RCA Vintage

Including RCA records recorded during the Living Stereo era and pressed into the 70s.

Saint-Saëns, Chausson – Introduction and Rondo Capriccio / Poème / Oistrakh

More of the music of Camille Saint-Saëns (1835-1921)

More Classical and Orchestral Recordings

  • You’ll find outstanding Shootout Winning sound throughout this original RCA Victrola Stereo pressing
  • It’s also fairly quiet at Mint Minus Minus, a grade that most of our classical records, even the mintiest ones, cannot quite manage
  • One of the best violin recordings we offer – the rich, textured sheen of the strings is clearly evident throughout these pieces
  • The sound is big and rich and ALIVE with pyrotechnic fireworks on side one – if you want to demonstrate to a novice listener why modern recordings are unsatisfactory, all you have to do is play this record for them
  • The highlight for us on a collection like this is always going to be The Introduction and Rondo Capriccioso, “one of Saint-Saëns’ few genuine showpieces.”

The violin here is superb — rich, smooth, clear, resolving. What sets the truly killer pressings apart is the depth, width and three-dimensional quality of the sound. The Tubey Magical richness is to die for.

Big space, a solid bottom, and plenty of dynamic energy are strongly in evidence throughout. Zero smear, high-rez transparency, tremendous dynamics, a violin that is present and solid — it takes the sound of this recording beyond what we thought was possible.

The full range of colors of the orchestra are here presented (on side one; side two is simply violin and piano) with remarkable clarity, dynamic contrast, spaciousness, sweetness, and timbral accuracy. If you want to demonstrate to a novice listener why modern recordings are unsatisfactory, all you have to do is play this record for them. No CD ever sounded like this.

The richness of the strings is on display for fans of the classical Golden Age.

It’s practically impossible to hear that kind of string sound on any recording made in the last thirty years. It may be a lost art but as long as we have these wonderful vintage pressings to play it’s an art that is not lost on us.

I don’t think the RCA engineers could have cut this record much better — it has all the stereo magic one could ask for, as well as the clarity and presence that are missing from so many other vintage Golden Age records.

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Beethoven / Symphony No. 6 – Reviewed in 2005

More of the music of Ludwig van Beethoven (1770-1827)

Living Stereo Titles Available Now

Reviews and Commentaries for the Music of Beethoven

This is a lovely sounding RCA Shaded Dog.record, with a smooth, natural top end, the opposite of a hi-fi spectacular. Some may find it dull, but it’s actually correct.

Monteux has a wonderful feel for this symphony. His Beethoven in general is actually quite good. This music belongs in any serious collection. String tone is everything in the Pastoral, and Living Stereo gives you the string tone rarely found elsewhere.

Our favorite Beethoven 6th is of course the Ansermet from 1960. Decca does a pretty good job recording strings too in our opinion.

This is an older classical/orchestral review

Most of the older reviews you see are for records that did not go through the shootout process, the revolutionary approach to finding better sounding pressings we started developing in the early 2000s and have since turned into a veritable science.

We found the records you see in these older listings by cleaning and playing a pressing or two of the album, which we then described and priced based on how good the sound and surfaces were. (For out Hot Stamper listings, the sonic grades and vinyl playgrades are listed separately.)

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Sonny Rollins – Our Man In Jazz

More Sonny Rollins

More Living Stereo Recordings

  • An original Black Label Living Stereo copy, with outstanding Double Plus (A++) sound or BETTER from the first note
  • A superb 1963 Living Stereo recording with tons of Tubey Magic, one of Sonny’s best
  • We’ve played quite a number of Our Man in “X” RCA titles, and I don’t think we have ever heard a bad one
  • It’s the exceptionally rare copy that sounds as good as this one does – let’s find it a good home!
  • Recorded live in 1962 at the Village Gate in Greenwich Village, NY and featuring Bob Cranshaw, Don Cherry, and Billy Higgins

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Chopin, Rachmaninoff et al. / Richter

More of the Music of Sergei Rachmaninoff

  • This original White Dog Stereo pressing (just missed the cutoff for “Living Stereo” but the sound is awesome anyway) boasts STUNNING Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound or very close to it on both sides
  • A WONDERFUL collection of solo piano works performed by one of our favorite pianists, Sviatoslav Richter
  • The piano is present and clear, with no practically no smear whatsoever – both sides are dynamic and open with plenty of weight
  • Recorded live in concert on December 26, 1960, at Carnegie Hall in New York, and December 28, 1960, at Mosque Hall in Newark

This vintage RCA pressing has the kind of Tubey Magical Midrange that modern records can barely BEGIN to reproduce. Folks, that sound is gone and it sure isn’t showing signs of coming back. If you love hearing INTO a recording, actually being able to “see” the performers, and feeling as if you are sitting in the studio with the band, this is the record for you. It’s what vintage all analog recordings are known for — this sound.

