducting!" Kreutzer and the Spring, followed by In answer to a query from me. Szeryng the three sonatas of Brahms. A few went on. "What was Flesch like as a months after the latter were released, teacher? Many people have read his Bell's T -347 Tape Deck Mr. Szeryng was back in town for Memoirs, but I would much rather they recording, this time with Mercury, go to his Art of Violin Playing, which provides full four -track stereo and further and was putting the finishing touches is nobler and wiser. The Memoirs are so playback, variable echo, sound on on his preparation of a new concerto bitter. He wrote in the introduction to sound, off -the -tape monitoring by Benjamin Lees before playing its the Art of Violin Playing that his in- and DuoSound. And it's perfectly premiere with the Boston Symphony. tention was to free the student of had matched to other fine Bell Stereo I met him late one evening in Mercury's habits and encourage his strong qualities components. studio, and learned that the artistic path -not to lead him into imitation of the which had led him to the well- remem- teacher. But then comes the tragic part. bered Bach recording had taken some Flesch had some weak pupils, with ÌH\ BELL STEREO curious turnings. small personalities, who copied him in Thompson Ramo Wooldridge Inc. "My life has been strange and rather everything-fingering, bowing, phrasing. 6325 Huntley Road, Columbus 24, Ohio wonderful, I think," said Mr. Szeryng, Others did not, but these were not his who seems still to marvel somewhat at finding himself, at forty -one, immersed Continued on page 38 CIRCLE 19 ON READER -SERVICE CARD 34 HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

www.americanradiohistory.com C. AR -3 PLAYBACK: THE FINE ARTS QUARTET AS AUDIENCE

THE FINE ARTS QUARTET has just recorded Beethoven's Quartet in E flat major, Opus 127 (Concert -Disc CS-235). The musicians are listening to the first playback, checking its fidelity to the tonal sonority and interpretation that have brought them rave notices all over the world.

AR speakers are being used for monitors. They were chosen by the Quartet members themselves because they create a musical carbon copy of the live performance, free of hi-fi gimmick effects.

AR -3 and AR -2a speakers are often used professionally, but they are designed primarily for home use. AR -3's are $203 to $225, depending on finish, and AR -2a's are $109 to $128. A five -year guarantee covers parts, labor, and reimbursement of any freight to and from the factory.

A catalog and list of AR dealers in your area will be sent on request. We will also send a brief description of two books on high fidelity published by AR.

ACOUSTIC RESEARCH, INC., 24 Thorndike Street, Cambridge 41, Massachusetts

CIRCLE 1 ON READER -SERVICE CARD APRIL 1963 35

www.americanradiohistory.com Marantz Model 8B, Dual 35 -watt Stereo Amplifier, $264.

There are three amplifier characteristics which determine the realization of maximum performance quality from a given loudspeaker. First in importance is stability (a characteristic which is not fully understood by many in the industry). Next in importance are low distortion and wide power response. These are the prime factors which make one amplifier sound better than another. In all these respects the Marantz Model 8B is conceded to be in a class by itself. Other designs may have succeeded in approaching orte or another performance characteristic, yet none have equalled the 8B amplifier in overall excellence. In fact, except for its conservative 35 watt rating, it is virtually identical in characteristics to the remarkable Marantz Model 9 amplifier.

Long term reliability is also important to the owner. As is true with all Marantz products, parts and construction are of the highest grade in the field. An individual report is packed with each amplifier stating its performance Under rigid tests. Assurance of the continuation of its fine performance is backed by a full two year warrantee.

The vast majority in the high fidelity industry use Marantz in their own personal systems, as well as for demonstrations and tests of their products. Follow their lead where only the best possible results are acceptable. Send for free booklet 57F.

The precision quality of the Model 7 Stereo Preamplifier makes it a perfect match for the 8B Amplifier. $264. Cabinet extra

25 -14 BROADWAY, LONG ISLAND CITY 6, NEW YORK CIRCLE 64 ON READER -SERVICE CARD 36 HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

www.americanradiohistory.com o IflKDL1l1 "SPACE -PERSPECTIVE" FOR STEREO HEADPHONE LISTENING

Jensen's exclusive SPACE- PERSPECTIVE network makes it possible for the first time to eliminate the "closed ears" effect of ordinary stereo headphone listening, in which the sounds appear to come only from the left and right, and accurately presents the "open ears" sensations of normal stereo speaker listening in a room, in which the performance is out -in -front as intended with true directional effects. It accomplishes this by accurately shaping the frequency characteristics and time delay of the signals sent to the individual phones so that they correctly portray the sound "build -up" and "shadowing" at the ears due to the obstacle effect of the human head as acoustic waves from the source flow around it. This breakthrough is due to an ingenious circuit development by Bauer of CBS Laboratories, employing the analogue computer, and is based on the acoustic measurements on the human head by Wiener, then at the Psychoacoustic Laboratory, Harvard University.

Ordinary stereo headphone listening confines the left channel sound to the left ear, the right channel sound to the right ear. You have .14.11 the impression you are in the midst of the musicians, who are partitioned to the left and right of you.

OM In "open ears" stereo speaker listening, sound from the left speaker reaches the left ear, and alto the right ear a little later in time. The kelu sound pressure at the left ear rises, while that at the right ear falls, due to acoustic "shadow" as the audio frequency is increased. The corresponding thing happens for sound from the right speaker.

tis Bauer at CBS Laboratories visualized an inspired answer to the problem -a left- right, right -left "cross- feed" electrical network that would accurately simulate the "open ears" acoustical situation. Note the resemblance of the electrical paths of 3 to the acoustic paths of 2.

circuit is complex, as would be expected since frequency characteristics and time delay must be precisely shaped. Resistance NgBauer'snetworks and potentiometer or volume control "blending" circuits cannot do this.

Here is the performance of the Jensen SPACE -PERSPECTIVE network compared with Wiener's acoustic data. Note how accurately the network produces the desired acoustic result at the ears. (The data is shown only over the frequency range important to stereophonic directional location; HS -1 'phones and network transmit the full frequency range.)

ST. M. Jensen Mfg. Co. CC -1 and CFN -1 Licensed by CBS Laboratories Dlv., Columbia Broadcasting System, Inc.

PRESENT STEREO LISTENING NORMAL STEREO LISTENING Jensen "SPACE- PERSPECTIVE" WITH HEADPHONES IN ROOM WITH SPEAKERS STEREO LISTENING WITH HEADPHONES

LEFT AMPLIFIERS SPEAKERS MGM LEFT AMPLIFIERS

'SPACE-PERSPECTIVE" NETWORK

NEAR Qß L Í EAR LEFT RIGHT LEFT j RIGHT LEFT EAR RIGHT EAR EAR 4.0 EAR EAR EAR USTENER WITH STEREO HEADPHONES LISTENER WITH STEREO HEADPHONES USTENER and jen,en "SPACE- PERSPECTIVE" CHAR) LAWS-TRANSMISSION EAR 's CHARACTERISTICSETRET OF "SPACEdE EAR 3 PERSPECTIVE" WIEORK DOTTED LINES-WIENER DIFFRACTION DATA

I 100 ROO E00 R[ 10 It FREQUENCY

The JENSEN CC -1 STEREO HEADPHONE CONTROL CENTER places at your fingertips complete controls for personal or professional stereo headphone listening ... plus the exclusive advantage of Jensen's new SPACE- PERSPEC- TIVE. Styled in an oiled walnut case, this attractive and compact unit can be conveniently located wherever you choose to listen; hang it on the wall if you wish. Controls allow you to adjust volume; adjust balance to suit the music and the best hearing conditions for you; select left or right channels or have stereo with choice of left -right reversal; switch from moho to stereo or stereo with SPACE -PERSPECTIVE; switch speaker system on or off. 'Phone jacks for two. Requires as little as 10 watts per channel (20 watt stereo rating) capacity. May be used with one or two 4 to 8 -ohm nominal impedance dynamic headphones. Jensen HS -1 'phones are recommended for best results. $39.75 JENSEN Model CFN -1 SPACE -PERSPECTIVE CROSS -FEED NETWORK only is available for incorporation into your system at lowest cost. It provides the full cross -feed characteristics to simulate speaker listening but without the controls of the CC -1. Consists of network, 'phone jack and terminals for exten- Write for Catalog 165 -H sion phones. Small enclosure can be mounted wherever you choose. $19.50

JENSEN MANUFACTURING COMPANY /DIVISION OF THE MUTER COMPANY /6601 SOUTH LARAMIE AVENUE, CHICAGO 38, ILLINOIS Canada: Radio Speakers of Canada, Ltd., Toronto Argentina: UCOA, S.A., Buenos Aires Mexico: Fapartel, S.A., Naucalpan, Mex. CIRCLE 53 ON READER -SERVICE CARD APRIL 1963 37

www.americanradiohistory.com P4c1,107+! HENRYK SZERYNG il%1ala'fo Continued from page 34

favorite pupils. His advice against imitation was like the advice of a doctor THORL5EN who warns you not to smoke and at the same time takes out a cigarette and lights it. But in matters of technique he NEW STEREO TURNTABLE was a great teacher."

A ' 1J IT WAS AFTER the period with Flesch (which constituted his final training) that Szeryng's career branched off from the natural route taken by most concert violinists. His parents had seen to it that his education was not confined to the narrow straits of the typical prodigy, and it was perhaps the broadening influence of study in aesthetics, history, literature, and languages (he speaks seven fluently) that prompted him to go to Paris in 1934 to study the fundamental aspects of music with Nadia Boulanger. His interest in composition was more than merely perfunctory, and he ac- knowledges considerable activity along this line under Mme. Boulanger's direction. In 1939, however, came a second turning. With the fall of Poland, Szeryng enlisted with the Polish forces in exile, and during most of the war, except for a term as translator for the Polish Prime Minister. General Sikorski, he played concerts for Allied servicemen stationed THORENS TD -135, COMPLETE WITH INTEGRATED ARM throughout the Western world. "It was then that I became truly aware of the new TD -135 offers a For the first time, Thorens - in the - power of music to communicate," he a precision component -quality arm and turntable mated with said. "I played for officers and enlisted that insures you perfect tracking, perfect sound ... always ... men, Americans, with minimum of installation effort on your part. Africans, English, and a Poles. They all responded in the same There's no compromise whatever with quality such as you way." During these wartime travels he usually find in integrated turntable and arm units. THORENS played twice in Mexico City -recitals TD -135 is Swiss -precision crafted throughout ... true compo- which led to his permanent engagement nent high fidelity all the way. You get: A precision turntable there towards the end of the war. featuring 4 speeds, all adjustable, with an 8 -pound non- Mexico might still claim Mr. Szeryng magnetic table ... plus a completely new, advanced tone arm as its own exclusively (the official esteem that's so good we also sell it separately (see below) for use accorded him is indicated by the fact with any turntable of your choice. Exceeds NAB specs for that he travels under a diplomatic pass- wow, rumble and flutter. Has same belt -plus-idler drive as port) had it not been for Artur Rubin- famous TD -124. Shuts off automatically at end of record. stein's "great moral help." After first Many, many more features than we can detail . $1 25. net hearing Szeryng, Rubinstein lost no time in using his influence to arrange bookings for him in London, Paris, and Berlin; and it was he who in 1956 came backstage to Szeryng after a concert in Paris, bringing with him "a short gentleman in a broad black hat." THORENS BTD -12S, 12" PROFESSIONAL TONE ARM The gentleman offered to schedule Identical arm included with TD -135, but sold as separate unit. twenty concerts in the United States - Less than 0.5° /inch tracking error. Built -in cueing device. All and thus under the imposing wing of adjustments : vertical height ; calibrated gram-force ; stylus Sol Hurok, Szeryng's future on this positioning slide; balancing counter -weight. Unique vertical side of the Atlantic was assured. pivot keeps stylus vertical for any height adjustment. During our evening's conversation Mr. Resonance well below audible frequencies. Interchangeable Szeryng mentioned in passing that while 4 -pin cartridge shells. Mounted on board for THORENS studying the Bach solo works he had TD -124, TD -121 turntables. $50. net found it helpful to play them on the See and hear the THORENS TD -135 and ALL the members organ. ( "That is why I begin the fugues of the "TD" family of fine turntables at your franchised softly and let them build up voice by dealer's today; there's one for every budget! For additional voice. On the organ you can play them information, write us direct. no other way. ") The mode of study struck me as indicative of just how fully THORENS DIVISION Szeryng lives up to his contention that ELPA MARKETING INDUSTRIES, Inc. he regards his instrument as a means New Hyde Park, N. Y. and not an end -a belief professed by violinists but acted upon by in- For Thorens In Canada: Tri -Tel Associates Ltd., Willowdale, Ont. many finitely fewer. SHIRLEY Fu MMING CIRCLE: 37 UA III: 1,1)FI2- SI :RAICI: CARD HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

www.americanradiohistory.com Your assurance of a flawless tape: this Quality Control Number

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Every reel of Soundcraft Tape must Soundcraft's patented Micropol- today -more high frequency output, pass the toughest inspection stand- ished& Process polishes the tape sur- greater signal -to -noise ratio and dy- ards in the industry. For with mod- face to a mirror smoothness. Surface namic range, and freedom from tape irregularities are eliminated, the tape hiss, low -speed and editing squeal. ern 4 -track recorders, you need needs no breaking -in; you record per- Always buy Soundcraft Tape, quality this standard of perfection in the fectly right from the start. controlled to assure best performance tape recording you buy. Even the Soundcraft Tape is slit to incredibly on your tape recorder. Write for the subtlest physical defects -surface close tolerances, insuring a tape entirely "ABC's of Soundcraft Tape ". free of edge burrs and irregularities, edge burrs, skew, skew. To our engineering- minded friends: mail feathered edges, cupping and curl- Soundcraft Tape is wound extremely us the tab showing the quality control ing -will prevent intimate contact smooth to eliminate protruding edges number of your reel of Soundcraft Tape which can be "feathered" or damaged between the narrow re- and we'll send you its rigid specifications. tracks and during handling and use. cording head, causing severe loss Soundcraft's oxide coating and base suìCiiFr of high frequencies. The quality material are balanced to prevent the UNiINICIGFT control number you now see on cupping and curling caused by different UCIAFT every reel of Soundcraft Tape is the rates of expansion and contraction be- ICAAFT UN BC RAT T tween these materials. NUCNAF final step in the painstaking manu- INwauF Soundcraft's FA facturing processes which make exclusive -4 oxide formulation is frequency adjusted for these recording tapes the very best REEVES SOUNDCRAFTc0RP. 4 -track stereo. It offers the most ad- Main Office: Great Pasture Road. Danbury, Connecticut New York: 10 E. 52nd Street Chicago: 28 E. Jackson Blvd. Los that money can buy. vanced magnetic properties in a tape Angeles: 342 N. LaBrea Canadian Reps.: Toronto, Vancouver CIRCLE 78 ON RF:ADER-SF.RVICF. CARD APeIT. 1963 39

www.americanradiohistory.com The finest FM Stereo Tuner ever built for the home' says Martin Gersten, chief engineer of WNCN, The Concert Network

Mr. Gersten talks from experience at least 30 db channel separation. -both as an FM broadcaster and as Its automatic FM stereo indicator a high -fidelity authority and enthu- takes all the guesswork out of siast. And in all his experience he finding stereo broadcasts. And its has never heard an FM stereo tuner flywheel control construction, in that compares with the PILOT 780. conjunction with its tuning meter, assures easy, accurate tuning. At $199.50 (less enclosure), the PILOT 780 is the greatest value on the high -fidelity market today. The PILOT 248B, companion to the 780, is a 74 -watt Integrated Stereo Amplifier with a frequency response (± 1 db) of 5- 50,000 cps and He first heard the PILOT 780 in September, 1962, at the New York only 0.1% harmonic distortion excellent rating High Fidelity Show. (IHFM). Given an by HiFi /Stereo Review, the 248B He says : "The Concert Network features outputs for tape and head- station in New York City, WNCN, phones, 7 pairs of inputs and a 104.3, was broadcasting music and total of 13 front and back controls and interviews with manufacturers and switches. Price (less enclo- dealers directly from the Show. We sure): $269.50. tried to monitor our station on several FM tuners. None of them, including the most expensive ones, could produce a satisfactory signal, that is, until we walked into the PILOT exhibit and tried the 780. The exceptionally clear, noise -free signal it produced was a revela- tion. Subsequent tests convinced me that this was the finest FM Stereo tuner ever built for the home. Today, I use this tuner in my home and, as far as I am con- NUMtER ONE SOUS: iN 'tYm+ cerned, it is in a class by itself." The fact that the PILOT 780 out- For those who desire the finest performs all other tuners is no receiver ever built for the home, accident. Its 4 IF stages and sophis- there is no substitute for the PILOT ticated circuitry produce an FM 746, a 60 -watt FM Multiplex -AM Stereo performance matched only Stereo Receiver which includes by professional broadcast monitor many of the features of the two tuners costing hundreds of dollars units mentioned above, including more... FM sensitivity: 1.8 uv; har- 8 inputs and 14 controls for com- monic distortion at 100% modula- plete stereo and monaural flexibil- tion: 0.2 %; capture ratio: 1 db; ity. Price (less enclosure): $399.50. selectivity: 44 db. Its unique signal - For more information, hear them sampling Multiplex circuit assures at your PILOT dealer, or write:

Pi/or PILOT RADIO CORPORATION, 37 -18 36TH STREET, LONG ISLAND CITY 1, NEW YORK CIRCLE 72 ON READER-SERVICE CARD 40 HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

www.americanradiohistory.com An Inquiry Into Psychoacoustics

THE TERM psychoacoustics is widely heard these instance, the sound intensities, or listening levels, days, but it is a term not susceptible to easy defi- used were not adequate for symphonic music, and nition. Indeed, it is much easier to say what psycho- the reproducing equipment employed suffered from acoustics is not than to say what it is. It is not, for distortion that became disagreeable at the wider re- example, solely a matter of "how we hear "; this topic sponse bandwidths. It now seems apparent that belongs more properly in the realm of aural physiol- other factors were also operative, such as the lis- ogy. It is not only a matter of what is "pleasing" teners' own conditioning to "canned sound" by years to hear; this subject is the concern of applied psy- of hearing music on AM radio sets, inferior phono- chology. It is not purely a question of the means graphs, and juke boxes. Conceivably too, some by which sound is produced, or reproduced; this listeners may have voted for the restricted range is the province of designers and engineers. out of unrealized dislike for the test situation itself What, then, is psychoacoustics? One can say, or their fellow- subjects or those conducting the test. perhaps, that the term is a convenient catchall, a If psychoacoustics has provided a valid hind- semantic repository for everything relating to the sight, it also suggests the potentialities of a new fore - nature of sound, including what we do not know sight-in the design of equipment as well as in the or fully understand. A neat analogy then can he choice of equipment for a given home music system. drawn between psychoacoustics and philosophy. The In the former area, a good deal of controversy "love of wisdom" embraces many categories of centers around the issues of extremely wideband re- knowledge -languages, literature, history, the nat- sponse (beyond the normally accepted high fidelity ural sciences, mathematics, and so on. In fact. even range of 20 to 20,000 cycles per second) and of in this day of nuclear power and space exploration very small, but continuing, reductions of distortion there exists at many universities an academic divi- in amounts hitherto not admitted to be audible. sion known as the "Faculty of Philosophy" -whose Here, psychoacoustics challenges prevailing concepts members of course expound many subjects. Each by insisting that every iota of improvement is per- is, in its way, a tool in the pursuit of wisdom. Like ceptible and results in less listening fatigue -and philosophy in its broadest sense, psychoacoustics in- should thus bring about a stronger and wider accept- volves a variety of disciplines-from the physics ance of the whole principle of high fidelity. Oddly of sound to the physiology of hearing to the psy- enough, to bolster this position, its proponents turn chology of the human receptor. back to the nineteenth century and the authority of In terms of this journal's special interests, psycho- the physicist and physician Hermann von Helmholtz, acoustics promises a means of understanding things whose researches provided the first documentary evi- in sound reproduction hitherto not understood or dence in support of the principle on which today's seemingly at variance with objective data. For in- "wideband response theory" is based. The article stance, a notable set of early "listener preference" in this issue by Dr. S. J. London deals with this tests (conducted in 1945) indicated that only 12% of seminal figure and relates his work to the progress those tested preferred wide -range sound for the play- of high fidelity. In connection with the relevance back of classical music. If these test results had been of psychoacoustics to the controversial problem of accepted at face value, the progress of high fidelity what actually constitutes "high fidelity" for an in- might have ended right there. Subsequent tests have dividual listener, Irving M. Fried, in another article, produced quite the opposite results and permitted explains its unique contribution to evaluation of the different inferences to be drawn. The important listening experience. point is that psychoacoustics has made it possible to Clearly, psychoacoustics has an importance for interpret, rather than simply to accept, the findings of high fidelity -and our present examination suggests such tests. Thus, analysis of the test conditions of the that it may bring to the scientific knowledge and 1945 experiment revealed basic limitations for the technical prowess already at our disposal a new perception of high quality sound reproduction: for and fruitful insight.

AS high fidelity SEES IT

APRI I I ",, 43

www.americanradiohistory.com A hundred years ago Hermann von Helmholtz startled his contemporaries by insisting that the perception of sound involved physical, physiological, and psychological factors. Today we see his work as the genesis of psychoacoustics.

IN THE BEGINNING there was Helmholtz. perceived. Today we see in Helmholtz's discoveries No irreverent echo of Holy Writ is intended. the genesis of psychoacoustics. One hundred years ago a granite -faced Junker Helmholtz not only gave a radically new dimen- produced a gospel that stirred the nineteenth century sion to the musical aesthetics of his age; he also to its Romantic marrow with an integrated phi- challenged the future. One of the most important losophy of science and art. Titled On the Sensa- concepts this great pontifical figure leveled at us tions of Tone as a Physiological Basis for the was, strangely enough, that of wide frequency Theory of Music, Helmholtz's massive treatise response, a doctrine that we assume to be uniquely demonstrated, for the first time in history, that of the mid -twentieth century. Yet actually this music was not a creation of mathematics or meta- fact should surprise no one, for in many ways physics but rather the total of what the ear per- Helmholtz belonged more to our time than to his ceived and how the brain interpreted what was own. He was, for instance, the prototype of today's

44 HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

www.americanradiohistory.com high fidelity devotee, with an overwhelming love absurdities of mathematics; if overtones could not for music, an insatiable curiosity about the nature be heard they were nonexistent, and if they were of sound (fed by a genius for mathematics and nonexistent, even those that could be heard were physics), an incurable tinkerer's instinct, and a illusions manufactured by the ear. Regardless of cantankerous perfectionism. Every paper theory and the stand taken, the hapless scapegoat was the ear cerebral abstraction had to be tested against the and its alleged infirmities and limitations. evidence of the ear itself-and often resulted in Such specious arguments outraged Helmholtz, musical sounds the likes of which were not heard especially since neither side had taken the trouble again until the advent of John Cage. It is for to examine the culprit organ more than super- this reason, more than any other, that every modern ficially. From the time he had been a first -year household that shares its Lebensraum with an audio medical student, in 1838, he had devoted his life system owes its way of life to Helmholtz and that to the physiology of sensation. This work had con- present -day promulgators of wide frequency response vinced him that every attribute of perceptible physical begin and end their arguments with him. energy was received and recorded by the human To some extent, Helmholtz's excursions into sensory organ assigned to its perception exactly as what we now call psychoacoustics grew from the it existed in nature. If any mystery attached to the very circumstance of a twentieth -century men- that perception, it was due to ignorance of the tality in conflict with nineteenth- century Roman- anatomy and physiology of the receptor organ, of ticism. In these days when it is considered quite the way in which it converted physical into nervous chic for creative artists to borrow heavily from energy, and of the latter's influence on the brain.' the natural sciences, it is hard to realize that in From the very outset, therefore, Helmholtz care- 1853, as Helmholtz began his research, the sciences fully emphasized the three functional divisions of and the arts were at loggerheads. The cold ration- musical sound: physical acoustics, the physics of alism seemingly preached by Darwin's biology, tone; physiological acoustics, the perception of Faraday's new atomic chemistry, and Gustav physical tone by the ear; and psychological acoustics, Magnus' physics was being strenuously opposed by the interpretation by the brain of what the ear a hostile school of arch -Romanticists, who believed transmitted. The last, he said, might easily prove that exposure of the roots of art as mere exten- to be the most important of the three, but for sions of matter and energy meant the complete the time being he was more concerned with the destruction of all beauty. Fortunately, however, second which, if satisfactorily explained, would there existed a small group of intermediaries - lead as naturally to the third as the Tiber to Rome. medical men, mainly -who undertook to bridge Both of these interrelated functions, he believed, the gap by demonstrating how the human organism, depended on the manner in which overtones were in structure and function, is able to convert natural perceived. Indeed, so intense was Helmholtz's pre- phenomena into works of art. It was to this select occupation with partials that he was openly derided pastorate -which included the French physiologist by certain of his contemporaries: Brahms called him Claude Bernard, the German anatomist Wilhelm a foolish dilettante, while Emile Chevé, another His, and the American clinician Oliver Wendell physician -acoustician, dubbed him the Pontifex of Holmes -that Hermann Ludwig Ferdinand von the Partials. Helmholtz belonged. But neither a fool nor a false pope he, as he was to prove in logical fashion. His first step was to manufacture accurately tuned pure -toned resona- WHAT STARTED Helmholtz on his glory road was tors of glass and metal that fitted his ears snugly. a violent controversy between physicists and mu- When he sounded a compound tone, the overtone sicians over the significance of overtones (they were with the wavelength of his resonator was thus called partials then). The disputants could agree on intensified and stood out from all the others. In only one fact: that not more than a handful of this way he demonstrated that all overtones up to the mathematically possible overtones -up to the the sixteenth, and under certain conditions a little fourth and possibly the sixth -were audible. These higher, were not only present but audible. He they could hear on stringed instruments, the organ. then went on to prove mathematically that the very the piano, and by means of their very primitive high overtones were only apparently imperceptible acoustical devices. From this point on, however, because the energy of their 'ibrations was so weak all was Sturm and Drang; the physicists claimed as to be overpowered -but not obliterated -by the that if physical law decreed the existence of an greater energy of the lower overtones. imposing host of overtones, they did in fact and in From this investigation he drew his first impor- deed exist, and that if most of them were not tant conclusion: that the quality and color of a audible, the fault was that of the human ear and compound tone derived from all its overtones; the not of the physics of sound. The musicians, on pure fundamental itself was flat and colorless, the other hand, insisted that overtones were only whereas its compound tone was full -bodied and abstractions compounded and confounded by the rich. Moreover, even without resonators a listener

APRIL 1963 45

www.americanradiohistory.com The due to the absence of the very high overtones be- ,,,;,,;,,, yond the sixteenth which he was unable to reproduce accurately and which most acousticians assumed were inaudible. Therefore, he declared, even nominally inaudible overtones appear to be necessary for perception of the full beauty and expressiveness Psychoacoustics of a musical tone: i.e., in our terms, wide frequency response is an imperative.

could, by strict attention, train himself to distinguish overtones at least up to the sixteenth. Helmholtz BUT WHY, Helmholtz asked, was this so? From then proceeded to all sorts of tones-from all known his own work and that of others, Helmholtz esti- instruments to the human voice-and arrived at mated the full auditory range of the ear to be from other conclusions that are today considered basic 4 to 40,000 vibrations per second, but that its to sound reproduction. For instance, he pointed musical range was constricted to 40 to 4,000 vps out that in a musical tone of good quality the (although some well- trained ears could widen the fundamental was the loudest, the first two over- band to 24 to 6,000). His experiments with organ tones (the octave and the twelfth) were the next pipes and the polyphonic siren revealed that pitch powerful, the third and fourth overtones (the double became indeterminate and tones unmusical below 40 octave and its fifth) were moderately powerful, the and above 4,000 because the fundamentals could not higher overtones were weak and faded rapidly. be accurately perceived at these levels. Fundamentals When overtones above the sixth were intensified, below 40 vps were heard as pulsations, the number the tone was dry and tinkling (as those of us who of pulsating beats corresponding to the number of remember early piano recordings can well attest); vibrations per second; although their upper har- when they were absent, the tone was soft and sweet monics were in musical range, they produced only but altogether dull. When all the overtones were inchoate masses of sound because they overpowered louder than the fundamental, the tone was confused the fundamental. Despite their basic unmusicality, and lost its pitch. Insofar as individual instruments these very low tones still had a place as unusually were concerned, their qualities depended not only descriptive sounds (whose utility Romantic corn - on the number of overtones they produced but on posers were only then beginning to discover). At their timing- whether they appeared, or disappeared, the other extremity, sound waves with frequencies abruptly or gradually. Another aspect of instrument above 4,000 had their energy so dissipated by the quality was the inharmonic overtones produced - rapidity of their vibrations that they were at the the scraping of a bow on a string, the rush of air threshold of audibility. As fundamentals, therefore, from an organ pipe, the tap of a piano hammer. they were practically inaudible, but as overtones Although these needed to be held to a minimum, they were important determinates of tone quality their presence was nevertheless required to round (and likewise added an ineffable something to the out the quality of the instrument. needs of Romantic high tone color). In other words, Helmholtz called this study of tones the analyti- the frequency range of sound necessary for the full cal approach to tone perception, but to confirm his enjoyment of music stretched from 36 vps at the observations he reversed this process and used what lower end to an incredible 36,000 at the upper. he called the synthetic approach. For this he in- Helmholtz then set about finding what in the vented a series of tuning forks placed between the ear made this a physiological fact, thus establishing poles of electromagnets and attached to the mouths the core of physiological, and hence of psychological, of perfectly tuned resonators. The tuning forks, acoustics. The only reasonable locus of the core activated by an electric current passed through the was the inner ear -the cochlea- shaped like a snail magnets, poured their sounds into the resonators, shell, filled with fluid, and partitioned by a basilar which then emitted pure tones. The apparatus was membrane containing a great number of elastic controlled by a keyboard which not only regulated microscopic fibers. It was these fibers, he said, that the tones to be sounded but also determined their converted the physical energy of sound into nervous intensity by varying the voltage through the elec- impulses that rode the auditory nerves to the brain. tromagnets with grades of pressure on the keys. In Each fiber vibrated to a sound wave of identical this way the investigator was able to synthesize frequency; and since the basilar membrane was tones by sounding their fundamentals and each cal- shaped like a piano or a harp, the shorter fibers culated harmonic up to the sixteenth, and by varying responded to sound waves of high frequency and the relative dynamics of fundamentals and over- the longer fibers to those of low frequency. tones to imitate the tone colors of almost all the There were, according to the most authoritative instruments. It was at this point that Helmholtz contemporary anatomists, 4,500 fibers in the basi- made the discovery for which modern sound repro- lar membrane. Deducting three hundred fibers for duction is most indebted to him. He found that his the tones lying outside musical range, Helmholtz synthetic instrumental tones lacked the vitality of estimated that 4,200 were available to perceive the natural instruments and concluded that this lack was seven musical octaves. This meant that there were

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www.americanradiohistory.com six hundred fibers for each octave and fifty for each between the frequencies of the constituent tones, semitone, more than enough to distinguish slight and that the overtones, both high and low, con- changes in pitch and certainly ample to ensure tributed markedly to the beating sensation. If the that every fundamental and every overtone would tones contained harmonics that were largely the strike its corresponding fiber with corresponding sane, the beats were held to a minimum and the force. They were so close together. however, that resulting intervals -such as the octave, the double a given sound wave -fundamental or overtone - octave, the fifth-were consonant. Conversely, the would inevitably excite not only the fiber in unison fewer the identical overtones the greater the beating with it but adjoining fibers, the latter obviously sensation and the more dissonant the interval, ex- with less force. Under these conditions the maverick plaining why dissonance increased through the three hundred out of musical range would just as fourth, the major sixth, the major third, and became inevitably be brought into play, as overtones, when unmistakably dissonant when the minor third and the fundamentals at either end of the musical range were minor sixth were reached. These findings were of sounded. Since they were physically present, it was utmost importance to music theory, which was entirely possible for the listener to train himself Helmholtz's primary goal, but he also managed to to appreciate them by concentration of attention. extend them into areas that were immeasurably to Here at last, Helmholtz said, was the physio- influence acoustical reproduction. logical basis for the perception of compound tones, Since the lower overtones in an interval were intervals, chords, and progressions, the matrix for not only louder but more likely to be identical than "the tissue of music and harmony." Subsequent audio - the upper ones, they usually played a more important physiological research, with its new electronic and role in determining its consonance or dissonance. psychosurgical techniques, has proved Helmholtz If, however, the intensity of the higher overtones wrong about the specific role of these fibers in was increased, their divergences were more easily cochlear function, but it has not altered the basic perceived, the beating sensation increased, and a physiological principles he so brilliantly worked out. borderline consonant interval like the major third It has, as a matter of fact, vindicated the concept was more apt to be turned into a dissonance. Sev- of psychoacoustics that led others, as it did its eral important conclusions flowed quite naturally originator, into richer pastures of research. For Helm- from this principle. The major third or the major holtz, the issues were those of consonance and dis- sixth, ordinarily pleasant in the middle and upper sonance, of musical beauty and ugliness. registers, became dissonant in the bass because in Helmholtz found by continued experiment that that compass the higher overtones were usually two or more compound tones sounded together louder than either the lower overtones or the funda- produced a beating sensation in which the number mentals and hence their beats easier to perceive. of beats was equal to the arithmetical difference This explained why basses and baritones were more liable to produce unpleasant vocal effects than tenors or sopranos and why the value of a bass depended so greatly on the quality of his lower register. Because the higher overtones of a violin had considerably more power than those of other instruments, they were more perceptible and consequently influenced the instrument's pitch to a greater extent. It was therefore difficult even for trained ears to identify intervals or chords correctly in the violin's high registers, and so it was that the great Tartini frequently called his upper register intervals as much as an octave too high. By the sane token, identical high register intervals on different instruments sounded dissimilar because the quantitative and qual- itative differences between their high overtones so altered tone quality as to destroy any semblances of pitch similarity. The high overtone differences produced when various instruments played together then suggested much about the aesthetics of ensemble music. They explained why, for instance, string quartet players needed years of togetherness to produce beautiful sound even though they played related instruments: their tone productions depended on the characteristics of their harmonic (and inharmonic) overtones and could be made to blend only by similar bowing and fingering techniques. With was Bettmann Archive orchestras, the problem was compounded: it In 1863, a twentieth -century mentality. necessary that performers Continued on page 117

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www.americanradiohistory.com A new technique is being formulated for evaluating music systems in terms of the total listening experience.

SOUND REPRODUCTION, like all Gaul, may be di- Indeed, it has become increasingly evident that vided into three main parts. One has to do with the judgment of the quality of performance of a the design of components and related equipment; high fidelity system must necessarily include sub- another involves the environment in which the equip- jective factors -that the factual recital of measure- ment is used; a third concerns the listener and his ments and functions does not adequately convey a reaction to the sound produced. This last considera- sense of "how it sounds." This realization of what tion -the newest and so far least understood - may be called the total listening experience was not, involves both physiological and psychological factors in the past, universally shared by high fidelity to which the listener is subject. It has now become experts. I recall many instances In which the over- apparent that this new area, called psychoacoustics, all listening quality of a given system installed is a most important one in assessing the suitability in someone's home was poor, yet the engineer of a given home music system for an individual lis- who designed the equipment refused to change it tener. In its largest sense, the study of psycho - because it had "good specs." acoustics attempts to relate a subjective reaction to Today, in happy contrast to such "thinking by an objective set of sonic circumstances. Once such the numbers," many audio experts are suggesting a relationship is established, then psychoacoustic that we will, in time, adopt more sophisticated con- considerations themselves may be used -if not to cepts of measurements, which must take into account help in the design of sound equipment, at least subjective experience as well as objectively derived to serve as a guide to the listener in choosing equip- data. In any case, the application of psychoacoustics ment best suited to his own needs. may well lead to more meaningful evaluations of

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www.americanradiohistory.com sound reproduction from program source through reproduced sound) preferred triode amplifiers on the separate audio components to the sound system wide -range reproduction rather than pentode -type finally installed in the home. amplifiers. It was further brought out that untrained We already have, of course, precedents for the listeners (accustomed to the limitations of conven- evaluation of the listening experience on a statistical tional equipment and unfamiliar with live sound) basis -conspicuously the many attempts to prove invariably preferred narrow band reproduction (80 that reproduced sound was "indistinguishable" from to 4,000 cycles) to medium band reproduction (60 live sound. Among the more notable tests of this to 8,000 cycles), while "expert" listeners preferred sort, the following were of major significance: wide band reproduction (40 to 12,000 cycles) to Leopold Stokowski's stereophonic transmission via medium band reproduction but only if the total telephone lines from the Academy of Music, in system distortion was below 2 %. Philadelphia, to the stage of Constitution Hall. in Mr. Briggs also has conducted home experiments. Washington, D.C., in the early 1930s; Gilbert He finds no correlation between actual measured Briggs's "live" and "reproduced" concerts a few hearing acuity, listening preference, and "expert- years ago in Carnegie Hall, New York City; the ness." Rather, he finds a startling correlation between Pension Fund experiments of the Philadelphia Or- listening experience and "expertness," suggesting that chestra, a few years ago, with the orchestra "live" the ability to discriminate depends on the acquired against itself reproduced via Ampex, Fisher, and or inherent capacities of the listener. Jensen components; the Acoustic Research Dynaco Again, prolonged "listening preference" tests concerts, during recent audio and music shows. were carried on, with musically expert listeners, Invariably, the demonstrators concluded from by P. J. Walker and his associates in England. each such test that "You couldn't tell the difference." These were made during the development of the Unfortunately, this assertion could be made only Acoustical Corner Labyrinth Reproducer of 1949 by ignoring those who could tell the difference and and of the later (1956) Quad Electrostatic. From who preferred the live to the reproduced sound these researches it was found that an evaluation of (or in some cases, vice versa!). As one who was sound as "real," or "pleasantly real," derived prima- present at several of these demonstrations, I can rily from the acoustics of the sound presentation, the say that the group which "couldn't tell the differ- relative degree of reflected and direct sound in the ence" was comprised mainly of those engaged in listening room. selling the equipment on exhibit, people who had Other studies may also be mentioned: those of already invested in it and wanted to be reassured A. D. Blumlein, father of the stereo disc; P. G. A. H. of its high quality, and those predisposed to accept Voigt's researches on speakers, from which emerged the wonders of technology uncritically. In short, the "Window on the Orchestra" concept, so popular the "mental set" was all important. in Britain and Europe; Stewart Hegeman's correla- The will to believe may in fact be the determining tion of sound sensations with mechanical and electri- factor in any evaluation of the quality of sound cal specifications, from which investigation has de- reproduction. Mr. Briggs, commenting on his own veloped the present -day "wide band amplifier re- numerous demonstrations, has bluntly stated that the sponse" approach. single most crucial factor in suggesting "reality" with reproducing equipment is the site of the demonstration -the concert hall itself. Speakers and am- THE NET EFFECT of these and other experiments is plifiers notwithstanding, the very fact of being to suggest the desirability of developing a system present in a concert hall, where one naturally is of evaluating home listening, its possibilities and its accustomed to hearing live music, might lead one to limitations. What are the basic criteria, for instance, believe that what is being heard is the real thing which should determine our choice of listening rather than a reproduced version. In the home, equipment? What can we listen for, realistically? of course, we lack the aura (as well as the acoustics) Knowing the limitations of audio equipment, can of the concert hall. And so the quest begins for better we then acknowledge that the response of the lis- equipment, better room acoustics, better program tener is itself the most important criterion in the material. This quest has produced vast improve- series of judgments that end with the phrase "high ments -but it does not tell the whole story. fidelity"? I think we can. As soon as we do, we In addition to public concert -demonstrations, can abandon certain naïve ideas about the repro- the history of sound reproduction also documents duction of music, such as the one I call the "fallacy numerous examples of investigations into listening of specifications." Almost all high fidelity owners, in home environments. Most of these home lis- some time or other, spend large sums of money tening tests were intended to serve as guides in the to improve their music systems, purchasing equip- design of equipment for different types of listeners, ment with astonishing specifications -amplifiers and their findings are often illuminating. For in- with "perfect" square waves and lots of power, stance, Dr. Harry F. Olson's experiments in hearing speakers guaranteed to reproduce 20 to 20,000 preferences, performed under strict laboratory con- cycles, and so on. And many of us afterwards trol, revealed that "expert" listeners (accustomed find ourselves no more satisfied with the "new" to live sound and conscious of the limitations of sound than with the `old."

