Maybe I'm just not a big enough jazz fan, but for me it's probably the only genre I listen to where it's important for it to sound good. This doesn't mean, though, that I refuse to listen to Django or scratchy old Louis Armstrong reissues.
Jazz listening: Is it about the music? Or is it about the sound?
The thread title says it all. I can listen to jazz recordings for hours on end but can scarcely name a dozen tunes. My jazz collection is small but still growing. Most recordings sound great. On the other hand, I have a substantial rock, pop and country collection and like most of us, have a near encyclopedic knowledge of it. Yet sound quality is all over the map to the point that many titles have become nearly unlistenable on my best system. Which leads me back to my question: Is it the sound or the music? Maybe it’s both. You’ve just got to have one or the other!
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The best systems make everything sound better. They do not disseminate from old 78's of Fats Waller https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PSNPpssruFY to 192/24 Nine Inch Nails. It all sounds incredible. |
I'd say that it's both, and I too listen to more jazz than ever these days. To my ears acoustic music almost invariably sounds better than electronic on a high-quality system, and I suspect that the recording engineers (e.g. Rudy Van Gelder) who focussed on jazz were among the very best. I grew up listening to should and funk, and still love to spin Tower of Power discs, etc. But ultimately, the nuances of acoustic music draw me in more deeply. |
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