If you exclusively play modern repressings of vintage recordings, I can say without fear of contradiction that you have never heard this kind of sound on vinyl. Old records have it — not often, and certainly not always — but maybe one out of a hundred new records do, and those are some pretty long odds.

The Piano

On the transparent and tonally correct copies it is clear and full-bodied. The piano in a solo recording such as this often makes for a good test.

How easily can you see it and how much like a real piano does it sound? 

If you have full-range speakers some of the qualities you may recognize in the sound of the piano are WEIGHT and WARMTH. The piano is not hard, brittle or tinkly. Instead, the best copies show you a wonderfully full-bodied, warm, rich, smooth piano, one which sounds remarkably like the ones we’ve all heard countless times in piano bars and restaurants.

In other words like a real piano, not a recorded one. Bad mastering can ruin the sound, and often does, along with worn-out stampers and bad vinyl and five-gram needles that scrape off the high frequencies. But some copies survive all such hazards. They manage to reproduce the full spectrum of the piano’s wide range on vintage vinyl, showing us the kind of sound we simply cannot find any other way.

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Paul Desmond & Gerry Mulligan – Two Of A Mind

More Paul Desmond

More Living Stereo Recordings

  • Superb Double Plus (A++) sound from the first note to the last on this RCA pressing in glorious Living Stereo
  • Both sides here are tonally rich, and with killer Living Stereo sound, you hear both of these brilliant hornmen presented as solid and real in the soundfield as any you may have heard
  • If you’re looking to demonstrate just how good 1962 All Tube Analog sound can be, this vintage pressing may be just the record for you
  • 4 1/2 stars: “Altoist Paul Desmond and baritonist Gerry Mulligan always made for a perfect team during their infrequent collaborations. Both of the saxophonists had immediately distinctive light tones, strong wits, and the ability to improvise melodically. Highly recommended.”
  • If you’re a fan of the smooth jazz stylings of Paul Desmond, this is a Must Own Classic from 1962 that belongs in your collection.
  • The complete list of titles from 1962 that we’ve reviewed to date can be found here.

THIS is the sound of Tubey Magic. No recordings will ever be made like this again, and no CD will ever capture what is in the grooves of this record. There actually IS a CD of this album, and YouTube videos of it too, but those of us with good turntables could care less.

And if you have an especially good turntable and the system that goes with it, we think you will find a world of difference in the sound of our Hot Stamper early pressing and any of the Heavy Vinyl records being produced of this very title.

They may be good — excellent even — but you won’t know what you are missing until you hear our record (or yours if you have an especially good one).

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Shostakovich – Symphony No. 1 / The Age Of Gold Ballet Suite / Martinon

More of the Music of Dmitri Shostakovich

  • This superb pressing boasts better than Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound on side one for the symphony
  • Side one of this copy was so much better than every other side we auditioned we were tempted to call it 3.5 (A+++ – A++++), but we don’t do that anymore, so let’s just say you won’t believe how good side one of this pressing sounds
  • The Symphony No. 1 concludes over the first inch of side two and the sound here is excellent as well, with many of the same sonic attributes, as rightly befits a true Golden Age Classic from 1959
  • The Age of Gold Ballet Suite found on side two of this record is one of the best recordings we know of the work, if not the best
  • Recorded in Kingsway Hall with the London Symphony, this Decca licensed title has orchestral sound to rival the anything you’ve heard
  • “This is an example of what art as recorded sound should strive to be. A triumph for all participants.”

Our Story

The first copy of the album I got my hands on and needle-dropped blew me away with its big, open, clear, solid orchestral sound. Close to three years later, when we had enough copies to do this shootout, sure enough it won. That rarely happens — in a big pile of records there’s almost always something better than whatever we’ve heard — but it happened this time.