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www.americanradiohistory.com One explanation for this disenchantment may be PENDING A revision of performance specifications that "specifications" as such have limited relevance and a concomitant interrelating of them with personal to the problem of choosing and operating a pleasant listening tastes and variations in home environment, or "natural- sounding" music system. In the first place, it may seem well nigh impossible to define a goal no one has ever established a satisfactory correla- for music listening in the home. Yet such definition tion between specifications currently in vogue (and is possible today, at least in a relative if not absolute specification standards do change, from time to sense. It involves not one "ideal system" but three time) and the actual listening process. Furthermore, generic types, doubtless with overlappings and varia- it is apparent to anyone versed in this field that tions; and in truth, the aims behind these systems most of us prefer certain kinds of distortion to "lab have determined the design criteria employed in the perfect" conditions. For instance, it has recently significant developments in the history of audio. been pointed out by one writer that most listeners - Briefly, they may be described as "The Artist in the not "expert," and relatively unacquainted with live Room," "Electronic Enhancement," and "The Win- sound -prefer a bass characteristic that is sharply dow on the Orchestra." peaked between 60 and 120 cycles. As soon as "The Artist in the Room" concept is largely the these listeners are exposed to the technical language history of the phonograph. The earliest recording of sound engineering, it appears that they must artists were singing "just for you." At every stage be reassured that their preference is really "flat" - of development, there have been listeners who have although in fact they still want that peak. (Many wanted to believe that Caruso is in the room, so to speaker designers obligingly provide it.) Again, speak. As sound moved to Hollywood, this principle most of us prefer "good" stereo reproduction to was amplified (literally) and elaborated. The sonic monophonic despite the fact that the measured goal of the talking films was to get the sound out distortion, by conventional "specs," may be con- from behind the screen, so that the actors would siderably lower in some monophonic systems and seem to be talking to each person in the audience. program sources. This involved peaking the response characteristic, Finally, most listeners -if asked to choose a to aid in the projection of voices and to lend loudspeaker by sound alone -will choose the one "presence" to the audio -visual illusion. In the United with the kind of coloration (i.e., distortion) to which States this kind of high fidelity, the artist in your they are accustomed. The only time, in my experi- room, has been, until recently, the guiding con- ence at least, that a "lab perfect" speaker is chosen cept. Most of the early home "hi -fi" equipment as a listening preference is when the listener has was taken bodily from theatres or adapted to fit been informed that it is "lab perfect "! into smaller cabinets. For instance, the Shearer Horn, While conventional specifications for equipment beloved of early audio aficionados, became the are helpful to a limited degree, they obviously do not model for most hone speaker systems. take into account the uncharted, but clearly im- A system intended to suggest "The Artist in portant, psychoacoustic factors. What does correlate the Room" will include large amplifiers with reserve most closely with the choice of a system is the for high level transients and loudspeakers (classically, "mental set" of the listener -what he is prepared horn systems) with "presence" peaks -or at least to believe and to enjoy. It has been shown that what the facility for adjusting the presence -and direc- he will beliove and enjoy in a concert hall is not tional treble dispersion. Recording engineers -and exactly what he will believe and enjoy in his home; our recording techniques were all developed on the that what he will believe and enjoy on live presenta- basis of this same concept -will employ close -up tion is not the same as his response to reproduced microphone techniques, using multiples. For stereo, presentation; that what he will believe and enjoy in they will use wide- spread techniques, involving multi- a dealer's showroom is different from what he will ple "faders" and "mixers," to convey the sound that enjoy at home. Even to a specific home installation one might hear at the conductor's podium, or at there may be a wide difference in listener response. least in the first few rows of the hall. Among At one recent session I know of, for instance, three notable examples of recordings conceived in "close - "experienced listeners" were exultant at the "power- up" sound are a series left by Toscanini. The Mae- ful bass," while a fourth insisted that the bass was stro, by the way, often preferred to use large unnatural. He also complained about the "treble theatre horns for playback. shriek," and wondered why the others present did An interesting variation on the "Artist in the not hear it. Room" principle has appeared in the last several There is also at hand enough evidence to con- years. In an effort to spread the source of sound, clude that the "recommendations" of testing labs engineers have developed various kinds of omni- that do not take into account the complex of sen- directional speakers. Generally, these reflect the sations and attitudes operative in home listening mid- frequencies and the treble frequencies from the are of limited value. Far more fruitful are those corner or the ceiling. In such fashion, with a close- lab reports that attempt to correlate measurements up recording technique, the engineers replaced the with listening tests and that suggest a general kind acoustic conditions of the recording hall with the of system in which a component -albeit one that acoustics of the listening room, the latter becoming does not measure perfectly -may logically be chosen. the surrounding for the Continued on page 116

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www.americanradiohistory.com NOBODY CAN remember exactly when Project Boris was originally conceived. I recall having first heard about it in May 1961, when I had a chat in London with David Bicknell, director -in -chief of EM I-Angel's international recording activities. Bicknell is a tall, ruddy Englishman in his mid- fifties whose psyche somehow combines the sensitivity and fervor of an artist with the sturdy composure of a veteran foreman. He was at his unruffled best that day as he outlined some of the far -ranging projects on which his company hoped to embark. "One of our more ambitious plans," he said, "in- PROJECT volves the re- recording of Boris Godunov- with Christoff again, of course. We feel there is a market today for a new stereo version of this opera, and we intend to use plenty of atmospheric effects to suggest the BORIS action on stage. Kyril Kondrashin will conduct, and we're in hopes of engaging a chorus from the Soviet Union or one of the satellites. We'll record it in Berlin- because we can get there easily and so can they." Before any definite dates had been set or contracts signed, the Russians put up The Wall and overnight Berlin became a singu- larly inappropriate locale for East -West musical coöperation. Moreover, at just about the same time, Kondrashin let it be known that his commitments in Russia had reached the point where he could no longer promise to participate. For Bicknell, whose experience with unpredictable Russians goes back to the days of Feodor Chaliapin, these were unfortunate but not cataclysmic developments. With or without the Russians, he was determined that Project Boris should go on. But a good deal of replanning had now to be done -and for this Bicknell called in his chief assistant, a young Australian A report on the best laid named Peter Andry. Andry could still rely on the project's plans of an opera recording - sine qua non, Boris Christoff, a basso of Bulgarian birth and Italian training who is Angel's Boris Godunov, generally regarded as the most accomplished interpreter of Mussorgsky's haunted to be released later monarch to have emerged since the prime years of Chaliapin. But Christoff was all. this month. The rest of the enterprise had to be put together from scratch. "Our first problem," Andry recalls, "was to choose a suitable recording hall. We wanted a large and very By Roland live hall-a place where we could put a Gelatt sizable chorus, a full orchestra, and plenty of soloists without losing any spaciousness and depth of sound. Among the various halls available to us, the Salle Wagram in Paris

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www.americanradiohistory.com seemed far the best for our purposes. This meant them for minor roles in the Boris recording. He left that we would need a French orchestra-and we Bulgaria with a pocketful of contracts and a solemn settled on the Paris Conservatoire Orchestra and the assurance that choristers and soloists would duly conductor André Cluytens, who is an experienced appear at the Salle Wagram in September with their hand at directing opera recordings." Negotiations for parts studied to perfection. hall, orchestra, and conductor occupied Andry in- termittently through the fall of 1961, and by the end of the year he had progressed far enough to IN London, meanwhile, the tempo of Project Boris make some tentative commitments for sessions in was on the increase. Suddenly hundreds of details September 1962. clamored for attention, and Andry cast around for A vital ingredient, however, was still lacking. some expert help. He found it in the person of David In Boris a first -class chorus is of the utmost impor- Lloyd- Jones, a recent Oxford graduate with an en- tance. It is intended as the embodiment of the Rus- cyclopedic knowledge of Russian literature and a sian people, the collective mouthpiece -as it were - professional command of music. Lloyd -Jones had through which Mussorgsky expresses his concern and been closely involved in a new production of Boris compassion for the common man. And Andry had, at Covent Garden and was thus in a position to give no chorus. Ten years before, when EMI made its invaluable advice on matters of staging. For tech- first recording of Boris, the problem was easily nical guidance, Andry brought in Robert Gooch, a solved. Then the choral parts were sung by Russian quiet, bespectacled engineer who had recorded sev- emigrés who had escaped after the 1917 revolution to eral other operas for EMI and was conversant with settle in Paris. (Many of the emigrés had learned to the acoustics of the Salle Wagram. Late in April - support themselves as taxi drivers, and at the 1952 while Glotz was still searching for his chorus -the sessions there were often a hundred cabs parked three experts sat around a table and went through around the recording hall.) In the intervening decade, the score from beginning to end with a view to an- however, the Choeurs Russes de Paris had disinte- ticipating the problems that night be encountered. grated. Even at the time of the earlier Boris record- The problem of the score itself had already been ing, the youngest of the emigrés were already middle - settled. Early in the history of Project Boris, the de- aged; ten years later they were too old to sing Mus- cision had been made- primarily by David Bicknell sorgsky. A replacement for the White Russians had -to use the Rimsky -Korsakov revision. It was not to be found, and the finding fell to Michel Glotz, a an easy decision to make, either from an artistic or hyperbolic operaphile in his mid -thirties who works commercial standpoint. The original Mussorgsky for EMI's French subsidiary, Pathé- Marconi, as a score and the Rimsky revision are two very different sort of roving talent scout and ebullient trouble operas. The Mussorgsky is stark, episodic, at times shooter. Glotz began by advertising in the newspaper brutally dissonant, seldom conventionally "operatic." Figaro for Russian- speaking singers of a suitable age. The Rimsky is the work of a practiced man of the Three people answered his ad. Then he considered theatre and an astute orchestrator-in which exotic the practicality of teaching a French chorus to sing pageantry is emphasized and rough edges are filed in Russian, but quickly gave up this plan as im- away. Convincing artistic arguments can be advanced moderately costly and time- consuming. for each. And commercial arguments too. It was "It became increasingly obvious," Glotz told me suggested that the first recording of Mussorgsky's later, "that we had no alternative but to .import a Ur-text might conceivably have a larger sales poten- chorus from one of the Iron Curtain countries. tial than a re- recording of Rimsky's familiar revision. Christoff was strongly in favor of Bulgaria. He main- No one could know for certain, but Bicknell opted tained that the Sofia Opera Chorus was the best in for Rimsky -with the proviso, however, that certain Eastern Europe. So I enlisted the help of a Bulgarian passages cut from the earlier EMI recording be re- friend who lives in Paris and we sent off a letter of stored in the new one. Christoff, who sings both inquiry to the Ministry of Culture in Sofia. Their versions, agreed with this decision. answer was a round -trip air ticket -no letter, just In his preliminary conferences with Gooch and the ticket. I went to Sofia in May. A man from the Lloyd- Jones, Andry set forth his general views on Ministry met me at the airport, took me to a good stereo opera recording. "I believe," he explained to hotel, and gave me money for incidentals. He also me later on, "not so much in stage movement per se gave me a ticket to the opera that evening, and I as in the necessity for setting the scene. Sometimes, discovered that Christoff was absolutely right. These to be sure, you have to do this by having your char- people are magnificent singers -with a long tradition acters move from one microphone to another. But of performing Russian opera in the original language. sometimes you can set the scene merely with a dif- The next day I started negotiations with the Min- ferent type of sound. I'm not in favor of movement istry. Fortunately, they were anxious to show off for its own sake." Gooch, for his part, described their chorus and were willing to subsidize part of the the type of microphone setup he envisaged and in costs. Otherwise we could never have afforded to general outlined the sonic potentialities at their dis- bring a hundred singers to Paris all the way from posal. Lloyd -Jones made concrete proposals for the Bulgaria." Glotz also auditioned several solo singers handling of certain key scenes. at the Sofia Opera and engaged about a dozen of After the three had agreed on a general plan of

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www.americanradiohistory.com Under the classic frieze typical of the Salle Wagram's Empire décor the choristers imported from the Sofia Opera watch the orchestra and conductor, located in another part of the hall, on closed -circuit television. Beforehand (as pictured here at left), the Bulgarian singers had gathered round their celebrated compatriot Christof f to renew old acquaintance. The photograph below this scene of fraternal welcome shows the basso in conversation with conductor André Cluytens. At bottom, left, are the men in the control room: recording director René Challan; chief engineer Bob Gooch; finder -of- the- chorus, Michel Glotz; and -in dark coat - Peter Andry, in general charge of proceedings.

APRII. 1963

www.americanradiohistory.com Photographs by Hans Wild

ActtJist was going on everywhere in the Salle Wagram; at top right a tele-Lision man adjusts his camera on the balcony; as staging-consultant David Lloyd -Jones looks on, Czar Boris practices the proper way to knock over a table (the white -haired bystander is a sound -effects su- pervisor); Alexander Labinsky, Christof f's long -time accompanist, is seen demonstrating a point in the score; ChalLan and Christoff debate a problem. The photograph at bottom left shows one of the more than four hundred takes that made this stereo recording of Boris Godunov.

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www.americanradiohistory.com action, Lloyd -Jones began to map out the detailed Paris for mimeographing and distribution to everyone scene -by -scene strategy. His first step was to diagram concerned. "After that," says Andry, "there was the recording stage into a pattern of numbered and nothing to do but keep our fingers crossed and hope lettered squares. Then he routed the traffic on this that everything would come off as planned." imaginary stage in accordance with the prescriptions of the score and with opera house traditions. The result was a sheaf of mimeographed "Directions for WHEN I met Peter Andry in the Hotel Bellman on Soloists and Chorus" in which every movement and the morning of the first session, it was clear from his sound effect in the opera was explicitly noted. jovial demeanor that no catastrophes had yet de- While Lloyd -Jones was devising his staging veloped. "I've just come from seeing Czar Boris," scheme, the a & r people at Pathé- Marconi grappled he explained. "He seems in a very good humor and with the logistics of the September sessions. In addi- I think the sessions should begin smoothly." We ate tion to the large contingent from Bulgaria, singers as quick a lunch as is possible in Paris and walked would be arriving from Italy, Yugoslavia, Germany, over in brilliant sunshine to the Salle Wagram. and England, and hotel accommodations had to be The main doors of the hall on the Avenue Wa- found in Paris for all of them. To complicate matters gram, a few blocks north of the Etoile, are opened further, they would be arriving and departing at dif- for boxing matches on Friday nights and bals dan- ferent times. "The ideal way to record an opera," sants on Saturdays. Otherwise this entrance is closed, Andry concedes, "is to start with the overture and and at recording sessions one goes in by a rear pas- run right through to the final curtain. But its also, sageway on the Rue de Montenotte, a short narrow I'm sorry to say, a very impractical way. For one street with shops for cheese, wine, neat, and grocer- thing, you can't get busy singers to make themselves ies, a shoemaker and a baker, a few cafés, find a available for the full two or three weeks required to couple of tiny hotels (of somewhat doubtful re- record an opera. They want to record all their scenes spectability). On the swinging plush- covered doors within the space of a few days -and this means that leading directly into the hall were large signs calling you have to hop about from one part of the score to for silence and no smoking. The latter injunction another. It's impractical from an economic stand- seemed particularly pertinent. The Salle Wagram point as well. When you're paying for the board and dates from 1812, and the interior is full of old -and, keep of a large chorus, you don't want them on one suspects, rather easily flammable -wood. It is your hands any longer than necessary." a beautiful hall, square in shape, with a large open The task of working out a practical schedule of arena in the center, a narrow balcony surrounding it recording Boris was given to René Challan, a Prix on all four sides, and a lovely Empire ceiling of fili- de Rome composer who has been a recording direc- gree and inlay. The building has been classified as a tor at Pathé- Marconi for many years. His first step "public monument," which means that no structural was to parcel ou the score into fifty -one sequences, or decorative alterations can be made without ap- varying from two to seven minutes in length and each proval from the Ministry of Cultural Affairs. One ending at a place where a successful splice could be wonders why permission was ever given to install the made. Bearing in mind the availability of artists, the ruthlessly utilitarian fluorescent lights over the arena; musical and engineering problems to be encountered, the original chandeliers must certainly have been and the economics of the project as a whole, Challan much handsomer. put together a chart assigning the fifty -one sequences The orchestra had already begun to tune up in to specific hours and days. For the first session, at the center of the arena when we arrived. Behind 3 o'clock on Tuesday, September 4, the chart called them, on a temporary stage laid out in squares con- for Boris, Feodor, and Shuisky (i.e., Boris Christoff, forming exactly to the Lloyd -Jones plan, a tiny tabby Ana Alexieva, and John Lanigan) to record the con- cat scampered about. Bob Gooch, the chief record- clusion of Act II- sequences 29 -31, with a durée ing engineer, was busy tapping his various micro- prévue of 8' 25 ". Four more afternoon and evening phones- several of them suspended from a boom in sessions on the following Wednesday and Thursday front of the stage, others in and above the orchestra. would account for the rest of Boris' big scenes (his Up in the control room his French assistants were address to the people at his coronation, the mono- carefully checking out the tape equipment and the logue "I have attained the highest power," and the monitoring console. death scene) as well as the two scenes from Act III Christoff appeared promptly at 2:55, greeted in which Rangoni takes part. The chart then showed old associates, was introduced to new ones, and a hiatus of six days (to allow Cluytens to fulfill a went off with Cluytens for some last- minute con- prior engagement). When the sessions resumed at sultations; then he climbed up on stage and played 8 o'clock on the evening of Wednesday, September with the kitten while awaiting further instructions. 12, the Sofia Opera Chorus was to be on hand for At length the control room called for a trial run- the first time. The recording was then to proceed through of the first sequence. Already a change had without a break to the final session on Friday morn- been made in Challan's original schedule; instead of ing, September 21. beginning with the Clock Scene, Christoff preferred Towards the end of June, Challan's schedule was to start off with his solo in the Prelude. The horns submitted to Andry for approval, then returned to sounded a unison G, the clarinets descended to a

APRIL 1963 55

www.americanradiohistory.com C minor triad, and instantly one was transported to we'll try it once more," he said, and went back to the Kremlin in the year 1598. From the balcony of the recording stage. The solo was repeated again and the hall the run -through sounded magnificently spa- again. Then work began on the Clock Scene. But cious and brilliant; it was easy to understand why the afternoon was wearing on, tempers were frayed, the Salle Wagram has become one of Europe's most and at six everyone was happy to call it a day. favored recording halls. But the ears in the control room were apparently not satisfied, for there ensued much shifting of microphones and lowering of cur- FOR THE SECOND SESSION, twenty -four hours later, tains behind the stage. the hall had been damped down even further. Drapes Finally, at 4 o'clock all was in readiness for Take hanging from the ceiling now shut off the balcony 1. In the control room Gooch had installed himself completely. Christoff took up the Clock Scene where in front of the huge monitoring console. Facing he had left off. It was extraordinary to observe how him were two loudspeakers and a television screen, he could throw himself into the tormented hallu- which was connected to various cameras in the cinations of Boris at a moment's notice. One minute hall. To Gooch's right sat Challan, flanked by a full he was an urbane basso in a well -tailored Italian orchestral score of Boris and an intercom phone to worsted suit; the next, he was Czar Boris reeling the conductor's stand. Behind them-on a raised before the horror of his troubled conscience. The platform at the rear of the room -sat Andry and scene was splendidly performed, the orchestra ap- Glotz. An orchestral score was at Andry's elbow plauded, and the playback won general approbation. also, and it was he who had ultimate responsibility Everything now began to run more smoothly. By for running the show, though Challan -for linguistic the end of the fifth session, Project Boris was pretty reasons -communicated with the musicians below. nearly back on schedule. As Take 1 proceeded, Andry's expression grew On September 12, when the company reassembled progressively glummer. "Such a cavernous sound!" after the planned six -day interruption, it was re- he exclaimed. Gooch turned around, peered over the vealed that Project Boris had suffered its first cas- rims of his glasses, and said soothingly, "Well, at ualty. In the interim Peter Andry had fallen ill in least were getting somewhere -it's a definite im- London, and it seemed doubtful whether he could provement, you'll have to admit." But Andry was resume work before the end of the month. But the not to be placated. Turning to Challan, and with over -all plan had already been set, and the Messrs. a note of tension creeping into his voice, he said: Gooch, Glotz, Challan, and Lloyd -Jones were in- "Tell the orchestra to take a break while we work structed to carry on -now with eighty -nine new- this out." Then to Gooch: "Bob, we've got to get corners in the Salle Wagram. The Sofia Opera Cho- this hall damped down. Let's lower every piece of rus had arrived, just as the Bulgarian Ministry had drapery in the place." promised, and the hall was filled with the chatter While the engineering crew scurried off down- of a strange tongue. stairs, Christoff appeared in the control room, ac- The choristers came to the Salle Wagram well in companied by his wife, Cluytens, Lloyd- Jones, and advance of their first session and stayed clustered Alexander Labinsky-a frail and ancient man with together in what seemed to be rather nervous antici- a parchmentlike complexion who is Christoff's ac- pation. We soon discovered why. The moment Chris - companist and musical adviser. Labinsky was the toff set foot in the hall, they burst out in a ravish- one person in the Salle Wagram whose memories of ingly harmonized folk song, clapping their hands as Boris went back to Czarist Russia; and when he he walked towards them, and surrounding him in a looked up from his tattered score to offer a sug- sea of affectionate compatriots. "Let this song of our gestion, everyone listened with attentive respect. But land unite us forever "they sang, and tears filled Chris - it was now Christoff who spoke. "Let's hear a play- toff's eyes. It had been twenty years since he left back," he demanded in a sonorous singer's voice. He Bulgaria for vocal study abroad. Since then he had listened to it, head buried in hands, a figure of utter become a national hero in absentia, the most cele- dejection. When it was over he stood up. "Not brated Bulgarian of our time even though he had good," he announced. Andry nodded his head. long since ceased to live in his native land. But "We're not too keen on it either," he agreed. "It's for some of these singers in the Salle Wagram he too reverberant; the hall still needs damping." Chris - was more than a hero. He was an old friend, a toff frowned menacingly. "No, it's the balance," he fellow student from the distant days before the protested. "The orchestra drowns my singing. I do war, and during the course of the ensuing sessions not recognize my voice at all." Andry threw up his there was much conviviality and remembrance of hands in feigned horror. He had been expecting this things past. outburst from the beginning. Singers invariably com- The arrival of the Bulgarians lightened the plain about balance at the first session. "Oh, I can't atmosphere at the sessions perceptibly. Their singing agree with that," he objected, mustering as much surpassed all expectations. For a month prior to their firmness as one can in confrontation with an ob- trip to Paris they had been rehearsing Boris, inter- durate basso. "Why don't you listen again ?" This rupting their summer holidays to do so, and the time the take was played back at a different volume virtuosity and musicality of their work were astonish- level. Christoff seemed somewhat mollified. "Well, ing. "Never before in my Continued on page 119

56 HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

www.americanradiohistory.com l';1i;4í!1

By Paul Henry Lang

THE RIPPLES caused by H. C. Robbins Landon's "A Pox on Manfredini," in the June 1961 issue of HIGH FIDELITY, are still discernible in the correspondence columns of this journal long after that article's appearance. That so many readers are concerned with the issues it presented is gratifying indeed, and the author is to be congratulated on the interest he generated. Certainly, it is not my intention to quarrel with Mr. Robbins Landon, but rather to discuss the problems which are at the bottom of the whole affair. The historian endeavors to resuscitate bygone art; it is his main task. He uncovers the conditions that determine historic styles, illuminating the work of art from every possible angle. Insofar as those conditions can be recon- structed, he can make his contemporaries conscious of them; but he cannot conjure up the instinctive empathy felt by men of another age. We hook up a transformer, so to speak, to the old work of art; and if we can convert the electricity it generates to our voltage, our mental apparatus begins to hum. But the transformer cannot re- create the atmospheric conditions in which the old art breathed. From the distance of a couple of centuries a composer, for instance, tends to recede into the general style of his time, and to many of

APRIL 1963 57

www.americanradiohistory.com us these old masters all seem to have composed the there have always been in every field of human same sonatas, the same concertos, and the same endeavor, and there were also many who worked operas. Yet they are individuals, and once we become humbly as mere artisans, without fanfare and even familiar with their differing styles and procedures without a desire to be different from their col- we can recognize their individuality. leagues. They were not troubled with any impulse Every artistic expression has a relation to its to unravel the mysteries of the universe; rather they time which is lost if we are unable to establish our directed an eye at the manners and experiences of own relationship to that time. For a century and a their day, worked within the musical fashion, and half it was held that only with Bach and Handel were not isolated from the popular taste. But they do we really enter the domain of unquestionably often ended by being overwhelmingly powerful in- living music; the result of this presupposition was dividuals whose every utterance is unmistakably their the impossible historical category of "pre- Bach" own. Only a few decades ago a Buxtehude, and a music. There are many persons who listen to the Vivaldi, and a Charpentier were nothing but names in "Princes of Music" of the sixteenth century, Pales - textbooks; now they have been recognized as great trina, Lasso, Victoria, and Byrd, with respect and composers because we have become conversant with even awe -all the books say they were great compos- their style and principles and have begun to dis- ers -but few discern behind this music a human coun- tinguish the individual within the uniformity of the tenance or even shades of variation: Gloria sounds reigning style. pretty much like Credo, Kyrie like Agnus Dei. Seventy or eighty years ago even the experienced Lully, Couperin, Kuhnau, and all the others are and famous musicians who prepared the first com- pleasant enough, but they appear to wear a common plete edition of Bach's works, the celebrated garb and look alike; no message seems to emanate Bachgesellschaft edition, were completely baffled from them beyond a certain innocent charm. But by baroque music. They knew neither the literature when we hear "I know that my Redeemer liveth," or nor the style, and therefore accepted everything in the second Brandenburg Concerto, there is not the Bach's handwriting as genuine. They did not realize slightest doubt in our minds that this is `bur" music, that Bach copied many a score by other composers, by composers we "understand" and whom we could both earlier and contemporary, which he found not mistake for anyone else. But ought we to be interesting. As a result the old Bach edition is so sure? On the one hand, there are many universally studded with all sorts of compositions by seven- admired pieces in Handel's works that were lifted teenth- and eighteenth -century masters whom, iron- bodily from older composers now declared dead; ically enough, Bach regarded with admiration but on the other, what does the Art of Fugue convey to we declare passé. It was only later that scholars the music listener who is accustomed to "original discovered that all of Bach's harpsichord concertos, invention" and "meaning "? to quote one example, were actually composed by The prevailing opinion -and not only among Vivaldi, Marcello, and others. laymen-is that this old music lacks subjective expression and therefore fails to convey the type of satisfaction we are used to. But why should TODAY we realize that no art is understandable we assume that because more recent music is of a from a knowledge of historical facts alone; it different kind it is superior and more highly devel- must be experienced through a perception of its oped? No one would maintain such ideas with regard style -not only analyzed, but felt and divined. It is to painting or literature. The medieval painter who not so much the historical facts (which to the lay- used no perspective is no longer considered "primi- man are always the mark of scholarliness) as the tive"; his superimposed layers are recognized as a historical connections that are most important. The valid concept. Nor do we speak of pre- Voltaire or pre - minute we attempt to explore the historical connec- Swift literature. This old music does have subjec- tions, then we are entering the area where the idea is tivity and expressivity, though not in the nineteenth - to be found -and idea, no matter how relative, leads century sense: all contemporary documents prove to style. that in preromantic music individuality was felt and An obvious question arises at this point: what understood. The trouble is caused by the modern is the relationship between musical instinct and musi- listener's inability to perceive the earlier composer's cal value? That they do not necessarily coincide is inner, unified vision. He must reconstruct this evident. Our musical life shows a gulf between what vision from the small details which are not inner the general public likes and what the initiated con- truth but largely facts that must be quarried from sider the highest manifestations of music. But we the cold foreign past. should not accept without suspicion the articles of The older masters took their departure from the faith of the epicureans who at the drop of a hat trot métier, from the collective universal, which guided out nothing less than the Art of Fugue. They believe them serenely, whereas with the advent of the that artistic value is as evident in their choices as romantic era the great artist arose from real or the trade -mark of a famous manufacturer. For the imagined opposition to the norm. There were many moment let us disregard the fact that our knowledge plodders among the old composers, to be sure, as of baroque music is still very sketchy, that an im-

58 HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

www.americanradiohistory.com mense treasure of scores, containing many master- Bach's Musical Offering would be surpassed by pieces, is still to be made known and available. But Tchaikovsky's B flat minor Piano Concerto. It is we do have a fair number of publications and function and design, the "working -out" or manipula- recordings, among them many by minor composers. tion of musical substance that leads to masterpieces Musicians, editors, and advisors to record com- in this old music. panies, whose acquaintance with "old" music is But even music much closer to us shows that rather recent, find themselves in a world whose "invention" was not always synonymous with "orig- language they speak imperfectly, and it is for this inality," and that "imagination" must be sought else- reason that they are preaching a cult of indis- where. The Jupiter Symphony and the Fifth of criminate proliferation. But there is another and Beethoven both start out with very ordinary clichés much worthier reason for making the minor corn- plucked from the public domain -but see what hap- posers available: they can be enjoyed not in neglect pens to the clichés by the application of imagination! or defiance of the approved great masters, but in Surely, Mr. Robbins Landon, who knows his Haydn simple acceptance of the fact that altogether enjoy- and who has done so much to make this great and able art can be created by musical poets who are not neglected master come to life, is aware that most of exactly thought- ridden. At certain times a minor his wondrous symphonies and quartets were hatched composer who knew no high ecstasies or profound with the motto creatio ex nihilo. This was the griefs falls easier on the ear than a towering genius. eighteenth-century precept: the question was how One may question the profundity or the accomplish- soon the creative spark would strike the imagination. ment, but there is no denying the entertainment. Look at the beginning of Beethoven's Ninth Sym- Essentially taste is a convention, often a very phony. This stupendous symphonic structure still unreasonable convention, and like every convention begins with "nothing " -a few tentative intervals that it is changeable -in art it must change. In a certain do not even fix the tonality -but then we can vir- sense, taste is a form of social etiquette and lack of tually witness how imagination forces the raw matter taste is often nothing else than the liberation of new to coalesce into an idea. This process was alien to territories for creative imagination. In Manfredini's the romantics. They had to begin with a substantial time, the marks Mr. Robbins Landon is distressed and fully formed musical idea, an approach which not to find in that composer's music would have been of course represents a totally different, though considered lacking in taste -but the historian, work- equally valid, aesthetic concept. Unless we under- ing backward and armed with hindsight, must beware stand these aesthetic premises and refrain from ap- of converting migrations of taste into aesthetic argu- plying our own, we are unable fully to understand ments. the artistic intentions of the composer and may even Finally, there is the question of the relationship altogether misjudge the music, as Berlioz did Haydn's of invention and imagination, which in the case of or Tchaikovsky Bach's. our still little understood field of music are terns There is no denying, however, that Mr. Robbins subject to different interpretations. The difficulty for Landon's strictures are at least partly justified. Cer- us is that the ratio and quality of these two elements tain commentators, broadcasters, and record editors, are not constant; they change, often radically, within seeing that a vital literature originated in the baroque a generation or two. How can we otherwise explain era, lump together the living music with the dead, that an excellent musician such as Gounod could advocating their views with the sanie supercilious- find Bach's C major prelude from the first book of ness that the party of the 24 -carat masterpieces ex- the Well -Tempered Clavier a piece lacking in inven- hibits. They take us into their confidence, though tion but presenting imagination in the "accompani- they have little to confide, pouring into our ears a ment," to which Gounod furnished his dubious Ave copious flow of thin music. It is a kind of make - Maria? The notion of "invention" -and hence to our believe by which the blessed past is projected into unscientific aesthetics, the "expressive " -is purely the prosaic present. This anomaly should be pro- arbitrary and in itself irrelevant unless stylistically tested, but it would be sad if, as Mr. Robbins Landon qualified. Because the old masters are strong in the only half facetiously suggests, the baroque concerto handling of their materials, and because this ability could serve only to make martinis more potable. of theirs can be quickly appreciated whereas their There are indeed abuses in this as in any other soul is often hidden, it may appear to some that they area of music, but the abuses need not be abused had nothing but a well -settled uniform technique. quite so sweepingly. Whatever means a scholar may Not only Mr. Robbins Landon but many an other- adopt, his concern is always with a cultural tradition wise able musician considers the baroque the age of which it is his business to transmit. I am afraid that musical statutes and bylaws observed meticulously Mr. Robbins Landon, on the contrary, satisfied him- by everyone- except Bach and Handel. One thing is self with an incongruity to be exploited. If so, I am certain, though, and several HIGH FIDELITY cor- sure he misjudged his HIGH FIDELITY public. As one respondents who took up l'affaire Manfredini are of this audience I too enjoy a fine piece of cheerful fully aware of it: in this music it is not the strength vituperation, but "A Pox on Manfredini" suffers of the emotional expression and the dynamic enrich- from a quality that is not a sign of imaginative ment that determines artistic value. If this were so, criticism but of sensational impatience.

APRIL 1963 59

www.americanradiohistory.com new from ßv 1-I L,J R originators of scratch -proof high fidelity tone arms

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www.americanradiohistory.com The consumer's guide to new and important high fidelity equipment

high fidelity :: EQUIPMENT REPORTS

Pilot Model 654MA Tuner -Amplifier

tape input. There are also AT A GLANCE: The Pilot 654MA is an FM- multiplex level inputs and a high level and twin -channel integrated amplifier, tape output jacks for feeding a tape recorder. stereo tuner stages chassis facilities for receiving stereo The amplifier section has two preamplification offering on one for RIAA broadcasts as well as equalization, controls, per channel, which include the equalization and mono preamplifier and power amplification for other program sources such phono. The output of a 12AX7 dual triode functions as a tone net- as discs and tapes. Tests, conducted by United States is fed to a second 12AX7 that Inc., indicate that the 654MA is a work driver and first audio amplifier. A third 12AX7 Testing Company, for clean- sounding instrument. It measures provides additional audio gain and phase inverting well- designed, two 7591 by 123/4 inches deep by 51/2 inches the push -pull output stage which incorporates 145/8 inches wide from high. Price, including a black- and gold -colored brass pentodes per channel. Negative feedback is used of the second case, is $329.50. Manufacturer: Pilot Radio Corp., the output transformer to the cathode adjustments are 37 -22 36th St., Long Island City 1, N.Y. audio amplifier. DC and AC balance available for each channel. approxi- IN DETAIL: The 654MA is enclosed in its own attrac- In USTC's tests, the Pilot 654MA delivered tively styled enclosure. It can, however, be custom -in- mately 20 watts per channel before clipping occurred. left channel stalled in almost any kind of cabinet. Operating controls With each channel operating separately, the right channel on its front panel include an FM tuning control, a master clipped at 1,000 cps at 20.4 watts and the volume a stereo balance control, separate bass at 19.5 watts. At these levels the waveform harmonic control, both and treble controls for each channel, a six -position switch distortion for both channels was 0.14 %. With left which serves as a combination function selector and channels operating simultaneously the output of the input selector (phono mono, phono stereo, FM, FM channel dropped only slightly from 20.4 watts to 19.8 stereo, tape stereo, and tape mono), and a two -posi- watts for the same distortion level (0.14 %). The power tion switch that selects one of two phono inputs. bandwidth curve-measured an the left channel with Also included are slide switches for AC power, loudness the output distortion maintained constant at a 0.5% contour, scratch filter, rumble filter, and tape monitor. figure -extended from 23 cps to 12.5 kc. of The FM station dial is a large, across -the -face scale that The frequency response of the amplifier section =171 db is illuminated during use. The set has output taps for the Pilot 654MA was found to be flat within 7 cps 4 -, 8 -, and 16 -ohm speakers as well as output terminals from 10 cps to 10 kc, dropping down to 3 db at the for feeding a derived ( "A+B ") signal to a center and 39 kc. The harmonic distortion, measured on channel speaker. One switched AC convenience outlet is left channel, remained under 1% from 29 cps to 14 kc also provided. Input jacks are supplied for two low at 20.4 watts output, and under 1.5% from 20 cps to 20

Equipment reports are based on laboratory measurements and listening tests. Data for the reports, Inc., on equipment other than loudspeakers, is obtained by the United States Testing Company, 1880, has been a of Hoboken, New Jersey, a completely independent organization which, since leader in product evaluation. Speaker reports are based on controlled listening tests. Occasionally, The of REPORT POLICY a supplementary agency may be invited to contribute to the testing program. choice equipment to be tested rests with the editors of HIGH FIDELITY. No report, or portion thereof, may be reproduced for any purpose or in any form without written permission of the publisher.

APRIL 1963 61

www.americanradiohistory.com o 2 IHFM SENSITIVITY CURVE Power Bandwidth @ 0.5% THD c 0 10 rd 2 4 20.5 Watts Output 20 6 IHFM Sensitivity at 98 mc =3.6 30 E 10 THD Ia 10.25 Watts Output _ Frequency Response 40 12- @ 1.0 Watt Output 14

50 5 16 18 _ 20 ifi 1.0 10 100 1K 10K 10 10' 10' 10' 10' 100K FREQUENCY, CPS TUNER INPUT LEVEL IN MICROVOLTS

20 RIAA EQUALIZATION CHARACTERISTIC 15 -I- 10 5 5 0 0 5 FM MONO FREQUENCY RESPONSE 5 10 1 I I 1 i 10 50 100 300 500 1K 3K 5K 10K 20K 15 FREQUENCY, CPS RIAA Standard 20 Equalization _

20 50 100 300 500 1K 3K 5K 10K 20K

FREQUENCY, (PS I 5 FM STEREO FREQUENCY RESPONSE AND CHANNEL SEPARATION -1- 20 10 I 15 Loudness_ 15 i r 10 R. 20 . 5 __-I E 25 0,1111111111M Loudness 0 _ ;-. 30 5 Scratch Filter 35 10 =_- Ca. : Left Channel PirarM Wale 'LI 40 ' 15 - Right Channel 1 - - -- - 20 TONE AND FILTER CHARACTERISTICS `a 20 50 100 300 500 1K 3K 5K 10K 20K 20-- 50 100 300 500 1K 3K 5K 10K 20K FREQUENCY, CPS FREQUENCY, CPS

kc at 10.2 watts output. Intermodulation distortion on waves was fairly good. The 10 -kc waveform shows some the left channel measured very low, reaching 0.12% at rounding of the leading edge and slight evidence of ring- 4 watts, 0.2% at 10 watts, and less than 0.3% up to ing, but not enough to be considered serious. With a 25 watts. 50 -cps square -wave input, the output waveform had some The tone controls provide approximately 13 db of low frequency phase distortion, which in the amount boost or cut at 100 cps and 10 kc. The scratch and shown is typical of most integrated amplifiers and is rumble filters, as well as the loudness contour, were not too serious. moderate in their effects. The amount of low frequency Measurements on the FM tuner section of the Pilot attenuation provided by the rumble filter is relatively 654MA were made by USTC through the amplifier, small, with the 30 -cps rumble component being reduced with the amplifier supplying approximately one watt of by only 6.5 db. The scratch filter will remove much of audio output. The IHF sensitivity of the tuner was good, the mid -frequency program material, since it operates being 3.6 microvolts at 98 mc, 5.5 microvolts at 90 mc, at the approximate slope of 6 db /octave above 2,000 and 7.5 microvolts at 106 mc. Its audio harmonic distor- cps. The loudness contour. is a fair approximation to the tion was very low, being 0.28% at 400 cps, 0.21% at natural equal -loudness curves. 1,000 cps, and 0.47% at 40 cps. The tuner's signal -to- The amplifier's sensitivity for each of the inputs noise ratio was good (59 db) as was its capture ratio was: tape high level input, 115 mv; magnetic low level (4.5 db). IM distortion was a very low 0.25 %. Its tuning input, 3.3 mv; and magnetic high level input, 13.8 mv. eye gave a slightly erroneous indication of the receiver's The RIAA equalization characteristic of the 654MA proper tuning point, and when tuned to a station solely was very good, being maintained within ± 1.5 db of by using the tuning eye the receiver's harmonic distor- the RIAA standard from 20 cps to 20 kc. The set has tion rose to 0.74 %. When properly tuned to 98 mc, no built -in NAB equalization for use with magnetic tape 90 mc, and 106 mc, the dial reads 0.4 mc low, 0.6 mc heads, but according to Pilot, an approximate NAB low, and 0.7 mc low, respectively. Monophonic fre- equalization will be obtained when the tape head is fed quency response of the tuner was flat within x-1.3 db into the magnetic phono input and the bass control is from 27 cps to 27 kc and was down 3 db at 33 kc. set at the 4 o'clock position to boost the low end of the In FM stereo operation, an indicating light comes on curve. This gives a rough approximation of the NAB when the set is tuned to a station broadcasting a stereo- standard, although for best results when playing recorded phonic program. The distortion level in FM stereo op- tapes, the 654MA should be fed from a tape playback eration was still quite low. On the left channel, the dis- pre amp. tortion was 0.86% at 40 cps, 0.70% at 400 cps, and The amplifier's signal -to -noise ratio was 70 db 0.58% at 1,000 cps. On the right channel the distortion through the tape high level input, 51 db through the was 0.84% at 40 cps, 0.78% at 400 cps, and 0.62% magnetic high level input, and 48 db through the mag- at 1,000 cps. FM stereo frequency response was flat netic low level input. The damping factor of the ampli- on each channel within ± 1 db from 24 cps to 15 kc. fier was favorably high at 5.7. The channel separation, of both channels, was good - The amplifier's response to high frequency square being in excess of 30 db from 80 cps to 2,700 cps, and

62 HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

www.americanradiohistory.com Square -wave response at 50 cps, left, and at 10 kc.

in excess of 20 db from 20 cps across most of the band, All told, the 654MA is quite good as both a tuner dropping to 10 db on the right channel, and 13 db on and an amplifier. It is especially outstanding in its low the left channel, at 15 kc. The output of the 654MA, harmonic distortion, very low intermodulation distor- when operating in stereo, is 2 db down from its mon- tion, and the very good frequency response and channel ophonic output. The 19 -kc pilot and the 38 -kc sub - separation on FM stereo operation. It should serve carrier levels in the tuner output, relative to full output, nicely in many an installation where the convenience of were down 31 db and 29.5 db respectively. having all functions on one chassis is desired.

Pickering Stanton 481A Cartridge;

Model 200 Tone Arm

0.1 gram. AT A GLANCE: One of Pickering's newest "Fluxvalve" markings were found to be accurate within plug that mates magnetic cartridges is the Model 481 Stanton Calibra- The cartridge shell contains a four -prong fast and simple tion Standard, which was tested by United States Testing with the four pins on the cartridge for Inc., in conjunction with the Pickering Model cartridge installation. For other than Pickering cartridges, Company, clips Stanton Unipoise tone arm. The cartridge tested the plug can be removed and the standard spring 200 on contained the Pickering D -4007A stylus assembly (0.7- can be put on the wires for connection to the pins mil diamond), which is designated as the Model 481A. the cartridge. its own built -in arm rest, and Other styli are also available having 0.5 -mil, 1 -mil, and The tone arm contains in two phono jacks that 2.7 -mil diamond tips, and any may be readily slipped its lead -in wires are terminated the cartridge (without tools) for easy replacement. are located, after installation, beneath the turntable into lateral system, the 481A cartridge and the 200 tone arm mounting board. The lead -in wires exert some As a to be top -quality performers. Prices: the 481A force on the tone arm, but they can be arranged proved to which cartridge, $48; Model 200 arm, $36. Manufacturer: Pick- minimize this force to negligible proportions, be done for best results when using ering & Co., Inc., Sunnyside Blvd., Plainview, L.I., N.Y. USTC recommends light tracking forces of 1 or 2 grams. The tone arm IN DETAIL: The Unipoise tone arm, to begin with, has no pronounced resonance frequency above 10 cps, the mounting features a very simple construction with a single pivot and is not too susceptible to jarring of to be of generally bearing. The arm is fashioned of a light hollow alumi- board. USTC considers this tone arm companion num shaft of square cross section. Its front end contains very high quality, and regards it as an ideal a plastic cartridge shell, while a sliding counterweight at to the 481A cartridge. itself is designed to track at the rear is used for adjusting the arm to static equilib- The 481A cartridge rium in the horizontal plane. Additionally, one side of -4- 5 the counterweight is fitted with a round adjustable nut used to balance the arm statically in the vertical plane. 0 5 the arm will sit true on its CHANNEL SEPARATION When correctly balanced FREQUENCY RESPONSE AND II .."31.. 10 single pointed pivot bearing and will be free to move in CHARACTERISTICS all directions without friction. Indeed, when properly á 15 is as S 20 set up, the bearing friction completely negligible, Left Channel _Asa arms. o 25 low or lower than that found in other fine tone Right Channel - - -- ApplI- force is adjusted by moving 30 The cartridge's tracking á y a located between the pivot and d 35 second counterweight, Zero DB = 4.65 mv. the cartridge shell, to the indicated location on the tone 40 arm shaft. Markings are provided on the shaft for set- 20 50 100 300 500 1K 3K 5K 10K 20K ting the tracking force to 1, 2, or 3 grams, and these FREQUENCY, CPS

APRIL 1963 63

www.americanradiohistory.com between 2 and 5 grams, and USTC performance meas- channel and 22 db to the right channel. These are, in urements were made at a 3 -gram tracking force. The sum, among the finest figures yet encountered. cartridge was loaded with 47,000 ohms on each channel. The cartridge's sine -wave distortion was generally As a system, the 481A cartridge in the Pickering 200 tone quite low, as was its IM and square -wave distortion. The arm performed very well, with the cartridge exhibiting cartridge had very low needle talk, extremely high an extremely flat response over most of the range, as compliance, and an excellent ability to track very heavily well as excellent channel separation. modulated grooves. The cartridge provided ± an output Response on the left channel was flat within 1 db level of 4.65 my at 5 cm /sec peak velocity, which is from 50 cps to 11 kc, with a 3.5 -db peak at 15 kc. The high enough to drive any preamplifier. right channel was flat within +2 and -1 db from 50 cps All things considered, the laboratory data and listen- to 11 kc, with a 5 -db peak at 15 kc. Channel balance was ing tests on this cartridge and tone arm indicate that maintained within 0.5 db over the mid -frequency range. each is a very fine product. They mate logically to form The cartridge's channel separation was better than 30 a high -performing pickup system, one that should pro- db at i kc, and better than 22.5 db up to 10 kc. At vide satisfactory service in any high fidelity installation 15 kc, the channel separation was 18 db to the left and be of interest to the discriminating listener.

