What are the characteristics quality recordings?

WOW - Some excellent responses to this post! Thank you.

I would enjoy hearing from other people regarding their views on this topic - particularly on what cds or albums exemplify a good recording in areas of music such as rock, jazz, etc.

Thanks again

John

I've always wondered, Bufus, why I have to turn Pearl Jam CD's WAY DOWN when I play them. They are so much louder than my other CD's. Is that due to "normalization, compression, etc..."?

Or just maybe the Ed Vedder honeymoon is over for me... sigh.

Cheers.

Thanks Rushton. Perhaps I will check your recommendations out. I obviously have difficulty describing what I hear so I appreciate the clarification.

Rushton has hit it spot on! My listening biases are oriented as his are toward classical and jazz vinyl. Music that is well recorded, that preserves the space and natural harmonic overtones of the performance, dynamic swings, and the leading edge transients that give you what J. Gordon Holt calls the "goosebump factor" make you forget about listening to your gear and allow the music to wash over you.

That being said, I think his list is a very good example of recordings that do just that. I would add that the example of Holst's "Savitri" on the Argo lable is a great test of your system's ability to resolve placement of the voices on the stage. The male voice moves down and across the stage as the recording progresses. Janet Baker's voice in this recording is so liquid and involving, if your system is up to the task, you will be completely immersed.

I would also add Stravinsky's "Firebird" on the Sheffield Lab lable as well (Lab 24) a direct-to-disk recording with Erich Liensdorf and the Los Angeles Symphony. Recorded in one take in a large recording studio, this recording as enormous dynamic swings, with some of the best recorded drum whacks I have ever heard. Great performance as well, maybe not quite as emotionally involving as the Dorati/Mercury, but well worth seeking out.

Respighi "Church Windows" Reference Recordings 45 rpm

Miles Davis "Kind Of Blue" Classic Records 45 rpm reissue.
I am very partial to the "Flamenco Sketches" track.

The example of Starker/Bach "Cello Suites" is wonderful in that while the instrument itself is so closely miked, and the cello seems huge, it is intimate at the same time. The acoustic space in which it is recorded is well delineated, and you can sense and feel the subtle shifts of nueance in the various parts of each piece. You can also detect Starker shifting his position in the chair as he plays.

Recordings that are so faithful to the performance, that make me forget I am listening to a "hi-fi", that paint a visual image in my head of the players spaced across the stage in front of me, that gets it done for me.

There is a wealth of fine reissues ou there right now, that while a little pricey (for the LP), represent the golden age of jazz and classical recordings at their best.

Hi,

Regarding cd´s;

I wrote this on another thread:

Considering a CD takes 2secs to press ( including cooling ), and the ´master-copy´ looses detail on every press ( can take 2-10K of cycles ), your lucky if you get one of the first ones off the press, as the rest will decrease in quality. Buy two of the same CD, play them, chances are good that they will differ in quality.

Serious press-companies/Labels runs with a new master in Very short cycles. Getting better quality sounding CD´s.

The first ones off the press sounds just astonishing!

Also, I just get scared when knowing that a lot of studios plays with a simple transistor-/household-/car-/megaboom-stereo
for reference/mixdown-reference. Because they know that there´s were the music will be played the most. They make it sound good on those thus they know that will sell them more records. Scary and Ugly, but true.

Mike