Imagine if I had played one of the bad sounding or noisy ones to start with. It’s unlikely I would have been motivated to pursue the title and consequently the shootout we just did would have never happened. Lucky for us all that that first copy was so good.

These sides are “real” sounding, with a clean bottom and clean lower mids. Little to no smear. The sound is full-bodied and rich, yet clear and clean, and spread out on a huge stage – it’s yet another example of proper orchestral reproduction.

This is the kind of record that will make you want to take all your heavy vinyl classical pressings and put them in storage.  (more…)

Bach / Mozart / Two Violin Concertos – Laredo

More Violin Recordings

Hot Stamper Living Stereo Classical and Orchestral Titles Available Now

This original plum label Victrola pressing from 1965 has SUPERB sound on both sides. The Bach piece is a rich tapestry of strings spread across the stage and clearly separated left to right. There’s not much depth but that seems of little consequence; all the instruments are heard in their proper space and location. The tonality is right on the money throughout.

The Mozart concerto starts out sounding a bit opaque, but about an inch or so into the side it opens up wonderfully, with sweet, spacious, natural sound from there on out. Jaime Laredo plays both works superbly, and the Living Stereo quality sound brings his playing to life in a way that few recordings can.

Although never released as a real LSC, this Victrola pressing is every bit the equal of most of the better Living Stereo pressings. (more…)

The Doowackadoodlers – Doo Wacka Doo

More Titles on Living Stereo

  • This copy was just plain bigger, richer, and more Tubey Magical than every other copy we played; the energy level is off the charts and the bottom end is right on the money
  • “These albums aren’t quite as wild as Esquivel’s, but they’re worth looking for if you like music with a big zing, zang, zoom in it.” – spaceagepop.com

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Esquivel – Other Worlds, Other Sounds

More Exotica

More Easy Listening

  • This early Living Stereo pressing has wonderful Double Plus (A+++) or BETTER sound from first note to last- fairly quiet vinyl too
  • Both sides are spacious and open, yet rich and and oh-so-Tubey Magical, with brass that has little to none of the “blarey” quality that plagues so many copies
  • Folks, I can tell you right now, most original Living Stereo Popular (LSP) pressings, of this or any other LSP title, do not begin to recreate the Studio Wizardry found on this 1958 album
  • “Its real significance is as the moment where Esquivel takes control of his production and develops his signature sound… This is the promise of the future.” – All Music, 4 Stars

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Overtures and Intermezzos – Solti

More Living Stereo Pressings

  • Off the charts “Triple Triple” (A+++) sound for this classic Decca engineered “Living Stereo” Victrola from 1965 – both sides of this pressing of VICS 1119 earned our top grade of A+++
  • Listen to how rich the cellos sound — this is Tubey Magical Analog and its most luscious and enchanting.
  • You could easily play one hundred classical albums and not hear this kind of sound!
  • If you have the real Living Stereo pressing (with the cool die-cut cover), let us send you this pressing to compare — who knows, you might like it even better than your Shaded Dog
  • Classic Records did this title back in the 90s, and it was one of the worst of their sorry releases

This 1959 Decca recording is overflowing with the kind of rich, spacious, Tubey Magical sound that can only be found on vintage vinyl.

On this copy you will find As Good As It Gets sound. It’s so BIG and RICH you will have a hard time believing that it’s a budget reissue from 1965, but that’s precisely what it is.

Ah but it’s a reissue from back in the day when they knew how to cut a record properly, regardless of its retail price.

The rich, textured, rosin-on-the-bow lower strings on this record are to die for. Find me a modern record that sounds like this and I will eat it.

And by “modern record” we hasten to include both modern recordings and modern remasterings of older recordings. NO ONE alive today can make a record that sound even remotely as good as this. To call it a lost art is to understand something that few vinyl-loving audiophiles appear to have grasped since the advent of the Modern Reissue, which is simply this: they can’t begin to compete.

After twenty years of trying and literally hundreds of failed examples the engineers of today have yet to make a record that sounds as powerful and life-like as this London from almost fifty years ago.

Fortunately for the both of us we are not trying to make a record that sounds the way this one does. We’re just trying to find one, and folks, we found the hell out of this one. (more…)