EICO RP -100 Series

Tape Recorder

AT A GLANCE: The RP -100 by EICO is a quarter - hysteresis synchronous motor for the capstan drive, and track, two -speed stereo /mono tape deck with built -in two four -pole induction motors for the supply and record /playback transistorized preamplifiers. It is avail- take -up reels. Speed change between 71/2 and 33/4 ips is able as a factory -wired and -assembled unit (Model accomplished by a push -pull knob that causes the RP -100W, $399.95) or as a "semi -kit" (Model RP -100K, drive belt to shift between two steps on the pulley $299.95). In the latter version, the tape transport is of the capstan -drive motor. USTC found that this preassembled; the buyer wires the electronic sections speed- change method in the RP -100 worked with unusual and then connects them to the transport for the smoothness. The drive belt, incidentally, is looped finished product. The completed recorder may be around a massive capstan flywheel, designed to impart installed in a number of ways as well as carried about. smooth and silent motion to the transport. An optional carrying case costs $29.95; an optional rack The transport is electrically operated by pushbutton mount accessory costs $9.95. No microphones are fur- controls. Electro- dynamic braking is applied to the reel nished. To listen to the RP -100 requires an external motors, and electro- dynamic holdback tension to the amplifier and speaker system, or headphones. supply reel. Solenoid- operated tape lifters (for the fast Tests of the semi -kit version conducted by United forward and rewind modes), a solenoid- operated pinch - States Testing Company, Inc., indicate that the RP -100 roller, and mechanical flutter filter are featured. An is a well -designed unit that boasts many worthwhile automatic stop mechanism operates in the play or features. Manufacturer: Electronic Instrument Co., Inc., record mode, but not in fast forward or rewind. 3300 Northern Blvd., Long Island City 1, N.Y. The control buttons are mechanically interlocked to prevent going from one operating mode to another IN DETAIL: The EICO RP -100 is an extremely versatile without first going through the stop position. While in and smooth -running tape machine. It provides stereo or the stop position, the tape lifters are not activated and monophonic quarter -track ( "four- track ") erase, record, the playback preamps are on, permitting easy cuing and playback. It also can play half -track stereo and and editing of the tape. mono recorded tapes. It can be used for sound -on- The three magnetic heads (erase, record, and play- sound recording quite conveniently, and its separate back) are arranged along an arc so that the tape assumes record and playback heads permit monitoring off the an angular wrap around them, eliminating the need for tape being recorded. Separate line and microphone input pressure pads. This arrangement also was found to level controls are furnished for each channel to permit make threading of the tape somewhat easier on the adjustments for mixing and recording levels. Each RP -100 than on many other decks. channel has its own signal level meter. The deck, Variations in line voltage had no noticeable effect over -all, is handsomely styled and all controls are on the operation of the tape deck, which ran somewhat neatly and logically arranged. Maximum reel size is fast at both speeds (1.2% fast at 7.5 ips and 1.3% fast seven inches. Two speeds -71 and 33/4 inches per at 3.75 ips). Wow and flutter were moderate, being second -are provided. measured as 0.12% and 0.25% respectively at 7.5 ips, The transport is powered by three motors: a and 0.22% and 0.3% respectively at 3.75 ips. The re-

64 HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

www.americanradiohistory.com { Left Channel Right Channel -1- 10 - 5 ó RECORD/PLAYBACK FREQUENCY RESPONSE AT 7.5 IPS z 5 o liwormgias 5 0 5 10 °d Left Channel 10 _Right Channel -- -20 50 100 300 500 1K 3K 5K 10K 20K RECORD/PLAYBACK FREQUENCY RESPONSE AT 3.75 IPS FREQUENCY, CPS 20 50 100 300 500 1K 3K 5K 10K 20K

FREQUENCY, CPS Right Channel - - -- Left Channel FREQUENCY RESPONSE AT 7.5 IPS ç b PLAYBACK DISTORTION AT 3.15 IPS z -1- 5 TOTAL HARMONIC / o ° 5 0 Right Channel W Left Channel -- 20 50 100 300 500 1K 3K 5K 10K 20K 20 50 l00 300 500 1K 3K 5K 10K 20K FREQUENCY, CPS FREQUENCY, CPS

O 2.1 volts on z a put levels (with a 700 -cps -VU signal) of 1 I I I I 1 TOTAL HARMONIC DISTORTION AT 7.5 IPS the left channel, and 3.1 volts on the right channel, which is a difference of about 3.4 db. The recorder's playback response was flat on the left channel within ±2 db from 80 cps to 10.5 kc, and within ±4.5 db from Left Channel Right Channel -- 50 cps to 15 kc. The response of the right channel was á 20 50 100 300 500 1K 3K 5K 10K 20K generally similar to the left channel. at 7.5 FREQUENCY, CPS The record /playback frequency response ips was flat within ±2.5 db from 23 cps to 12.5 kc on the left channel. and from 26 cps to 16 kc on the right and fast forward time was 45 seconds for a seven - wind channel. At 3.75 ips, the left channel had flat response 1,200 -foot reel of tape, which is comparatively inch, within db from about 70 cps to 10 kc, while the the automatic stop mechanism is ±3 fast. Inasmuch as right channel's response was uniform within -!-4 db inoperative in the fast forward and rewind modes, from 80 to 11 kc. that the operator be on hand to stop cps USTC advises The harmonic distortion of the recorder was less the deck when the end of the tape is reached. The than 3% from 50 cps to 11 kc at 7.5 ips, and less than transport's ability to handle tape was considered very 4% from 60 cps to 9 kc at 3.75 ips. These measure- the tape could be started and stopped quickly good, and ments, as well as the record /playback response measure- without developing spillage or slack. were with signals recorded at -10 of the RP -100- ments, performed Associated with the electronics At recorded levels, the distortion rises, and and two signal level VU. higher in addition to the six push buttons at 700 cps (7.5 ips tape speed) microphone, and playback the 3% distortion point meters -are ganged line, occurs at -0.4 VU on the left channel and at -1.5 VU channel, separate recording and level controls for each on the right channel. The recorder had a very favorable switches. and separate re- playback equalization selector signal -to -noise ratio. On playback it was 48 db on the mode selector switches. The cording and playback left channel (re 0 VU) and 51 db on the right channel. selector switch has positions for making recording mode The record /playback signal -to -noise ratio was about 3 db sound -on -sound recordings on either channel without the from less on each channel. necessity of making external patch cord connections The recorder's IM distortion was clocked at 5% IM to the input to the second the output of one channel on each channel at the normal recording level of -10 microphone input connectors provided on channel. The VU, which is satisfactory for this class of equipment. screw -on type rather than the the front panel are the Peak recording levels, up to 0 VU. introduced higher microphone preampli- more common phone jacks. The IM and 30% on the left and right channels, re- for use with high -18% fiers in the recorder are designed should be avoided when recording on only, and crystal or spectively -and impedance dynamic microphones the RP -100. will not give as good results with ceramic microphones All in all, USTC concludes that the RP -100 is a this recorder. well -built machine that has a great deal of flexibility. RP -100 uses 4 PNP The recording amplifier in the The RP -I00 should appeal to the home recordist whose transistors per channel, and the recording level meter may not be professional, but is meter. interest in tape recording circuit includes an adjustment for calibrating the certainly more than casual. The 70 -kc push -pull bias -erase oscillator uses a 6BX7 dual triode tube, with the B+ for the tube obtained from a 6X4 rectifier supply. Bias level adjustment po- tentiometers are provided in the recording amplifier so How It Went Together that peak high frequency performance can be obtained from the recorder. The playback preamplifier contains The individual steps in the assembly and wiring of the 3 PNP transistors per channel. Power for the transistor RP -100 are simple enough and instructions in the manual circuits in the RP -100 is supplied from a full -wave are readily followed, but the stacked construction of selenium rectifier. A second rectifier circuit supplies the unit- necessary for fitting all parts into place - the necessary DC power to operate the pinch -roller makes it difficult to check possible wiring errors after solenoid and the electro- dynamic brakes. assembly or (as happened with our samples) to locate To facilitate head alignment and bias adjustment, a a couple of defective capacitors and a shorted head cable 10 -kc alignment tape is supplied with the RP -100, and that had inadvertently been supplied with the kit. While if the instructions in the manual are followed carefully, an experienced kit builder would have relatively no alignment of the RP -I00 is fairly simple. If an AC trouble in this regard, the rank novice might be confused VTVM (vacuum -tube voltmeter) is available, it will and would probably have to consult the manufacturer facilitate an accurate alignment. for advice. Total construction time, including the minor In USTC's tests, the RP -I00 provided maximum out- trouble -shooting mentioned, was thirty hours.

APRIL 1963 65

www.americanradiohistory.com Audio Dynamics Model ADC -18 Speaker System

AT A GLANCE: Audio Dynamics, known for the ADC cartridges and the Pritchard tone arm, has introduced a line of high quality loudspeakers that incorporate novel design features such as the use of a rectangular- shaped woofer. The differences in the speakers (the ADC -14, ADC -16, and ADC -18) are confined to the extreme reaches of the bass response and relate directly to the size of the enclosure. The ADC -18, tested for this report, is a two -way system housed in a handsome walnut cabinet that is 40 inches high, 17 inches wide, and 121/2 inches deep. It is a very smooth. natural- sounding speaker system that strikes us as one of the finest presently available. Price is $250. Manufacturer: Audio Dynamics Corp., Pickett District Rd., New Milford, Conn.

IN DETAIL: It is evident by now that a deliberate and successful attempt is in progress to upgrade the design and performance of "conventional" speakers -that is, speakers that operate on the electromagnetic voice -coil pliance. of the suspension is enhanced by the fact that and diaphragm principle. A major part of this effort the surround is impregnated with silicone rubber. The involves the material of which the diaphragm is made; woofer magnet is a ceramic type, weighing nine pounds. the traditional paper cone increasingly is being supple- The tweeter employs a one -and -a- half -inch voice -coil mented with, or supplanted by, new materials -of which that drives a very light diaphragm made of Mylar. The expanded polystyrene foam is the most used. The new diaphragm is round. and curved outward to provide a speakers from Audio Dynamics exemplify this trend wide angle of treble dispersion. and introduce some design twists of their own, all of The cabinet itself is rock -solid and its inner walls which combine to produce speakers of great merit and are heavily lined with sound- absorbent material. It is commendable performance. Any of the three is more completely sealed except for a small aperture that ap- than satisfactory in its size and price class. but the plies some resistive loading to the rear of the woofer. ADC -18 in particular appears to be an outstanding re- The response of the ADC -18 was extremely clean and producer from any standpoint, one that is suited for the smooth throughout its range, which is estimated to ex- finest of home music systems. tend from below 30 cps to beyond audibility. The bass It is a two -way system in which the woofer and line was in general clear and well defined. Distortion did tweeter are designed to overlap in response between not become apparent unless the speaker was driven very 1,000 and 4,000 cycles per second by means of their hard in the 30 -cycle region. With the doubling that design well as as by the dividing network that is em- occurs as the input signai is increased, or with the natural ployed. The woofer has a natural roll -off toward 4 kc, roll -off that takes place with no increase in input signal, and the tweeter down to 1 kc. The aim of this approach the woofer continued to respond to an indeterminate is to smooth the midrange response and to reduce dis- point below 30 cps. Throughout the midrange and tortion. The network is installed within the enclosure, highs, the ADC -18 was uniformly clean and smooth, and both tweeter and woofer radiate directly into the with only a few negligible variations. listening area from behind an attractive grille cloth. The The highs seemed widely dispersed and open -sounding nominal impedance of the ADC -18 is not critical, and from virtually any position one would normally listen is given as 8 to 16 ohms. The system is of moderate in, and at varying distances from the speaker. Reproduc- efficiency and can be driven by amplifiers rated from ing white noise, the speaker's characteristic sound quality 10 to 65 watts power output per channel. was smooth and subdued, indicating a minimum of The woofer is made of expanded polystyrene foam acoustic coloration. Transient response was crisp and shaped as a rectangle with slightly rounded corners. clean, with no audible hangover or ringing effects. This shape naturally provides a larger radiating area The ADC -18's reproduction of program material was than a round woofer of the same diameter as the di- eminently satisfying. The initial impression of listening mension across the width of the ADC woofer. The shape to music through the ADC -18 was one of immediate also contributes, according to the designer, to the acceptance, and this impression has been strengthened speaker's piston action and linearity of response. The after weeks of listening. The speaker does not favor one woofer diaphragm is attached to the voice -coil in the type of music. or one family of instruments, over an- usual manner, but its outer edge is attached directly to other. It is an impartial, honest, transparent reproducer the front panel of the enclosure by means of a soft that seems to render no more or less than what is fed cloth "surround." The resiliency, and thus the com- into it. Its tonal range is very nicely balanced: the bass has ample impact; the midrange and highs are clean and airy. There is virtually no trace in its sound of REPORTS IN PROGRESS boxiness or any "canned' quality. A pair of ADC -18s enhance monophonic material, and provide excellent stereo. And not to be overlooked is the fact that its Heathkit GR -22 TV Receiver superior sound emanates from a handsome, sculpture - like cabinet. The ADC -18, in sum, is very easy to listen Marantz 8B Basic Amplifier to and live with, and is a worthy complement to the ADC cartridge itself.

66 HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

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Each McIntosh is unconditionally protected for 3 years. and connec- Every transformer, capacitor, resistor, diode, McIntosh Laboratory, Inc. tor is guaranteed for 3 years from date of purchase. Tubes 2 Chambers Street and fuses alone are excepted. For example, if you invest in Binghamton, New York McIntosh in September 1962, your investment is protected Please send me full information on McIntosh stereo until September 1965! instruments. You have merely to register your equipment at McIntosh Laboratory Inc., 2 Chambers Street, Binghamton, New York to qualify for this protection. Name....._ Can you really afford anything less per- than McIntosh Address.....___ formance, quality, reliability -in short, McIntosh protection? Send this coupon for full information on McIntosh Ampli- City._ State._.._ fiers, Tuners, and Preamplifiers. CIRCLE 65 ON READER -SERVICE CARD

www.americanradiohistory.com COLUMBIA o REG(_)RllS Only rarely do the performance and its reproduction match the quality of the music itself. Here are just such achievements to which initiates turn and connoisseurs return again and again.

Ai #s+t Jll/i il >ru ,'s%1" a . x lit 4r14 r

The world's most stirring patriotic anthems, Doris Day and Robert Goulet, recording A new English translation of Franz Lehár's the glorious voices of the mighty Mormons, together for the first time, are right on tar- ever -popular operetta . . . brilliantly per- Eugene Ormandy and The Philadelphia Or- get in a lively, newly orchestrated re -crea- formed by singing stars Lisa Della Casa and chestra. tion of Irving Berlin's celebrated Broadway John Reardon. classic.

HSxoEREO uxo HSAEREQy souxa `i¡ NEW RECORDINO -IN ENOLISR CJ THIS IS MY COUNTRY OF ONE OF TRE WORLD'S GETYOUR EEST -LOVED THE MORMON TABERNACLE CHOIR ROBERT OPERETTAS RICHARD P. CDNDIE, DIRECTOR { AIE iD LISA DELLA CASA JOHN REARDON THE PHILADELPHIA ORCHESTRA EUGENE ORMANDY, CONDUCTOR

THE STAR -SPANGLED BANNER THIS IS MY COUNTRY FIALAHOJA- LAND Of HOPE AND GLORY CIVE ME YOUR TIRED, YOUR POOR

HATIBVA - THE MAPLE LEAF FOR EVER- AMERICA, THE BEAUTIFUL THE MARSEILLAISE 0 COLUMBIA THE GEM OF THE OCEAN A

BY FRANZ LEHAR

Kell, Brown LAUREL BURLEY 'CHARLES E. L DAMS

F, Orchestre & Chorus PAUL TRABER HOWARDEARL PAUL RICHARDS Under Direction of

-K Franz Allers ,': - THE AMERICAN OPERA SOCIETY ORCHESTRA AND CHORUS x,u,,. enueu. aeon FRANZ ALLERS, CONDUCTOR

Unprecedented . . . in musical substance, Here is the astounding young pianist whose Available on one LP for the first time. Gus- audience reaction and critical acclaim. An alternately lyric and pyrptechnic display of tav Mahler's magnificent work interpreted all Prokofiev program brilliantly performed virtuosity at his Philharmonic Hall debut with unique artistry and unprecedented au- by pianist Sviatoslav Richter. inspired a six minute standing ovation. thority by Bruno Walter conducting the New York Philharmonic.

¡TEREOLj <-117;57,5,91-* SVIATOSLAY PRESENTS RICHER E EXCTNGIIE DEBTUTH MAHLER: DAS LIED VON DER ERDE Ai CARNEGIE HALL ANDRE WATTSLATING COMPLETE ON ONE RECORD -r Mmeme n MILDRED flEg01'dBll IO MILLER,oz0. o ERNST HAFLIGERnew LISZT PIANO CONCERTO NEW YORK Pelto?mBee NO.1 IN E PHILHARMONIC I FLAT'wini EAAAH1,- of LEONARD BERNSTEIN a1^ , I All PnKmeu morn NEW YORK PHILHARMONIC IiMR Ma I SàA3S MM.I LISZT IINCM YIBMNI LES PRELUDES HAlll (SYMPHONIC POEM) tMMArMMR YIMIrM1Jrrelwow Ihwl.Nn..IllY1ir PRYER nIE1YErY

CIRCLE: 26 ON READER -SERVICE CARD 68 HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

www.americanradiohistory.com eskers by ROLAND GELATT

SIXTY YEARS AGO this month, the far from ordinary. Instead of the pianist appeared on a televised Young Columbia Phonograph Company took usual V- shaped formation, the grooves People's Concert, playing the Liszt E full -page advertisements in Amer- had the look of a flat, shallow trough. flat Concerto under Leonard Bern - ica's leading magazines to "announce Graham asked the lab to furnish him stein's direction. He played it so well a most extraordinary achievement, with a truncated stylus -that is, a that when Glenn Gould fell ill and marking an epoch in the art of re- stylus with its tip sawed off -and the canceled a series of performances as cording and reproducing sound." This difference, he says, was startling. soloist with the New York Philhar- epochal undertaking was a series of "Suddenly I was getting tone and pres- monic, Andre Watts was asked to sub- Grand Opera Records, selling at $2.00 ence instead of surface noise." stitute in his place. And he substi- per single -sided ten -inch disc. The Having found the proper stylus tuted so well that Columbia promptly artists were reigning luminaries at the width and shape, Graham copied the recorded the performance and signed Metropolitan Opera -among them, the thirty -two records onto 15 -ips tape him up to a contract. Our spy at the basso Edouard de Reszke (then on the without introducing any equalization recording session reports that Watts verge of retirement), the contralto whatsoever. The precious discs were showed the unruffled assurance of a Ernestine Schumann -Heink (long be- then sent back to the library and the veteran and that his approach to Liszt fore she had become America's sym- job of electronic rehabilitation began. -delicate, singing, classically poised bolic grandmother), the soprano Mar- By boosting some frequencies and at- -turned out to be the antithesis of cella Sembrich. tenuating others, Graham was able to what one might normally expect from It was an impressive constellation bring voices forward and minimize a musician of his age and generation. of singers, and Columbia paid dearly surface scratch. Amazingly, he discov- The Liszt concerto, coupled with Les for their services. (Sembrich report- ered that the upper-frequency range Préludes, is being rushed into produc- edly received $3,000 for her three ten - of these ancient recordings went be- tion and should be on sale by the time inch discs.) But as sometimes happens yond 5,000 cycles; and because of this this issue appears. in the unpredictable record business, unexpectedly high top limit, he did customers proved hard to find. On the not allow his filters to cut in below THE ERSTWHILE head of West- acoustic phonographs of the time, Co- 6,000 cycles. Some surface noise thus minster Records, an Americanized lumbia's piano -accompanied record- inevitably comes through, but at least Londoner named James Grayson, is ings sounded scratchy and faint, and nothing is missing from the originals. back at his old desk -a classic case the poor sonics were probably largely Each selection in the series pre- of the man and the job being insepa- to blame for the disappointing sales. sented a different problem, for. Co- rable. Grayson was president of West- At any rate, within a few years the lumbia's 1903 enginers were obvious- minster from its founding in Novem- records had completely disappeared ly working by trial and error. Some- ber 1949 until the firm ran into finan- from view. times the voice predominates, some- cial difficulties ten years later, and Now the whole series of thirty -two times the piano; sometimes the during that decade he was largely re- records is being revived on micro- sound is forward, sometimes distant. sponsible for the characteristic West- groove, in an album entitled "The Graham's task was to smooth out these minster "image" -Bach and Handel 1903 Grand Opera Series," due from variations as much as possible. Un- from Scherchen, Schubert from Columbia this month. And they no doubtedly the most time- consuming Badura -Skoda and Demus, Haydn longer sound scratchy and faint. For record in the lot was Giuseppe Cam - from the Vienna Konzerthaus Quartet, this we have to thank the engineer in panari's rendition of the Largo al Couperin from Cuenod. Now, after a charge of the project, Edward ( "Bud- factotum. The New York Public Li- hiatus of three years, the new dy") Graham, who has accomplished brary's pressing had a large crack, owners of Westminster- ABC -Para- an incredible job of sonic resuscita- but you will never suspect this in its mount Records -have asked him to tion. Graham was obliged to work reincarnation on LP; the offending return as managing director. Grayson from scratch in the most literal sense, noises-225 of them -were all neatly agreed to come back, on condition for Columbia's masters had long since removed from the tape. Altogether, that he could continue to run the been melted down, and the only avail- this is a superb demonstration of the Music Guild, founded in 1961. able "source" was a set of the sixty - sound that can be coaxed from old Plans for new recordings are high year -old records in the New York Pub- recordings. And the performances on Grayson's agenda. When we spoke lic Library's collection. themselves, with their stentorian with him, the plans were still fairly "My heart sank when I first listened spoken introductions, are of tremen- nebulous, though a spring trip to Eu- to them," Graham confesses. "The dous historical and musical interest. rope-for the purpose of auditioning surface noise was excruciating, and it new artists and supervising recordings seemed like a hopeless undertaking." CONCURRENTLY with this dip into -had already been mapped out. For that first playback, Graham had the past, Columbia is staking out a From the hints that were dropped, we used an ordinary 3 -mil stylus. But claim to the future -as embodied in had the very definite impression that closer observation revealed that the the sixteen -year -old person of Andre Westminster's old image would soon grooves on these 1903 pressings were Watts. In mid -January, this young reassert itself.

APRIL 1963 69

www.americanradiohistory.com A Special Offer Spotlighting Angel's Stereo Supremacy

HERE ARE JUST A FEW OF THE HUNDREDS OF TITLES INCLUDED IN THIS SPRING STEREO BONUS OFFER:

BACH Brandenburg Concertos - Klemperer, PhO .5.3627 -B BEETHOVEN Piano Con. No. 1- Arrau, Galliera, PhD S -35723 ANGEL SPRING Piana Con. No. 4 - Gilets, Ludwig, PhD S -35511 Piano Con. No. 5 ( "Emperor ") - Arrau, Galliera, PhD S -35722 Symphonies (Al - Klemperer, PhO S- 3619 41 Also available separately:)

Sym. Nos. 1 & 8 5.35657 Sym. No. 2; Coriolan: Prometheus S-35658 Sym. No. 3 ("Eroica "i S -35853 Sym. No. 4: Consecration of the House S -35661 SmIFO ß0.105 Sym. No. 5 S-35843 Spi. No. 6 ( "Pastorale ") S-35711 Sym. No. 7 S -35945 Sym. No. 9 ( "Choral" ); Egmont Music 5.3577.8 Triple Concerto - Oistrakh Trio, Sargent, PhD S -35697 Violin Con. - Milstein, Leinsdorf, PhD S -35783 BIZET l'Arlésienne & Carmen Suites - Karajan, PhD S-35618 BRAHMS Double Concerto - Oistrakh, Fournier, Galliera S -35353 GET Piano Con. No. 1 Arrau, ONE - Giulini, PhD S -35892 ORCHESTRAL DISC Symphonies (4) - Klemperer, PhO S- 3614 -D (Also available separately:/ Sym. No. 1 S -35481 Sym. No. 2; Tragic Overture 5.35532 Sym. No. 3; Academic Festival Overture 5-35545 Sym. No. 4 5 -35546 BRUCKNER Sym. No. 7 - Klemperer, PhD i with Wagner) S- 3626 -8 DVORAK Cello Con. - Starker, Susskind, PhD S -35417 Sym. No. 4; Scherzo Capriccioso - Giulini, PhO S -35847 Sym. No. 5 ( "New World ") - Karajan, PhD S -35615 GRIEG Peer Gynt - Beecham, RPO 535445 Piano Con. - Cziffra, Vandernoot, PhD (with Liszt) 5.35738 HANDEL Love in Bath - Beecham, RPO 5.35504 HAYON Cello Con. - Starker, Giulini, PhO (with Boccherini) S -35725 Sym: Nos. 98 6 101 ( "Clock ") - Klemperer, PhD S -35872 HINDEMITH Mathis der Maler - Karajan, Berlin Phil. twith Bartok) S-35949 LISZT Les Preludes, Tasso - Silvestri, PhD 5-35636 Piano Concertos Nos 1 & 2 - Francois, Silvestri, PhO S-35901 MAHLER Sym. No. 1 - Kletzki, Vienna Phil. S-35913 Sym. No. 2 ( "Resurrection ") - Klemperer, PhD 'S- 3634 -B Sym. No. - 4 Klemperer, Schwarzkopf, PhD S -35829 MENDELSSOHN Midsummer Night's Dream - Klemperer, PhO S -35881 Sym. No. 3 ( "Scotch "); Hebrides- Klemperer, PhD 5.35880 Violin Con. - Milstein, Barzin, PhO (with Bruch) S -35730 MOZART Horn Concertos (4)- Civil, Klemperer, PhO 5 -35689 Serenade 'Ei ne kleine Nachtmusik"; German Dances; Ave Verum - Karajan, Berlin Phil. with Handel) 5.35948 Sym. Nos. 25 6 40 - Klemperer, PhD 5.35407 Violin Concertos Nos. 3 & 5 - Menuhin, Bath Fest. S -35745 POULENC Concert Champetre; Two -Piano Concerto - Van de Wiele, Poulenc, Février, Pretre, Paris Cons. 'S -35993 WITH EVERY TWO YOU Organ BUY* Con.; Gloria - Duruflé, Pretre, Carteri, RTF S -35953 -O)' "(IUD':AL WI -III III'_AI I'I2 PROKOFIEV Cinderella -Irving, RPO S.35529 Sym. No. 5 - Schippers, PhO S -35527 RACHMANINOFF Piano Con. No. 2 - Lympaay, Sargent, RPO S -35736 RAVEL Daphnis and Chloe (Suite No. 2); Alborada del Gracioso - Giulini, PhO (with Falla) S-35820 Piano Concertos in G & for Left Hand - Francois, In proud Cluytens, Paris Cons. 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No, 5 - Barbirolli, PhD S -35952 other orchestral VIVALDI II works Cimento dell'Armonia e dell'Invenzione - reproduced honestly, Virtuosi di Roma 5.3611.0 The Seasons (from above) S -35877 violin Concertos (4) - Milstein S -36001 WAGNER Klemperer Conducts Wagner - without engineering gimmicks, in concert -hall Klemperer, PhO S- 3610 -B The Orchestral Wagner - Sawallisch, PhO S-35755 A Wagner Program - Klemperer, PhD S-35947 WEBER Overtures (7) - Sawallisch, PhD S-35754 realism... recordings that will stand COLLECTIONS: supreme in Beecham: Lollipops - RPO S -35506 Beecham: Lollipops (Vol. 2) - RN) S -35865 Karajan: Opera Intermezzi - PhO S-35793 your classical library for years Kempe: Háry Janos (Suite); music by to come. Gotovac & Tchaikovsky 5.35975 Kempe: Treasures of Vienna - Vienna Phil, S -35851 Klemperer: Three -Penny Opera Suite; Klemperér's See . . Merry Waltz; music J. your by Strauss S -35927 dealer today. he has Milstein: Music of Old Russia - Irving S -36002 Pretre: Russian Orchestral Masterpieces - RPO S -35951 Sargent: English Ballets of the 20th Century RPO - S -35889 these albums in stock now, in limited PhD = Philharmonia Orchestra. 'To be released April 1. RPO = Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. quantities. CIRCLE 8 ON READER- SERVICE CARD 70 HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

www.americanradiohistory.com PAUL AFFELDER NATHAN BRODER O. B. BRUMMELL R. D. DARRELL ALFRED FRANKENSTEIN reviewed by HARRIS GOLDSMITH JOHN F. INDCOX Records ROBERT C. MARSH CONRAD L. OSBORNE in ERIC SALZMAN JOHN S. WILSON Review

For the First Time on Records,

Siegfried in Its Entirety

by Conrad L. Osborne

Photo: Donald Southern Nilsson and Windgassen, at Covent Garden.

the vocal IN TERMS of living performance, Sieg- singing -actor (assuming. for the sake of who has managed to overcome he must fried is the most problematic of all the argument. that he cares a damn) is and musical difficulties that who Siegfried is, operas of the Ring cycle. if not of Wag - given almost none of the usual guide now think about just ner's whole output. All his operas suffer lines by which to operate in building a and you are asking to be pitched out of the virtual because today's audiences find it hard to characterization. The essential thing the studio window.) Add in the very accept a more or less literal representa- about Siegfried is that he is, when we impossibility of ideal casting problems tion of such improbabilities as a swan - meet him, a person with no previous long title role to the staging the boat or a cap that transforms dwarfs into experience in human relations save that posed by the fight with the dragon, toads; hence the nonrepresentational di- gained from his years spent in the depths forging of the sword, and such episodes rection taken by the Wagner grandsons of the forest with the Nibelung Mime. -to say nothing of the casting of the the at Bayreuth. But Siegfried suffers most Thus, an actor playing the role must re- other roles -and one can recognize of all. for its action (or its stage busi- move from his characterization all re- unlikelihood of ever seeing the thing ness, perhaps I should say) consists actions which might depend on, let us believably brought off. almost entirely of just such goings -on, say, childhood relations with mother or But what a score it is! No advertising supplemented by dialogues that, super- father, or any sort of experience with copy is needed at this date for such mag- ficially, seem nothing but rehashes of the opposite sex (down to mere knowl- nificent passages as the Forging Song, last week's installment. edge of its existence). If an actor were the Forest Murmurs, or the final duet. The first act is especially difficult, con- really to succeed in this. there would be It is. rather, the scenes most often sisting entirely of conversation between nothing at all laughable about even the slighted that can now inspire admiration an old whimpering dwarf and a young famous line "Das ist kein Mann! " -in as, thanks to London. we are able for bullying muscleman (both tenors). in- fact, Siegfried's wonderment at his own the first time to listen to and study the terrupted by another conversation be- perceptions and feelings throughout the opera at some leisure. The long "Riddle tween the dwarf and a one -eyed god in final scene would be extremely moving. Scene" between Mime and The Wanderer disguise, and climaxed by a scene in But such a characterization would re- is really a wonderful piece of writing. which the muscleman forges, in plain quire careful rethinking of practically The charges that it is "undramatic" or view, a sword out of some fragments, every line of the role; it is an acting "repetitive" are silly in the extreme; just and then splits the anvil in two with it. challenge of the first order. And all as Wotan's long monologue in Die Wai- This act, like the rest of the opera, is this, to be convincing, from a man who kiire is not primarily about the preceding dominated by the character of the young looks the part and who has a voice of events of the cycle, but about Wotan Siegfried- without doubt the most dif- extraordinary size, range, resonance, and himself and the nature of his relation- ficult of all the Wagnerian roles to rep- endurance. (Simply memorizing the part ship with Brünnhilde, so is this scene resent convincingly. This is because the is work enough; suggest to any tenor devised chiefly for purposes other than

APRIL 1963 71

www.americanradiohistory.com synopsis. To begin with, of course, it The cast is not ideal, but it's as close singing only by stretching a point. It introduces Wotan in his new guise, and as one could reasonably expect. Wind - ends by sounding overdrawn. The case with his new (quite different) way of gassen, of course, leaves something to need not be stated so strongly-there is looking at things -the establishment of be desired in the title role. His voice plenty of characterization in the music, such a turn in character development is is really of a sort that, in an era of and even if it were sung perfectly itself justification for the scene. In ad- great dramatic singing, would be as- "straight," we would get the point. But dition, it moves the action forward by signed to the lighter Wagnerian roles - there is, anyway, a difference between bringing to Mime the information that Erik, Lohengrin, Walther, probably Par - a character role in Wagner and a char- only a hero who has never known fear sifal -but which would sensibly be kept acter role in Berg; the former ought to can forge the fragments of Nothung. away from Siegfried. His tenor is just be sung, however one chooses to char- And it serves as a final, concise look at not the ringing, heroic instrument called acterize it. After all, we have to listen the world order that will, before the for and will inevitably create a some- to this fellow pretty constantly for about opera is over, be overthrown. what undernourished impression. Yet he two hours. Within his framework, Stolze In any case, one can never separate has been far and away the best Wag- works ingeniously, but it is not to my the dramatic function of an operatic nerian tenor before the public over the taste. Neidlinger is at least as fine here scene from the music. Here, the music, past decade, and even the best Siegfried. as he is on the Rheingold recording - with its recapitulation of themes associ- He never descends into beefy bellowing; easily the best Alberich I've ever heard, ated with the Nibelungs, the Giants, the the voice is always focused and clear, and the only one of whom I could hon- Wälsungs, the Sword, and the young sometimes constricted, but sometimes estly say, purely on the evidence of his Siegfried, not only "sums up" the previ- possessed of a fine resonance. Musical- work in this role, that he's a good singer. ous action, but forces an emotional rely, he is close to flawless; his treatment Höffgen is a stylish, poised Erda. Her turn to them, reminds us of their mean- of the text is intelligent and sometimes voice lacks the deep, quiet contralto ing for us. This is an almost essential insightful; his phrasing is tasteful. He quality I would like to hear in the part, device of a drama laid out as a cycle, makes the most of the lyric moments and but her singing is round in tone and and the most valid raison d'être for the surmounts the final scene in quite an captures the general atmosphere of her whole leitmotiv system. It is Wagner's impressive fashion. Even in the more scene. Sutherland, sounding very fresh recurrent use of the device that is respon- heroic sections, where his tenor is out- and free, is welcome lagniappe as the sible for much of the Ring's massive, matched, he refuses to apply extra muscle Forest Bird, and Böhme booms impres- epical effect; such scenes actually serve to make his voice something it isn't. sively through his speaking- trumpet. to frame the drama and clarify its struc- This is not a great performance, but a On the basis of the sound offered by ture -which is why the Ring operas gen- Likable one that commands respect, and the final advance pressings, I should say erally seem longer, rather than shorter, one that could not be surpassed by any the set will be up to the company's best when these scenes are cut. other current Heldentenor. operatic standard. London has struck an None of them is cut in this, the first Nilsson is splendid. As in the case excellent vocal /orchestral balance in the Siegfried on records (except for the mar- with most really imposing voices, her set, avoiding both the singer- dominated velous old HMV -Victor 78s of roughly soprano never sounds quite as exciting sound of the older type of recording and half the opera). In fact, not a bar of the on records as it does in the opera house, the orchestra -ruled sound of some of its whole long score (1,163 pages in the and there is little really exceptional recent sets. Neidlinger, Nilsson, and Eulenberg miniature edition) is omitted, about the purely aural aspects of her Hotter all seem in fine relation to the and we are thus three -fourths of the impersonation, as there is about the remarkably clear, warm orchestral sound; way towards a truly complete, technically visual. However, the cool, balanced Windgassen and Stolze are sometimes up -to -date Ring. The performance here quality of the voice, its remarkable true- not present enough. I must observe would be difficult to improve on these ness to pitch, and its uncommon steadi- again that, with only the sound of days, and no one should hesitate to in- ness are here, as is her lovely phrasing an opera to go by, we must hear the vest in it. It has an exciting conductor, and unusually easy handling of "Etiw'ig singers more clearly and consistently an excellent Brünnhilde, a superb Al- war ich," and the really stunning high than we do in the theatre if they are to berich, and very respectable performers Bs and Cs (the last one held for con- make any impression. This is, though, in all the other roles. siderably longer than its indicated value). to some extent a question of individual Siegfried is, to my mind, Solti's finest I would like to be enthusiastic about taste, and Siegfried at least contains no recorded accomplishment to date. There Hotter's performance, since he is an instances of singers swept out of the is no capriciousness of tempo, no attempt artist of real stature, but I can only say picture by the orchestra. The special at "individualizing" accent. The reading that his performance has all the ex- effects create a good impression of is extremely brisk and clear, so much pectable attributes of intelligence, sen- physical presence-the hammer clanks so that it occasionally misses some of the sitivity, and a feel for the grand line. on the anvil with a jarring impact, and repose and warmth that one would His voice (which sounded so good in Nothung cleaves the anvil in two with a imagine Furtwängler bringing to it -I the low keys of the recent DGG Win - satisfying swipe. The question of per- am thinking mainly of some of the terreise) is here a very worn -sounding spective is again arguable: I wish Erda quieter moments in Act II. But it moves one. Most of the color has fled from would sing her first line ( "Stark ruft das so beautifully and logically, and with his tone, leaving an unrelieved grayness Lied ") up close, rather than from a such a fine sense of proportion among of timbre, and he is unable to keep his distance, and I wish the Wanderer the scenes, that the opera almost seems voice steady in the frequent long sus- wouldn't go off into another room to short; I have certainly never before had tained passages of this role. He still yell at Fafner in Act II. But others the sense of the action moving so swiftly gives us fine moments, as in the colloquy will disagree. (perhaps because so much of the action with Alberich in Act II, and most of All told, a solid production, and a is in the score itself). The Vienna Phil- that with Siegfried in Act III; but the welcome plug in one of the more de- harmonic sounds tremendous. There are punch is gone. plorable gaps in the catalogue. On to no mellower, richer brasses, nor are there I am not entirely convinced by Ger- Götterdämmerung, please. any finer soloists for the second act hard Stolze's Mime, brilliantly executed passages -clarinet, oboe, and violin in though it is. His voice is almost too thin the Murmurs, the horn in Siegfried's and light; that of Paul Kuen, the Mime WAGNER: Siegfried Hunting Call: all are magnificent. (Sieg- of the Rheingold set, seems to me more fried's playing of the pipe is also just appropriate -a character tenor, but a Birgit Nilsson (s), Brünnhilde; Joan right, and quite funny.) The over -all substantial one. (And, though I don't Sutherland (s), A Woodbird; Marge sound of the ensemble is gorgeous, and like to carp, I really think that since we Höffgen (c), Erda; Wolfgang Windgas- the huge orchestra can snap like a whip have a Ring in the making, no effort sen (t), Siegfried; Gerhard Stolze (t), when it needs to. "So schnell wie mög- should be spared to leave such roles Mime; Hans Hotter (bs), Der Wanderer; lich," Wagner has written Gustav Neidlinger (bs), Alberich; Kurt for the clos- in the same hands throughout.) Beyond Böhme (bs), Fafner. Vienna Philhar- ing pages of Act I -"As fast as possible" that, there is the fact that Stolze deals monic Orchestra, Georg Solti, cond. -which is in this case almost dizzyingly with nearly all the music in an ugly LONDON A 4508. Five LP. $24.90. fast and exceedingly lucid to boot. sort of Sprechstimrne; one can term it LONDON OSA 1508. Five SD. $29.90.

