Ottawa, Ontario

Well, we had a meeting at my place last night and it was a great pleasure to spend a few hours with Matthew and Paul. We listened to a wide range of material: Eva Cassidy, Alison Krauss, John Zorn, Doug MacLeod, Walter Leigh - everything from Blue Grass to Classical. A couple of bottles of fine wine, some excellent companionship and great music - really, what more could a man want? (well, okay, there is that). Greatly looking forward to our next get together.

Hello Bill,

Thanks for the note. If you are in the company of Terry and Paul you are walking on rarified air. Great people, who just happen to know a lot about music as well. We will be planning another listening session soon. Send me an e-mail through the Audiogon system and I will include you on the discussion.

all the best

matthew

Last Friday we met at my place again, to taste the delights of the Audion Silver Night PX25 amp. It acquitted itself very well. I over-programmed the music, though. My bright idea was an evening of chanber music, chosen for the number of instruments in the ensemble - starting with a Bach solo violin sonata and going all the way up to Spohr's Nonette. While there was some good music along the way (including a transcription of de Falla's "Nights in the Gardens of Spain" for guitar trio, and the Beethoven Grosse Fugue) we only made it as far as a Brahms Sextet before the idea wore out its welcome.

As a reward, we listened to some CD copies of working tapes made by a recording engineer from Toronto. He specializes in single-pass recording, done with strict stereo miking. The pieces were a small jazz combo - a female vocalist, a piano and a bass. The recordings were straight from the session, and included a lot of "beginnings" that ended in mistakes. It was like looking at a photographer's contact sheets - fascinating. The recording quality was interesting, in that it gave a very realistic picture of the venue acoustic, sometimes at the expense of the individual instruments - especially the piano which sounded a bit distant compared to the voice.

It seemed like time for another update. Well we've been trucking along for a little while and now we have 5 members. I hosted our most recent get together on September 23 2005. What a blast! My sound room, if it can be called that is really only able to hold to people so I set up the stereo in my living/dining room instead. The acoustics weren't great (but then again my regular room is far from perfect) but we were able to sit all five comfortably and I hope the music was interesting enough to make up for the sound bouncing around. As I look back now, I think that starting up this listening club was one of the best things I have taken part in over the last several years. We meet once a month for tunes, conversation and the odd beverage and it's a hoot. I look forward to each meeting. I can't see us being able to expand any further because of space issues but I can see why some of our group are in other listening clubs, it's great fun.

I chose to program music from or inspired by Chicago for my theme. We listened to: Misha Mengelberg; the Chicago Underground Quartet; Ethnic Heritage Ensemble, Chicago Symphony Orchestra; Steve Goodman; John Prine; Junior Wells; Mike Bloomfield; Jimmy Reed; Clifford Jordan; Albert Ammons; the Pharaohs and others.

And the set up was: Totem Model 1's, Jolida 502B, Classe CD.5 and VPI HW19Jr.5

Good Day,

I would love to join. I'm a graduate student here in Ottawa. I have a headphone only system, something that may not appeal to you members right away, but it may also amaze you at what can be attained having transducers strapped to one's ears.

As for frontends, I can offer a highly modified Shanling TD-100, a Michell Gyrodec with Orbe platter, SME V, Koetsu Black, soon a Grado Statement, and an Ear 834p phono. If ever I was asked to bring this along, I would require a lift as I don't own a car.

Sooo...if membership is still open, please consider me.

Cheers