72 HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

www.americanradiohistory.com Scordatura- And the Mysteries of the Rosary

by Eric Salzman

Heinrich Franz Biber von Bibern

Jesus among the Doctors. Dotted OF MUSIC mentions strumentai music of Northern Italy, it child EVERY HISTORY and repeated notes might suggest Franz Biber von Bibern and is not altogether impossible that, in a rhythms Heinrich to an audience of the time the Passion curious religious program music for day of international crosscurrents and his of Christ. The Descent of the Holy written in scordatura, that vibrant rapidly changing stylistic developments, violin might be indicated by the mys- term for a mistuned his work may, in turn, have had some Ghost and evocative quivering, trilling violin; the as the Biblical or effect on the formation of the mature terious, violin, and known Ascension of Christ and the Assumption Mystery Sonatas. One has heard tell Italian baroque string style. Certainly, on the of the Blessed Virgin Mary by ascending of remarkable and forgotten secrets, of Biber had a direct influence string scales; the sure help of the Guardian art of violin playing that was lost character of German -Austrian an Angel by the incessant repetition of the be recovered. Yet for technique, particularly with respect to and could never -note bass theme in the final Passa- the actual music has chordal playing, generally regarded as four all its reputation, caglia. quite obscure. In 1905 the a particularly German and un- Italian remained In my own opinion, however, Biber's century manuscript was fi- characteristic. There is no question that, seventeenth- intention may well have been less an printed (in the rather awesome apart from questions of sheer string nally attempt to provide a literal musical der Tonkunst in Osterreich color, the principal significance of Denkmäler parallel to the Gospel narratives than to but the notation there was in- scordatura is that it greatly facilitates series), express an interior religious feeling tended merely to serve as a guide to the complex harmonic and chordal patterns aroused by contemplation of the Mys- player, indicating where he should put on an instrument that is normally more teries. Far from being free, program- fingers on the mistuned strings. Since at home in melodic functions. his matic fantasias, most of these Sonatas the scheme of mistunings changes in Biber published one set of sonatas are built around double -bar pieces of every piece, the results are, to put it in 1681. The unpublished and updated vocal or dance origins: arias with varia- mildly, confusing. A second, "practical," Mystery Sonatas are thought to have been tions; Allemandes, Courantes, Gigues and edition for a normally tuned violin, is- written in the previous decade. The Sarabandes, generally with doubles or sued a number of years ago, was so full name of the set derives from the fact variations of their own. One, two, or of editorial distortions that it did not that in the manuscript each Sonata is of these appear in each Sonata, merit consideration as a representation of accompanied not by a title, but by an three by "open - And not only have perform- engraving illustrating a New Testament generally preceded or followed the original. The first movement ers been scared off by the fearsome scene. The entire set comprises the form" movements. a Praeludium with a running, technical feats demanded, but the diffi- fifteen Mysteries of the Rosary. A six- may be over a held pedal culties of keeping a mistuned violin in teenth composition, a Passacaglia for showy violin part slow -fast move- any kind of tune at all are nightmarish. solo violin, is accompanied by an en- bass or a more complex and containing Paul Hindemith, who is reported to have graving of the Guardian Angel. The ment labeled "Sonata" development. given one of the few modern concert works were apparently meant to be per- imitation and contrapuntal be a Finale proper, performances of these works, is said to formed in church during the Rosary The final section may with fast figures over a pedal bass, have had a whole battery of assistants Servic. ; the Passacaglia seems to be also backstage busily tuning violins. connected with the Feast of St. Michael, or a concluding chordal Adagio. Ob- The obvious result: much talk, few which was introduced into the church viously these do not represent the fixed performances. Only now, with the release calendar at about the time the Sonatas patterns of the eighteenth -century sonata church of Cambridge Records' fine recordings, were written. -even the distinction between not yet estab- are we able to say that the Biber Mystery Many attempts have been made to and chamber sonata is Sonatas genuinely merit their reputa- elucidate the "programs" of these works. lished. But we do see easily recognizable tion. They have been translated into ex- The "Christ on the Mount of Olives" types which appear elsewhere in Biber's cellent performances that not only over- Sonata consists of a single, freely con- work. Within these outlines Biber come the mechanical difficulties (for the structed movement which, with its con- achieves remarkably expressive lines, an most part at least) but also have style stantly changing tempo and character, elegant play of sonorities, extraordinary and character. often seems quite graphic and narrative. string colors that result from the Biber was born in Bohemia in 1644 This impression is increased by the head- scordatura, a wide range of chordal and and thus can be said to belong to the ing " Lamento" at the very beginning, a harmonic effects, and, finally, a re- middle generation of baroque composers. marking that may well refer not merely markably flexible and even asymmetri- Like many of his colleagues and com- to the opening but to the entire work. cal array of rhythmic and phrase struc- patriots. he became a Kapellmeister, Some of the other references are even tures. first in the court of a certain prince - more explicit. The "Ascension" Sonata When Biber breaks out of the re- bishop in Moravia and, later, for the has an "Mirada" and a following "Aria quirements of the formal musical lan- Archbishop of Salzburg. His efforts Tuhicinum" in which the violin with its guage of his period, he does so, it as a virtuoso violinist and composer even bass quite literally imitates trumpets seems to me, because of the intensity earned him a rare patent of nobility as and drums, suggesting the glad welcome of the musical thought. This is true, well as the favor of the great figures for Christ in Heaven. Some two -part I would think, of the "Mount of Olives" of the age, including the Emperor him- counterpoint might symbolize the Visita- Sonata mentioned earlier. It is certainly self. While, like other German com- tion. A touching Adagio may suggest true in the last two Sonatas where he posers of the period, he seems to have the Adoration of the Shepherds. The carries the Variations principle far be- absorbed a good many Italian influences, long Chaconne which constitutes the en- yond the mere idea of the decoration of especially from the early -baroque in- tire Fourth Sonata might refer to the a theme. Thus in the last Sonata, an

APRIL 1963 73

www.americanradiohistory.com Aria and Variations eventually becomes and tensions. 1-he mental obstacles of the tive in sound. The gamba and bassoon the subject of a free, expressive, con- notation and the tricky technical prob- playing is tine. I he late Dr. Smith is trapuntal Canzone. In the next to the lems of the violin writing were, of a conscientious and sometimes inspired last Sonata, an aria- with -ground -bass course, solved by Miss Monosoff's ex- keyboard performer, although one often is elaborately transformed and recon- cellent head- and finger -work. Actually, wishes that he had not stuck quite so stituted a in beautiful formal sequence solutions could not be found for all of closely to the Denkmider realizations of phrase overlap. of Something similar the intonation problems, as Miss Mono - the continuo parts. I would have liked, happens on an even grander scale in soff frankly admits in her excellent pro- among other things, to have heard a the "Resurrection" Sonata, where the gram notes. The differences in string good deal more in the way of ornamenta- fusion of meditative, and musical, techni- tension -even if maintained without tion, rolled chords, and so forth. Miss cal effects is perhaps most complete. change -require thousands of tiny adjust- Monosoft does provide a good bit of The principal section this of composi- ments in the precise positioning of the such ornamentation always in good taste tion consists of a remarkable series of fingers not only from piece to piece hut, and style; she also provides some excel- variations on an actual Resurrection within one work. from string to string. lent rhythmic and phrase flexibility hymn. treated partly as a ground bass All of these adjustments must be care- which serves the music magnificently. and partly as a treble melody against fully worked out. often in unusual The sound is close and dry: if it is its own continuation in the bass. The double- and triple- stopping positions, not beautiful, it is at least clear, con- mistuning arrangement in this Sonata and almost always in a situation where sistent, and trim. The stereo version has been completely misunderstood by the performer is unsure what the actual tends to split up the violin and the the editor of the Denkmiller; fortunately, pitches are supposed to be. Nevertheless, continuo. The historical and technical Sonya Monosoff, violinist in the present the over -all impression given by these background is well provided in the recording, gets it right and the intention performances is excellent. The variety notes by Paul Nett! and Miss Monosoff becomes clear and extraordinary. Each tone of colors and double -stop effects herself. All in all, this album is an string becomes like an organ stop, and is stunning; the musical intelligence and achievement which finely re- creates an when the theme appears in the violin in projection are exceptional. exceptional experience of a rich and not octaves the sonorous effect is electrify- Mr. Scholz's viola da gamba is not yet fully understood age. ing. only a Stainer of the period but, in- Miss Monosoff solves the terrific credibly enough, it may actually have BIBER: Fifteen Sonatas and Passa- problems of the scordatara by using a formed part of a set ordered by Biber caglia for Violin set of six old violins and a variety of (Biber used Stainer instruments and, in different types of strings (all provided, fact, spent a good deal of time with Sonya Monosoff, violin; Melville Smith, by the way, by Rembert Wurlitzer). The Stainer in the Tirol). organ and harpsichord; Janos Scholz, viola particular tuning necessary for each The varying use of different continuo da gamba; John Miller, bassoon. CAMBRIDGE Sonata was set up well in advance, with instruments is. on the whole. CRM 811. Three LP. quite suc- $14.94. several weeks allowed for the strings to cessful. The harpsichord and the organ work into the CAMBRIDGE CRS 1811. Three SD. unaccustomed positions are roughly of the period and are attrac- $17.94.

By Harris Goldsmith

On Two Recital Discs, Debut of a New Czech Pianist

Iran Moravec

UNTIL VERY RECENTLY the name Ivan struck with an undiagnosed ailment which doubt. by the brilliant and rather graph - Moravec was almost totally unknown on produced "mysterious and excruciating itelike tonal characteristics of his Baldwin this side of the Atlantic. It now seems pains in his hands. arms, and hack." On instrument). I would say that accentua- likely that this situation will quickly be his recovery. in 1957, he went to Italy tion, symmetry. and severe clarity of rectified: next season the young Czech to put himself under the tutelage of texture are the qualities uppermost in pianist will make his American debut Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli. whose in- the pianist's mind. with the Cleveland Orchestra and a con- fluence can be detected in certain as- Among the works on the present two cert tour is on the books. In the mean- pects of his playing on the present re- discs. the Mozart C minor Sonata is time. music listeners have an opportunity cordings. In general. Mr. Moravec is a most suited to Moravec's highly calcu- to acquaint themselves with his work detached sort of performer. His concep- lated type of keyboard artistry. The through two recital discs just issued by tion of phrasing. voice -leading, and tempos are rather fast here. and the Connoisseur Records. rhythm is. to be sure. highly subjective, over -all musical form emerges clearly de- Moravec's career to date has not but the most basic feature of his pianism fined. Purely from a technical standpoint been a conventional one. Born in Prague is the neatly balanced. ultrareserved this is superlative playing. Moravec has on November 9. 1930. he studied under clarity of his fingerwork. Moravec does complete digital independence and an both Erna Grünfeld and Ilona Kurz and not seem to he a colorist; he favors, absolutely faultless balance of power be- was embarked on a promising future rather. a dry. monochromatic type of tween his right and left hand. The when, in his early twenties, he was keyboard sound (influenced here, no phrases are shaped with complete au-

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www.americanradiohistory.com thority and awesome security. The rapid of the hushed passages all but come to runs in the first movement -all taken a dead halt), and the basic continuity CLASSICAL with clipped staccato and perfectly acis maintained despite some wayward centuated -are an ample measure of tempos. Moravec's stature as an executant. All Altogether, Mr. Moravec's artistry is told, his is a rather aloof approach and, of a kind not frequently encountered. as such, will appeal to the intellect rather At its least convincing, it is intriguing; BACH: Concertos: for Flute, Violin, than the emotions; but so too is the at its best, it is magnificent. I await Harpsichord, and Strings, in A mi- music itself somewhat reserved. As a his debut in this country with immense nor, S. 1044; for Violin, Oboe, and classical exposition then, Moravec's ver- interest. Strings, in D minor, S. 1060; Bran- sion of the Mozart C minor must take Technically, these 45 -rpm discs are denburg Concerto No. 3, in G, S. a place equivalent to that occupied very well made, but since surface noise 1048 by the Lipatti among editions of the is negligible and volume level extremely Mozart A minor, K. 310. In other words, low, one runs the risk of exposure to Soloists; I Musici. PHILIPS 500008. LP. $4.98. this is obviously the work of a highly bothersome amplifier hum and turntable PHILIPS 900008. SD. $5.98. gifted and intelligent interpreter who rumble. I myself would prefer a con- does not find it necessary to defy conventional LP disc with wider grooving and higher volume output. The packag- This performance of the triple concerto, vention and good taste to make a a fine work that deserves to be better personal impact. ing of these records is superb, inci- known than it is, compares favorably In the Appassionata, on the other hand, dentally; the program notes are explicit, with the Archive, the best of the four Moravec allows himself certain indul- thorough, and literate. versions available before the present one gences. It is impossible, for example, to appeared. The soloists here are all able, equate his whispered statement of the BEETHOVEN: Sonata for Piano, No. and the tempos seem good, although I work's opening with the brisk concise- prefer Archive's more animated pace in 23, in F minor, Op. 57 ( "Appas- Ina non tanto. For some rea- Beethoven so obviously implied the Adagio ness sionata") son the Musici add a cello to the harpsi- with his Allegro assai tempo indica- -I-Mozart: Sonata for Piano, No. 14, in chord's bass line in this movement, giv- tion, and throughout the entire Sonata C minor, K. 457 ing it a different coloration and char- the pianist veers towards a highly roman- acter. The sound of the Philips is tic interpretation of the music. In many Ivan Moravec, piano. brighter, that of the Archive mellower. respects Moravec's stretched rubatos and CONNOISSEUR CS 562. 12 -in. 45 -rpm The D minor Concerto is still another SD. $6.95. bold underscorings remind me of attempt to restore the original that is Richter's interpretation of this piece. thought to have been the basis for what we know as the Concerto for Two There is one crucial difference between CHOPIN: Ballade No. 3, in A flat, Harpsichords, in C minor. It is tran- their interpretations, however: clearly, Op. 47; Scherzo No. 1, in B minor, who, like 23 scribed by Franz Giegling, Moravec has read Beethoven's score, Op. his predecessors, generally allots the whereas Richter often gives the impres- tFranck: Prélude, choral et fugue right -hand part of Harpsichord I to the to do so. The Harpsi- sion of having neglected Ivan Moravec, piano. violin and the same part of the crucial II to the oboe. The result is quite former, for instance, observes CONNOISSEUR CS 662. 12 -in. 45 -rpm chord subito piano at the beginning of the SD. $6.95. plausible, and the only criticism I have first movement recapitulation and places here is that the absence of a harpsi- is felt. The accents correctly throughout. These sig- chord in the slow movement Brandenburg receives an energetic per- nificant details are largely ignored in formance, marred only by heavy accents the Richter performances. Furthermore, on the first beat of each measure Moravec is able to give the impression towards the end of the first movement. of a more consistent basic tempo than NEXT MONTH IN N.B. Richter achieves, although both artists are, in truth, extremely (in my opinion, BACH: Well- Tempered Clavier, Book excessively) flexible. I personally feel I: Preludes and Fugues 1 -8 that among currently available editions Egon Petri's is the most faithful to the high fidelity Glenn Gould, piano. composer's intentions, but Moravec's COLUMBIA ML 5808. LP. $4.98. reading makes for an exciting perform- COLUMBIA MS 6408. SD. $5.98. ance of the virtuoso type. The clarity The Demonstrator he achieves in the last movement, while Glenn Gould has been very much in taking it at a tremendous clip, is, for Leonard Bernstein, the public eye lately. The television example, a remarkable tour de force. audience has been treated to some of and the celebrated to the Franck cou- seen in fresh perspective. his performances, Turning Chopin- case of Gould vs. Bernstein (or Gould pling, I find Mr. Moravec more success- by Leonard Marcus vs. Brahms) is still a vivid memory. To ful with the Belgian composer. The judge by comments I have heard and Prélude, choral et fugue is given a broad ro. by the newspaper reports, the public sonorous reading which impressively cap- has reacted as to a cinder. The con- The Case the Tilted Stylus eye tures the cathedral -like grandeur of that of sensus seems to be that some pianists work. Less warm in concept than should be heard and not seen, at least Richter's superb version (its only com- Can the vertical angle not close up. Records are, of course, and may be the best Mora - another matter, petitor in the present catalogue), cause distortion? what Mr. Gould has to way, way to receive vec's performance is, in its own offer. While I have found some of his equally valid and very much better - by R. D. Darrell recordings considerably inferior to others, recorded. The two Chopin favorites get I am one of those who believe that by extremely personal interpretations. I con- and large he has a good deal to offer. fess to finding Moravec's playing here a How To Learn French There are in the present disc some unflowing for things I find hard to accept, but Gould bit too sharp -edged and In Twenty -four Easy this basically romantic music. It is, in makes me aware, as few other pianists is result fact, rather too "detail" conscious. Even do, that everything he does the An examination long and painstaking study whose so, one help being impressed of cannot sole aim is to expose the composer's by the regal security of this artist's digital lof language courses on records. thought as faithfully as possible. It is articulation and by the disciplined way obvious that every note is presented in which he clarifies all the inner voices. by Conrad L. Osborne with precisely the weight, and with pre- The use of rubato is extremely resource- cisely the relationship to every other ful if not constantly convincing (some J note in the piece, that Gould thinks it APRIL 1963 75

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www.americanradiohistory.com should have. Since he is a gifted and style of great clarity, polish, and ex- Burgin's fine solo violin playing. But the penetrating musician, some of these pressivity. Their style is still distinctive, unique value of the record is to be works, such as the C sharp minor Prel- and even, one might say, genuinely found on the other side: the first stereo ude and Fugue and the D minor Prel- Russian, but the lush, old -fashioned, recording of the Sonata for Two Pianos ude, come off beautifully. soulful Russian style is replaced here by and Percussion. Mr. Farberman is a per- There are some interestingly indi- a musical approach that has close affini- cussionist in the Boston Symphony and vidual ideas here, too. In the D major ties with modern Western chamber style. a composer in his own right, and one Fugue, for example, Gould differentiates The very idea of a chamber ensemble has the impression here of enormous between the two pairs of dotted eighths of this kind lies essentially outside of sympathy with the idiom and character and sixteenths by holding the first the "Romantic" tradition and all of its of the work. The four performers are eighth longer than the second. On the "Socialist- realist" transformations. The all fine musicians and they produce a other hand, the first part of the C minor repertory for a group like this must be handsome and vital reading that con- Prelude sounds to me like a finger drawn largely from the centuries pre- veys the strength and the originality of exercise, although the second part is ceding and following the nineteenth. this striking contemporary masterpiece. played with imagination. The phrasing Even more important, the medium it- E.S. chosen in the C major Prelude or the self suggests an anti -Romantic approach, D minor Fugue or the E flat major replacing blended, balanced orchestral Prelude will appeal to some more than sound with chamber music individuality BEETHOVEN: Overtures: Leonore to others. The great E flat minor Prel- and clarity, harmonic and rhythmic am- No. 1, Op. 138; No. 2, Op. 72a; ude is shorn of any trace of romantic biguity with contrapuntal precision, grand No. 3, Op. 72a; Fidelio, Op. 72 sentimentality; the brevity of the half- gesture with meaningful detail, rhetoric note chords here is probably justifiable, with a more thoughtful sense of struc- Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, Lorin but one wonders why a few chords are ture and poetic expression. Maazel, cond. arpeggiated downwards. And so it goes. These characteristics are clearest in LONDON CM 9328. LP. $4.98. The playing-and recording-through- the Bartók but they also apply to the LONDON CS 6328. SD. $5.98. out is of an extraordinary clarity (there Vivaldi concertos, both of which are is practically no pedal) and technically from L'Estro armonico. The sensitivity A few quibbles are possible about de- faultless. You may disagree with some to baroque style is considerable. It is tails in these performances, but on the of Gould's ideas, but you won't be true that the string tone (aided and whole they are capsule dramas set forth bored. This is the first disc in a series abetted by the virtuoso London engineers) with a confident hand. Certainly they that will comprise the entire Well - is round and fat; it is also true that are the best Beethoven that Maazel has Tempered Clavier. It is to be hoped the continuo is sparingly used and, when given us so far, and the orchestra is that in the forthcoming recordings the it does appear, is almost submerged a great one. Unfortunately, it has been Columbia engineers will expunge Mr. beneath the weight of the gorgeous string recorded with excessive resonance, Gould's singing, here occasionally faintly sound. But it is hardly a foregone con- which blurs detail and casts a smear of audible, as ruthlessly as they would any clusion that a good baroque style im- violin sound over ensemble details that other extraneous noise. A good pianist plies a desiccated instrumental tone. The ought to register clearly. Since no other should be heard, to be sure, but as a really important point here is that the stereo disc duplicates this repertory, pianist. N.B. richness and beauty of tone are put at one must accept the present edition with the service of strong, clear lines and its misapplication of engineering tech- shapes. niques best kept in the pop music field BARBER: Toccata Festiva, Op. 36- The performance of the Bartók Diver- -or remain with the fine old Klemperer See Poulenc: Concerto for Organ, timento must rank as the best in the monophonic edition. R.C.M. Strings, and Timpani, in G minor. catalogue, a remarkable example of a completely conscientious reading that BEETHOVEN: sacrifices nothing in the way of expressiv- Sonatas for Piano BARTOK: Divertimento for Strings ity. Every dynamic, every balance, every No. 8, in C minor, Vivaldi: Concerti grossi, 3: No. shading Op. 13 ( "Pathé- O. is beautifully adjusted and a tique"); No. 14, in C sharp minor, Op. 10, in B minor; No. 11, in D minor whole range of warm and varied colors, 27, No. 2 ( "Moonlight inflections, "); No. 26, in E and articulations are brought flat, Op. 81a ( "Les Adieux "). Moscow Chamber Orchestra, Rudolf to bear on the realization of a precise Barshai, cond. conception. The composer's ideas are Artur Rubinstein, piano. LONDON CM 9332. LP. $4.98. understood and projected both literally RCA VICTOR LM 2654. LP. $4.98. LONDON CS 6332. SD. $5.98. and below the surface as well. Precision RCA VICTOR LSC 2654. SD. $5.98. and fidelity are achieved, not mechani- BARTOK: Divertimento for Strings; cally, but with a sense both of flexible These performances are very -well, detail and of big line. While it is certainly very Rubinstein. The notes hit a new Sonata for Two Pianos and Percus- true that the work is not exactly "far pinnacle for press agentry by saying, sion out" by modern Western standards, its If there is but one god in piano music artistic questions and answers are still -Beethoven -his prophet is Rubin- Richard Burgin, violin; Boston Cham- essentially contemporary. The Soviet stein." To which, I fear, there is no ber Ensemble, Harold Farberman, cond. musicians rise magnificently to these fit reply but the cockney, "Aw, come off (in the Divertimento). Ralph Votapek, stylistic, intellectual, and poetic chal- of it, guv'nor." Rubinstein is a remark- Luise Vosgerchian, pianos; Everett Firth, lenges. able artist, but if he is to be regarded Arthur Press, percussion (in the Sonata). By comparison, Mr. Farberman's per- as a high priest of Beethoven, it is time CAMBRIDGE LRM 803. LP. $4.98. formance is a good deal more easygoing. he ceased concentrating on the popular CAMBRIDGE CRS 1803. SD. $5.98. It is relaxed and it swings but it is also "sonatas with names" from the com- much less precise. It tends to emphasize poser's early and middle periods and Bartók from East and West, including the lyric flow of the music rather than showed us how he stacks up with his a fine Russian performance of the its tensions and dramatic juxtapositions. pianistic rivals in the Hammerklavier Divertimento as well as an excellent The Russians get a much wider play of and the last sonatas as well as the and much needed stereo recording from colors ranging from extreme richness Diabelli Variations. Boston of the Sonata for Two Pianos to a vibratoless, white, misterioso sound. The three performances recorded here and Percussion. The various kinds of attacks, articula- abound in romantic mannerisms and The music of Bartók, now widely tions, and special colors are emphasized self -conscious virtuoso strokes, elements performed in the Soviet Union, has be- as are the contrasts between solos and thrilling to Rubinstein's vast public but come a channel through which modern tuttis with the result that everything not the ideal representation of Bee- Western ideas and techniques are enter- emerges in fine, bold, expressive relief. thoven's piano writing. If we survey the ing the Soviet Union. It is fascinating All of this is enhanced by London's ranks of the Beethoven pianists, it is not to see how, in spite of the pressures of recorded sound, an advantage further in- difficult to find more penetrating and official taste, Soviet artistic ideas are creased by the fact that the Cambridge rewarding statements of this music. For nevertheless developing along the lines version suffers from some bad tape a start, there are the Serkin versions of of what is happening or has happened splicing. the Moonlight and Pathétique and in the West. Even the very existence of Mr. Farberman's performance of the Foldes' recent edition of Les Adieux. In a crack chamber ensemble is good evi- Divertimento would certainly have made all three instances one will find a re- dence of changing tastes. The Moscow a much greater impression if the Rus- straint, a tighter control of line, and an Chamber Orchestra is a first -class organi- sian competition hadn't arrived at the awareness of the composer's idea of zation which combines rich Russian same moment. As it is, it has many rhythm and phrasing which are missing string tone with a precisely articulated attractive things, including Richard in the Rubinstein versions.

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www.americanradiohistory.com The obvious focus of this set is ° A the eloquence. The latter approach, now best C4724"."444e Moonlight. (The other sonatas Rubin- heard in Furtwängler's DGG set, always Not,/-, stein has recorded before.) The first has seemed to me most in accord with movement could serve as the paradigm the nature of the work, but I know of the approach which makes it a lush others disagree. nocturne; from there on it's all fire- Among the dissenters, obviously, is works. If it's the Rubinstein manner you Maestro Dorati, whose performance Imported want, it is here in abundance and well here is quite fast, very light, and pro- recorded -though with little difference pelled by an unrelenting force. Even the between mono and stereo. R.C.M. nominally slow movement marches and briskly; the fast sections really move. There is BEETHOVEN: more to this reading. how- Sonata for Piano, No. ever, than the usual quick brush to a Domestic 23, in F minor, Op. 57 ( "Appas- familiar score. Much of the detail is sionata") treated in a fresh and even unorthodox ¡Mozart: Sonata for Piano, No. 14, fashion -for a start, the Adagio bar FOLK MUSIC in C minor, K. 457 with the oboe cadenza in the opening movement. I question the length of the Ivan Moravec. interpolated rest, but one cannot call new on Mercury Records it hackneyed. Despite the quick pace For a feature review including this re- and the single side format, the repeat cording, see page 74. in the opening movement is observed. Egmont gets a more orthodox but CLASSIC FOLK FROM ABROAD BEETHOVEN: thoroughly effective performance, one Sonatas for Violin and that seems to justify the attention Dorati BALALAIKA Piano: No. 5, in F, Op. 24 is receiving in Europe. The Consecra- FAVORITES ( "Spring "); No. 7, in C minor, Op. tion is less successful, partly because it Osipov State Russian 30, No. 2 is a work that requires faultless balances Folk Orchestra and here the winds are far too easily David Oistrakh, violin; Lev Oborin, overpowered by the strings. Indeed, I FLAMENCO! piano. suspect throughout this disc one hears Pepe Romero PHILIPS PHM 500030. LP. $4.98. "engineer's sound" rather than "con- THE ROYAL FAMILY PHILIPS PHS 900030. SD. $5.98. ductor's sound." The violins get too OF THE SPANISH much of the limelight, the inner voices GUITAR This is one of the best -recorded like- too little. R.C.M. Celedonio, Celin, Pepe nesses of the Oistrakh violin we have and Angel Romero had. The tone flows with a silken ele- gance that conceals technical refine- BIBER: Fifteen Sonatas and Passaca- ments which a more ostentatious vio- glia for Violin linist would exploit. Oistrakh's musician- Sonya Monosoff, et al. ship is well matched by Oborin, whose POPULAR AMERICAN FOLK contribution is as important to the suc- For a feature review of this recording, JOSH WHITE cess of these performances as those of see page 73. The Beginning his better -known colleague. And the engineers are not to be slighted, for bal- BIZET: Jeux d'enfants, op. 22 FLATT & SCRUGGS ances are excellent in both forms, and 1 -6, The Original Sound the presence of the performers is force- tBrahms: Waltzes, Op. 39: Nos. 10 -11, 14 -15 INMAN & IRA ful and cleanly defined. Singing Spokesmen For The statement of Op. 30, No. 2 here ¡Hindemith: Sonata for Piano, Four The New is competitive with any we have, Hands Generation although slightly lacking in the drama of SHELDON & JAMES the Schneiderhan -Seemann version. In Paul Badura -Skoda and Joerg Demus, Sing Of Laughter, the Op. 24, Oistrakh excels in the slow pianos. Beauty and Compassion movement but lacks the vitality which MUSIC GUILD 22. LP. $5.50. his rivals on DGG bring to their mi- MUSIC GUILD S 22. SD. $6.50. THE INTRODUCTION raculous Of The Knob Lick affirmation of the cantilena Badura -Skoda and Demus give a delight- Upper 10,000 heralding rebirth. This is a master's per- ful account of the Bizet work. Their formance. nonetheless, projecting a tran- playing has humor, buoyancy, and zest. THE COURRIERS quil and romantic spring song with the They were having The Courriers touch obviously fun making Carry On of a poet. this record, and their enthusiasm is ANITA CARTER Obviously, European record makers vividly communicated to the listener. Anita Carter Sings Folk have not agreed on the proper stereo Some of the same tonal color and Songs Old And New positioning for a violinist and pianist. lyrical impressionism carry over into the Philips' Oistrakh is on the left, DGG's THE YEOMEN rendition of the Hindemith. Although The Schneiderhan on the right. Mono puts this graceful romanticism emphasizes Yeomen both in the center, and unless you want new facets of this music, I do miss some -Session One a wide stereo spread, this perspective of the monochromatic linearity and struck me as fully satisfactory. R.C.M. rhythmic tautness which Hindemith's occasionally cerebral style demands. But, America's First Family BEETHOVEN: Symphony No. 5, in with this reservation, the present inter- of Fine Recordings C minor, Op. 67; Overtures: Eg- pretation has many undeniably attractive mont, 84; features. Op. Zur Weihe des Not so with the Brahms. The waltzes Hauses, Op. 124 are given coy, languid readings with all London Symphony Orchestra, Antal sorts of fussy mannerisms and excessive (*Devi( Dorati, cond. use of portamento. This is essentially MERCURY MR 50317. LP. $4.98. hearty music and as such requires more MERCURY SR 90317. SD. $5.98. elemental vigor. These artists are basically lyricists, and their sympathies ap- Mercury Record Corporation 35 East The interpretative perimeters of this parently lie outside of this musical otbit. Wacker Drive Chicago 1, Illinois score were defined for record collectors The recording, apparently made in by the old Toscanini and Furtwängler a very live studio, is a shade diffuse in editions: the one intense, hard -driving, tone, although pleasant to the ear. H.G. and sweeping in a long curve to the ii'4voloramtil climactic finale; the other slower, BRAHMS: Hungarian Dances: Nos. broadly phrased and deeply inflected, 1, 3 -6, 10 -See Schubert: Sym- ri and proceeding by the cumulative force phony No. 4, in C minor ( "Trag- of statement to a memorable level of ic"). CIRCLE 66 ON READER -SERVICE CARD 80 HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

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www.americanradiohistory.com BRAHMS: Piano Works the albums more than offset these minor defects. In sum, enthusiastically recom- Ballades (4), Op. 10; Intermezzos (3), mended. H.G. Op. 117; Rhapsodies (2), Op. 79; Sonata AUD/0 fAIL for Piano, No. 3, in F minor, Op. 5; Stücke (6), Op. 118; Variations on a BRAHMS: Waltzes, Op. 39: Nos. 1 -6, Theme by Schumann, Op. 9; Variations 10 -11, 14 -15 -See Bizet: Jeux on a Theme by Handel, Op. 24; Waltzes, d'enfants, Op. 22. FIDELITY® Op. 39-on VBX 430. Scherzo, Op. 4; THE HIGHEST STANDARD IN HIGH FIDELITY Sonatas for Piano: No. 1, in C, Op. 1; BRUCH: No. 2, in F sharp minor, Op. 2; Phan - Concerto for Violin and tasien, Op. 116; Stiicke (8), Op. 76; Orchestra, No. 1, in G minor, Op. NEW RELEASES Stiicke (4), Op. 119; Variations on an 26 Original Theme, Op. 21, Nos. 1, 2; Vari- -- Mozart: Concerto for Violin and Or- ations on a Theme by Paganini, Op. 35 chestra, No. 4, in D, K. 218 (Books I, II)-on VBX 431. CVA (N)"Enterprise" Jascha Heifetz, violin; New Symphony Walter Klien, piano. Orchestra of London, Sir Malcolm Sar- SOUND EFFECTS Vox VBX 430/31. Six LP. $9.98 each gent, cond. album. RCA VICTOR LM 2652. LP. $4.98. THE FASCINATING OPERA- RCA VICTOR LSC 2652. SD. $5.98. These two sets constitute the first corn - TIONS ABOARD AMERICA'S plete recording of the Brahms music for The present performance of the Bruch FIRST NUCLEAR POWERED AIR- keyboard solo, and it is indeed singular G minor is one of the most dazzling good fortune that the project was put in examples of incandescent fiddling that I CRAFT CARRIER! the assured and sensitive hands of Walter have ever heard. While Heifetz's older Aircraft launchings and landings of bombers, Klien. The Austrian pianist gives a really recording of the work ranked with the fighters, reconnaissanceand transport planes. impressive account of himself on these best in this violinist's discography, this discs, offering performances which are remake far surpasses it in every way. A Suspenseful emergency landing. Engine strong, poetic, technically rock -steady, new repose and flexibility in his playing room sounds and deck operations. and yet delicate and flexible when nec- simply enhance the diamond- cutter bril- DFM 3014 /DFS 7014 essary. Klien is a very modern player liance of his attack. And such perfect in that the architectural and intellectual bow control and intonation. Again, the qualities of the writing are stressed with new purity and simplicity of his phrasing, relative objectivity and leanness, but his especially in the slow movement, is a interpretation springs from the same soil welcome feature of the interpretation. Sound Effects, Vol.4 that produced such notable expo- Similarly, the Mozart also displays a nents of the literature as Edwin Fischer reconsidered interpretative outlook. Hei- ANOTHER EXCELLENT ADDITION and Artur Schnabel. In other words, his fetz appears to have responded to crit- playing is scholarly and rugged, expan- icism (his own criticism and musical TO AUDIO FIDELITY'S OUT- sively rhetorical, and directs the listeners' conscience, above all) and modified his STANDING SOUND SERIES. attention to the music itself rather than erstwhile typical mannerisms of inflec- to the performer. tion. In the new reading every note is Submarine maneuvers aboard the USS Klien is equally at home with the large attacked squarely "on pitch" rather than Cubera: torpedo launch, living alarm, and small forms. He achieves a lovely from slightly above or below, and the close hatches, up periscope, ventilator limpidity of texture and engaging charm throbbing vibrato is happily eliminated blowers, general quarters. Gymnasium in many of the smaller pieces (the B completely. And once again, the techni- from Op. 76 is especial- cal brilliance associated with Heifetz sounds: punching bags, skipping rope, minor Capriccio ly fleet and cleanly articulated), but for over fifty years remains. The only sparring. Also: crickets, rock slide, rat- holds the bigger works together impres- jarring note in either of these perform- tlesnake, many more. sively well. The three early Sonatas ances is the slightly anachronistic caden- de- zas (his own) which the violinist uses DFM 3015 /DFS 7015 (which can so easily ramble) are livered with almost crushing impact and for the Mozart. a real sense of bravura, while the Paga- Sargent leads beautifully sympathetic nini Variations are stated with rhythmic accompaniments, keeping the sonorities firmness of outline (Klien's basic tempo down in the Mozart (he cuts the com- is a rather broad one) and welcome em- plement of strings) but allowing the phasis on the poetical rather than the climaxes of the Bruch to surge ahead PARIS WITH LOVE pyrotechnical content. The Handel set, with fiery intensity. The orchestral play- on the other hand, could have been in- ing throughout has exquisite finish. JO BASILE, his Accordion & vested with a bit more poetry. Klien's Victor's sound is ideal, possessing interpretation does tie up more loose warmth and clarity in equal measure. Orch. - Back again in his native ends than any other rendition I have A startling amount of instrumental de- heard, but some of the subtlety and in- tail emerges -and in perfect proportion element weaves his magical spell trospection of the writing are lost in the to the strand of sound which is the solo it is to violin. The stereo edition enhances the with : Autumn Leaves, Mon process. Even so, exhilarating hear the work "hurled" at you, and airy clarity evident in the monophonic Coeur, Petite Fleur, Conversa- Klien's hard -driving statement is by no pressing. A magnificent record. H.G. tion, means devoid of sentiment. Docks Of The Seine, Speak Needless to say, certain of these works BYRD: Mass for Five Voices; Great To Me Of Love, others. can be heard to more persuasive effect Service: Magnificat and Nunc di- on other recordings (Rubinstein's of the mittis; Ave verum corpus AFLP 1938 /AFSD 5938 F minor Sonata, for example, has a bit more flexibility and tonal subtlety), but Choir of King's College, Cambridge, the totality of Klien's work is amazingly David Willcocks, cond. NOW AVAILABLE AT YOUR RECORD SHOP convincing. The recording (mono only) LONDON 5725. LP. $4.98. is satisfactory, though slightly clangy, LONDON OS 25725. SD. $5.98. STEREO: $5.95 (DFS, AFSD) and the labeling -as in many Vox boxes MONO: $4.98 (DFM, AFLP) -leaves something to be desired. I These are fine -spun, sensitive perform- searched in vain for the performances ances. That each part in these polyphonic of six of the Organ Preludes, Op. 122, works has a life of its own is clearly For your FREE catalogs of which were supposedly contained in Vol. brought out in this recording, even records and tapes, write: 2, while the Romance in F, Op. 118, though there is sometimes a tendency for No. 5 and the Intermezzo in E flat the treble voices to predominate. The minor, Op. 118, No. 6 (occupying places treatment of rhythm, tempo, and dynam- AUDIO FIDELITY INC. on Sides 3 and 4, respectively, in VBX ics is flexible. Especially in the Mass, 770 Eleventh Ave., New York 19, N.Y. 430) were both labeled as being Op. 118, the change of texture when one or two No. 5 on the review copy. But the quality parts drop out is more marked than in of the performances and the low price of any other recording of that work. This CIRCLE 13 ON READER- SERVICE CARD 82 HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

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www.americanradiohistory.com makes the five -part passages even richer Concerts Lamoureux, Maurice Duruflé, The Valuable than usual. The sections from the Great cond. Most Service show that Byrd could write just EPIC LC 3856. LP. $4.98. as beautifully for the Anglican rite as EPIC BC 1256. SD. $5.98. Cartridge System for the Catholic. The sound of the chorus is lovely, and except for the oc- Maurice Duruflé, renowned contempo- You'll Ever Own... casional overprominence of the soprano rary French organist and composer, com- line, well balanced; the intonation is al- pleted his Requiem in 1947. The thematic the New most always secure. I found that I had material is based almost entirely on the to turn up the volume somewhat higher Gregorian chant in the Mass for the FAIRCHILD F -7 than usual for the best effect. N.B. Dead, around which Duruflé has woven an interesting choral and orchestral fab- ric, yet despite its thematic sources the Today's conventional cartridges CHOPIN: Ballade No. 3, in A flat, music is not archaic. Stylistically, it is Op. 47; Scherzo No. 1, in B minor, quite French. Duruflé's chief influence not only have to trace the groove, Op. 23 has been the Requiem of Gabriel Fauré, they have to generate a voltage tFranck: Prélude, choral et fugue and like that work this music is more sufficient to operate today's comforting than terrifying. Although pre -amplifiers. This is usually Ivan Moravec. there are a few passages where Duruflé writes more dramatically than Fauré, his accomplished through the use of Requiem is for the most part beautifully comparatively massive (from For a feature review including this re- a cording, see page 74. placid. The parallel with Fauré extends cartridge design philosophy) gen- to details, since the present work is di- erators- usually magnets or coils, vided into the same sections, and soloists CHOPIN: Waltzes (complete) are used in the same places. or ceramic elements. These mas- With the composer conducting in his sive generators can cause exces- Ingrid Haebler, piano. own church, Saint -Etienne -du -Mont in sive record and stylus wear and Vox PL 1 1970. LP. $4.98. Paris, one would naturally expect the distortion. But FAIRCHILD has performance to be authoritative. But it This is one of Miss Haebler's finest ef- is far more than that; it is deeply moving. disregarded the need for a nor- forts to date. She delivers these pieces The two vocal soloists may not be out- mally useable output level from with commendable bravura, admirably standing, but the combined choirs are this type of tracing device and took straightforward (but by no means met- superbly disciplined and sing with ex- a completely unique approach with ronomic) rhythm, and fine vigor. Hers ceptionally clear diction. this one basic concept is a rosy, `but -of- doors" type of Chopin It takes only a moment of listening to - the car- playing, perfectly idiomatic and roman- realize why this, the first recording of tridge must trace only the groove tically satisfying, never pretentious or the Requiem, was awarded a Grand Prix ...of f ortlessly and accurately. labored. Perhaps her pianism lacks the du Disque. The clarity, balance, and nat- Therefore, the NEW FAIRCHILD incandescence and classical purity of uralness of the sound are apparent from F -7 is a low, low mass, moving such players as Lipatti and Werner the very outset, while in stereo each sec- coil Haas (both of whom have made out- tion of the choir is effectively pinpointed. tracing element. The F -7 traces standing recordings of the Waltzes), but Put Duruflé's work down as an impor- the groove at a pressure of well I can well imagine that many people tant addition to the list of distinguished under a gram, and in turn trans- may prefer her tone, which adheres to settings of the Requiem. And put this lates minute impulses into a the clinging, conventional sound usually recording down as a fine example of the tran- associated with Chopin's music. Further- art of interpretation and reproduction. sistorized pre -preamplifier which more, her disc includes (as does the P.A. then generates a sufficient signal earlier -and excellent -Vox release by for today's preamplifiers. The Novaes) the three lovely posthumous FRANCK: Prélude, choral et fugue- transparent highs, the outstand- Waltzes. See Chopin: Ballade No. 3, in A ing transient response, and the The sound is a trifle clattery and flat, Op. 47; Scherzo No. 1, in B reverberant, but never so much so that minor, Op. 23. unbelievably low distortion of the one's listening pleasure is seriously FAIRCHILD F -7 system now diminished. H.G. allows you FRESCOBALDI: Music for Harpsi- to hear a new world of chord recorded definition and dimension. DUBOIS: The Seven Last Words of tPicchi: Balli d'arpicordo Christ Rafael Puyana, harpsichord. Winifred Dettore, soprano; Wayne Con- MERCURY MR 50259. LP. $4.98. ner. tenor; Marshall Heinbaugh. baritone; MERCURY SR 90259. SD. $5.98. Earl Ness, organ; Philadelphia Oratorio Choir, Earl Ness, cond. Having got off to an excellent start with RITTENHOUSE RM 1002. LP. $4.98. his first disc (reviewed here last Decem- RITTENHOUSE RS 1002. SD. $5.98. ber), Puyana confirms the impression he made there with the present release. Théodore Dubois's Seven Last Words is The Frescobaldi pieces include the fine a reverent work but to my ears musically variations on the airs called La Fresco - rather uninteresting. Ness and his excel- balda and Ruggiero, as well as a nicely lent forces do their utmost to make it varied group of galliards neatly rounded live. The three oratorio soloists are first - off by the repetition of the first one at rate, the choir well trained. and Ness the end. Little is known about Giovanni himself directs and plays the organ im- Picchi except that he was active as an aginatively. Although the experiment of organist in Venice early in the seven- having the soloists sing at varying dis- teenth century. His Dances for Harpsi- tances from the microphone for dramatic chord, here presented complete, reveal effect does not always come off very him as a composer of considerable skill well, there is a great deal of depth, range, and invention. The Passe mezzo has and clarity in the recorded sound. Sung some impressive variations, the Todesca FAIRCHILD F-7 Cartridge Systems are available in English, as is customary in this coun- is charming, and the Ballo alla pofacha in limited quantities at authorized FAIRCHILD try, this is certainly one of the best avail- has nobility, but the music as a whole dealers. Complete specifications available. able recorded versions. P.A. seems to have less character and substance than the works by Picchi's con- DURUFLE: Requiem, Op. 9 temporary and present disc mate. Puyana is nevertheless to be commended for FAIRCHILD Hélène Bouvier, mezzo; Xavier Depraz, venturing off the beaten path, and espe- RECORDING EQUIPMENT CORPORATION baritone; Marie- Madeleine Duruflé -Che- cially for the sensitiveness with which he 10 -40 45th Ave., Long Island City 1, N.Y. valier, organ; Philippe Caillard and uses the resources of his instrument. Very Stéphanie Caillat Chorales; Orchestre des good sound. N.B. CIRCLE 41 ON READER- SERVICE CARD 84 HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

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www.americanradiohistory.com HANDEL: Trio Sonatas, Op. 2: No. HINDEMITH: Sonata for Piano, 8, in G minor: No. 5, in ,Sonata hear better FM G; Tour Hunds --See Bizet: Jeux d'en - for Oboe and Harpsichord, in C fants, Op. 22. (lll.11l] Ililljlljlj: minor, Op. I. No. & Sonata for Recorder and Harpsichord, in B flat KEYES: Music for Monday Evenings -See Kodály: Symphony. Baroque Trio of Montreal. Vox PL 930. LP. $4.98. KODALY: Symphony Vox STPL 500930. SD. $4.98. tKeyes: Music for Monday Evenings All of these works are short and well Louisville Orchestra, Robert Whitney, made, with songlike or dancelike mel- cond. here... odies and Handel's usual transparent tex- LOUISVILLE LOU 631. LP. $7.95. tures. The two trio sonatas are performed (Available on special order only, from here by flute, oboe, and harpsichord. The 830 S. Fourth St., Louisville, Ky.) able Trio -Mario Duschenes, flute and recorder; Melvin Berman, oboe: Kelsey For a composer of world celebrity to Jones, harpsichord -plays flexibly and write his first symphony at the age of with unanimity. and the sound is well seventy -nine is at least unusual and prob- balanced and lifelike. N.B. ably unprecedented; Kodály's symphony, however, is not much different from his other orchestral I-IAYDN: Mass No. 9, in D minor works in spirit and style. In other words it is impeccably made, in ( ") "Nelson a generally conservative idiom, full of good tunes, Sylvia Stahlman, soprano; Helen Watts, and gently suffused with and here... Hungarian folk color. It is the kind of contralto; Wilfred Brown, tenor; Tom thing one would Krause, bass; Choir of King's College, expect to find recorded with the Gallo FMS -101 by one of the virtuoso conductors, such Cambridge; London Symphony Orches- as David Willcocks, cond. George Szell, who introduced it to Indoor Antenna System tra, this country last year, LONDON 5731. LP. $4.98. a few months after its completion. Whitney is not LONDON OS 25731. SD. $5.98. altogether happy with it, but gets a considerable richness out of Until you know the late Haydn Masses its slow movement. Only The dance suite on the other side, by you really do not know the composer. the young composer his in the Nelson Keyes, was Always surprising, work years written for a high $2995! 1796 -1802 reveals powers which are not school orchestra which meets on Monday nights, and that is pre- fully evident even in the 107 symphonies cisely what it sounds he had produced earlier. The Nelson like. A.F. No matter where you live- suburbs or heart of Mass, surely, belongs in the company the city -your high fidelity FM stereo system's with Bach's Mass in B minor, the Bee- LEHAR: Die lustige Witwe performance is only as good as the signal that thoven Missa Solenmis, or the Verdi reaches your receiver. For true, perfect and Requiem as a score of ever growing Elisabeth Schwarzkopf (s), Hanna Gla- undistorted reception, free from interference, you splendor, drama, and magnificence. Here, wari; Hanny Steffek (s), Valencienne; need the strongest possible signal from every Nicolai Gedda station. virtually for the first time, is a chance to (t), Camille; Kurt Equi- hear it. This is the stereo debut of the luz (t), Cascada; Hans Strohbauer (t), Now you can be sure of the full realism of FM music, and the text used is the authentic St. Brioche; Eberhard Wächter (b), stereo and monaural broadcasts--with the new Danilo; Josef Gallo FMS -101 indoor antenna system that at- original of the composer as edited by Knapp (b), Baron Zeta; taches to any FM radio or tuner using just a H. C. Robbins Landon. (The old Haydn Franz Böheim (comic), Njegus. Phil - screwdriver. In just minutes, you are able to Society set, which introduced the Nelson harmonia Chorus and Orchestra, Lovro receive a high -quality, high -gain signal over the Mass to many listeners, was based on von Matacic, cond. entire FM broadcast band -sit back and enjoy extremely corrupt material.) ANGEL 3630 B /L. Two LP. $9.96. better music at its best, even from stations you The performance seems to me a re- ANGEL S 3630 B /L. Two SD. never could listen to before! markable effort to restore a lost tradi- $11.96. The Gallo FMS -101 antenna system is compact, tion. The high baroque trumpet parts handsomely styled, fits into any room decor. It are well realized. and counterbalanced It has been a long time since I've listened has an omni- directional antenna, coupled to an to Angel's previous all- transistorized pre -amplifier, all completely en- by the roll and thunder of the drums. recording of The closed in its sturdy case. Nothing to go wrong, There is no woodwind in the orchestra, Merry Widow (now nearly a decade old), nothing to need replacement ever. but the stronger voice of the organ is but it seems to me that it possessed more The Gallo FMS -101 costs only $29.95 -less than used with strings for the accompaniment. lilt and life than the new effort. Perhaps many roof -top antennas. And this marvelous indoor The brilliance of the instrumental parts, we have just grown accustomed to the antenna system is guaranteed to produce better moreover, is matched by the vocal writ- very high standard that Angel has set FM reception anywhere -or your money will be ing, and you can debate for yourself for its operetta recordings. refunded. Go to your own Hi -Fi Dealer. Hear the whether it is the high trumpet or the high This performance is very well sung and Gallo FMS -101 antenna system -and what it does soprano of Miss Stahlman that wins the played. Schwarzkopf's handling of her for your FM reception. If your dealer does not exquisite soprano has a stock the Gallo FM Antenna System, send us his greatest honors. (I tip my hat to the grown shade name and we'll see that he is supplied. lady.) Her colleagues have nothing quite careful for this part, and there are now so in evidence one or two sharp (in quality, You don't risk a penny. If the Gallo FMS -101 spectacular todo, but they make up antenna system does not perform as stipulated, a strong solo quartet, while the chorus not pitch) top notes, as well as a very you may return it with your sales check for a full is one of the finest in the world. (I'm an poor trill, but by and large, she still sings refund within 10 days from date of purchase. The old Cambridge man, and prejudiced. but the music irreproachably and speaks her system, complete, is warranted to be free from my college was Trinity so I'm not that lines with point and sophistication. Her defective components for one full year from date prejudiced!) Honors go as well to the "Vilja Song" is quite representative of of purchase. conductor, who gives the work the thrust her work- round -toned, poised, extreme- r 1 and vitality it requires. ly accurate, but not altogether winning; GALLO ELECTRONICS CORPORATION I would be happier. however. if the she is a bit too much the singer, not 12 Potter Avenue, New Rochelle, N. Y. organ, organist, and place of recording quite enough the "personality." Steffek's were identified. From the internal evi- "ich bin eine anstiind'ge Frail" does not Please send me descriptive literature giving make she complete details of the Gallo FMS -101 Antenna dence I would surmise that the tapes much effect, partly because System HF -43 were made in the chapel at Cambridge, does not coax the words enough, partly for the acoustics are those of soaring because she is not recorded very close - NAME gothic vaults, and in that case the organ to. She does well in the "Pavilion Duet," STREET is presumably the much rebuilt Eliza- though. bethan instrument which adorns the loft Wächter is fine so long as he is sing- CITY STATE of that noble edifice. ing along in an easy, lyric way -he is re- My dealer's name and address is In any case. the sound is very good markably relaxed in the high (for a with just the right atmosphere of ecclesi- baritone) tessitura. He goes overboard, astical precincts. R.C.M. though, with "O Vaterland," forgetting CIRCLE 43 ON READER- SERVICE CARD 86 HIGTT FIDELITY MAGAZINE

www.americanradiohistory.com the rather pleasant music entirely in favor of some exceedingly precious, self - indulgent acting. Once he settles down, he sings beautifully. Gedda is just about AN EXCITING PROGRAM perfect in Camille's music -his tenor has certainly gained in ring and color since his early recordings, even if it seems to have lost a trace of the pure OF SPRING RELEASES lyric ease it used to have. His vocalism here is quite showy, in the best sense. The smaller roles are all adequately, if for the selective listener not memorably, performed. Von Matacic gets sharp execution from the Philharmonia, but there are In the spirit of the Easter season Westminster proudly presents, for the first times when his heart doesn't seem in it time on records, a superb performance of Beethoven's exciting oratorio, Christ -the opening of Act II, for instance on the Mount of Olives with Hermann Scherchen conducting the Vienna State (which is admittedly pretty awful stuff, Opera Orchestra, \\ith the Vienna Academy enjoyable only in the framework of a Chorus. Soloists in this stirring firmly tongue -in -cheek staging). On the work are Jan Peerce and Maria Stader, also presented in solo recitals. And, the whole I would counsel investigation of Selective Listener will want to hear -and own -a Wagner Program conducted the London set: Gueden's Hanna has by Hans Knappertshusch, foremost Wagnerian, in commemoration of the more fire and abandon than Schwarz- 150th anniversary of Wagner's birth and the conductor's 75th kopf's, and the conductor, Robert Stolz, birthday. Add has the sort of touch that often eludes to these new albums, other musical achievements under the famous Westmin- Von Matacic -on that set, the "Vilja ster label, listed below ... all music appropriate to the new spring season ... Song" has a touch of magic. Emmy for the Selective Listener. Loose also characterizes Valencienne with more piquancy than Steffek, though BEETHOVEN: CHRIST ON THE MOUNT OFFENBACH: FAMOUS OVERTURES -LA VIE London's men ( Per Grunden and Walde- OF OLIVES, Op. 85 PARISIENNE; ORPHÉE AUX ENFERS; MON- mar Kmentt) are neither as good vocally Jan Peerce, tenor; Maria Stader, soprano; SIEUR ET MADAME DENIS; LA BELLE nor as sharply differentiated as Wachter Otto Wiener, bass; Vienna Academy Chorus; HÉLÈNE; LA GRANDE DUCHESSE DE and Gedda. Vienna State Opera Orchestra; HERMANN GÉROLSTEIN; BARBE -BLEUE; SCHERCHEN conducting. Angel's sound is, by current standards, Vienna State Opera Orchestra; HERMANN middlin' good- perfectly listenable. but XWN -19033 (mono) WST -17033 (stereo) SCHERCHEN Conducting. The first recording of this 'obscure' oratorio XWN -19035 (mono) WST -17035 (stereo) nothing exciting. The mono set is not - another Westminster 'first'. Scherchen inferior in any important way to the brings this exciting and moving work to life, Sparkling and exciting performances recorded stereo. Complete text and translation with inspired performances by Peerce, under the magic baton of Professor Hermann provided. C.L.O. Stader and Wiener. Scherchen. KNAPPERTSBUSCH CONDUCTS WAGNER: TRISTAN UND ISOLDE; DIE MEISTER- MOZART: THE TWO SINFONIE CONCER- 2 SINGER; TANNHAUSER; PARSIFAL- Munich TANTI; LISZT: Hungarian Rhapsody, No. Philharmonic Orchestra. -See Schubert: Symphony No. 4, Chamber Orchestra of Lausanne; VICTOR XWN -19032 (mono) WST -17032 (stereo) DESARZENS conducting. in C minor ( "Tragic"). Includes the 'Meistersinger' Prelude: 'Tann- hauser' Overture; 'Tristan' Prelude and Liebe- XWN -19036 (mono) WST -17036 (stereo) stod; and the 'Parsifal' Prelude. Of Knap- MILHAUD: Les Choéphores pertsbusch Wieland Wagner says: His name Two of Mozart's most beautiful works ex- awakens love and reverence ... in the center pertly performed by the group who appear of his being stands the work of Richard on Westminster's highly -praised 'Le Vin Vera Zorina, narrator; Virginia Babikian, Wagner ... nobody at all is more chosen Herbé' by Frank Martin. Desarzens again soprano; Irene Jordan, mezzo; McHenry than he to interpret this mystic, mythical, shows fine musicianship. of but also gay and idyllic music of Richard Boatwright, bass. Schola Cantorum Wagner." New York; New York Philharmonic Or- SCARLATTI: SONATAS -LONGO 23, 82, 217, chestra, Leonard Bernstein, cond. JAN PEERCE SINGS HANDEL ARIAS 238, 255, 256, 257, 352, 449, 457, 482 and COLUMBIA ML 5796. LP. $4.98. Jan Peerce, tenor; Vienna State Opera Or- 483; COLUMBIA MS 6396. SD. $5.98. chestra; HANS SCHWIEGER conducting. FOU TS'ONG, piano XWN -19028 (mono) WST -17028 (stereo) XWN -19015 (mono) WST -17015 (stereo) Les Choéphores Libation Bearers One of the world's greatest artists sings -The some of the world's greatest music, includ- The incomparable young Fou Ts'ong pre- of Aeschuylus, translated into French by ing arias from 'Atalanta', 'Samson', 'Alexan- sents Scarlatti Sonatas, adding to his varied Paul Claudel- provided Milhaud with der's Feast', 'Semele', 'Acis And Galatea', repertoire on Westminster - Mozart Piano the opportunity to compose one of his 'Radamisto', 'Alceste', 'Jephtha' and 'Judas Concerti, Chopin Pieces, and Piano Sonatas most important scores. The Maccabaeus'. of Beethoven, proving his complete musi- polytonal cality. choruses which he spread throughout the MARIA STADER LIEDER RECITAL: SCHU- 'work were astonishing enough for their MANN, MOZART, SCHUBERT period (the music was written in 1919) Maria Stader, soprano; Joerg Demus, piano. THE GYPSIES ARE SINGING but the various numbers for an exactly XWN -19029 (mono) WST -17029 (stereo) The Sándor Lakatos Ensemble of Budapest - notated speaking voice, speaking chorus, Schumann's 'Frauenliebe Und Leben' and including 8 soloists. five songs each by Mozart and Schubert. XWN -19022 (mono) WST -17022 (stereo) and percussion were something absolute- Maria Stader's recent recitals were received ly sensational. They still are. The at- as follows: "simplicity and nobility marked Probably finest of Hungarian mosphere of blood, hate, revenge, and all of her singing and dedication to her art the group convinced the listener that here, indeed is Gypsy Players in the world. A most enjoyable general doom achieved in this violent an artist who knows, who feels, who de- album -the closest you'll ever get to authen- music remains unparalleled, and an up- livers." tic Gypsy music. to- date recording was long overdue. The LIST PLAYS LISZT: PIANO CONCERTO NO. THREE chorus sings superbly, the orchestra plays 1; MALEDICTION FOR PIANO AND STRINGS; CLASSIC CYMBALOM- INCLUDING extremely well, Zorina is an admirable HUNGARIAN RHAPSODY FOR VIOLIN SOLO SONGS BY COUPERIN AND THREE SCAR - recitant; the singing soloists must all AND ORCHESTRA; LATTI SONATAS; have had bad colds that day. A.F. Eugene List, piano; Carroll Glenn violin; Aládár Rácz, cymbalom; Ivonne Rácz, piano. Vienna State Opera Orchestra; GYORGY XWN -19011 (mono) WST -17011 (stereo) LEHEL conducting. XWN -19025 (mono) WST -17025 (stereo) Aládár Rácz is without doubt the finest per- MONTEVERDI: Madrigali guerrieri Outstanding recording of Franz Liszt works former on the Cymbalom of this century. His performed by Eugene List, Carroll Glenn genius raised the instrument from the limited Charles Bressler, Herbert Handt, tenors; (Mrs. List), and G9orgy Lehel, little -known sphere of a cafe instrument to a level worthy Chester Watson, bass; Albert Fuller, but great conductor. of the concert platform. harpsichord; Aeterna Chamber Orches- tra, Frederic Waldman, cond. Free: For the Westminster Listener...com- DECCA DL 9417. LP. $4.98. plete new catalog. Write Dept. HF -17 List Price: Single albums DECCA DL 79417. SD. $5.98. WESTMINSTER RECORDING CO., INC. Stereo $5.98; Monaural $4.98 a subsidiary of ABC -Paramount Records, Inc., These fifteen pieces, depicting the 1501 Broadway, New York. 36, New York. thoughts of a soldier concerning love and ANNOUNCING: RE- ISSUES OF WORLD- FAMOUS war, vary from short ones of a few lines WESTMINSTER CLASSICS to an entire miniature cantata. They WESTMINSTER INVITES YOUR PERSONAL PREFERENCES WRITE FOR FREE LIST CIRCLE 99 ON READER- SERVICE CARD APRIL 1963 87

www.americanradiohistory.com range from solo monodies with con- Poulenc and Barber); New York Phil- tinuo accompaniment to many- voiced harmonic, Leonard Bernstein, cond. (in works with strings. Most of them are in the Strauss). the intense and dramatic style that COLUMBIA ML 5798. LP. $4.98. Monteverdi was one of the first -if not COLUMBIA MS 6398. SD. $5.98. the first -to introduce into music. Espe- cially striking, to me, are the cantata - This record provides a good sample of like Altri canti d'amor, in which Watson the sound of the new Aeolian- Skinner does some particularly effective singing, organ in the Philadelphia Academy of and Hor ch'el ciel, with its mysterious Music as well as (not surprisingly) an- opening and unusually expressive har- other demonstration of Mr. Biggs's skills. monies. Mr. Waldman's forces perform The Philadelphia organ is apparently with verve and a wide range of dynamics. somewhat similar to the one just com- They spin out long melodies beautifully, pleted at Lincoln Center. If anything, it and convey the excitement of the more seems to be a somewhat more attractive rhythmic passages. The sound is excel- instrument, an effect that is possibly due lent in both versions. N.B. more to hall acoustics than to r'Fferences between the instruments themselves. In recording, at least, the Philadelphia in- MOZART: Arias: Don Giovanni: strument comes across with a handsome, Madamina, il catalogo e questo. Il vigorous sound that is beautifully voiced Flauto magico: Qui sdegno non for elegant, clear, and contrasting lines s'accende. Le Nozze di Figaro: Non and colors. più andrai. Mentre ti lascio, o The Organ Concerto by the late Fran- Who's afraid of the dangerous loudspeaker? figlia, K. 513 -See Rossini: Arias. cis Poulenc is quite closely related to his Two -Piano Concerto. There are, however, some significant differences. The Organ If you think that's a rhetorical question, MOZART: Concertos for Piano and you're merely confirming our suspicions. Concerto takes itself quite seriously; its We are beginning to suspect that people Orchestra: No. 26, in D, K. 537 evocation of the past is not so much a don't take our advertising literally. ( "Coronation "); No. 27, in B flat, collection of quotes and references but an For two and a half years now, our ads K. 595 actual evocation of an obscure but glori- have been warning high fidelity enthusiasts ous era. The wit here is the result of against the perils of owning an audio trans- Robert Casadesus, piano; Columbia Sym- benign good humor and the work is even ducer as uncompromisingly truthful as the phony Orchestra, George Sze11, cond. -more or less-internally consistent. dangerous loudspeaker. COLUMBIA ML 5803. LP. $4.98. Poulenc was a cultivated gentleman But no one seems to believe that we COLUMBIA MS 6403. SD. $5.98. who heard and enjoyed a gread deal of really mean what we say. Thousands and pleasant music of no great import which thousands of our readers have thrown cau- The performance of the D major Con- he gracefully rescued from oblivion by tion to the wind and bought the EMI Model certo sounds to me exactly like that by transforming it and turning it to his own DLS -529. the same forces on Columbia's ML 4901. musical accounts. With a straight face Well, let's get it straight. We mean ex- The only difference I could hear is that the composer gave us here a concerto actly what we say. Here, for example, are the rather loud beginning of the finale in the style of Viotti, or perhaps Méhul those who really are afraid of the dangerous has been toned down. From the stand- as transcribed by Saint -Saëns. There is loudspeaker. point of both performance and record- now and then a Poulenc -style wrong Owners of much larger and more expen- ing, it remains the best available in the note, but not very often. Yet the results sive loudspeaker systems, who now realize domestic catalogues. Casadesus' elegant have all the charm and esprit of typical that the EMI speaker sounds considerably and polished playing. avoiding sentimen- Poulenc -erie. It is not very easy to explain more natural and musical than theirs. tality even in the easily sentimentalized exactly how all this is carried off so suc- Possessors of less- than -perfect amplifiers, Larghetto, and Szell's deft handling of cessfully. Part of the effect is certainly pickups or other components, who fear that the orchestra combine to make this a due to a marvelous naïveté; the naïveté the uncanny transient response and extreme highly enjoyable reading. As for the of, say, a Matisse odalisque -that is, the transparency of the EMI speaker might re- great B flat major Concerto. Casadesus most sophisticated naïveté in the world. veal the slightest flaw in their equipment. is here favored with much better sound The contrast between the graceful, Careless record collectors, who fear the than in his older version with Barbirolli light touch of Poulenc and the heavy - merciless clarity with which the EMI speaker and the New York Philharmonic. The handed Barber Toccata is striking. This reproduces scratches, gouges, pops, clicks result is a reading that is superior to all latter composition was written for the and hiss. the others I know that are now available occasion of the inauguration of the new Manufacturers of other loudspeaker sys- (I haven't heard the Backhaus), except Philadelphia organ and, in fact, it turns tems. And so on. the Serkin. I find Serkin's Larghetto out to be just a little too occasional. The fearsome object itself, the dangerous more poetic, but prospective purchasers This is not an impressive or an engaging loudspeaker, is deceptively simple. would do well to compare both versions work either in its ideas or in the way There is the enclosure, 24 by 13 by 121/4 before deciding. N.B. they are delivered. The performance is, inches, of the finest available walnut. Fin- however, noteworthy and -as in the ished on all sides, including the back. Thick MOZART: Concerto for Poulenc-Biggs, Ormandy, and the Phil- walls, heavily reinforced. No ports, slots, Violin and adelphia Orchestra produce an excellent Orchestra, No. 4, in D, K. 418 ducts or other dubious acoustic gimmicks. - collaboration. The orchestral sound is Just an airtight seal and lots of damping See Bruch: Concerto for Violin and somewhat dull, possibly because of a material. Orchestra, No. 1, in G minor, Op. tendency to favor the organ. There is EMI's famous elliptical woofer, 26. The Strauss work constitutes some very 131/2 by 81/2 inches, with aluminum cone pompous filler. Originally written for and special plastic suspension. Hand -made. the dedication of the Wiener Konzert- Then there are the two specially designed MOZART: Sonata for Piano, No. 14, haus, this piece was used for a similar 31/2 inch tweeters and the high- precision in C minor, K. 457 -See Beethoven: purpose during the opening week of Phil- 4,500 -cps crossover network. The three Sonata for Piano, No. 23, in F harmonic Hall at Lincoln Center. The drivers are strung out in a single line. The minor, Op. 57 ( "Appassionata "). idea was to show off the new Aeolian - right way. Skinner organ installed in that auditorium The price? That's one thing about the but, unfortunately, it was impossible to EMI speaker that nobody is afraid of. It's PICCHI: Balli d'arpicordo -See Fres- get the instrument ready in time. Mr. $159.00. cobaldi: Music for Harpsichord. Biggs played on a borrowed electric or- Higher in the South and West. For fur- gan instead, and it is this instrument that ther information, write to Scope Electronics POULENC: Concerto for Organ, was used in the present recording. Per- Corporation, a subsidiary of Symphonic haps it didn't matter very much since, in Electronic Corp., 10 Columbus Circle, New Strings, and Timpani, in G minor any case, Strauss did not really use the York 19: Exclusive distributor of EMI loud- ¡-Barber: Toccata Festiva, Op. 36 organ as a solo instrument here but as speaker systems and integrated pickups and I-Strauss, Richard: Festival Prelude an adjunct to his enormous orchestra. tone arms. for Organ and Orchestra, Op. 61 The organ is there to add a note (or sev- EMI eral hundred notes) of proper solemnity E. Power Biggs, organ; Philadelphia Or- -an echo from more hallowed precincts (Electric and Musical Industries, Ltd.), England chestra, Eugene Ormandy, cond. (in the to suggest a sacred blessing on a secular CIRCLE 38 ON READER -SERVICE CARD 88 HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

www.americanradiohistory.com enterprise. The work itself is, unfortunately, a terrible piece of bombast. The performance is properly grandiloquent. E.S.

IIIIIII 111111 i::: 12fiNlCûiuluuul1W;mJWlíllmrlulOmllrilllllullW1111IlmlmllOMNmmn11NIIWI1t1107711unIIdRINU11111111111011WNIN ul®101u1@nuutl®WWIIIII01111IM RACHMANINOFF: Symphony No. 3, in A minor, op. 44; Chanson géorgienne, Op. 4, No. 4 Netania Davrath, soprano (in Chanson géorgienne); Utah Symphony Orchestra, Maurice Abravanel, cond. VANGUARD VRS 1094. LP. $4.98. VANGUARD VSD 2119. SD. $5.95.

This is the finest of Rachmaninoff's symphonies, and along with Isle of the Dead, the most successful of any of the composer's purely orchestral works. The material is cogent and its development stimulating without being cloyingly sweet or long- winded. There once was an RCA Victor reissue of a recording of the Third New This Month Symphony by the Philadelphia Orchestra as led by the composer, and Boult, Sar- gent, Ormandy, and Golovanon were responsible for later editions of the score. BRITTEN: YOUNG PERSON'S GUIDE TO THE Only the Ormandy disc remains in the and catalogue to challenge this newcomer. ORCHESTRA. Lorin Maazel, Conductor In contrast to Ormandy, who exploits Narrator. the opulent Philadelphia sonority to the hilt, Abravanel seems determined to keep PROKOFIEV: PETER AND THE WOLF. Alec the lines of the score as lean and astrin- Clunes, Narrator. L'Orchestra National Français. gent as possible. His tempos are on the fast side and, for the most part, well cho- LPM 18 746 Stereo SLPM 138 746 sen. A lot of woodwind and brass detail intentionally submerged by Ormandy 14 songs ( who favors a more "generalized" ap- OTHMAR SCHOECK: BURIED ALIVE. proach) is brought to the fore in the from Gottfried Keller's verse cycle. Dietrich Vanguard recording -which matches the orchestra's style with engineering that is Fischer -Dieskau, Baritone, Berlin Radio Sym- clear, sharp, and highly complimentary to phony Orchestra, Conductor Fritz Rieger. the wind, brass, and percussion sections. (The strings are a bit scrawny -probably LPM 18 821 Stereo SLPM 138 821 a tree facsimile of their actual sound. The ensemble's over -all work, I hasten to add. is highly skilled and thoroughly SCHUBERT: SYMPHONY NO. 2 IN B FLAT, professional.) Unless one has an antipa- SYMPHONY NO. 3 IN D MAJOR. Berlin Phil- thy to the lush style of the Philadelphia Orchestra. however, the Ormandy must harmonic Orchestra, Conductor Lorin Maazel. retain preference, for Abravanel's intelli- LPM 18 790 Stereo SLPM 138 790 gent interpretation lacks some of that conductor's personal involvement and sheer flair for this type of music. BEETHOVEN: THE FIVE PIANO CONCERTOS. The Chanson géorgienne is the same work familiar to many as O Cease Thy Wilhelm Kempff, Piano; Berlin Philharmonic Singing, Maiden Fair. Netania Davrath conducted by Ferdinand Leitner. does rather well by the music, but the old acoustical version by John McCor- No. 1 in C Major mack (with Fritz Kreisler lending his LPM 18 774 Stereo SLPM 138 774 violinistic adornments to the tenor's golden voice -recently revived by RCA Vic- No. 2 in B flat /No. 4 in G major tor on LM 6099) has a warmth and LPM 18 775 Stereo SLPM 138 775 rapturous conviction which far out- matches the present singer's accomplish- No. 3 in C minor ment. H.G. LPM 18 776 Stereo SLPM 138 776

No. 5 in E flat, "Emperor" ROSSINI: Arias: La Cenerentola: I [PM 18 777 Stereo SLPM 138 777 miei rampolli. Il Barbiere di Sivi- glia: A un dottor; La calunnia. L'Italiana in Algeri: Femmine d'Italia SUPERB RECORDINGS f Mozart: Arias: Don Giovanni: Mad- amina, il catalogo e questo. Il BEAUTIFULLY PACKAGED Flauto magico: Qui sdegno non s'accende. Le Nozze di Figaro: Non più andrai. Mentre ti lascio, o a figlia, K. 513 DIRECT IMPORT 4MIDL FACTORY SEALED 11lI111llllllltIluuluupulu Ezio Flagello, bass; Orchestra Sinfonica di Roma, Nicholas Flagello, cond. Send for the new illustrated 1963 catalogue of fine Deutsche Grammophon Recordings. SCOPE MV 0001 LP. $3.98. Write: MGM RECORDS, Classical Division, 550 Fifth Ave., N.Y. 36, N.Y., Dept. A -4 SCOPE SV 0001. SD. $4.98. In Piled. Deutsche Grammophon (Great Britain) ltd.. 12/13 lathbone Place, Oxford Street, London W. This is the first release under the new 30 ON READER- SERVICE CARD APRIL 1963 89

www.americanradiohistory.com Scope label, and the first recorded solo very well, as Magnificó s aria illustrates, passion which this great aria ought to reoital by Ezio Flagello. This young and has a reasonable command of the have. basso is already getting major buffo as- general buffo inflections for indicating The accompaniments are solid, but do signments at the Met, as well as some nastiness or extreme choler. There is little to lift the recital. Scope's sound of the more serious roles, such as Paolo as yet nothing especially individual or is decent, with good stereo spread, but and Pogner. His appearance, as well as illuminating about his way with such a touch of harshness and a lack of any his voice, makes him perfectly suited to music (Capecchi, for example, makes real depth. I believe the mono version is the buffo repertory, though it is to be things much more specific), but the actually the less fatiguing to listen to, hoped that his unusually round, beauti- voice is a joy to listen to and there is and it seems no less faithful to the voice. ful instrument will not be entirely squan- no lack of temperament or stylistic The jacket notes are perfectly corn - dered on such fare. In time, he should grasp of a more general sort. petent, but tell us virtually nothing about make an ideal Falstaff, since he has both The more serious numbers are less the content of the arias -there is no hint the true basso contante timbre and the satisfactory. He negotiates the vocal of what "Mentre ti lascio" is all about, high notes required for the role. depths of the Magic Flute aria with a to say nothing of any text. C.L.O. The present disc offers much gratifying minimum of discomfort, but somehow singing. Flagello's voice ascends without misses the quiet dignity and authority problems to the high G, and stays open of the piece (his voice, basically, is not SCHUBERT: Symphony No. 4, in C and bright around E flat and E, without dark enough for Sarastro). "Mentre ti minor ( "Tragic ") turning blatant (this ability is a good lascio" is quite undistinguished -a pleas- f Liszt: Hungarian Rhapsody, No. 2 deal less common than one might sup- ant, slightly restless stretch of vocalizing, { Brahms: Hungarian pose). He does the Rossinian patter altogether lacking in the anguish and Dances: Nos. 1, 3 -6, 10

Vienna Symphony Orchestra, Paul Sach- er, cond. (in the Schubert); Austrian Symphony Orchestra, Hans Hagen, cond. (in the Liszt and Brahms). EVEREST 6102. LP. $4.98. EVEREST 3102. SD. $4.98.

What strange bedfellows we have here! There is music by Schubert, Liszt. and Brahms that might reasonably be jux- taposed on a single disc, but this isn't it. 1f one considers these works separately. however, one will find that they are given creditable accounts. Paul Sach- er, conductor of the famous Basel Chamber Orchestra, is a very fine musician, and his reading of the Schubert Symphony is sane and well proportioned. Hans Hagen seems at home in the gypsy - flavored works of Liszt and Brahms, and he has been accorded reasonably good reproduction. Sacher, on the other hand, has been let down by relatively poor sound, of limited tonal and volume range. P.A.

STRAUSS, RICHARD: Festival Prel- REja.ndberg ude for Organ and Orchestra, Op. LISTENS TO AFRICA 61 -See Poulenc: Concerto for Or- Tandberg gan, Strings, and Timpani, in G Tape Recorders...Dependable Everywhere! minor. THE PLACE: Ruandi Urundi, Congo, Africa. THE SITUATION: Natives listen with rapt attention as a Tandberg Model #2 (Model #8) plays VIVALDI: Concerti grossi, Op. 3: back their singing voices. The identical No. 10, in B minor; No. 11, in D unit was used extensively on safaris into the deepest jungle where minor -See Bartók: Divertimento on -the -spot tapes of wild animal life sounds were recorded. The rugged for Strings. construction and quality design of the Tandberg were instrumental in obtaining faithful recordings under difficult conditions. Power was derived from a converter and car battery. WAGNER: Siegfried THE CONCLUSION: TANDBERG OFFERS BETTER, CLEARER, Birgit Nilsson. Wolfgang Windgassen, MORE NATURAL SOUND UNDER ANY CONDITION! Hans Hotter, et al.: Vienna Philharmonic Tandberg tape recorders are guaranteed for 12 months. Orchestra, Georg Solti, cond. *Details about Tandberg Tape Recorders For a feature review of this recording, see page 71.

WEBER: Der Freischütz (highlights) Irmgard Seefried (s), Agathe; Rita Streich (s), Annchen; Richard Holm (t), Max; Eberhard Wächter (b), Ottokar; Kurt Böhme (bs), Kaspar; Walter Krep- MODEL 74 pei (bs), A Hermit. Chorus and Orches- MODEL 64 MODEL 8 tra of the Bavarian Radio, Eugen Complete Stereo Music System. Stereo Record /Playback Deck. Monaural Record/Playback. Features: 3 speed, 4 track Features: 3 separate heads, Features: 2 speeds, 2 heads, Jochum, cond. stereo record, stereo playback monitoring on tape, multiplex power amplifier, built -in DEUTSCHE GRAMMOPHON LPEM with 2 power amplifiers and 2 input, 3 speeds, automatic tape speaker. In 2 track or 4 track. 19221. LP. $5.98. built in speakers. stop, sound -on- sound. Remote Model 8F - Remote control, DEUTSCHE GRAMMOPHON SLPEM List $39940 control start-stop available. start-stop, fast rewind. 136221. SD. $6.98. List $498.00 From $21940 ,Tandberg of America, lac., P. 0. lox 111, 8 Third Ave., Pelham, N. Y. An excellent once -over of the opera, CIRCLE 98 ON READER -SERVICE CARD 90 HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

www.americanradiohistory.com drawn from DGG's complete recording released about two years ago. Of the two up -to -date versions of the complete op- At era, I prefer Electrola's by a small mar- gin (partly because of the inclusion of Lo1YRECORDS more dialogue, which is of no consequence in an abridged version). An abridgment of the Electrola recording is listed in the catalogue, but I haven't heard it. As for this one, it includes just about all the major items of the score, though it reduces some of them (one verse of Kaspar's drinking song, for example). The selection has been done with a view towards keeping the work's essential shape, which it does very well, with no distressing end -of -band fade -outs. The only number I really wish had been included is "Und ob die Wolke," but there are limits to what a single disc will hold. Enough dialogue has been kept to keep the drama moving intelligibly. I still find Holm's voice a couple of shades too light and undramatic for this role, but he is knowing in his handling GEORG SOLTI Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra of the big aria. Seefried is in top form; Streich vocalizes well, though without much in the way of characterization; Böhme is a convincing heavy without providing much really good singing tone. BIRGIT NILSSON Jochum's leadership is fine, the sound excellent in stereo (I have not received the mono). If an abridgment is of in- WOLFGANG WINDGASSEN terest, this is a worthwhile purchase. C.L.O. HANS HOTTER WOLF: Goethe Lieder Mignon Lieder: Heiss' mich nicht reden; GERHARD STOLZE Nur wer die Sehnsucht kennt; So lass mich scheinen; Singet nicht in Trailer- tönen (Philipe); Kennst du das Land? Ganymed; Anakreons Grab; Die .Spröde; GUSTAV NEIDLINGER Die Bekehrte; Blumengruss; Gleich und gleich; Friihling übers Jahr; St. Nepo- muks Vorabend; Epiphanias. Elisabeth Schwarzkopf, soprano; Gerald Moore, piano. ANGEL 35909. LP. $4.98. ANGEL S 35909. SD. $5.98.

This is quite a satisfying recital, although I don't care for it quite as much as I did for the excellent Schwarzkopf /Moore with Italian Songbook disc released about a year ago. It seems to me that the Schwarzkopf mannerisms do not fit the JOAN present songs quite as well as they do the Italian Songbook selections. Her tendency to pick things to pieces, to smash a song SUTHERLAND into a welter of textual fragments, does damage to the Mignon songs. The sim- as the Forest Bird plicity and emotional directness of the character gets lost. We get the same sort of applied whisper (and therefore the same emotional effect) on each of these lines: " Allein das Schicksal, will es nicht" in Mignon I; "Vor Kummer altert' ich zu frülte" in Mignon III; "Es glänzt der Saal" in Kennst du das Land? Yet the meaning and even the general mood is quite different in each case. so that this kind of whisper begins to sound like mere effect -a substitute for really getting inside the song. There is still much fine singing. Mignon III is really very good, with the singer filing her tone down to an almost colorless thread. The climaxes of Kennst du das Land? are wonderful; especially admirable is the building of the third "A Stupendous verse to the big phrase on "Es stürzt der Fels and fiber ihn die Flut!" (Moore also Musical Experience" underlines the change from second to third verse very beautifully.) Ganymed is given a superb performance, with CIRCLE 62 ON READER -SERVICE CARD APRIL 1963 91

www.americanradiohistory.com Moore setting forth the even single tones Gedenke doch, mein Geist. La Fontaine - of the accompanying motif meaningfully, RECITALS AND Clérambault: L'Hipocrite reclus; La Peau and Schwarzkopf's soprano gleaming de l'ours; Sotte vanité; L'Oisiveté; Bons steadily through the final verse -this is MISCELLANY amis rares; La Vie champêtre; L'Envie. still an impressive, lovely voice. Side 2 is almost wholly successful. Songs like Hugues Cuenod, tenor; Albert Fuller, Die Spröde and the gorgeous Frühling harpsichord. übers Jahr seem to call forth more HUGUES CUENOD: Songs from CAMBRIDGE 702. LP. $4.98. CAMBRIDGE 1702. spontaneity from Schwarzkopf than Shakespeare, Bach, and La Fontaine SD. $5.98. some of the more heavily "serious" ones. Even Epiphanias, which usually comes Wilson: Take, O take those lips away. A very interesting collection, particularly off best with a fairly hefty male voice, is Purcell: Come unto these yellow sands; strong in the Shakespeare songs on the gratifyingly realized. Altogether, a most Fall fathom five. Morley: It was a lover first side. All of these are good, and worthwhile release, even if the perform- and his lass. Arne: Blow, blow thou the Arne contributions are extraor- ance often remains in the realm of the minter wind; Under the greenwood tree; dinary; Where the bee sucks, in fact, admirable rather than the overwhelming. Where the bee sucks, there suck I. seems to me a really inspired setting. The sound is not of the best, being a Come, come away death. Bach: Five Several of these songs were on discs trifle shallow and dry -in this instance, Songs from the Little Notebook for Anna back in 78 days, but so far as I know the stereo pressing is distinctly better Magdalena Bach: Erbauliche Gedanken they have not previously turned up on than the mono, particularly as regards eines Tabakrauchers; Bist du bei mir; LP. fullness of piano tone. C.L.O. Aria di Giovannini; Wie wohl ist mir; The numbers collected by Bach for his Little Notebook are by no means of great musical stature except for Bist du bei mir, but they make extremely pleasant listening. The same can be said for the lightheaded little La Fontaine songs, with basses figured by Cléram- bault, who apparently made use of previously existing tunes. They are marked by curious end -of- phrase embellishments, and by heavy underlining of the "morals" at the conclusion of each fable; in La Vie champêtre and L'Envie this is done by means of unusual falsetto runs. Cuenod is really splendid. His light, clear tenor is well suited to such literature, and his exemplary musicianship and crystalline enunciation in each of these languages is of great assistance. He displays considerable breath control, a fine trill, and an instinct for keeping the music moving. His hushed performance of Bist du bei mir approaches perfection. Fuller's accompaniments, including some graphic pictorial effects in the La Fontaine numbers, are excellent. So is the sound, though the stereo separation (I haven't heard the mono edition) between harpsichord and voice is too extreme for my taste. Notes, texts, and translations are supplied. C.L.O.

VICTORIA DE LOS ANGELES: Cantos de España Montsalvatge: Cinco canciones negras: Cuba dentro de un piano; Punto de haba- nera; Chévere; Canción de cuna para dormir a un negrito; Canto negro. Gra- nados: Llorad, corazón; Iban al pinar. Rodrigo: Cuatro madrigales amatorios: Con qué la lavaré; Vos me metasteis; De dónde Vetlís, aurore ?; De los álamos ven- go, madre. Esplá: Cinco canciones play- eras españolas: Rutas; Pregona Las 12; El pescador sin dinero; Coplilla. Falla: The truly portable new tape recorder 801 -A La vida breve; Vivan los que rien; Alli SONY esta! Riyendo! Victoria de los Angeles, soprano; Orches- word power! tre de la Société des Concerts du Con- Wherever you are, wherever you go, what- also a strikingly handsome addition to your servatoire de Paris, Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos, cond. ever the time, your completely portable, office or den furnishings. Additional features include: adjustable pause and back -up ANGEL 35937. LP. $4.98. battery operated, new Sony 801 -A is ANGEL S 35937. SD. $5.98. ready to work for you. Sales meetings, lever (this Sony exclusive enables you call reports, lectures, conferences, inter- = to repeat a word, a phrase, a sentence), Another lovely collection of Spanish views, vacationing, home or office -press self-storing microphone (another Sony vocal music -this time exclusively twen- stop and go button on the tieth Miss de los Angeles. the button and it's recorded with the Tape it, exclusive), century -from world- famous Sony fidelity. Playback? with you! microphone, two speeds (17/s & 33/4), Montsalvatge's songs, with their texts It's immediate, through the built -in, full- and a full line of accessories. Complete with mirroring Negro scenes and their Carib- bean influences in the music, bear super- range speaker. Truly portable, the 801 -A is microphone and accessory earphone, $250.* write for illustrated ficial resemblances to some of Villa *Leather carrying case $10 additional. For specifications, uses and a list of accessories, free negro, which brochure to Superscope Inc., Sun Valley, California. In New York City, visit the Sony Salon, 585 Fifth Avenue. Lobos' -especially in Canto depends for its effect on a rhythmic playing- around with repeated syllables. SUPERSCOPE The Tapeway to Stereo They have an almost popular flavor, and seem to me to miss the essence of the CIRCLE 96 ON READER- SERVICE CARD 92 HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

www.americanradiohistory.com poetry wherever it is straightforward pieces from various chamber suites by PAUL PARAY: "Ballet Highlights and intense, as in Chévere ( "A Man with Couperin, arranged for cello and strings from French Opera" a Scar "). by Paul Bazélaire. These are beautifully Both the Granados and Rodrigo played by Janigro as soloist, but their texts, connection with Couperin seems remote. Gounod: Faust: Ballet Music; Waltz. groups are based on old traditional Saint- Saëns: Samson et Dalila: Baccha- and their melodic lines are traditional Next comes Mozart's Divertimento in the more inven- D, K. 136. By playing the appoggiaturas nale. Bizet: Carmen: Danse bohème. Ber- too. Rodrigo is perhaps lioz: Les Troyens: Royal Hunt and tive of the two (though the Granados long instead of short, Janigro drastically mournful changes the character of the first theme; Storm. Massenet: Phèdre: Overture. Llorad, corazón is hauntingly Thomas: Mignon: Gavotte. -and of course the composer represents the slow movement, however, is nicely sung. A lusty performance of Corelli's an earlier generation than Rodrigo's); at Detroit Symphony Paul Paray, - Concerto grosso in D, Op. 6, No. 4, with Orchestra, times, it almost seems as if a sixteenth cond. century court song had been grafted onto a lively realization of the continuo The (played by Anton Heiller on a harpsi- MERCURY MR 50318. LP. $4.98. a page of Respighi orchestration. MERCURY SR 90318. SD. $5.98. results are mildly interesting. chord), follows. Finally, there is Brit - The Esplá songs strike me as the best ten's youthful Simple Symphony, with of all; based on intriguing verses by its rather moving, though long, Senti- A look at the contents of this record Rafael Alberti, they never fail to provide mental Saraband to offset a touch of will quickly reveal that not all of it effective setting. El pescador sin dinero cuteness at the close of the first two is ballet music. Little matter. Paray with No Money "), in movements. The sound in both versions plays it all with verve and vibrancy. ("The Fisherman music has been played and fact, is an unusually sensitive and fin- is full and resonant. N.B. Some of this ished song, marked by fine taste and restraint in its orchestration. The arias from La vida breve need no comment by now -De los Angeles' way with them is as compelling as ever, even if her voice no longer has quite the fresh freedom of the first few years. She is in good form throughout the recital, and in this sort of music her interpretations are as close GRADO to definitive as any can come. The accompaniments are excellent, and so is the sound, in both versions. Angel has also performed its customary thorough job of presentation- notes, complete texts, and LABORATORY SERIES STEREO CARTRIDGE $49.50 translations. C.L.O. Performs: Superbly In All Record Changers and Automatic Turntables NOAH GREENBERG: "Renaissance Festival Music" New York Pro Musica, Noah Greenberg, cond. CLASSIC SERIES STEREO CARTRIDGE $37.50 DECCA DL 9419. LP. $4.98. DECCA DL 79419. SD. $5.98. Performs Superbly In All Record Changers and Automatic Turntables

Side 1 of this disc includes a group of dances of various sorts from a collection published by Tielman Susato at Antwerp SENATOR SERIES STEREO CARTRIDGE $24.95 in 1551. Mr. Greenberg's fine group of as they players allows us to hear them Performs Superbly In All Record Changers and Automatic Turntables might have been performed at some royal banquet or a wedding of wealthy nobility. Some are done by "loud" in- shawms), struments (cornett, sackbuts, MK1 others by "soft" instruments (recorders, EXPER MENTAL STEREO CARTRIDGE $75.00 krummhorns, viols), still others by a combination of these. The fresh, lovely Designed For Transcription Tone Arms Only colors are sufficient reason for the current revival of these old instruments- a revival in which Mr. Greenberg's ensemble has taken an important part ALL GRADO STEREO CARTRIDGES in this country. As always with this group, performances are lively and PLAY MONAURAL RECORDS strongly rhythmical. In two of the dances, drums and cymbals add to the effect. The same general principles are observed on the other side, which is devoted to Venetian pieces of around 1600, All Grato Stereo Cartridges are unconditionally guaranteed including one by Andrea and three by Giovanni Gabrieli. In one or two in- for 1 year and the diamond stylus is guaranteed for 5 years stances Mr. Greenberg uses more players than were likely to be available in a against normal wear. Venetian church except on the grandest splendid. occasions, but the results are above are The performers sound as much at home These guarantees are valid only if the cartridges with their instruments as though they were veteran members of the musical used in record changers, automatic turntables and transcrip- staff of St. Mark's in Gabrieli's time, and Decca's engineers have served them tion tone arms. skillfully in both versions. N.B. ANTONIO JANIGRO: Music for Strings GRADO LABORATORIES INC. Solisti di Zagreb, Antonio Janigro, cond. RCA VICTOR LM 2653. LP. $4.98. 4614 Seventh Avenue, Brooklyn 20, N.Y, RCA VICTOR LSC 2653. SD. $5.98. A mixed lot. First there is a group of CIRCLE 45 ON READER -SERVICE CARD APRIL 1963 93

www.americanradiohistory.com recorded too often, but one would never album was prepared consists of those guess it from the freshness and spirit who enjoy light music and want to hear of the conductor's approach, from the the miracles Toscanini could achieve with Order Your clean, lively playing of the orchestra, some of these scores. In those terms the or from the bright, crisp quality of set is a success, for it makes its points HIGH FIDELITY the reproduction. Even jaded ears will with a vigor which monophonic records appreciate these performances. P.A. cannot match. The Toscanini cult, on TREASURY the other hand, will be wise to view it ARTURO TOSCANINI: "Toscanini as a piece of engineering virtuosity, valid Right and interesting in such terms, but no Now! Plays Light Classics" more completely Toscanini than Turan- dot is completely Puccini. R.C.M. Imagine getting this handbook of Bizet: Carmen: Suite No. 1. Brahms: 31 enduring, informative contribu- Hungarian Dances: Nos. 1, 17, 20, 21. tions on audio for only $2.50. Each Dukas: L'Apprenti sorcier. Ponchielli: La VIENNA CHOIR BOYS: Twelve Gioconda: Dance of the Hours. Rossini: piece was written by a well -known [Madrigals; Eight German Folk Guillaume Tell: Overture: Saint -Saëns: Songs expert. Each has appeared in High Danse macabre. Smetana: The Moldau. Fidelity, or its sister publications. Strauss, Johann II: On the Beautiful Blue Vienna Choir Boys, Hermann Furth - Each has been selected with these Danube. Sousa: Stars and Stripes For- moser, cond. ever. PHILIPS PH 500011. LP. $4.98. qualifications in mind: PHILIPS PHS 900011. SD. $5.98. NBC Symphony Orchestra, Arturo Tos- 1. Is it pertinent today? canini, cond. The "madrigals" include German poly- 2. Will it help the reader under- RCA VICTOR VCS 7001. Two SD. phonic songs by Erasmus Widmann stand the principles of re- $13.96. (1572-1634), balletts by Gastoldi and cording and reproduction, in- Morley, and chansons by Claude Le cluding stereo? To take a recording which has reached Jeune and Pierre Certon. All are sung its legal majority and convert it into a in German. The abilities of the remark- 3. Will it help the reader plan pleasing and plausible example of elec- able group of boys that sings them are a new reproducing system to tronically synthesized stereophony is an familiar in America. It remains only to suit his needs at a price he is engineering tour de force of consequence. report that they are in good form here, willing to pay? It opens the door to the reprocessing, re- with their usual excellent diction and in- release, and rehearing of many Toscanini tonation. The folk songs, all but one 4. Will it help the reader get the performances now buried in the archives. sung, like the "madrigals," unaccom- most out of that system or For although nothing will replace the panied, are unfamiliar -at least to me- his present system? Toscanini originals as documents of the though one of them, the Steirischer Maestro and his art, there is no question This new, illustrated paperback Glockenjodler, is strangely similar to that carefully made stereo transcriptions Brahms's Lullaby. Good sound. N.B. book of 132 pages, measuring can bring his music to many who might 61/2x91/2 inches, will stimulate and otherwise pass it by in favor of more up -to -date discs. inform anyone who has ever It would be foolish to suggest that thought about owning a "rig" of the contents of the album, dating from his own. It covers many phases of 1942 -53, are indistinguishable from Vic- SPOKEN WORD interest from recording through tor's best work of a decade later. But it would also be unfair to imply that the listening. As an idea -sparker it's average person, listening to these records, worth its weight in diamond styli. would not accept them as genuine ex- SHERIDAN: The School for Scandal amples of the two If audio perks up your interest -channel medium. They - sound good. The stereo reprocessing has Geraldine McEwan (Lady Teazle); Gwen fill in and mail the coupon below been done with both skill and taste, and Ffrangcon- Davies (Mrs. Candour); Mer - at once before we sell out. Pay- although the premium price is steep for iel Forbes (Lady Sneerwell); Pinkie ment with your order, please, to light music, it is obvious that a lot of Johnstone (Maria); Ralph Richardson time prevent bookkeeping expense. But and expert labor were involved in (Sir Peter Teazle); John Gielgud (Jo- the preparation of this set. Moreover, one seph Surface); Richard Easton (Charles satisfaction guaranteed or your gets a feeling of direct experience of Surface); Laurence Naismith (Sir Oliver money back! Toscanini and his orchestra which simply Surface); Malcolm Keen (Rowley); is not to be matched by the monophonic Peter Barkworth (Sir Benjamin Backbite PARTIAL CONTENTS originals. and Careless); Charles Lloyd Pack (Crab- The best test case is the Dukas, which tree); David Evans (Snake); Howard The ABCs of Stereo is a particularly fine monophonic record Goorney (Moses); David Evans (Trip). Stereo for the Man Who Hates Stereo (LM 2056), but seems quite a bit more Directed by John Gielgud; musical ar- Music and Stereophony vivid here. The Moldau, its partner on rangement and direction by Leslie Stereo Recording Today both discs, is perhaps the least satisfac- Bridgewater. Cabinets for Components tory of the reprocessed works. COMMAND 13002. Three LP. $14.94. The Music Wall In preparing this review I listened to COMMAND RS 13002. Three SD. Improvements in Cartridges and Arms the "stereo" edition, replayed the origi- $17.94. From One Speaker to Many nals, and then alternated the two. In one FM Stereo in the Marketplace case, the Bizet Carmen suite, the new The cover of Command's album rather Antennas for FM version was decidedly superior to that startlingly proclaims this an "Original FM for Motorists of the monophonic discs in my file, Cast Album." That, to be sure, it is Anyone Be Can a Sound Engineer while the Strauss waltz offered a kind of not, but it is a fine recording of the ex- A Mike or Two Around the House sound which could not possibly be se- tremely polished revival which has just High Fidelity Servicing cured from the 78 pressings. Rhythmical- left New York's Majestic Theatre after Noise -the Uninvited Guest ly, I find the performance too inflexible, a successful run of several months. The -and many more! but it is astonishing to realize what has production, though not perfect, was so been done in updating its sonics. much better than any other representa- Wyeth Press, a division of 463 Elsewhere, apart from the stereo ef- tion we can hope to see for a generation High Fidelity Magazine fects, two major changes can be noted: or so that it seems silly to quibble. In Great Barrington, Mass. the addition of resonance and the re- some respects, it shows to better advan- Please send me a postpaid copy of the First sultant change in textures, and the al- tage on records than it did in the theatre. High Fidelity Treasury for the $2.50 enclosed. teration of dynamic values. Quiet pas- I am thinking specifically of Ralph sages have nearly always been lifted in Richardson's Teazle. Visually, it was, I Name level, while loud ones have been slightly thought, too busy; Sir Ralph got so scaled down. I don't know why this was tangled up in a series of "turns" that he Address done, and at times I almost hear a husky - tended to let the character-the warmest voiced ghost asking with polite irony, and roundest in the play -slip plumb out "You know what means fortissimo ?" of sight on more than one occasion. His I assume the public for whom this Teazle was, in sum, gimmicky. But on

94 HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

www.americanradiohistory.com The exciting new folk group the recording, we are lett with only the scene," there is a fair amount of audible vocal part of his characterization -and confusion from Mr. Gielgud and Miss in their first album! it could not be better. His moments of McEwan, followed by a very short choler, of near apoplectic rage, of almost pause, followed by Teazle's opening line, touchingly blind self -righteousness, of "Ah, ever improving himself." Now it generosity, of hurt (what a role it is!) is true that if one listens closely, one may -all fall into place to add up to a corn - be able to fish the meaning out of the plete human being. I doubt that there hurried sequence of lines; but if one is another actor alive who could capture misses a word or two, one will not real- so precisely the wonderful change from ize that 1) Lady Teazle has concealed uneasy reconcilement to comfortable herself behind the screen, or 2) that squabble in his second scene with Lady Joseph has hurriedly taken a book in Teazle. ( "All the same, my dear . . hand and is affecting deep concentration We have in an instant the picture of a upon Teazle's entrance. In other words, man who just can't quite leave a matter the whole dramatic situation here is by alone.) Among many other treasurable no means apparent, and, incidentally, the moments, I like best the heart -breaking fun of Teazle's line is lost. To those who resignation of his "My widow, I sup- know the play well or have the produc- pose," when Lady Teazle pleasantly sug- tion fresh in mind, there is no problem: gests that he can go one step further to others, bafflement could well result than making her his wife. from this and perhaps a dozen other sud- Gielgud's Joseph Surface was the dom- den, unmarked changes in situation on inating performance in the theatre, and the recording. it holds up well here, though there are I, for one, am grateful that Command one or two spots where it seems the oili- has not cluttered things up with a mess ness and the oratorical pomposity of the of sound effects intended to clarify the "sentiments" could have been toned down situation or with ad- libbed additions a bit for recording purposes. Small mat- to the dialogue ( "Here, Lady Teazle, ter -one would not notice it at all save quick- behind this screen! "). And many in the context of such a subtle perform- of these situations are made clear in the ance. He is especially brilliant in Joseph's stereo rendering of the movements, while one moment of breathless disintegration, a few more are described by a between - just before Teazle's arrival in the "screen scenes narrator, whose role is fortunately scene." kept to a minimum. But the text, com- There is also a superb Lady Teazle plete with the stage directions, would Contents: Walk Right In, from Geraldine McEwan. The problem is have put the capstone on the release. Hey Boys, Shoes, Houston too As it is, one must buy the play as well Special, Tom Cat, Cool Water, to keep the character from seeming Somebody Came Home, You bitchy for Act IV reclamation, and Miss as the recording, and hope that the di- Don't Know, Stagolee, Rained McEwan solves it nicely. Her Lady rections in the printed edition are not too Five Days, Ham and Eggs, Ha bursting irrelevant. It is. however, worth it, for Ha Thisaway, Brandy Leave Teazle is always on the verge of Me Alone into rippling laughter, and frequently Command has done the one (essential) mono & stereo does (and a lovely infectious laugh it thing so often overlooked in the record- VANGUARD is). Irresponsible and even malicious as ing of plays -it has obtained the very RECORDS is primarily a best in the way of performance. C.L.O. Lady Teazle can be, she CIRCLE 101 ON READER -SERVICE CARD country girl dizzied by her taste of society and simply having the time of her life among the scandalmongers. This is what Miss McEwan projects so well, and 11.1hß IT REST what makes us ready to accept her mag- \\TooD ff BEIFER-TELEOTRO MAKES nificent turnabout speech after Teazle's discovery of her behind Joseph's screen. At the same time, Miss McEwan sacrifices none of the point behind the bons mots of the scandal scenes, or the off- handedness of her insults to her aging husband; the Norina in Lady Teazle (if I may borrow an operatic reference) is all there. The rest of the cast is exemplary, which is what one could not expect of most productions. Malcolm Keen's excellent Rowley, for example, or David Evans' equally fine Snake (especially good in his admiration of Lady Sneer - well's accomplishments in the opening scene) are of a quality seldom found in such subsidiary roles. Laurence Nai- smith's genial Uncle Oliver, Richard Easton's amiable, slightly adolescent ELECTFtCI SS SOO Charles, Peter Barkworth's effete Back- bite, Charles Lloyd Pack's genuinely e} Elllel'soll Radio() odious Crabtree (he has probably the nastiest -sounding voice I've ever heard A spacious hand -rubbed solid walnut enclosure as- in a theatre) -all are admirably in the sures richer tones in the SS500 stereo tape recorder. frame. Finished front and back, this table model high fidelity One complaint, and a serious one, I instrument looks better and sounds best anywhere. fear. While the notes by Sir John which Here's more reasons why: 25 watt audio power out- Command has provided are of interest, the text would have been even more put Exclusive Simul -Track for simultaneous record/ welcome. It is not that the words are un- play Public address facilities Two 6" woofers, two clear, for they are impeccably spoken 3" tweeters with crossover network 4 -track stereo/ and recorded. But there are too many monaural record /play 3 speeds Digital counter important entrances, exits, and other Illuminated VU meters Pushbutton controls changes of situation that are not in any Automatic shutoff 2 deluxe microphones way made apparent, and on which the Write for Complete Specifications humor or even the sense of the lines depends. One important example: When ® America's Leading Tape Recorder Specialist Joseph's servant reports that Teazle is TELECTRO TF- Division of about to appear during the "screen Emerson Radio Inc. 680 FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK 19, N. Y.

APRIL 1963 95

www.americanradiohistory.com A special 64 -page supplement in the April issue of Harper's magazine

The Craft 01 Intellìgence

by Allen W. Dulles Former director, Central Intelligence Agency

An engrossing, book -length account of "the least understood and most misrepre- sented profession ", The Craft of Intelligence is based on Mr. Dulles's unequaled experience as a diplomat and an intelligence officer.

Here, for the first time, is an authoritative account of how the O.S.S. worked with anti -Nazis inside Germany during World War II; the prospect of a successful revolt inside Cuba; how the text of Khrushchev's secret speech denouncing Stalin was found; what the U -2 has accomplished; and scores of international intrigues unrav- eled by American intelligence officers and our allies.

Mr. Dulles spells out not only the techniques of modern espionage but also the philosophy and the role of intelligence in a free society threatened by a global con- spiracy.

Read The Craft of Intelligence in the April issue of Harper's. Plus Harper's regular contents, which include Learning to be Unemployable, Harvard's B. F. Skinner: The Last of the Utopians, Heaven Had Better be Good, Is the Welfare State Obsolete ?, The Ultimate Teaching Machine, The Swing Band Era, What Women Can Do For Peace, A Warm- Hearted Guide to Certain Girls' Schools, Canada's Gadfly: The Winnipeg Free Press, and After Hours: Mediterranean Mosaic. Plus The New Books and Books in Brief.

What better time to start your Harper's subscription. You may have up to 14 monthly issues for only $4.20 -at a special new -reader's rate.

HF -4 Harper' 0 magazine, 49 East 33rd Street, New York 16, New York Please start my Harper's subscription with your April issue, which includes the special 64 -page supplement, The Craft of Intelligence, by Allen W. Dulles. I understand that a year's subscription (12 issues) is normally $7.00. But: I want to take advantage of your special subscription offer. Please send me the next 12 issues for only $4.20, and bill me later. CHECK ONE I would rather receive the next 14 issues for only $4.20 and pay for my subscription now. I have enclosed my check. NAME PLEASE PRINT ADDRESS CITY ZONE STATE

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POPULAR THEATRE FOLK

They Match the Manner To the Matter

"Our Men in San Francisco." The Limeliters. RCA Victor LPM 2609, $3.98 (LP); LSP 2609, $4.98 (SD).

Limeliters Hassilev, Gottlieb, and Yarbrough.

EACH SUCCESSIVE release (and there are now seven The hallmark of the Limeliters' style is mature entries in the catalogue) attests anew to the primacy intelligence. They can be as frenetic as the loudest of the Limeliters among America's endlessly prolifer- campus quartet on vinylite, but they indulge in such ating folk trios. Almost four years of close harmony abandon only if the material so requires. When it have molded this group -Glenn Yarbrough, Lou does, as in The Wabash Cannonball that leads off Gottlieb, and Alex Hassilev -into a brilliantly co- this program, they concede decibels to no one. To hesive whole that is far greater than the sum of its a degree unmatched by any competition, however, parts. Each of the three singers, as a matter of fact, the Limeliters have developed an interpretative sup- had once established a reputation of a sort as a pleness that makes each ballad a three -dimensional soloist; but, until they pooled their talents in the experience. On this disc, they suffuse a lullaby, spring of 1959, none had struck real artistic fire. Sleep Soft, with a gentleness redolent of warm milk

APRIL 1963 97

www.americanradiohistory.com and snug blankets and, a moment later, invest Corn for "the cheers turn to crying when life turns to Whiskey with a subtle interplay of moods that quite dying, and bright golden buttons will all turn to literally transfigures that much- battered chestnut. To rust." Then, to somber, insistent chords, the trio the Limeliters, the protagonist of Corn Whiskey is limns the chiaroscuro home -coming of the decimated not the amiable drunkard we have come to know First Battalion. Again Yarbrough's light voice rides through other versions: he is a man cursed with in high, ironic counterpoint above the dark, driving insight; a loser who waxes fatalistic, wistful, sardonic, melody. Grim death stalks the outposts in Yes I See, bitter -and only incidentally conic-about whiskey and Two Brothers poignantly underlines the interne- and the women whose "breath tastes as sweet as cine heartbreak of our hundred -year -old national the good old moonshine." tragedy. A reprise of The First Battalion caps six The program is a typical one in that it ranges original, exciting minutes that -in raw emotional widely through both time and geography. From impact -surpass most to be found on Civil War Greece comes the melodic tale of the girl Yerakina, albums now available. and the France of centuries past provides the viva- Nonetheless, for all its excellence, this release cious Le Joueur de luth. This classic of double - is not free of flaws. It was recorded live at San entendre lightheartedly recounts the tale of the lute Francisco's hungry i, and therein lies the rub. More player who arrives in town to give lessons to the and more folk singers are now being taped in actual ladies, but sorrowfully rejects an aging mademoiselle performance -a procedure that provides a certain too eager, but too late, to learn. spontaneity but also provides a surfeit of silly chat- Quite the finest offering on the record, how- ter. Today's combos feel constrained to loosen up ever, is a medley of four Civil War songs. It opens their audiences with comic-God save the mark! - with Glenn Yarbrough's high, limpid tenor etching comments on every selection. As a case in point, the bittersweet Bright Golden Buttons: drums throb a first -rate spoof of John Henry, titled Max Goolis, and swords glint as the Americans of that other age fails to survive Lou Gottlieb's windy, witless, and march off to war and to inevitable disillusionment, almost endless introduction. O.B.B.

"Merman in Vegas." Orchestra, Russ Black, cond. Reprise R 6062, $3.98 (LP); R9 6062, $4.98 (SD). "Patti Page on Stage." Orchestra. Mercury MG 20758, $3.98 (LP); SR 60758, $4.98 (SD). "Eddie Fisher at the Winter Garden." Orchestra, Eddy Samuels, cond. Ramrod RRM 1, $7.96 (Two LP); RRS 1, $9.96 (Two SD). "Sammy Davis, Jr., at the Cocoanut Grove." Dick Stabile's Orchestra, George Rhodes, cond. Reprise R 6063/2, $7.96 (Two LP); Sammy Davis, Jr. R9 6063:2, $9.96 (Two SD). Eddie Fisher

The Latest Crop from the Café Circuit

STRETCHING ACROSS the continent, from the Copa- but waited until October 26, 1962 to venture on cabana in New York to the hungry i in San to the café circuit. Thirty -two years between debuts Francisco, are a series of night clubs and hostelries is a long, long time, and it shows. For though the now doing double duty as show places and recording Merman voice can still puncture an eardrum, the studios. In this dual role, they have been responsible experience is less agreeable than it used to be. (And for a great many on- the -spot recorded mementos there are several anxious moments in her act which, of the great and near -great café entertainers of today. thanks to her own theatrical know -how and show- With their inevitable fulsome introductions and manship, she skillfully covers up.) Opening with a shattering applause (much of it inserted after the new Roger Edens' number, Just a Lady with a Song, actual taping), these discs usually end up high on La Merman plunges into a reprise of all (well, nearly the best -seller charts. It is not surprising to find all) the songs she has made famous, from Life Is another parcel of live -performance microgrooves Just a Bowl of Cherries to Everything's Coming Up among the current crop. Roses, concluding with (what else ?) There's No Busi- The great lady of the American musical theatre, ness Like Show Business. All the performances dis- Ethel Merman, made her Broadway debut in 1930, play tremendous vivacity and enthusiasm. Billy

98 HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

www.americanradiohistory.com May's arrangements are cleverly geared to the sing- parent on the recording, almost two hours of pleasant er's no- nonsense vocal delivery, and are most helpful but hardly exciting singing becomes a slight bore. in smoothing over some of the rougher moments. When he is recalling the songs which helped his early Miss Merman has probably never been quite so career -Heart, Oh My Papa, and Anytime- every- close to the cash customers, and she is obviously thing is fine, and the Jolson medley has also con- enjoying the experience. siderable impact. Unfortunately, most of his other From further south (or is it north ?) on the Las songs lack the spark needed to vitalize them, and Vegas night club strip comes a recording of Patti Don't Let It Get You Down strikes me as too obvi- Page's act at The Dunes. Miss Page is primarily a ous an appeal for sympathy. There is good theatre recording artist, whose stage exposure must have ambience in the stereo version, but the sound is often been extremely restricted, to judge from her homey, on the fuzzy side. almost corny, chatter and her straightforward re- Both Sammy Davis, Jr., and his audience were cording style. She too is giving the customers exactly really swinging when his Cocoanut Grove recording what they came to hear -a cavalcade of her old was made. One of the most gifted and versatile of hits, Doggie in the Window, Cross Over the Bridge, contemporary night club performers, Davis gives a I Went to Your Wedding, and the inevitable Tennes- dazzling display of his virtuosity as a singer, im- see Waltz. As long as she sticks to this repertoire personator, and all -round entertainer. In the seventy she is on safe enough ground. When she tries more minutes of this two -record album, it is almost im- sophisticated material, songs such as Night and Day possible to recall one dull moment, from his amusing, or Don't Worry 'Bout Me, I suspect the customers slightly Dietrich -like Falling in Love Again (and are ordering another drink. She resorts to a good his comments when he spots his wife, Mai Britt, deal of chitchat with her audience, most of it pretty at the ringside table), to the truly exciting medley dreary, and when she advises a customer "not to from West Side Story with its accompaniment by drink too much," she surely wasn't endearing herself Johnny Mendoza's pulsating bongos, by the Sinatra - to the club owners. She has not been particularly styled version of River Stay 'Way from My Door. well served by the orchestra, its arrangements, or by No Davis disc would be complete without some of the recorded sound. his remarkable impersonations, and in Rock -A -Bye Emulating the late, great Al Jolson, Eddie Fisher Your Baby with a Dixie Melody he includes some took over the Winter Garden Theatre this past sea- extraordinary lifelike ones of Jimmy Stewart, James son, but where Jolson confined his appearances to Cagney, Louis Armstrong, and Marlon Brando. Sunday nights, Fisher did a five -week stand. Al- Everything he does is projected with tremendous though he is a greatly improved singer since the vitality and artistry, even down to the banter he days when he recorded for RCA Victor, he is hardly indulges in with his audience. No wonder they all a dynamic performer. What he could rely upon was love him. I have heard only the mono version, which a good deal of personal sympathy after his recent has moments of fading as the artist moves out of marital difficulties, and a sort of nice, open -faced range of the microphones. This effect, rather strange boyishness which the women in his audience prob- here, may well be used advantageously on the stereo ably found irresistible. Since the latter is not ap- version. J.F.I.

"Piaf ... Chansons." Edith Piaf; Orches- bered the soft embraces of Polynesia tra. Capitol T 10328, $3.98 (LP); and the icy grasp of Antarctica -all this ST 10328, $4.98 (SD). before the great nineteenth- century ex- I have no information as to when this peditions of exploration. The glory has recording was made, but assuming it to long faded from the New England water- postdate Piaf's recent illnesses, it sug- fronts, and Yankee ships no longer course gests either that the reports of those the Southern Ocean in pursuit of the illnesses were dramatically exaggerated, mighty whale, but this disc -in its own or that the diminutive chanteuse has roughhewn way as evocative of that era the most astonishing recuperative powers. as the works of Herman Melville -re- Not once in the course of this program creates the ambience of the old whale of new songs is there the slightest hint fishery. Here, hauntingly performed, is that her vocal or her interpretative the Boston- Come- All -Ye that recruited powers have been impaired. The perform- Piaf: total anguish, total rapture. crews, the whaleman's fond accolade to ances of Des histoires, Quatorze Juillet, The Bark Gay Head, and the eager joy and Toujours aimer, songs of anguish of Homeward Bound, In between are with a in- woman's remarkable talents. Stereo adds cleverly interwoven mementos of the and disillusion, blaze pathetic impact of this disc, tensity that is quite chilling. Incompara- very little to the soft Pacific islands where crews took it does a slightly more ble as Piaf is has always been though boast languorous ease on coral beaches. The -and -in live sound the mono issue. J.F.I. this type of song, she is scarcely less than flip side offers the sound track, equally wonderful in Ca fait drole and Faut rich in ballads -of a documentary film pas qu'il se figure, in which she superbly "Whaler Out of New Bedford." Ewan on whaling. The singers -Ewan MacColl, projects the rapture of a woman hope- MacColl, A. L. Lloyd, Peggy Seeger. A. L. Lloyd, and Peggy Seeger -have lessly in love but timid of showing her Folkways FS 3850, $5.95 (LP). made their mark in the world of au- affection too overtly. Individually, none Whaling was once a proud American thentic folk song, and their perform- of these songs are likely to supplant monopoly. In the streets of Nantucket ances are all one could hope for. the more popular numbers in Piaf's and New Bedford strode captains who Recommended. O.B.B. repertoire, but collectively they are a knew the coasts of Africa and Japan, wonderful showcase for this ill- starred Peru and Australia; sailors who remem- Continued on next page

APRIL 1963 99

www.americanradiohistory.com "Together with Love." Eileen Farrell; of Wilder's Everywhere I Look, Arlen's ticularly, this is a considerable relief Orchestra, André Previn, pianist and The Morning After, and two songs writ- for the tale Harbach, Mandel, and Ham-- cond. Columbia CL 1920, $3.98 (LP); ten by Previn and his wife, Just for merstein dreamed up for this Moroccan CS 8720, $4.98 (SD). Now and Where I Wonder. Incidentally, musical strained one's credulity pretty In her three earlier recordings of pop the Farrell voice sounds darker in hue severely. Fortunately, Romberg's score songs, Eileen Farrell has seldom been than before, and her vibrato has widened, teemed with lovely melodies which more less than wonderful, even when she so that in her more intense moments she than compensated for the absurd libretto, has had to battle against what often often sounds like Judy Garland. A scintil- and Capitol's new version of the work sounded like overforceful arrangements. lating disc, highly recommended. J.F.I. is completely successful. Both Dorothy Here she is freed from such handi- Kirsten and Gordon MacRae seem to caps by the subtle and complimentary find this music more congenial than settings devised by André Previn for "The Desert Song." Dorothy Kirsten, that of The Student Prince (reviewed these dozen semi -torch ballads. Some Gordon MacRae; Chorus and Orches- in this issue on page 103). Miss Kirsten of these (But Not for Me, Cabin in the tra, Van Alexander, cond. Capitol is particularly brilliant in Romance, and Sky, and Lore Is Here To Stay) are W 1842, $4.98 (LP); SW 1842, $5.98 in a sparkling and vivacious performance standards, and to them Miss Farrell (SD). of the French Military Marching Song, brings all her vocal charm and expertise Recorded operetta, when it is well sung Gordon MacRae's voice is rather color- in some truly lovely performances. Even and imaginatively presented, enjoys one less, but it blends well with Kirsten's more appealing to me, possibly because great advantage over a theatre presenta- in the romantic duets, and is songs heard to the are so little known, are her tion: it completely eliminates the "book." advantage in a rousing rendition of effortless but very artful performances In the case of The Desert Song, par- The Riff Song. But the vocal honors do not belong exclusively to the two leads. The supporting soloists, Gerald Shirkey and Lloyd Bunnell, and the Roger Wagner Chorale all contribute assistance immeasurably superior to that usually found on similar presentations. Excellent sound, with the stereo seating you in reproduction so good fifth row center. J.F.I. . from an enclosure so small etite "Sing and Play a Folk Song." Jim Helms, ... it's almost unbelievable HIGH FIDELITY guitar; Art Podell, guitar and banjo; John Fine, bass. Horizon WP 1603. SPEAKER SYSTEM Here is that rare thing, a folk first. World- Pacific's Horizon label provides a top- drawer string accompaniment to twenty of the finest ballads in the literature. An accompanying folio contains words and music, enabling any wobble - voiced amateur to sing his heart out for Barbara Allen or Billy Boy or Molly Malone. A top array of tunes, a truly polished presentation, and, best of all, the enclosed music make this a genuine joy for anyone who wants to stretch his vocal cords in the cause of self- satisfac- tion and folk art. There is no phoniness, no patronizing in this fine offering. Check it out. 0.B. B.

" Netania Davrath Sings Yiddish Folk Songs." Orchestra, Robert DeCormier, cond. Vanguard VRS 9117, $4.98 (LP); VSD 2127, $5.95 (SD). The pure, floating soprano of Netania Davrath -well known through four previous Vanguard releases, including her stunning Songs of the Auvergne (VRS 9085 )- brings to this disc of Yiddish folk a USE ANYWHERE songs full measure of artistry. Born in a Jewish household on the Polish - Performance of the Petite is unmatched by any enclosure Russian border, Miss Davrath virtually grew up with these close to its 18" x 12" x 33/4" size. Bass notes come through uniquely touching, ri uniquely Jewish ballads. Her deep fa- rich and resonant ... highs clean and brilliant. The secret? miliarity with and her love for them Argos system- engineered techniques techniques which shines through every phrase. Her poign- SHELF ... precisely coordinate the enclosure with the moving system ant Rozhinkes Mit Mandlen haunts the ear, and a selection of joyous Chassidic of two Jensen speakers custom -made to Argos specifications. melodies resurrects all the gay love of Trim design and beautiful hand -rubbed 34" oiled American God informing that inspired eighteenth - century movement. As is customarily walnut veneer cabinetry make the Petite a distinctive addition the case with Vanguard recordings, the to any room setting. WALL Graceful solid brass legs, plus wall hang- sound is impeccable, with the mono- ers, make your Petite useable anywhere . .. shelf, table, wall phonic version rivaling the stereo edition or floor. See it at your hi -fi store, or write direct for descrip- in unalloyed excellence. O.B.B. tive catalog. "Our Man in Hollywood." Price $24.95 Henry Man- FLOOR cini and His Orchestra. RCA Victor LPM 2604, $3.98 (LP); LSP 2604, ADDITIONAL FEATURES $4.98 (SD). Speakers include: custom -designed Jensen The spatial effect of the stereo recording high -compliance woofer with 200% more cone is unusually striking here, in Mancini's travel, and Jensen tweeter with matching net- kaleidoscopic musical arrangements of work Frequency range, these movie and television themes. 50 to 17,000 cps. PRODUCTS Mawr COMPANY There are. to be sure, one or two non- 8 -ohm input Screw terminals polarized for descript pieces which resist his orches- stereo Volume control recessed into side Dept. H, Genoa, Illinois tral reworkings (Dreamsville and Bach- of cabinet. elor in Paradise fall into this category), CIRCLE 9 ON READER -SERVICE CARD 100 HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

www.americanradiohistory.com but the rest of the program offers what musical style originally composed for the harsh tonal edges and, through might be called a feast of aural tech - a Sadler's Wells ballet. Luscious is the judicious cutting, minimizes the long nicolor. The buoyant theme from The only appropriate word for the orches- sameness. The result should beguile any- Wonderful World of tote Brothers Grimm trations, the performances, and the one with a mild interest in the East and/ becomes unusually perky with the use of sound. J.F.I. or a taste for exotic rhythms. Those four merry piccolos, while a jangling who already know the sensual beauties Brazilian piano lends a curious saucy "Middle East Goes Modern." Eddie of Middle Eastern music will feel, how- bounce to Mr. Hobb's Theme. The full Adamis and His Orchestra. Philips ever, that Adamis has vitiated the arak orchestral arrangement for Drink More PHM 200 -066, $3.98 (LP); PHS 600- with too much sugar. Big, broad stereo Milk has all the swirl of a Sicilian 066, $4.98 (SD). sound, the choice version here, stretches tarantella, with instrumental timbres fol- Eddie Adamis, a native of Beirut, where the percussion from wall to wall. O.B.B. lowing one another in a welter of ir- East and West meet in a montage of idescent orchestral color. These com- bikinis and veils, blends the traditional "Strings Afire in Spain." The Clebanoff positions have never before sounded so rhythms of the bazaars with the big -band Strings. Mercury PPS 2032,. $4.98 good, thanks to Mancini's resourceful arrangements of Paris to achieve a syn- (LP); PPS 6032, $5.98 (SD). and unconventional settings. J.F.I. thesis that -while delighting purists in The sequel to i,ast year's "Strings Afire" neither camp -will attract the millions proves to be just as big and dazzlingly in between. Arabic music strikes the brilliant, although it also Ls markedly "Tony Dallara Sings." Vesuvius ST Western ear as dissonant and repetitious, dry, sharp, and loud unless one reduces 4408, $3.98 (LP). but the Adamis treatment polishes all considerably the extremely high modula- Tony Dallara is a warm, winsome vocalist who ranks among Italy's favorite pur- veyors of pops. Here he sings a dozen Italian hits, all of them infectiously melodic, testifying that the Common Market countries have more than mere tariff concessions to offer us. Bambina Bambina and Baci Baci possess both immediate appeal and a high degree of durability. One regrets the absence of either texts or translations, but Dallara's intense way with a song can even bridge the language gap. The sound, derived from a European recording, has a faintly muffled quality that annoys but does not disable. O.B.B.

"English Folk Songs -Old and Older." John Runge. Washington VM 735, $4.98 (LP). Unless my equipment plays me false, one side of this release represents a refur- bishing of the "English Folk Songs" sung so beautifully by John Runge on a River- side release of some six or seven years past (RLP 12 -814). To the best of that memorable, unhackneyed recital, however, Washington adds eight Eliza- bethan airs performed by Runge with a kind of earnest mirth that perfectly re- flects the time and the genre. Runge's tenor -high and somewhat reedy -is a robust equivalent of Richard Dyer -Ben- net's, and I can think of no greater accolade. This is a splendid recording; anyone with an interest in English traditional song will treasure it. Clear, full - range sound. O.B.B.

"Our Man in London." The Melachrino Strings and Orchestra. RCA Victor LPM 2608, $3.98 (LP); LSP 2608, $4.98 (SD). In arranging this bouquet of choice light music from both sides of the At- lantic, RCA Victor's musical ambas- sador in London, George Melachrino, has created the sort of Anglo-American musical entente cordiale most listeners will find quite irresistible. The side devoted to American music, mostly selected from film and show scores, is beautifully arranged and very handsomely performed now both stereo recording & stereo playback! but on the whole less interesting or varied than the English side. Here the An unprecedented price for the famed Sony quality! The long-awaited Sony Sterecorder conductor has gone further afield, to 464D -dual purpose, dual performance! Dual performance means both 4 track stereo the old English airs Greensleeves and recording and 4 tack stereo playback. Dual purpose means custom component instal- Alley; to Wood's Sally in Our Haydn Recording pre are built-in, and such features drawing -room ballad Roses of Picardy; lation and portable use. and playback -amps and to popular song hits of the war years, as sound on sound, language and music training, two speeds, push button track selec- A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square tion and Sony precision engineering make this the most outstanding tape recorder value and The White Cliffs of Dover. More at $199.50 All Sony Sterecorders are Multiplex-ready! stimulating, musically, than any of these 'Carrying case optional the Waltz are Medley Richard Adinsell For literature or name of nearest dealer. wrote as part of his incidental music write Superscope, Inc., Dept. to Noel Coward's play Blithe Spirit, t and Geoffrey Toye's The Haunted Ball- Sun Valley, California room, a delicious parody of Edwardian In New York, visit the Sony Fifth Avenue Salon, 585 Fifth Avenue CIRCLE 96 ON READER -SERVICE CARD APRIL 1963 101

www.americanradiohistory.com tion level in playback. Again, the Wayne sixteen of these rousing divertissements "Our Man in Boston." Boston Pops Or- Robinson and Caesar Giovaninni ar- here, ranging from Farrar's Bombasto of chestra, Arthur Fiedler, cond. RCA rangements are fancy, the symphonic 1895 to Karl L. King's Circus Days Victor LPM 2599, $3.98 (LP); LSC Clebanoff performances often melodra- of 1954. King, onetime bandmaster for 2599, $4.98 (SD). matically pretentious. Nevertheless, at Barnum and Bailey and the best -known Except perhaps for the March of the least a few of these genuine stereo spec- living exponent of this genre, is also Charioteers (from Ben Httr) most of taculars- Ritual Fire Dance, The Flea, represented by three other pieces, topped the encore materials here are already and El Torero- achieve musical distinc- by the razzle- dazzling Robinson's Grand familiar in Fiedler's buoyant, richly tion. thanks to superb flute playing Entree of 1911. Three more -Rolling sonorous, and precise performances. by Julius Baker. His virtuosity here must Thunder (1916), Bones Trombones Some of them have been included in be heard to be believed! R.D.D. (1922 ), and Circus Bee (1908) -are other fairly recent Bostonian releases, from the pen of another hippodrome but I assume that they are all freshly "Screamers!" Eastman Wind Ensemble, specialist, Henry Fillmore (1881- 1956). recorded here -certainly the extremely Frederick Fennell, cond. Mercury MG Other less well -known composers are powerful sonic and somewhat unnatural 50314, $4.98 (LP); SR 90314, $5.98 represented by single selections, all great acoustical ambience is characteristic of (SD). fun, but only one of which -Allen's the very latest Symphony Hall pops The arresting title does not imply sonic glittering Whip and Spur of 1902 - series technology. I like best Mason's stridencies: "screamer" is traditional big - matches the éclat of King and Fillmore sprightly arrangements of Guys and Dolls tent nomenclature for a fast, short piece at their best. A few of these pulse -raising selections and the romantic symphonic of musical razz -ma -tazz used to accom- pieces have been recorded before. but expansion of Smoke Gets in Tour Eyes pany bareback riding, steeplechase, or never have they been done with more (uncredited); but Hayman's amusing cowboy- and -Indian circus acts. There are thrilling sonic realism. R.D.D. And Now a Word front Our Sponsor is always a sure hit -as indeed are all the others: Mack the Knife, Exodus, and The Apartment themes might be given special mention. R.D.D.

Ci CO "The Fabulous Voice of Richard Tucker." Richard Tucker; Orchestra. Skitch Henderson, cond. Columbia ML 5797, three -piece $4.98 (LP); MS 6397, $5.98 (SD). There is much beautiful singing by Rich- stereo ensemble in ard Tucker in this concert of songs of love and inspiration, though quite a cost -saving KIT FORM! portion of it shows him to be neither comfortable nor really at home in this repertoire. The overemotionalized approach, the too dramatic performance, the rolling is smack a little too much of the opera house. The tenor sounds happiest, I think, in Softly As in a Morning Sunrise and, oddly enough, in The Sweetest Sounds. I say oddly because his Tonight is a comparative failure. as is another show tune, Climb Ev'ry Mountain. Vocally, it would be hard to fault his performances of The Exodus Song, I Believe, and With The.se Hands, but I find the style rather maudlin. Highly interesting arrangements are provided by Skitch Henderson, whose orchestra accords the singer splendid sup- ASSEMBLE IN port. J.F.I. LESS THAN SIX HOURS! "Our Man in Latin America." Perez Pra- A screwdriver is all you need to complete the Design ONE stereo ensemble. do and His Orchestra. RCA Victor All sections are pre -assembled and drilled for precision fit. LPM 2610, $3.98 (LP); LSP 2610, Step -by -step $4.98 (SD). instructions and all finishing materials are included. Matched -grain American As always, Prado's frantically driving Black Walnut of the finest quality and the distinctive grillework enclosures performances (given additional punch give you a classic contemporary piece of fine furniture that surpasses most and weight by tremendously powerful if factory- finished rather hard stereo recording) are ir- cabinetry. resistibly danceable, no matter how shown below with lid removed ta expose eompunrnta raucous they may be. Here he features Latinized variants of the Twist, but I much prefer his more varied. if still DESIGN /JACK BENVENISTE heavy, big -band bossa novas (Guai-are, Pachito E -che, and Alma Llanera). The pieces on the disc have been chosen to represent some eleven various Caribbean. South, and Central American national origins. R.D.D.

"Italian Mandolins." Claudio Bonelli and His Orchestra. Time 2068, $4.98 (LP); S 2068, $5.98 (SD). The arrangements here (for a twenty - one -man ensemble featuring six mandolin players) are ingenious and tasteful, the write for brochure Italian pop song selections are well chosen, and the performances both musically and sonically attractive -especially in the bouncing Vivere, a catchily Latin - 113/-11[171 II Americanized Resta co'mme, and a song- LW ful Strada'nfosa. In addition, the recording itself-notably full -blooded and FURNITURE MFG. CO., INC. 17GARDENA, CALIFORNIA E panoramic -will be of special interest Manufacturers of America's Most Honored Stereo Furniture to audiophiles as an example of Time's CIRCLE 18 ON READER -SERVICE CARD 102 HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

www.americanradiohistory.com new "Process 70," which employs less Son, the Folk Singer," but he comes a bill very satisfactorily. Dorothy Kir - high -end preëmphasis than the normal. stinging cropper on the tasteless likes of sten's Kathie sounds ravishing at mo- Just how much this feature contributes Won't You Come Home, Disraeli. On ments, but in general the maturity of to the over -all effectiveness remains to balance, however, Sherman remains the Miss Kirsten's voice and style never be demonstrated in further releases and drollest of song satirists. Forgive his oc- suggests the young Heidelberg waitress. on other types of program material, but casional sins and have fun. He provides This is Gordon MacRae's second ap- here at least it certainly achieves a gen- a lot of it. O.B.B. pearance on records as Prince Karl uine sonic glitter quite free from the Franz. His performance is colorless, and only too common glassy sharpness of so "The Student Prince." Dorothy Kirsten, vocal stress is often too apparent. The many recordings touted as "ultrabril- Gordon MacRae; Chorus and Orches- lesser roles are all most capably sung, liant." R.D.D. tra, Van Alexander, cond. Capitol W and the chorus work-by the Roger 1841, $4.98 (LP); SW 1841, $5.98 Wagner Chorale -is quite outstanding. The simulation of a performance in the 1078, (SD). "A Double -Barrel Blast." Cook A good stereo recording of Romberg's theatre has been expertly realized by $4.98 (LP). The Student Prince is badly needed; the Capitol's engineers, who have used the Cook's two -barrel barrage bats an even only other version (on RCA Victor LSC stereo techniques sensibly and success- on .500. Side 2, Listening In Computer 2339) is marred by Mario Lanza's tastefully on such numbers as Student's Conversations, is a labored, foolish spoof less vocalism and by the use of some Marching Song and Drinking Song, both of computers that is about as risible as a undistinguished additional musical num- ready -made for the medium. By com- defective transistor. Side 1, however, bers by Roy Brodszky. Unfortunately, parison, the mono, excellent though it is, offers perhaps the funniest bit of humor the new Capitol issue does not fill the sounds rather drab. J.F.I. -macabre, to be sure -that vinylite is likely to carry your way. The High Cost of Dying is the recorded transcript of a telephone call from "newly bereaved" relatives to the undertaker of their choice and the resultant haggling over the price of interment. Here is convincing testi- mony to the fact that the pinnacles of hilarity are often scaled by people who are merely being themselves. The undertaker- neatly entrapped by Emory Cook's skilled mourners -agonizes over his prices and the strange ways of the clergy ( "They're funny that way; even if you don't pay them, they like to say a few words over the body ") to the point where he almost wins your sympathy. A very offbeat and very funny release. The sound, as befits so spon- taneous an offering, is spotty. But happily no word is lost. O.B.B.

"Viennese Waltzes." Marcel Pagnoul and His Orchestra. Tins 2069, $4.98 (LP); S 2069, $5.98 (SD). By exercising a good deal of musical license and expanding the environs of Vi- enna to include such distant cities as Moscow, Strasbourg, and Paris, Marcel Pagnoul has assembled a program of what he calls Viennese waltzes. The echt Viennese entrants are the compositions of Johann Strauss II, Lehár, and Ivanovici, and there is a reasonable facsimile thereof in Les Patineurs, from the Strasbourg -born composer Waldteu- fel. But there is little of the Viennese style in Tchaikovsky's Waltz of the Flowers, much less in Marchetti's very, very French waltz Fascination, and none whatever in Waldteufel's Estudiantina, which smacks of Valencia rather than Vienna. But if you do not object to the inclusion of these non -Austrian selections, or to the abridgment of the familiar RESULT: RECORDS TEST -PLAYED Strauss favorites (which are all minus Now the record changer developed expressly their preludes, postludes, and repeats), for RCA Victor Total Sound Stereo Phono- OVER 3,000 TIMES SHOW NEGLIGI- the performances by this French or- graphs is available as a separate component BLE LOSS OF FIDELITY chestra, though taken at much faster for custom installation and replacement. tempos than would be acceptable in Besides delivering brilliant sound in stereo PLUS: Scientifically balanced, rock - Vienna, are quite enjoyable. I have not heard the mono version, but the sound or monaural, the Studiomatic Changer is a steady cushioned turntable Automatic of the stereo is both spacious and agree- long -time investment in record protection: shut-off at end of last record Ultra- sensi- able. J.F.I. tive Living Stereo Ceramic Cartridge Abil- Protects Against Spindle Wear. King - ity to intermix 7", 10" and 12" records of the size stabilizer holds records steady "My Son, the Celebrity." Allan Sherman. same speed Excellent stereo separation. Warner Brothers W 1487, $3.98 (LP); and wobble- free -drops them gently with virtually no wear on center hole, WS 1487, $4.98 (SD). Ask for it at your nearest RCA Victor dealer's. As attested by his debut disc, "My Son, thus eliminating a major cause of "wow." the is a Folk Singer," Allan Sherman N.J. funny fellow indeed. This sequel to his Protects Against Groove Wear. Tone - RCA PARTS AND ACCESSORIES, CAMDEN, preceding smash (check those ratings arm and stylus pressure are so light even yet!) amplifies both the virtues and that no audible scratches are pro- defects of its forerunner. Al 'n Yetta, The Most Trusted Name an inspired take -off on Alouette, and 2 duced if tone arm accidentally slides Sherman's hilarious Mexican Hat Dance across record. Precision -angled head assures e in Sound are far funnier than anything on "My true in- groove tracking over entire record. CIRCLE 74 ON READER -SERVICE C %IjI) APRIL 1963 103

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104 HIGH FIDELITY NI AG.-V I NE

www.americanradiohistory.com Bob Brookmeyer: "Trombone Jazz Sam- his playing. This was particularly true American jazz musicians to be attracted ba." Verve 8498, $4.98 (LP); 6 -8498, of the period during which he and Benny to the bossa nova on its home ground, $5.98 (SD). Golson jointly led the Jazztet. Farmer's Brazil, the early stages of the fad in Valve trombonist Bob Brookmeyer has a failure then to achieve this potential per- this country managed to slip past him go at bossa nova with a seven -man group sonal distinction may have had a good before he could get on board. This set, that includes Jim Hall on guitar, Gary deal to do with that group's failure. made up almost entirely of bossa nova McFarland on vibes, and a Latin rhythm That potential is finally realized on treatments of Brazilian and American section made up of Willie Bobo, Carmen this disc. Farmer's means of achieving tunes, puts him solidly in the forefront. Costa, and Jose Paula. Some pleasant it appear to be keyed to two things: his His regular quintet (as of the period bossa nova tunes have been included, use of the flugelhorn, which he has when Lalo Schifrin was on piano and but because Brookmeyer's heavy -timbred played occasionally before (and which Leo Wright played flute and alto saxo- trombone is too ponderous for the usu- proved to be equally effective for Miles phone) has been augmented by the ally airy feeling of the bossa nova, the Davis), and the interesting orchestral Brazilian guitarist Bola Sete, the Bra- performances fail, for the most part, to settings created by Oliver Nelson. The zilian percussionists and singers Jose come off. Things work out much better variety of colors conjured up with wood- Paula and Carmen Costa, and Charlie on one selection in which Brookmeyer winds, horns, and brasses brilliantly com- Ventura playing tenor and bass saxo- shifts to piano, changing the group's plement the colorful range of Farmer's phones. Added, too, is an overdose of character considerably in the process. In playing. The combination of assurance echo that often muddies the perform- any event, the disc has an ambivalent and rightness about everything Farmer ances. Over -all, it is a disappointing set nature: along with unfeigned attempts at does in this collection is the sign of a with an oddly rag -tag air. There is an bossa nova, there are such gimmickries as master at work. The selections run from imaginative and roaringly lusty bossa a Colonel Bogey Bossa Nova, a bit of a slow and brooding treatment of Far- nova treatment of Careless Love, a bril- malarkey on the Mutiny on the Bounty mer's haunting tune Rue Prevail to a liant solo by Schifrin on Chega de Sau- theme, and a Blues Bossa Nova, written singing version of Fly Me to the Moon; dade (in the midst of an otherwise by Brookmeyer, that has almost no ap- from slow, soaring lyricism on My lumpy and bedraggled performance), parent relationship to the genre. Romance to a sprightly bossa nova ap- and several flashes of Gillespie's polished proach to The Sweetest Sounds. There is trumpet work. But there is also an inap- Don Ellis: "Essence." Pacific Jazz 55, similarity between these performances propriate novelty song for Paula and $4.98 (LP); S 55, $5.98 (SD). and the Miles Davis -Gil Evans collabo- Costa. a sluggish attempt at a bass saxo- Ellis, a trumpeter and exponent of "the rations. although these works have phone solo by Ventura, and several other new thing" (as the farther -out wing of greater variety and Farmer is by far the aimless selections. jazz has been identified recently) has pro- more polished performer. vided a relatively mixed program here. Glen Gray and the Casa Loma Orchestra: Those who are not willing to accompany Terry Gibbs's Big Band: "Explosion." "Themes of the Great Bands." Capi- him off into the distant world of splutters Mercury 20704, $3.98 (LP): 60704, tol T 1812, $3.98 (LP); ST 1812, and flutters on Irony, or the lingering $4.98 (SD). $4.98 (SD). moans and sudden shrieks that he identi- Gibbs has kept his big hand working Although this collection wanders in and fies as a "ballad" called Slow Space, may on a part -time basis on the West Coast out of jazz (its focus is the signature still find some things to catch their ear. for a year or more, and the results of themes made familiar in the days of the The prime choice is Ostinato, based on this relatively steady employment are big bands -some jazz, some nonjazz), it African -derived rhythms and building up evident in these performances, taped should have strong appeal for anyone firmly to a strong, shouting solo by El- during an appearance at The Summit. who used to stay up at night listening lis. Duke Ellington's Johnny Come Late - This full-bodied, swinging band has one to the "remote" broadcasts by those Iv also offers him a foot on the ground essential quality understandably missing bands. Gray and his collaborators have and an opportunity to work out a solo from almost any group assembled in proved to have a far better knack than in which his relationship to Dizzy Gilles- a studio just for recording- relaxed as- most other studio organizations for re- pie is very pronounced. And there is surance and ease. The program is a mix- capturing for modern recording proces- Lover, taken very fast -essentially a ture of freshly approached standards ses the sound and feeling of the familiar showcase for Ellis' virtuosity. Many of (Sleep, I'll Take Romance), adaptations big -band arrangements of the past. Some these pieces swing, but doubts may be of small -group jazz classics (Billie's of the themes re- created here are avail- raised in the minds of those who feel that Bounce), and originals by Gibbs, Al able in recent recordings by the band jazz remains jazz just as long as it Cohn, and Bill Holman. There are sev- leaders who used them, but there are swings. Ellis recognizes the roots from eral good soloists in the band besides also several welcome additions -Jan which he springs, but he seems anxious Gibbs, in addition to a fine rhythm Savitt's Quaker City Jazz. Artie ,Shaw's to leave them behind. section. But the pointless liner notes, at- Nightmare, and Woody Herman's Blue tributed to Jerry Lewis, give no informa- Flame. A free bonus record is attached Art Farmer: "Listen to Art Farmer and tion whatever about the group or its per- to this release which contains ten more the Orchestra." Mercury 20766, $3.98 sonnel. Nevertheless, for fanciers of big - themes (making twenty -two in all), (LP); 60766, $4.98 (SD). band jazz, this is a very welcome disc. among them Gene Krupa's Star Burst, For several years Art Farmer has been Jimmy Lunceford's Uptown Blues, Bobby on the verge of breaking out of the Dizzy Gillespie: "New Wave!" Philips Sherwood's The Elks' Parade, and the common mold of contemporary jazz 200 -070, $3.98 (LP); 600 -070, $4.98 Casa Loma's own Smoke Rings. trumpeters and revealing completely an (SD). individuality sometimes discernible in Although Gillespie was among the first Continued on page 108

APRIL 1963 105

www.americanradiohistory.com by John S. Wilson

Duke with Coleman Hawkins.

Ellington After Four Decades, A New Luster

With Max Rouch and Charlie Mingus.

THERE ARE two or three jazz musicians qualified success, largely because of El- two veterans have recorded together, whose genius might be equated with lington's surprising squeamishness about despite the fact that. both have been Duke Ellington's, but none of them has placing himself in the spotlight for any prominent since the mid -Twenties. Par- exercised that genius over so long a pe- length of time, it hinted at an en- ticipating here is a small group strongly riod. During Ellington's four decades in couraging revival of the lustrous El- reminiscent, stylistically, of those El- jazz he has had, of course, his fallow lington aura. He drew his material from lingtonian musicians who were led at periods; but his accomplishments even at the almost limitless resources of his forty recording sessions in the late Thirties low ebb would be sufficient to cap the years as a composer, and at the same by Johnny Hodges, Barney Bigard, careers of most jazzmen. time broke away, by necessity, from the Cootie Williams, and Rex Stewart. During the Fifties, for example, his patterns established with the band. Trumpeter Ray Nance who, like Elling- flow of creativity as a composer was The direction suggested by this brief ton, sounds invigorated by his new sur- not so abundant as it had been. Never- break with tradition was followed up roundings, plays brilliantly all through theless, he produced Suite Thursday, last summer during a short hiatus be- this set. New vitality can be discerned Such Sweet Thunder, Satin Doll, and tween the termination of Ellington's con- even in the work of such relatively the erratic but occasionally provoca- tract with Columbia and the beginning consistent performers as Hodges, Harry tive scores for A Drum Is a Woman of a new one with Reprise. Between Carney, and Lawrence Brown. Hawkins' and Anatomy of a Murder, along with August 18 and September 26, he made years of free -lancing, with the con- numerous little gems of tunes that were three albums (for the United Artists sequent lapse into loose, rambling per- blithely tossed off and allowed to dis- and Impulse labels) with four unusually formances, sometimes put him at a appear in the constant hurry toward new challenging musicians: Charlie Mingus, disadvantage in the company of this things. In retrospect, the relative medi- Max Roach, John Coltrane, and Cole- compact group, which seems to have ocrity of that period seems due not man Hawkins. an instinctive sense of form. But he so much to any drying up of his personal On "Money Jungle," Ellington forms reaches the peak of his skill collaborat- muse as to his apparently static view of a trio with Mingus and Roach which, ing with Duke on Self Portrait, a lovely programming. in discipline alone, is remarkable. Fore- ballad by Ellington and Billy Strayhorn, Given the opportunity, the Ellington going his tendency to dodge the spot- or joining in the lusty tumult of The orchestra of those days could be as light, Ellington remains the focus of Jeep Is Jumpin'. These, and most of the exciting and distinctive as most of its the entire record. Mingus' fire and selections, are sound, solid Ellington per- predecessors. But the opportunity was virtuosity are molded into an almost formances of vintage quality. not granted very often. An Ellington incredibly close support of Ellington's "Duke Ellington and John Coltrane" program at a concert or festival or night piano; he plays too some distinctive in- is the only one of the meetings that is club became drearily predictable, and troductions and interludes, but they are less than satisfactory. Ellington serves placed stress on the least worthy as- carefully controlled, and never erupt as little more than an accompanist (and pects of the band: Cat Anderson's into the dominance that typifies his own during two long Coltrane solos he sim- caterwauling trumpet, Paul Gonsalves' records. And Roach, a drummer whose ply sits it out). His solos are all brief marathon tenor saxophone solos, and per- adventurous exploration of his equip- and quite casual, while Coltrane, on formances by the very ordinary singers ment has become a trademark, stays dis- tenor or soprano saxophone, goes on who appeared from time to time. These creetly in the background, providing a and on -with, in most cases, deadening concerts became contests of endurance strong, well- constructed foundation. results. in which the listener hung on, hoping for Ellington runs the gamut of his pi- The rest of the selections considered something distinctively Ellingtonian. anistic talent -from flashes of the Har- here, however, indicate new and stimu- (After 1955, there was at least the unfail- lem stride school which nourished him lating possibilities for one of the most ingly exciting performance of Johnny to passages that are pure mature El- enduring figures in jazz. Hodges to look forward to.) ington. He purrs lovingly through two The suspicion that this orchestra, of his dreamiest tunes, Solitude and Duke Ellington: "Money Jungle." United usually considered Ellington's most nat- Warm Valley, and digs joyously into an- Artists 14017, $4.98 (LP); 15017, ural medium of expression, might ac- other old favorite, Caravan. And four $5.98 (SD). tually have become an inhibiting factor new -and worthy- Elling-n composi- Duke Ellington: "Meets Coleman Haw- began to take definite shape a little tions are played with a splendor and kins." Impulse 26, $4.98 (LP); S 26, over a year ago when he appeared as a fervor that probably could not be equaled $5.98 (SD). pianist with only bass and drum ac- by any other threesome. Duke Ellington: "And John Coltrane." companiment -his first such concert. Al- Ellington's meeting with Coleman Impulse 30, $4.98 (LP); S 30, $5.98 though the occasion was not an un- Hawkins marks the first time these (SD).

106 HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

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CIRCLE 49 ON READER -SERVICE CARD APRIL 1963 107

www.americanradiohistory.com JAZZ rhythmic ideas, he is apt to get stuck GUARANTEED in down -home clichés. An enormously Continued from page 105 helpful contribution is made by Norbert FM andanti FM STEREO Hooper, whose drumming balances a Woody Herman: "1963." Philips 200- positive, assertive drive with a light, Up to 200 Miles! 065, $3.98 (LP); 600 -065, $4.98 (SD). lifting quality. Still another asset for the You have to go all the way back to Crusaders is their ability to create good Woody Herman's original Herd in the original material : five of these six pieces middle Forties to find any of his bands come from within the group. and they equal to this one. Power, polish, spirit, strike a far better average than most humor, a sprinkling of brilliant soloists, such originals. and arrangements that make use of the group as a band rather than as merely Mike Mainieri Quartet: "Blues on the a framework for solos are the ingredients Other Side." Argo 706, $3.98 (LP). of these excellent performances. Plus, of Mainieri is a young vibraphonist who course, the very perceptive and knowl- made a very strong impression when he edgeable guidance of Herman -whose was first heard with Buddy Rich two clarinet, incidentally, sounds much more years ago. Like most youngsters, he was at home here than in his bands of the anxious to show off his flash and vir- late Forties. The most important factor tuosity then -but he had the ability to is the clean, clear, bright attack -of hack up his showing -off. Sidelined with the sections individually and of the en- an illness after that, he returns on this tire ensemble. But there are at least disc leading a group of his own for two standout soloists: Phil Wilson, a the first time. The signs of quick ma- remarkable trombonist who seems to turity shown here are even more im- have picked up where Bill Harris left pressive than the virtuosity he displayed off as he slides lazily through his lines, with Rich. Most of these pieces are taken smoothly, gruffly, with staccato asides at moderate or slow tempos. Mainieri's and glancing touches of humor; and Sal playing is gentle and reflective at times, Nistico, a well -disciplined and strongly warmly lyrical on slow ballads, and NEW Wineya,rid swinging tenor saxophonist. Pushing the smoothly swinging, with no desperate whole thing is a marvelous rhythm sec- histrionics, on faster selections. His tion: Nat Pierce, piano; Chuck Andrus, quartet contains no familiar names, but bass; and Jake Hanna, drums. Hanna in it is remarkably cohesive and has. in STEREOTRON particular is a tremendously propulsive Bruce Martin, an exceptionally deft and FM ANTENNA force. perceptive pianist. Illinois Jacquet. Epic 16033, $3.98 (LP); Shelly Manne with Twin Nuvistor Amplifier 17033, $4.98 (SD). -Bill Evans: "Empathy." Verve 8497, $4.98 (LP); 6 -8497, $5.98 John Hammond, producer of this disc, (SD). is apparently intent on doing a multiple The trio at work here is made up of resuscitation job. He succeeds here in returning Manne on drums, Evans on piano, and Illinois Jacquet, Sir Charles Monte Budwig, bass. Thompson, and Roy Eldridge There is, as the to their title implies, considerable empathy exist- The reception ability of even the most expensive proper roles, and presenting them once FM or FM stereo ing among them, particularly between outfit is restricted by the again as the tastefully supple swingers Manne and performance of the antenna to it is Evans. Manne is a tasteful which con- they are. Jacquet. it will be recalled, and highly imaginative nected. If you want to see what your equipment long ago abandoned his real drummer who talent to gives Evans' delicately swung piano solos can really do, you need a new Winegard produce a mess of lucrative honks and Stereotron. squeals; a neatly shaded backing. He is also an Thompson has latterly been individualist, and the The Stereotron antenna and twin nuvistor fashionably dull on organ; while Eldridge setting he provides amplifier is is unique -particularly in the use the only antenna amplifier combi- has simply been passed by. All of them of cym- nation that can be used anywhere- responds bals and gongs for very interesting ac- are present here, backed by a couple to 1 microvolt of signal, yet takes up to 200,000 of excellent rhythm cent effects. The program seems, at first microvolts of signal without overloading. An- sections-each of glance, hardly promising: two of the which a tenna is GOLD ANODIZED, amplifier com- includes strong guitar (the ab- lesser tunes from sence of which has contributed greatly Irving Berlin's gen- pletely weather -sealed. Exceptionally high front - erally to the unexciting score for Mr. Presi- to -back ratio to prevent multi -path distortion. multitude of unswinging big -band dent and the well -worn Danny Boy are performances in the Antenna and amplifier are available separately. past dozen years). the ominous offerings on one side. Within settings reminiscent of the old We firmly believe that the Stereotron FM Actually, the banality of the tunes is antenna is in a league by itself and therefore we Basie small groups, Jacquet foregoes his of little consequence, for Evans moves make the following written guarantee: blatancies and concentrates on the rich, quickly away sinuous playing which from them to become I. We guarantee the Winegard Stereotron to be first brought him involved with Manne in a variety of de- the most effective, sensitive, finest con- to attention. Thompson rolls along with lightful Basie -like exchanges and improvisations. structed antenna available. grace, and Eldridge demon- The other side consists of an adventurous strates that his biting, cutting style has treatment of With a Song in My Heart, 2. We guarantee the Stereotron with Stereotron not lost any of its edge. It's good to amplifier will in a delicate but perky version of Gordon pull 85% of all FM stations know that there can still be this in a 200 mile much Jenkins' Goodbye, and a radius over average terrain. fun in jazz. performance of 1 Believe You 3. We guarantee you will be 100% satisfied in (from How To Suc- with a Stereotron or your money back. The Jazz Crusaders: "At the Lighthouse." ceed). The last -named, though it is a better tune than the two Mr. President STEREOTRON ANTENNA Model SF- $23.65 Pacific Jazz 57, $4.98 (LP); S 57, 8- $5.98 (SD). items, emerges here as the least effec- STEREOTRON NUVISTOR AMPLIFIER Model AP- This young quintet has come along fast tively played piece in the set. 320 input 300 ohms, output 300 ohms -can be used with any FM antenna -$39.95 in the two years since it made its first recording, Freedom Sound (Pacific Jazz Art Pepper: "The Artistry of Pep- Amplifier Model AP -375 for use with coax 27). The freshness and promise has per." Pacific Jazz 60, $4.98 (LP). cable. Input 300 ohms, output 75 ohms -$44.95 coalesced into well- integrated teamwork This collection of re- releases serves as a Write for technical spec's, gain charts, polar that still retains the attractive vivacity valuable reminder, now that Pepper is patterns, VSWR, etc., plus Free FM Station of the early performances. The quintet not free to make any new records, of Log and Map. appears at its best on the faster selec- the excellent work done by him. The tions here, on which it builds up, with clear purity of his alto saxophone tone lighter texture, the driving intensity often and the gracefully rhythmic flow of his World's Most Complete Line of FM and TV by lines are heard at their best in the four antennas, FM -TV Couplers and Amplifiers achieved Art Blakey's Jazz Messen- gers. Trombonist Wayne Henderson is selections on Side 1, where he is teamed the most consistent and authoritative of with tenor saxophonist Bill Perkins in the soloists, although tenor saxophonist some wonderfully fresh -sounding ensem- W' ä Wilton Felder also has some excellent ble passages. These performances remind ANTENNA rrEMS moments. Joe Sample, the group's pianist, one of the best work of the early Gerry 3014 -4 Kirkwood Blvd. Burlington, Iowa is erratic; although he has some potent Mulligan quartets, with the added de- CIRCLE 104 ON READER -SERVICE CARD 108 HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

www.americanradiohistory.com light of Pepper's very individual solo for discriminating music lovers only .. work. The second side, played by three different groups, is more uneven. On two selections Pepper reverts to a loose a new exciting experience in hi-fi pleasure and wispy style, but his other contributions are creditable. Vi Redd: "Bird Call." United Artists SZTPEREX stereo /phones 14016, $4.98 (LP); 15016, $5.98 (SD). the only stereo /phones with separate woofers and tweeters plus crossover networks. The few women who have made a mark as jazz instrumentalists have invariably been pianists. There have been others - Melba Liston on trombone, Billie Rogers on trumpet, and Betty Smith, an English saxophonist, come to mind-but none has achieved the stature of Mary Lou Williams or Marian McPartland or Toshiko. Vi Redd, then, is striking into reasonably new territory when she presents herself as an alto saxophonist. (She also sings, but even though she shows herself to be a capable vocalist here, one must assume that this is simply a hedge.) Her full capabilities as an alto saxophonist are not given a really fair exposure, for this collection is made up, with one exception, of pieces recorded by Charlie Parker. Since her tone and style are quite obviously derived from Parker, the suggestion of his presence, in these circumstances, shrouds everything she plays. The disc is taken SUPEREX because . HE LIKES 'EM because SUPEREX SHIE LIKES 'EM because of their You'll enjoy ... from two different sessions; at one of are specially designad to make hi -fi exciting privacy. Her husband they enable you to enjoy stereo at them she played consistently better than listening more intimate -more en- watches the ballgame on TV ... the its best. If you're serious about the in hi -fi entertainment -get the the impression, joyable - completely private. With- kids can clown around -while she is best at the other. One receives out muddling due to room bounce in -another world enjoying her very only stereo /phones with separate therefore, of a highly promising altoist and scramble. best hi -fi programs. woofer and tweeter elements and who may have distinctly more to offer crossover networks.. full 20- 20,000 than this initial disc shows. Siv129B M cps range -8 -16 ohms impedance. Frank Sinatra -Count Basie and His Or- stereo /phones Reprise for free brochure and name chestra: "Sinatra -Basie." only $29.95. of nearest dealer write: 1008, $3.98 (LP); 9 -1008, $4.98 (SD). PLACE The with which Frank Si- SUPEREX ELECTRONICS, 4 RADFORD YONKERS, NEW YORK consistency CIRCLE 9S READER- SERVICE CARD natra wins the annual "favorite male ON singer" poll conducted by the jazz magazine Down Beat has always struck me as puzzling. For whatever one's view of the meaning of the term "jazz singer," Sinatra is not one. If ever evidence of NOW! EVERY COPY OF this should be needed, it is contained in this meeting with the Basie band. Si- natra's forte is the ballad. Once the tempo starts moving up, he tends to turn unattractively flip, to appear to be sing- high fidelity ing out of the side of his mouth, or simply to be straining to keep up. Since AT YOUR FINGERTIPS most of these pieces are on the medium and uppish side, he is not shown to good advantage. The Basie band is re- WITH THIS duced, except for a few solos, to a background role, which it performs with BEAUTIFUL BINDER polish and aplomb. Billy Strayhorn: "The Peaceful Side." ONLY $250 EACH United Artists 14010, $4.98 (LP); 15010, $5.98 (SD). This disc presents solos by Billy Stray - NO MORE LOST ISSUES horn who-as Duke Ellington's arranger, co- composer, and assistant pianist since KEEPS COPIES IN PERFECT CONDITION 1939 -is so integral a part of the Elling- ton creative complex that it is frequently BEAUTIFUL ADDITION TO ANY BOOKSHELF difficult to determine which of them wrote what. (For a further discussion of LEATHERETTE FINISH -EMBOSSED IN 16k GOLD Ellington himself, see page 106 of this issue). Take the "A" Train, for example, CUSTOM MADE TO HOLD 12 ISSUES always assumed to be almost Ellington's SATISFACTION GUARANTEED. ALLOW 30 DAYS FOR DELIVERY composition, is actually by Strayhorn. Some discreet voices and strings are r occasionally added to the piano in these PREEM ASSOCIATES, INC. performances of tunes he has written 21 E. 40th St., New York 16, N.Y. alone or with Ellington (Lush Life, Day Please send me the following binder(s). Dream, Chelsea Bridge, and of course I enclose $2.50 for each. "A" Train, among others). Playing in Binder(s) for HIGH FIDELITY a style slightly reminiscent of Ellington, NAME Strayhorn has produced a lovely disc; his performances are unusually discern- ADDRESS ing in their simplicity and directness. CITY ZONE STATE JOHN S. WILSON

AI'IiIL 1963 11))

www.americanradiohistory.com Music (Epic EC 803, October 1961) ly different styles: the Juilliard's playing remains without competition. But for is more deftly integrated, precise, and extroverts at least. Stokowski's reel has more "modern," stylistically, than that BUYER'S GUIDE a galvanic sound appeal uniquely its own. of the more individualized and romantically outspoken Fine Arts four. But TO COMPONENTS JONGEN: Symphonie concertante you can't go wrong with either. TRADING Virgil Fox, organ; Orchestre du Théâtre STRAUSS, JOHANN II: Waltzes National de l'Opéra, Georges Prêtre, cond. Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Fritz CAPITOL ZP 8573. 37 min. $7.98. Reiner. cond. RCA VICTOR FTC 2093. 42 min. A tape first which sound fans will rel- $8.95. ish as a wall -bursting "demo." The pro- ', gram is played with immense virtuosity, With the January stereo disc version still as FISHER but the musical content strikes me fresh in my ears, direct A/B comparisons even shallower than when I reviewed were merely confirming proof that the the disc edition in February 1962. How- present taping boasts identical sound TUNERS, RECEIVERS & AMPLI- ever. I must say that there is far less qualities. There is a slight preecho at FIERS ... all leading makes and surface noise in the present taping than the very beginning, but in compensation models. WHY BUY? When you can in either the LP or SD versions. and the surfaces of the tape are even quieter TRADE ... and receive the highest that the stereo recording sounds cleaner than those of the disc. And with my trade -in allowance from the coun- and more incisive here than in the latter. praise for Reiner's performances perhaps try's original and largest audio trad- still fresh in readers' minds, I need only ing Organization, Audio Suite. note here that all five waltzes (Josef Exchange. KHACHATURIAN: Spartacus: Strauss's My Life Is Lore and Laughter, Gayne: Suite Johann II's Vienna Blood, Artist's Life, Roses from the South, and Treasure) KHACHATURIAN: Symphony No. 2 seem even more intoxicating on second hearing. The bravura Thunder and Light- Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, Aram ning Polka encore proves to be a dem- Khachaturian, cond. onstration of sonics that puts to shame LONDON LCL 80100 and 80106. 41 most more overtly showy examples. GARRARD and 52 min. $7.95 each. WAGNER: Orchestral Excerpts RECORD PLAYBACK SYSTEMS, AND Listeners with a taste for the Soviet - TAPE RECORD / PLAYBACK ... all Armenian composer's brash rhythms, London Symphony Orchestra, Antal tune and somewhat leading makes and models The catchy -fragments. Dorati. cond. ... poster -art "Eastern" tone colorings will Hi Fi /Stereo components your ear MERCURY (via Bel Canto) ST 90287. relish his versions of mostly familiar 43 min. $7.95. is yearning for will not only cost you Gayne pieces -including the ubiquitous less when you trade by mail with Sabre Dance. which sounds just as in- Fine orchestral playing, airily floating Audio Exchange (or in person at our sistent and slapdash in the composer's in lucid and expansive stereo, is the New York area showrooms), it's hands as in anyone else's. Those who prime attraction of this well -processed SAFER. Unmatched guarantees: free think he has something more significant tape. Unfortunately, Dorati seems self - to say in his larger works (and who parts and labor within 90 days . . . conscious and stilted in readings of 75% allowance in trade -back within don't already own the 1960 Stokowski/ Die Meistersinger Prelude. Good Friday United Artists version of the Second Spell from Parsifal, and a very deliberate 6 months ... plus a 10 -day money - Symphony now reissued by MusicTapes) back guarantee on USED com- Tannhiittser Overture (Dresden version) may he able to find more enjoyment than which no competition to Bruno ponents. offer I can in that rather grim, enigmatic. and Walter's tapings of the first two works, often pretentious music. The main at- or to Stokowski's of the third. Dorati's traction here. though, is the first stereo Prelude to Act I of Lohengrin comes representation of the Spartacus score off better. and here there seems to be featured on the Bolshoi Ballet's Ameri- no 4 -track reel competition. can tour. Only a few selections are played here. and several of these are calm and romantically expressive. The rest of the work is in saucy barbaric AR SPEAKERS style, of course, and if there's no great E. POWER BIGGS: "Heroic Music musical substance anywhere. there is SPEAKER SYSTEMS, Wall, Large for Organ, Brass, and Percussion" En considerable freshness and vivacity. The closure and Bookshelf ... all leading brightly recorded orchestra is admirable E. Power Biggs, organ; New England makes and models ... throughout. The tape processings are Brass Ensemble, Rosario Mazzeo, cond. FREE -"TRADERS HANDBOOK" - very good. except for two momentary COLUMBIA MQ 486. 32 min. $7.95. a colorful 16 -page booklet that ex- intrusions of reverse -channel spill -over. plains everything about trading by The featured artist actually appears as in an enchanting Purcell mail. New components from over a soloist only MOZART: Quartets for Strings: No. which shows to perfection the hundred manufacturers, and Ayre off guar- 14, in D, K. 387; No. 18, in A, K. of the Flentrop anteed baroque color resources used equipment by the car- 464 organ in the Busch -Reisinger Museum at load. All at lower cost because of Harvard University. Elsewhere he plays higher trade -in allowances. Write for Juilliard String Quartet. a subordinate role in the accompaniments your free copy. Eric EC 827. 58 min. $7.95. to six spirited brass and percussion players in his own and Daniel Pinkham's S <.9S.. .0/ ., S,,.lo ..o,.L 01:.,,1.,,1 MOZART: Quartets for Strings: No. arrangements of pieces by Clarke. Han- audio exchange 15, in D minor, K. 421; No. 19, in del. Croft. Purcell. and Telemann. The 10 C, K. 465 ( "Dissonant ") last -named's brief overture to Der I EASE MAIL ALL ORDERS A'.: RIES TO JAMAICA I getreue Musikmeister and amusing 153.21 N,II,.d, a,. , 1.m.A. 77, N 1 i NA ARI,E 7.7577 I '.5 N Y. BROONLY!. VANNASSES, N. Y Fine Arts Quartet. Heldennut.sik suite (consisting of a doz- Ave (OAS Faa +:. a51 Rlendome Sc CONCERTAPES 4019. 57 min. $7.95. en short marches entitled "Honor." PLEASE SEND ME FREE BOOKLET "Charm." "Bravery," etc.) are novel ma- NAME What a glorious windfall: four of the terials and the most discreetly and stereo - six Mozart Haydn quartets in first -and genically scored. The various English ADDRESS superb -4 -track tapings! Both reels are marches, trumpet tunes. and voluntaries well processed and excellently recorded. are fine rousing stuff, but rather over - I CITY STATE with apparently somewhat closer miking scored. especially in regard to percus- ` - -- J in the Concertape. Both are magnificent- sion. and most of them have been done ly performed too. although in distinctive- before as well or better in tapings by CIRCLE 12 ON READER -SERVICE CARD 112 HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

www.americanradiohistory.com PREPUBLICATION OFFER only s1.95 Tapes in Review: 1963 EDITION

bi R. D. Darrell

TAPES IN REVIEW 1963 Edition ... enlighten and entertain every musically now in preparation, will bring you in one minded reader. convenient book the pre- recorded tape reviews It will measure 61/2" x 914". Soft cover. We -about 500 -which appeared in HIGH judge it will come close to 100 pages. First FIDELITY during 1962 and 1961. All were shipments planned for late April. by R. D. Darrell, contributing editor of written Although the cover price is $2.50, until May 1, HIGH FIDELITY, pioneer in the art of 1963, you may buy a copy for only $1.95, payment author of The High Road to Musical discography, with order. Use the handy order form below. Enjoyment and Good Listening.

If you buy pre -recorded tapes, this book will 463 Wyeth Press, a Division of High Fidelity help you build a fine library of the music you Publishing House, Great Barrington, Mass. enjoy. Mr. Darrell's interests range from Beethoven to romantic Italian songs. As a sample Send me a copy of Tapes in Review: 1963 Edition for of the contents turn to The Tape Deck in this the 81.95 I enclose. (After May 1, 1963, send $2.50). issue of HIGH FIDELITY. Multiply that Send to contribution by 24, add a piece on The Basic Tape Library, and an index! Name

If you are not yet one of the HIGH FIDELITY Address readers who buys pre -recorded tapes, you will find Tapes in Review: 1963 Edition helpful as a guide to discs for performances on tapes are available, also, on discs. And the book will

APRIL 1963 113

www.americanradiohistory.com Voisin for Kapp and Wobitsch for Van- viewed in these pages February 1962. It SPECIAL STEREO guard. But if the transcribers' scholar- has not yet appeared in a tape edition. ship is somewhat flimsy here, their sonic The present collection was issued on disc CABLE ASSEMBLIES and stereoistic effects are often elec- last fall as Kapp 9070. Once again trifying. The recording is superb through- Voisin plays like the supreme virtuoso out, and the tape processing, apart from he is; Vardi's accompaniments are ad- FOR CONNECTING frequent preëchoes, excellent. mirably deft (with particularly fine real- 2 PIECES izations of the harpsichord continuo by Igor Kipnis); again the is OF STEREO LEONID HAMBRO and JASCHA recording clean and open, and the tape processing, EQUIPMENT ZAYDE: Tino -Piano Recital except for slight preëchoes, first -rate. Leonid Hambro and Jascha Zayde, The selections are even more novel than pianos. usual: except for the vivacious Torelli COMMAND CC 11010. 43 min. $7.95. Concerto in D, they are all tape firsts (indeed, only this work and the fascinat- Demonstrating that for Command's en- ing Fux Serenada for Two Trumpets are OOO gineers the hazards of piano recording available on discs). Perhaps the three OOOO hold no more terrors than those of Fanfares for Four Trumpets by Sigis- taping percussion ensembles and full mund Neukomm (1778 -1858) are too symphony orchestras, this reel is out- brief to be of much more than historical interest; but both Stradella's amusingly Eliminate Soldering standing for both its stereo technology and flawless tape processing. The per- lively Sinfonia to Il Barcheggio and Make a Quick, formances (of Mozart's Sonata in F, K. Alessandro Scarlatti's brisk Sinfonia No. Clean 497; Schubert's Fantasia in F minor, 11, in D, are thoroughly delightful Connection Op. 103; and Mendelssohn's Allegro baroque discoveries. briliant, Op. 92) are assured, straight- Connect your Stereo Amplifier to Multiplex forward, and brilliantly dexterous. Yet Adapter, Record Changer, Turntable or Tape Recorder! my praise must be regretfully qualified. Construction -Two shielded insulated cables, Playing the duet parts on two pianos inside a common chrome grey plastic jacket, pro- tends to exaggerate their differentiations vide for two completely isolated channels. Sep- "Bashin'." Jimmy Smith, arately insulated shields minimize the "ground and to spread unduly the stereo sonic electronic loop" problem. image; the instruments themselves are organ; Orchestra. Verve VSTC 279, Available with two straight Phono Plugs on either somewhat hard in their tonal qual- 39 min., $7.95. each end, plugs color coded for channel identi- ities to seem The best tribute I can pay the fication. Also available with two straight Phono or often made so by unpredict- Plugs on one end to stripped and tinned ends, the players' hammering vehemence; and, able Jimmy Smith is to assert that, al- plugs and inner jackets color coded. 3', 6' and more seriously, Hambro and Zayde sel- though his instrument produces as ugly 10' lengths -from $2.90 up. dom get below the surface attractions ersatz tones as I've ever heard, I'm con- Contact your dealer or write us for name of of the Mozart and the Schubert to sug- sistently hypnotized here by his genuinely dealer nearest you. gest the essential eloquence of these jazzlike improvisational imagination. works. Only Mendelssohn's more bra- Oliver Nelson's arrangements for the vura essay is interpretatively successful. sixteen -man band on the first side are all effective, and I like best the highly 5539 N. ELSTON AVE. CHICAGO 30, ILL original 01' Man River and the catchy KARL MUENCHINGER: Music for if erratic CIRCLE 97 ON READER -SERVICE CARD Step Right Up. Still more Chamber Orchestra fascinating are the title piece, on the second Stuttgart Chamber Orchestra, Karl side, and two others for trio alone (Smith, guitarist Jimmy Warren, and Münchinger, cond. drummer Don Bailey). LONDON LCL 80110. 40 min. $7.95. The recording and tonal balances are fine throughout. Except for Corelli's lovely Christmas Concerto, Op. 6, No. 8 (taped some "Count Basie and the Kansas City years ago by the Solisti di Zagreb for Seven." Impulse ITC 304, 37 min., Vanguard, originally in a 2 -track and $7.95. later in a 4 -track version), the present There is perhaps rather too much in- program is made up of tape firsts: consequential fluting here (although the Concertino No. 2, in G, long at- Frank Wess is a very deft soloist, espe- tributed to Pergolesi and here to Carlo cially in his two originals Secrets and Ricciotti; Miinchinger's arrangement of Senator Whitehead), and I could well the so- called Kanon by Pachelbel in- do without the Count's shifting from troduced on 78s by Fiedler; and the his usual light- fingered piano to a tubby Chaconne from Act III of Gluck's Paride electronic organ in the sentimentalized ed Elena which includes the famous I Want a Little Girl. But everything else Gavotte. Baroque purists may tut -tut here represents the current Basie Septet Miinchinger's romantic approach and at its most vivacious and delicate best, overexpressive string vibrato (I certainly with clean, markedly stereoistic record- prefer Janigro's tauter, more vivacious ing capturing every detail of the sotto treatment of the Corelli concerto), but voce subtleties in Count's Place, Tally - the combined emotional and sonic ap- Ho Mr. Basie, and Shoeshine Boy. Ex- peal of all these performances -that of cellent tape processing adds to the at- the gravely ceremonial, expansively tractions of one of the very best of NEW GIBSON GIRL® flowering Pachelbel work in particular Basic's latest releases. -will be hard indeed for most listeners to resist. Perhaps 4 TAPE SPLICER they can tolerate "Gay Purr -ee." Original Sound Track STEREO more kindly than I can the intrusions Recording, Mort Lindsey, of reverse -channel spill -over in the other- cond. War- GIBSON GIRL® STEREO 4, espe- The new is wise good tape processing. ner Brothers WSTC 1479, 35 min., cially designed to meet the precise re- $7.95. quirements of splicing 4 -track tape. A If the best -seller charts and most disc new streamlined Gibson Girl shape ROGER VOISIN: Music for Trum- reviewers (including my colleague J.F.I., protects program material on tape, pet and Orchestra, Vol. 4 with whom I seldom disagree) are to be the believed, it is not only the kids who yet leaves tape edges free of adhesive. Roger Voisin, trumpet; Kapp Sinfonietta, lap up this feline fantasy distinguished Splices glide past your tape head with Emanuel Vardi, cond. by an Arlen -Harburg score and such never a hint of their presence. See the KAPP KTL 49008. 43 min. $7.95. luminaries as Judy Garland, Robert new GIBSON GIRL® STEREO 4 at your tape Goulet, and Red Buttons. But I must recorder and hi -fi dealer. To set the record straight, this is not confess that it all struck me as an almost List Price $11.50 the disc collection entered as Volume 4 unbearably embarrassing venture into in Schwann: that (Kapp 9062) is prop- what I can only describe, sourly, as ROBINS INDUSTRIES CORP., FLUSHING 56, N. Y. erly titled "Trumpet Music" and so re- "whumsey." Perhaps you'd better trust CIRCLE 83 ON READER- SERVICE CARD 114 HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

www.americanradiohistory.com your own ears on this one. Certainly there can be no complaints about the recording (except for its lack of acoustical warmth) or the tape processing. "Jumbo." Film Track Recording, George TAPE Stoll, cond. Columbia OQ 507, 35 min., $9.95. "Rome Adventure and Neapolitan Favor- Review Digest ites." Film Track Recording ( "Rome Adventure "); Café Milano Orchestra FREE: ( "Neapolitan Favorites "); Max Steiner, cond. Warner Brothers WSTC 1458, 34 min., $7.95. Two current film reels of no great dis- THIS tinction. but they do contain some special attractions besides that of impressive sound. Jumbo is synthetically high- spirited (and niggardly in length 82.95 for its premium cost), but Doris Day does very well with Over and Over Again and My Romance, and Jimmie TAPE Over 700 complete TAPE REVIEWS Durante's staccato reprise of The Most Beautiful Girl in the World is by itself INDEXED BY: well worth the price of admission. Du- Popular Artists, Classical Composers rante's appearances, however, are far DIGEST too brief. The other reel features tenor Emilio Pericoli in a highly emotional Al di lìc, but I found this showpiece You'll find this Digest a highly useful guide in selecting tapes for your library. And you can get less appealing than Steiner's characteristically rich orchestral versions of Nea- it free. Just purchase two stereo tapes from your participating United Stereo Tape dealer from politan favorites on the other side, topped by a tuneful Serenade, and the brisk man- the following labels: ABC -Paramount, Atlantic, Col -Pix, Impulse, Kapp, London, MGM, Richmond, dolin-and accordion -dominated A rriveder- ci Roma and Volare. A couple of spill- UST Samplers, Vanguard, Verve, Warner Bros., Westminster and World Pacific. Each of these over whispers sneak in here, and I suspect one in Jumbo too, but in other tapes has a catalog- request card enclosed. Send two of these cards, or one card and $1.00 respects both reels seem well processed with minimal surface noise. (cash, check or money order) in an envelope to: "Digest Offer," United Stereo Tapes, 88 Lle-

wellyn Ave., Bloomfield, New Jersey. You'll also receive a free UST catalog, listing over 900 "Mr. President." Original Cast Record- ing, Jay Blackton, cond. Columbia stereo tapes, and a new release list. Offer expires April 30, 1963. STEREO IS BEST ON TAPE OQ 490, 46 min., $9.95. CIRCLE 100 ON READER-SERVICE CARD This show has taken such a beating from both theatre and disc critics that its success with the mass public seemed inexplicable to me until I heard the present reel and discovered that, while the critics are certainly right about the relative colorlessness of the characteriza- tions (which even Nanette Fabray and Anita Gillette can't succeed in vitalizing), the secret of its appeal lies in the score. Certainly it is naïve and old -fashioned, and certainly Berlin has written much better tunes in the past; nevertheless, these are unmistakably Berlin -ish and in their very lack of sophistication are GO FOR $1 A YEAR! comfortably easy on one's ears. If you're HOW FAR WRONG (AN YOU looking for another Of Thee I Sing, buy or swap used high fidelity speakers, you'll be sadly disappointed; but if you Eager to sell, want relaxing, light musical entertain- amplifiers, cartridges, turntables, tuners, records, etc.? ment, there's an abundance of that in Turn to our monthly bulletin: The BUY- SELL -or- Mr. President. SWAP NEWSLETTER. If you want to SELL -classified listings of used equip- "Two of a Mind." Paul Desmond and ment and records cost only $1 per ad -limit 30 words Gerry Mulligan, saxophones. RCA Vic- No dealer ads accepted. tor FTP 1172, 41 min., $7.95. including name and address. Few easygoing jazz improvisations and If you want to BUY -lots of bargains offered in the interplays have been as delectable as month. Sub- these relaxed yet superbly rhapsodic duos 50 or more ads that appear here every by Desmond (alto sax, left) and Mulli- scription price: only $1 a year! gan (baritone sax, right) with centered can you go for rhythm section. I've never heard the for- If you're audio- minded, how far wrong mer play more lyrically or the latter $1? Fill in and mail the form below today! more imaginatively. Although the tape surfaces are a bit rough and preechoey HIGH FIDELITY, Dept. CE Enclosed is my payment for $ on the first side at least, the exquisitely Great Barrington, Mass. pure and cleanly differentiated stereo Insert the following 30 -word adver- recording catches to perfection the con- Start my subscription to your BSS tisement (including name and address) in trasts and blends of individual tone color Newsletter with the next issue. (Only $1) the next issue of the BSS Newsletter. and stylistic nuances. Desmond's free- (Type or print plainly.) ($1) wheeling title piece, Mulligan's lively Nume Blight of the Fumble Bee, and a quiet All the Things You Are are all fine; Address the long, sometimes lyrical, sometimes swinging The Way You Look Tonight City State is an out -and -out masterpiece!

APRIL 1963 1 15

www.americanradiohistory.com FOR FULL QUALITY THE PROSPECTS FOR PSYCHOACOUSTICS Continued from page 50 STEREO -MULTIPLEX performer --who is thus even more no- States. Thus, monophonic recording en- OR MONOPHONIC ticeably "in the room." gineers favored the use of a single, Next came the "Electronically En- distant microphone which permitted FM RECEPTION hanced" school of high fidelity. It was much of the acoustic ambience to be D. short step from Hollywood's work in mixed with the direct signal. For stereo USE bringing the artist into the listening room recording, A. D. Blumlein of EMI sug- to surrounding the listener with music. gested the use of two microphones with The first major step in this direction, overlapping patterns, placed fairly near of course. was Walt Disney's Fantasia, each other. The objective was again NCO created jointly by the artist -engineers to capture the ambience of the record- of Hollywood and Leopold Stokowski. ing hail, and to increase the depth illu- Millions thrilled to Bach's Toccata and sion rather than to intensify "left- right" Fugue in D minor and Stravinsky's Rite or "surround- sound" effects. r ,r - of Spring. seen and heard in a theatre Amplifiers for "window" systems were alive with sound -recorded on eight not required to reproduce high level tracks -from every direction. More re- transients. and consequently they were cent are the seven tracks of very Model FM -4 counterparts designed to be lower- powered. but "Cinerama," the six tracks of "Todd -A- stable and accurate, with very low dis- O," and the four tracks of "Cinema - tortion at normal listening room levels. World's Most Complete scope." In speakers, extreme accuracy -to con- Stokowski, one of the pioneers in vey the ambience -was most important. line of HI-FI Phased sound reproduction. suggests that re- Thus. the Voigt and succeeding designs corded music can do more than re- create used heavy magnetic systems for pre- FM ANTENNAS original performances. that it can be cise control of the diaphragms. Elec- used artistically to heighten the moods trostatics were first admired in England and emotions of music. He further sug- because it was felt that they had a special The Top Performance Line ! gests multiple recording and reproducing ability to reproduce the "window" kind channels. in front of, at the side of, of sound. and when techniques had been and behind the listener. In time he ex- developed sufficiently, P. J. Walker pro- Ask your dealer to explain the advantages of these pects composers to create a new musical duced a free -standing full range unit. outstanding antennas or write for Catalog 20213 idiom expressly suited to electronic re- From the discussion above, it can be THE FINNEY COMPANY creation. seen that the equipment and techniques 34 West Interstate Bedford, Ohio The equipment required for "Elec- for one kind of system do differ, to a Dept. HF tronically Enhanced" reproduction is marked degree, from those for another similar to that for the "Artist in the kind. Yet all three merit the name of CIRCLE 42 ON READER- SERVICE CARD Room "; one just requires more of it, high fidelity. The determinant of what in more complex setup. Using current type of system is "best" must perforce two -channel material, we can derive be a psychoacoustic evaluation. Thus, GET "composite mid channels," and "reverse the man who expects his reproducing echo channels." If. in time, we have system to "enhance" the music will be OUR more channels of information available, most unhappy with equipment refined QUOTE we will be able to do a more thorough for the effect of the "window." Too, ROCH job of enhancing music electronically. while everyone professes to want to The "Window on the Orchestra" con- improve his system, to make it "better," cept- evolved in Europe, principally in "better" is a matter of subjective inter- England- embraces a completely dif- pretation. Indeed, the varying descrip- ferent aesthetic of recorded music. Its tions and conflicting opinions one hears premise is that no intelligent person can from different listeners discussing the ever believe that a symphony orchestra same piece of equipment tell us more is actually playing in his living room, about the listeners themselves than about DOTIOM nor would he want the dynamic range the equipment. STEREO HIGH FIDELITY and power of an orchestra in that con- The professed audio expert -engineer, fined space. Advocates of the "Window salesman, testing specialist, or even writer on the Orchestra" regard as a more -must be at least as much a psychol- reasonable sonic ideal the hearing of ogist as a technician. His final descrip- music as if one were listening through tions of reproducing equipment and an open window to a performance going music systems must be phrased in terms on in a large adjacent room. The re- of their objectives, the kind of listening ' l ICES producing system, then. and especially the for which they were intended. And any- PLUS THESE RABSONS EXTRAS loudspeaker. acts as the window through one who assembles and installs com- Established 1905 58 Years of Reliability Franchised Protection Plus which one hears a satisfyingly authentic, plete audio systems or recommends such Rabsons Special Six Month Guarantee naturally diminished reproduction of the systems must go behind the "specs," and Easy Payment Plan Up to 24 Months to Pay Each Component Double Packed to Insure original -with the acoustics or ambience try to furnish a system that will give Safe Arrival. At no extra charge of the original as an important part of pleasure to its user. Happy is the listener Rabsons Sells ONLY Factory Fresh Merchan. has a his dise in Original Factory Sealed Cartons the over -all presentation. who system designed for goal SO WRITE RABSONS It was P. G. A. H. Voigt, designer in listening; desperate is the man who Whatever your Hl-Fl requirements and receive of theatre horns in the 1920s for Edison - has a "perfect" system designed for

A $1 00 genuine Miracle Rei Bell, who developed the notion of a another kind of listening than his. ord Cleaning Cloth with reduced sonic image for the home. and In fact, without a technique of relating EVERY Quotation from Rab sons on a component or sys his speaker, the Voigt Corner Horn of the communicative function of audio FR tem of your choice 1928, exemplified this notion in playback equipment to its human receivers, people, equipment. Other kinds of equipment we cannot really say that "high fidelity" 57 ST. INC. and techniques developed abroad in con- has any meaning. With the technique that RABSONS junction with the "Window on the Or- psychoacoustics affords, high fidelity be-

1 19 West 57th St., New York 19, N.Y. chestra" theory were somewhat different comes more valid both as a science and Diagonally oppor re Coney, Ho', from their counterparts in the United an art. tIRCI I. 73 ON Itl: L DI- R- SERVICE C.4.RD

1 I F, HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE

www.americanradiohistory.com THE ORIGINS OF PURCHASING SAVEo4Ov0 PSYCHOACOUSTICS A HI -FI rFI

Up monthsto pay Continued from page 47 SYSTEM? USE OUR EASY - PAY -PLAN to 24 TRADE -INS OK -TIME PAYMENTS DON'T BUY Up to 2 years to pay! Components and Tape Recorders. Till You Get be trained to blow and bow more con- Return Mail Quote From "Your Friend in the from their very Jim Lansing` Business." sonant high overtones Altec Lansing TRADE -INS -Highest allowance -Send us your dissimilar instruments. Send Us Electrovoice list. Helmholtz pointed JensenHallicrafter Full 2 -Year warranty including parts and la- As for composers, Hartley* Gonset labor. out the necessity of their having a full USL Citizen Band 15 -Day money -back guarantee. the high overtone Your List of Texas Crystals Fully franchised most Hi -Fi lines. We ship understanding of Internat'I Crystals from stock. qualities of each instrument and each University Return your purchase within 6 months for choir. What was an ortho- Acoustic Research 75% allowance against other equipment of instrumental Components Janszen Viking your choice -if you wish. dox interval or chord in one instrumental Wharfedale We guarantee "We Will Not Be Undersold," combination could easily become dis- Concertone even within 30 days of purchase date. For A Bell G.E. Our 18th year of dependable and reliable sonant in another. When this technique Weathers service throughout the world. was utilized deliberately by a genius Harman -Kardon BEST BUY HI -FI LIST FREE. Send 10c for com- Eico Pilot plete Stereo Tape Catalog -all Labels. like Beethoven, the effect was often Package Sherwood* electrifying (although even he was at Tandberg* ESL Frazier ELECTRONIC WORLD HI -FI RECORDING TAPE castigated for his daring). The in- Superscope first 30 15KC vention of new instruments with new Quotation Dual Changer* 7" Spools Splice Free Freq. Resp. Bogen RCA high overtone spectra -an obvious ref- AIREX WON'T Dynakit Fisher 3-11 12+ 60M 31/4" 600' Mylar $1.09 $ .99 erence on Helmholtz's part to Wagner BE UNDERSOLD H. H. Scott Thorens* 12A 7" 1200' Acetate 1 09 .99 and his heroic bass trumpet and perhaps ECI Roberts 12M 7" 1200' Mylar 1.19 1.09 All merchandise 18M 7" 1800' Mylar 1.89 1.79 to Adolphe Sax -also trod the plank of De Wald National is brand new. Sony Challenger 24M 7" 2400' Mylar 2.59 2.39 dissonance, however brilliantly descrip- factory fresh & Browning 24MT 7" 2400' Mylar T en. 2.89 2.79 tive their effects might be. guaranteed. Garrard Any assortment permitted for 12+ price. Add Miracord 15c per reel postage and handling, continental is a shifting frontier For dissonance When in New York General Radio USA. Write for 100+ price and complete listing. governed by the nature of music visit our showroom. Rek -O -Kut We ship throughout entire world. Polytronics as a continuum of sound with a Norelco Finco changing flow -pattern where slight Fairchild AIREX Pickering Sonar changes in physical sound may pro- Audio Tape its psychoacoustics. Thus Magnecord* foundly alter RADIO CENTER the canny tone poet builds his climax Rockford Cabinets el` CORPORATION * Fair Traded "The House Of Low Low Prices" by stating a chord softly in the strings, 85 -HF Cortland St., N. Y. 7, WO 4 -1820 N. Y. then repeats the chord as he gradually 1797 -A First Ave., New York 28, i. adds woodwinds and brass in higher CIRCLE 3 ON READER -SERVICE CARD CIRCLE 51 ON READER -SERVICE CARD octaves with greater volume; his chord becomes imperceptibly more dissonant and dramatic until it eventually reaches its climax in what appears to be pure ACOUSTECII I dissonance. What at first may be disturbing reveals, on repeated auditions, SOLID ST.ITE much beauty and logic, until eventually POWER AMPLIFIED the disturbance vanishes entirely, leaving the listener conditioned to the beauty FUN -TO -BUILD of the dissonance. A similar conditioning process takes place in the historical knight -kit` continuum of music: the dissonant chords of the first movement of the Eroica, the discords of Berlioz's Requiem or WALKIE- Wagner's Gütterdiiminerung are no TALKIE longer ugly but represent the warp and C -100 ALL -TRANSISTOR woof of our musical lives. "...better than the best-- 2 -WAY TRANSCEIVER KIT Helmholtz wrote in On the Sensations real on- the -go communication states renowned audio expert Julian D. Hirsch in Now! Enjoy of Tone: "Whether one combination of between two or more stations up to 1/4 mile! tones is rougher or smoother than February, 1963 Hi -Fi /Stereo Review. Just press the button and you're "on -the- air." No license or exam required, no age another depends solely on the anatomical limit. Operates up to 75 hours on low -cost structure of the ear and has nothing battery. Handsome blue case, only 53/S x to do with psychological motives. But 27/a x 134 "; telescoping 40 "antenna. A breeze to build. Includes all parts, solder, easy wir- what degree of roughness a hearer is a copy of the com- For ing instructions (less battery). Wt., 9 ozs. inclined to endure as a means of musical plete report on the SOLID Sr, TE 83Y804EN.Walkie- Talkie Kit. 5995 and habit; remarkable Acoustech I AMPLIFIERS Each only expression depends on taste CAN hence the boundary between conso- as well as an SOUND BETTER 83Y013. Leatherette Carrying Case....98c 2 Sc nances and dissonances has been fre- authoritative 83 Y 002. 9 -Volt Battery booklet on quently changed . . . and does not rest solely on unalterable natural laws, SALLIED RADIO - I 100 N. Western Ave., Chicago 80, III. but is also the result of aesthetic prin- Write to: I Ship me: Walkie- Talkie Kit(s) 83 Y 804EN. ciples, which have already changed, and Carrying Case(s) 83 Y 013 ACOUSTECH, INC., DEPT. H -4 will still further change, with the pro- 9 V. Battery(ies) 83 Y 002 139 Main Street, Cambridge 42, Massachusetts gressive development of humanity." On $ enclosed check money order this principle is established the bulwark Name Name of psychoacoustics. Were Helmholtz PLEASE PR.T alive today it is quite possible that his Address terms of reference would include not Address City State only our avant -garde composers but . -_Zone State stereo amplifiers of 60 watts per channel. IIMINEWRIMMOINSMOMMIIMIMIN mml 4 ON :C It-St at\ "ICE CARD CIR(I I 2 ON ItI, N.DER -SFR\ "ICE: CI \RD CIRCI.I- RFAO APRIL 1963 117

www.americanradiohistory.com PROFESSIONAL DIRECTORY

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NO DEPOSIT WESTERN HI FI FANS SOU NDTASTIC! NO MINIMUM ARE YOU INTERESTED IN PRICES? RENT That's what our customers are OVER PER REEL RENTAL saying upon receiving 1500 POSTAGE PREPAID our prices! Write special low prices 4 -TRACK $ STEREO TAPES for on WRITE FOR QUOTATION hi -fi components, tape recorders, BUY SAVE OVER 25% etc. INDIVIDUAL QUOTATIONS Hi -Fi Sales Company ONLY! 735 West Main Street Phone 969 -3191 Mesa, Arizona STEREO TAPE CLUB No catalogs. BOX 1611 DES MOINES 6, IOWA 2057 Coney Island Ave., Brooklyn, N. Y. CIRCLE SO ON READER -SERVICE CARD CIRCLE CIRCLE. 91 ON READER -SERVICE CARD 15 ON READER-SERVICE CARD CALIFORNIA MARYLAND QUICK -SEE ALBUM FILE DIXIE Eliminates bottom You bet we'd be..... jacket wear. Rolls HIGH FIDELITY WHOLESALERS If we were to tell you All about AUDION's forward for front - view, flip- through Largest discount High Fidelity component dis- "Out of this World" selection. 9 models tributors in the South. Wholesale prices on Hi Fi Values. fit any cabinet, package or individual components. Latest mod- Write for free catalog. closet or shelf. els in factory sealed cartons. $7.95 up. A l s o available with cabinet shown. Deal- Are prices too high ? -Write: ers, inquire. 25 -HF Oxford Road KERSTING MANUFACTURING COMPANY DIXIE HI -FI Massapequa, New York 504 S. Date Street, Alhambra, California 12402 Connecticut Ave., Silver Spring, Md. CIRCLE 54 ON READER- SERVICE CARD CIRCLE 16 ON READER -SERVICE CARD CIRCLE 31 ON READER- SERVICE CARD RENT HARPSICHORDS CLAVICHORDS STEREO TAPES by AMPLIFIERS - MULTIPLEX - Over 2500 different, 4 -track & 2 -track TAPE RECORDERS, TUNERS SPERRHAKE SPEAKER SYSTEMS, ETC. No deposit on tapes rented write for AIR MAIL QUOTES - COMPARE Postpaid 2 to 5 day delivery (48 States) Illustrated brochure WRITE FOR CATALOG

FREE Robert S. Taylor stereo -parti AUDIO DIVISION BROCHURE 8710 Garfield St. 811 -A CENTINELA , INGLEWOOD, CALIF Bethesda, Maryland L. M. BROWN SALES CORP CIRCLE 93 ON READER -SERVICE CARD Dept. F -242 West 10th Street New York 14, N. Y.

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COMPONENTS, TAPE RECORDERS BRITISH STENTORIAN- SPEAKERS Write for nur low quotes on your choice of com- A complete line of highest quality full range [merits. Save more on "pkges." All factory loudspeakers - from 6" to 15" coaxials, sealed. Send for :Seontbly Specials" bulletin. tweeters, woofers and crossover networks. HI-FI RECORDING TAPE Silk 15 -dar ".'.r bark careen** in Hi Leaders -Fi since 1927 3.11 12 -23 24+ First in value. 1200' 7" Mylar or Acetate .1.09 1.05 .98 See your dealer or write for complete 1800' 7" Mylar 188 1.79 1.75 1800' 7" Acetate 149 1.39 1.29 literature: 2400' 7" Mylar 2 59 2.25 1.99 MAIN STORE: 2400' 7" Tensilire4 Mylar ..2.89 2.84 2.79 509 11TH ST., N.W., WASH., D.C. BARKER SALES COMPANY l'an Be Assorted. Add 150 Postage Per Heel 339 BROAD AVENUE 10! for 24-I- Lofa. is RIDGEFIELD, NEW JERSEY 125 -D East 88 St., New York 28, N.Y. *TRADEMARK ZCARJST#O/V %ti Atat, CIRCLE 69 ON READER- SERVICE CARD CIRCLE 17 ON READER- SERVICE CARD CIRCLE 24 ON READER -SERVICE CARD SAYE 30% ... . STEREO MUSIC ON TAPE LOW WAREHOUSE PRICES (Complete Stock) RECORDS AT COST... 31/4" plastic reels 100 ea. WAREHOUSE DIRECT SHIPMENTS BARGAIN PRICES on blank Through Our Special Membership Plan tape recorders and actes- SPECIAL WAREHOUSE PACKAGE DEALS Regular High Fidelity and Stereo Bories. ALL BRAND NEW COMPONENTS FRESH FROM WAREHOUSE Classical -Popular- Jazz-Show Hits -Folk etc. NORELCO SPEAKERS GET OUR WAREHOUSE 1 A unique kind of record club no "agree to pur- PRICE LIST - Famous AD3800M. twin cone 8" STEREO chase" obligations - no "selected" record list (75- 19,000 cycles), comparable net to choose from no "list price" purchases 9.90, now 4.99 (2 for 9.00), plus - - postage. OTHER Norelco speaker no "division" requirements. models at DISCOUNT PRICES. Simply, Citadel club members can purchase virtu- (Specifications on complete line ally any record or album, by any artist, on any sent on request.) WARENOUSEI. label for cost price. Yearly membership $3.00. SAXITONE TAPE SALES Write for free details ... (Commissioned Electronics, Inc.) 228 -H Greenway Terrace, River Edge, N. J. CITADEL RECORD CLUB 1776 Columbia Rd., Wash., D. C. 545 Fifth Ave. Dept. H. New York 17, N. Y. CIRCLE 92 ON READER- SERVICE CARD CIRCLE 28 ON READER -SERVICE CARD CIRCI.E 25 -SERVICE CARD NEW YORK ON READER ILLINOIS HI -FI COMPONENTS record TAPE RECORDERS index in Specializes SLEEP LEARN KITS MONEY reco cords SAVING IOU FRESH COMPONENTS Designed for collections of 150 up. FACTORY QUOTATIONS LOWEST POSSIBLE 25c record index FAST DELIVERY Send for brochure, sample by OVER 50 cards, sample index guides by composer. We are FRANCHISED FAMOUS MANUFAC- NATIONALLY Recocards (H3) FOR BARGAIN 1523 JERICHO TPKE. TURERS. WRITE 503 Hyde Park Bank Building LIST. RESSNER F Ave., INr. 38th) 1525 East 53rd St., Chicago 15, Illinois 71 5 2nd '.15,Y NEW HYDE PARK 19, N.Y. Visit Our Warehouse New York 16, New York CIRCLE 77 ON READER -SERVICE CARD CIRCLE 14 ON READER- SERVICE CARD CIRCLE 32 ON READER -SERVICE CARD www.americanradiohistory.com PROJECT BORIS everybody tried again. This time it was PROFESSIONAL DIRECTORY Cluytens and the chorus master who the closed - NEW YORK Continued from page 56 raised objections. Despite circuit television system, which allowed ) .;;>-, the chorus to watch Cluytens on a port- life," said Labinsky, "have I heard a able screen, the orchestra and chorus SAVE chorus perform the opening scene with could not seem to mesh. "Couldn't we WHEN YOU BUY all the attacks absolutely clean." A try it in the main hall ?" Cluytens asked, FROM HI- FIDELITY SUPPLY ,:S Paris newspaper man observed that and the chorus was instructed to come Write for quotation an any "these Bulgarians seem to come from back upstairs. They gathered under the :3', new.; ) components. All factory age which they have some- balcony behind the stage and sang the e Write for Specials Bulletin ., another how managed to preserve in a hostile passage first facing the microphones and world. You can hear it in their singing." then facing away from the microphones. .17 HI- FIDELITY SUPPLY Christoff and Glotz accepted congratula- Either way the sound in the control room AVE., NEW YORK 55, N. Y. r 2817-L THIRD tions on the chorus with the genial satis- seemed much too immediate and articu- faction of impresarios who have brought late -not at all an effect as from a dis- CIRCLE 52 ON READER- SERVICE CARI) off a coup; the Bulgarians had been tant corridor. Many experiments were brought all the way from Sofia on their tried until at length the chorus was put WINNERS say -so, and the venture had proved a far behind the conductor on a broad ALL* triumphant success. flight of steps leading into the hall. scene, recorded on Christoff could hear, conductor and cho- Be a winner too! Write For Boris' death for our big discount Thursday the thirteenth, Christoff and rus master were within eyeshot of each prices on your hi -fi were on stage while the cho- other, and the sound on the tape had the needs -and send for our Lloyd -Jones unusual money - saving rus was assembled in a low -ceilinged, essential lointain quality. audio catalog A -15. It's dimly lit basement storeroom, ordinarily And so it went on to the final session tree! *71,592 used for caching beer. champagne, -preliminary plans colliding with prac- SATISFIED CUSTOMERS cognac, and various other potations on tical exigencies, the ideal in conflict with Key Electronics Co. sale at les bats dansants. The plan was the possible. Somehow or other, quick 120 Liberty St., were invariably N. Y. 6, N. Y. for Christoff to sing right on mike in and effective solutions Lloyd- Jones, directly be- attained by this brilliant if not always CIRCLE 55 ON READER -SERVICE CARD dead center; hind him. was to stagger and fall down congruent company. And hour by hour, WRITE FOR FREE QUOTATIONS AND CATA- at the appropriate moment; the chorus session by session, Project Boris passed LOGS ON HI -FI AND STEREO EQUIPMENT. below was to sing at full volume, with from vision to reality. On the last day HI -FI RECORDING TAPE the gain on the basement microphones the number of takes passed the four 900' 1 Mil Acetate 5" Reel $ .75 so as to create the de- hundred mark. Miles of magnetic tape 1200' 1/2 Mil Mylar 5" " 1.15 turned way down 1200' 1.5 Mil Acetate 7" " 1.09 sired effect of a sound emerging from had been recorded. In the weeks ahead 1200" 1.5 Mil Mylar 7" " 1.19 distant corridors. ("The effect is quite much work would need to be done: edit- 1800" 1 Mil Acetate 7" " 1.39 superimpositions (for 1800" 1 Mil Mylar 7" " 1.75 different." explained Glotz, "from having, rebalancing, 2400" 1/2 Mil Mylar 7" " 2.49 ing the chorus sing softly on stage. ") example, the bells in the Coronation Serving all your needs in electronics Challan asked for a run -through, but Scene). Microgroove masters would have LION ELECTRONICS Christoff broke off in mid -passage. "I to be cut, annotations prepared, promo- 215 Fulton St., New York 7, N. Y. can't hear a note of the chorus," he ob- tion developed. But the vital work was REctor 2 -6714, Dept. LE jected, and it was true. The Bulgarians over. CIRCLE 61 ON READER -SERVICE CARD could be heard in the control room Gooch shut down the monitoring con- through the loudspeakers; Cluytens could sole for the last time, stuffed his notes hear them on the headphones he was on the final session into a briefcase, 111°K MAGNUM OFFERS! wearing; but on stage they were inaudi- walked down the creaking steps, and took Virtually all labels -all artists a look at the Napoleonic splen- No obligations -no requirements ble. "I suppose we should have thought parting Every LP at low discount prices of that," said Gooch as he hurried dors of the Salle Wagram. He had less records you want from Choose the downstairs to rig up a loudspeaker on than two hours to pack and catch the free catalog of over 25,000 LP's Boris had Magnum offers a complete one -stop record serv- stage so that Christoff could hear the plane to London. A stereo ice. You get lowest possible prices, complete was installed, been put on tape. freedom of choice, no purchase obligations or chorus. When the speaker requirements of any kind, unlimited selection, 100% quality guarantee . Special offer includes free catalog and free record cleaning cloth. For complete details write . MAGNUM RECORD SERVICE 447 West 50th Street, Dept. FH, New York 19, N.Y. PROFESSIONAL DIRECTORY CIRCLE 63 ON READER -SERVICE CARD TEXAS WASHINGTON 1 SORT$ LEARN T: SLEEP on all your Stereo Headquarters needs. Recorders, Experiment in this fascinating, Tuners, Amplifiers, Turntables, etc. educational new field. Use your recorder or amazing new "Elec- phonograph, recorder. We LET US PROVE that we can supply 200 tronic Educator" endless tape carry a full line of endless tapes for standard corn - your requirements PROMPTLY AT I recorders. plus timers, pillow speakers and RECORDS 20 unusual educational LOWEST COST. FREE CATALOG. Black wrought-iron cabinet is just waiting for your so e collection to grow into! Shows -off" 200 LP albums. I self-help tfcoour es on tape and record rslep- Ten compartments to file records by symphonies, learning and self -hypnosis experimenters. Write operas, ballets, jazz, folk, chamber and show music! for free 300 -item catalog and full details. STEREO COMPONENT Supply Co., Dept. F Sturdy: 25 "x22 "x12". Fully assembled! Please remit Sleep -Learning Research Association $9.95. Small express ch collected on deliv- P. 0. Box 24 -F, Olympia, Washington 150 NINTH AVE., NEW YORK 11, N.Y. ery, AIRMAIL MONEY- ACK GUARANTEE!. 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CO. REQUESTED WHOLESALE RADIO AND CAMERA HAVE YOU < P. O. BOX 3085 PHILA. 50, PENNA. A STERLING QUOTE? ? and we still BUY WHOLESALE- Direct From Distributor The Southwest's largest to write to us show you 11055 to keen your HUNDREDS OF NAME BRAND PRODUCTS source of quality HI -FI COSTS LOW! BRITISH EQUIPMENT HI -FI COMPONENTS hi -fi components WILL Amplifiers, Tuners, Speakers, CAMERAS Motor s, Pick -Ups from the NOT BE UNDERSOLD! United Kingdom. Hi -Fi Mail TAPE DECKS Order Specialists, carefully STEREO COMPONENTS packed, insured and shipped TAPE RECORDERS -STERLING promptly at minimum cost. PHOTO EQUIPMENT ELECTRONICS. INC. Send $1.00 for Catalogue. C. C. Goodwin (Sales) Ltd. (Dept. H), Distributor price lists sent upon request. Special SPACE CITY, U.S.A. 7, The Broadway, Wood Green, bargain offers included. P. 0. Box 1229, Dept. HF., Houston 1, Texas London N. 22, England. CIRCLE 44 ON READER- SERVICE CARD CIRCLE 103 ON READER -SERVICE CARD CIRCLE 94 ON READER- SERVICE CARD www.americanradiohistory.com LAFAYETTE ADVERTISING INDEX Key No. Page No. Key No. Page No. 1.... Acoustic Research, Inc. 35 58 .... Lafayette Radio 120 A complete 2 Acoustic Technology Labs. 117 59 Lansing, James B., recording studio ...... Sound, Inc. 85 in one case 3 .... Airex Radio 117 4 ...Allied Radio 117 21.... Lear Siegler, Inc. 32 5.... Altec Lansing Corp. 81 60.... Lektrostat 26 6 .... American Concertone 22 61 . Lion Electronics 119 7 .... Ampex Corp. 110 62....London Records 91 8 ... Angel Records 70 63 .... Magnum Record Service 119 9.... Argos Products 100 64 .... Marantz 36 10 .... Audio Devices 13 65.... McIntosh Laboratory 67 11.... Audio Dynamics 28 66.... Mercury Records 80 12 Audio Exchange 112 RECORDS 67.... Minnesota Mining & Mfg. 13 .... Audio Fidelity 82 SOUND -ON- Co. 16 14 . Audio Unlimited 118 68. Music -Appreciation Record SOUND 15 ... Audio World 118 Club 1 16 .... Audion 118 69 .... Myer's EMCO 118 PROFESSIONAL QUALITY 17 Barker Sales Co. 118 .... 70.... North American Philips ... 10 4 -TRACK STEREO 18 .... Barzilay Furniture Mfg. Co., Inc. 102 71.... Pickering 2 Bell Sound Division 34 TAPE RECORDER 19... 72.... Pilot Radio Corp. 40 Complete with 2 20.... Benjamin Electronics ....19, 21 Preem Assoc. 109 Dynamic Mikes, 21.... Bogen Communications Division 32 Output Cable, 73 .... Rabsons -57 St., Inc. 116 6995 22 . Bozak, R. T., Co. 20 74.... RCA Parts and Accessories 103 Tape Reel and NO MONEY DOWN 23 . British Industries Corp. 42 75 RCA 1200 ft. of Tape .... Tape 83 46.... Brown, L. M., Sales Corp. 118 76 .... RCA Victor Records .. 76, 77 77....Recocards 24.... Carston Studio 118 118 Here is professional quality at 78....Reeves 39 Lafayette's low price. Compare this 25 .... Citadel Record Club 118 79....Rek -O -Kut 104 dependable portable tape machine 26.... Columbia Records 68 80.... Roberts Electronics 4 with others and you will agree, the 27 Command Records 79 .... 83.. Robins RK -155 is tops. 28.... Commissioned Electronics 118 114 29 .... Concord Electronics 29 84 .... Sarkes- Tarzian, Inc. 18 Playback 4 and 2 -track stereo; 28 .... Saxitone Tape 118 4 -track monaural Record 4 -track 30 .... Deutsche Grammophon stereo and monaural Dual level Gesellschaft 89 38. ...Scope Electronics 88 meters Built -in amplifiers and 31.... Dixie Hi -Fi 118 81.... Scott H. H., Inc. 23 Inside Back Cover 2 full -tone stereo speakers for hi -fi 32 .... Dressner 118 sound Response: 40- 18,000 cps 82 .. . Sherwood Electronics 33 .... Dupont "Mylar" 24, 25 Back Cover at 71 ips 2 Speeds: 33/4 ips & 34.... Dynaco, Inc. 30 85. .Shure Bros. 60 71/2 ips Plays reels up to 7 inches 35....EICO 27 86. . Sleep- Learning Research Association 119 RK -155WX With Carrying 36 ... Electro -Voice 31 87 ..,Sonotone 12, 14 Case Net 169.95 37 ... ELPA Marketing 38 88 .. Sony Corp. 33 38 ... EMI 88 89 .... Southwest Sales 119 LAFAYETTE Radio ELECTRONICS 39 .... EMPIRE 5 Syosset, L.I., N.Y. 90 ... Stereo Component Supply OTHER LOCATIONS 41.... Fairchild Recording Co. 119 Jamaica 33, N.Y. Scarsdale, N.Y. Equipment 84 91....Stereo Tape 118 New York 13, N.Y. Paramus, N.J. 92.... Stereo Warehouse 118 Plainfield, N.J. Newark 2, N.J. 42 ... Finney Co. 116 58, N.Y. Boston 10, Mass. Bronx 40. . Fisher Radio Corp. . 8, 9, 11 93 .... Stereo -Parti 118 Natick, Mass. Inside Front Cover 94 ... Sterling Electronics 119 95....Superex 109 43 Gallo Electronics Corp. . 86 .... 96....Superscope 92, 101 23....Garrard 42 97 .... Switchcraft 114 44 Goodwin, C. C. 119 LAFAYETTE .... Radio ELECTRONICS 45.... Grado Lab., Inc. 93 98....Tandberg 90 Dept. WD -3 P.O. Box 10, Taylor, Robert S. 118 47.... Harman -Kardon 15 Syosset, L.I., N.Y. Telectro Division 95 48 ... Harper's Magazine 96 37 .... Thorens Division 38 RK155WX Rush me FREE 388 49 Heath Co. 107 Giant Sized Pages .... enclosed 1963 Catalog. 50 .... Hi -Fi Sales 118 100 .... United Stereo Tapes 11 S 51 .... Hi- Fidelity Center 117 52 .... Hi- Fidelity Supply 119 101.... Vanguard 95 NAME 53 .... Jensen Mfg. Co. 37 102.... Weathers Division of ADDRESS Teleprompter 17 54 .. Kersting Mfg. Co. 118 99.... Westminster 87 55 Key Electronics 119 CITY .... 103.... Wholesale Radio & Camera 119 56 .... KLH Research & STATE Development Corp. 7 104 ...Winegard 108 LZONE .J 57 ..Koss, Inc. 6 Wyeth Press 94, 113 CIRCLE 58 ON READER- SERVICE CARI) 120 HIGH FIDELITY MAGAZINE . www.americanradiohistory.com iE VOLUME - LOUDNESS

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BALANCE Q LOUDNESS R. CH. LEVEL MONOPHONIC RECORDS 4 5 OTT 7

QRIGHT O 10 CH ONLY POWER INCREASE PULL -ON

SCOTT'... and only SCOTT Dares Offer This New Double Guarantee!

NEW TWO YEAR WARRANTY FAMOUS LABORATORY STANDARD

Now Scott guarantees every major part . . . GUARANTEE including power and output transformers, Of all leading manufacturers of tuners and capacitors, resistors and controls for two full amplifiers, Scott ... and only Scott ... guar- years! When necessary Scott will provide a antees that every unit will meet or exceed replacement for any of these parts without published specifications. Scott dares otter charge within two full years of date of pur- this unique guarantee because their Quality chase. Tubes are covered by Scott's standard Control Department gives every factory as- 90 day guarantee. No charge will be made for sembled component more than 50 stringent labor within 90 days of purchase if per- tests before shipment. formed at an authorized warranty station or Actual proof of Scott's claims can be found at the factory. This new extended warranty by reading equipment reviews in leading high applies automatically to any component pur- fidelity magazines. In a recent review High chased after January 1, 1963. Fidelity reported that Scott " . . . met or Actually, Scott has provided this extended exceeded specifications . . ." (February, guarantee for years ... now we are making 1963). In the October, 1962 issue of Popular it official. This protection is possible because Electronics, the editors found that Scott ".. . of Scott's stringent quality control and in- met or exceeded all the manufacturers de- spection procedures ... and because Scott tailed specifications... "The December, 1962 engineers are ultra- conservative in their de- High Fidelity reported that "... rigorous test signs, always specifying that parts operate measurements either confirmed or exceed- well below maximum ratings. ed the units' published specifications ... "

H.H. SCOTT, INC., Dept. 226 -04 I 1 1 Powdermill Road, .:> SCOTT Maynard, Mass. *, ® Please send me your complete catalog of Scott Double- Guaranteed compo- ® nents. Include latest reviews. a °i ' Srrreo4lie,5139v'I mpltlter e2i995rea NAME r`-- %-.. ADDRESS CITY ZONE STATE If you have any friends who would like to receive Scott literature please include . their names and addresses. -wau Steten '3509 iM Sieren lunes 340 60 Atlas Radio Corp.. 50 Wingold Ave., Toronto A,npltt,e, /f. Steten Tunet $319.95 Export: Morhan Exporting Corp., 458 Broadway, N.Y.C. Canada: w,rn temer tren, Ina 111995 www.americanradiohistory.com Only Sherwood could combine the two most wanted components to bring you the new S-800011" FM Multiplex Stereo Receiver

The advanced design, highly sensitive and selective stereo FM tuner is essentially the same as that employed in the pace- setting S -2100 Sherwo.od tuner (below). Stereo music power circuitry is similar to Sherwood's high -rated S -550011

stereo amplifier (at right). These extra quality features are standard with the

Sherwood S -8000 II.

Instant FM stereo broadcast identification - Sherwood's new Stereo Indicator Light. Novar Output Tubes - have higher voltage ratings, more dependable.

Noise suppressing FM circuitry 3 Mc. Gated -Beam Limiter and Balanced Ratio Detector - 2.4 db. capture effect. Flywheel tuning - for faster, smoother dial tuning. Elimination of "rushing" sound when tuning - FM Interchannel Hush. Dial spread - communications -type, 20 %- longer professional scales.

64 Watts Superb Music Power

S-8000 Specifications Price of the S -800011 with attractive Walnut Leatherette Case $317.00 (Fair- Trade). Without FM Sensitivity: 1.8 µv. for -30 db. noise and distortion (IHFM). case $309.50. Full -year warranty. FM Selectivity: 200 kc. @ -3 db. FM Detector: 1.0 Mc. peak to peak FM Distortion: 1/3% @ 100% mod. Power output: each If you prefer a receiver which also includes AM channel 32 watts reception and has even greater music power music power or 30 watts continuous @ 11/2% IM distortion. (80 watts), Sherwood now offers the new S -7700. Stereo low -noise phono or tape head play -back preamps. Tubes: 21 plus 2 silicon Price with case $377.00. Without case $369.50. rectifiers, 9 diodes. Size: 161/4 x 4 x 14 in. deep. Full -year warranty. For new catalog, write Dept. H -4 Sherwood Electronic Laboratories, Inc. 4300 North California Avenue Chicago 18, Illinois

11=-m- I .e-tu®®,.®; H I G H F I D E L I T Y hI Stereo Receivers Tuners Amplifiers Multiplex Adapters Stereo Indicator Lights High Fidelity Speaker Systems Contemporary Cabinetry

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