1963-best

Rachmaninoff – Piano Concerto No. 3 / Ashkenazy / Fistoulari (Decca)

More of the Music of Sergei Rachmaninoff

  • Here is a vintage UK Boxed Decca stereo pressing of Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 3 with solid Double Plus (A++) sound or close to it from start to finish
  • It’s also impossibly quiet at Mint Minus to Mint Minus Minus, a grade that practically none of our vintage classical titles – even the most well-cared-for ones – ever play at
  • Spacious, rich and smooth (particularly on side one) – only vintage analog seems capable of reproducing all three of these qualities without sacrificing resolution, staging, imaging or presence
  • If you’re looking to demonstrate just how good 1963 Tubey Analog sound can be, this superb copy may be just the record for you
  • If you love this well-known piano concerto as much as we do, this is surely a classic from 1963 that belongs in your collection.
  • To read the 60-odd reviews and commentaries we’ve written for piano concertos, please click here

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Szeryng Plays the Music of Fritz Kreisler

More Recordings Featuring the Violin

  • Boasting solid Double Plus (A++) sound or BETTER throughout, this early pressing (one of only a handful of copies to ever hit the site) will be very hard to beat
  • The violin is so sweet and present, so rich, natural and real, you will forget you’re listening to a record at all
  • This recording is not your typical dry, bright, nasaly, upper-midrangy Merc – the sound is rich and smooth like a good London, with a big stage and lovely transparency
  • We are happy to report that the vinyl is reasonably quiet for a vintage Plum Label Mercury stereo pressing too, with no marks that play (something that could not be said of our Shootout Winner, alas)

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Gerry Mulligan – Gerry Mulligan ’63

 

  • You’ll find INCREDIBLE Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound throughout this original Verve All Tube Chain Stereo pressing
  • This copy is hard to fault – big, open, clear, with space and three-dimensionality that modern pressings fail miserably to reproduce
  • “With originals by Bob Brookmeyer, Gary McFarland and the baritonist/leader (in addition to the standards ‘Little Rock Getaway’ and ‘My Kind of Love’), this is a high-quality if rather brief program. Trumpeter Clark Terry and guitarist Jim Hall co-star with Mulligan in the solo department. It is a pity that this orchestra could not prosper; all five of its recordings are worth getting.”

For us audiophiles both the sound and the music here are wonderful. If you’re looking to demonstrate just how good 1963 All Tube Analog sound can be, this killer copy will do the trick.

This pressing is super spacious, sweet and positively dripping with ambience. Talk about Tubey Magic, the liquidity of the sound here is positively uncanny. This is vintage analog at its best, so full-bodied and relaxed you’ll wonder how it ever came to be that anyone seriously contemplated trying to improve it.

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 is of course a CD of this album, but those of us who possess a working turntable and a good collection of vintage vinyl could care less. (more…)

Shelly Manne – My Son the Jazz Drummer!

More Shelly Manne

More Contemporary Label Jazz Recordings

  • My Son the Jazz Drummer! appears on the site for only the second time ever, here with solid Double Plus (A++) sound or BETTER throughout this original Contemporary pressing – exceptionally quiet vinyl too
  • Tubier, more transparent, and more dynamic than most other copies we played, with plenty of that “jumpin’ out of the speakers” quality that only The Real Thing (an old record) ever has
  • The team of Lester Koenig and Howard Holzer insure that everything you want in an audiophile Contemporary jazz recording is here
  • “…drummer Shelly Manne and a sextet (with flugelhornist Shorty Rogers, Teddy Edwards on tenor, Victor Feldman doubling on piano and vibes, guitarist Al Viola and bassist Monty Budwig) perform jazz versions of ten Jewish and Israeli-based melodies. This long out-of-print historical curiosity is more successful than one might expect.”

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Thelonious Monk – Monk’s Dream

More of the Music of Thelonious Monk

  • Monk’s Dream returns to the site for only the second time in over two years, here with INCREDIBLE Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) grades or close to them throughout this black print Stereo 360 pressing
  • These are just a few of the things we had to say about this killer copy in our notes: “big and weighty”…”great size and detail and very full”…”breathy sax jumping out of the speakers”…”very big and full piano”
  • Both of these sides are rich, spacious, big and Tubey Magical, with less smear on the piano, a problem that holds many copies back
  • The sound found on these early Columbia 360 Label Stereo pressings is absolutely the right one for Monk’s music
  • This is a lot of money for a somewhat noisy copy – “Body and Soul” is pretty much ruined here, alas – but the sound is so awesome and quiet pressings of the album so hard to come by that we hope someone will take a chance on it and get the thrill we did from hearing it sound so good
  • 5 stars: “Although he would perform and record supported by various other musicians, the tight – almost telepathic – dimensions that these four shared has rarely been equalled in any genre… Monk’s Dream is recommended, with something for every degree of Monk enthusiast.”

A truly outstanding Monk album from 1963. Thanks to Columbia’s state of the art engineering, the recording really comes to life, or at least it does on a copy that sounds as good as this one does!

Charlie Rouse is particularly wonderful on sax on this album, and this copy features him on many of its tracks. The sax sound is full-bodied and natural with lots of breath and just the right amount of bite. Monk’s piano comes through with powerful dynamics and real weight to the keys.

So many copies just sound like an old jazz record, but this one lets you feel like you are right there in the studio, watching as the music is spontaneously created. What more could you ask for?

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Falla / Turina – Nights In The Gardens Of Spain / Danzas Fantásticas

More of the music of Manuel De Falla (1876-1946)

  • With excellent Double Plus (A++) grades on both sides, this original UK import pressing of these wonderful classical works will be hard to beat
  • These sides are doing pretty much everything right – they’re rich, clear, undistorted, open, spacious, and has depth and transparency to rival the best recordings you may have heard
  • Soriano’s piano is especially clear, solid, and present throughout Danzas Fantásticas, with practically no trace of vintage analog tube smear
  • When you hear how good this record sounds, you may have a hard time believing that it’s a budget reissue from the 70s, but that’s precisely what it is.
  • There are about 150 orchestral recordings we think offer the best performances with the highest quality sound. This record is certainly deserving of a place on that list.

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Schumann / Lalo – Cello Concertos / Starker

More Mercury Label Classical Recordings

  • An original Mercury pressing of Starker’s commanding performance of Schumann and Lalo’s cello concertos (one of only a handful of copies to ever hit the site) with superb Double Plus (A++) sound or close to it throughout
  • The cello is present and immediate on this side one, with sound that is wonderfully full and harmonically natural, and side two is not far behind in all those areas
  • You’d be hard-pressed to find a copy of SR-90347 that’s this well balanced, yet big and lively, with such wonderful clarity in the mids and highs (particularly on side one)
  • Problems in the vinyl are sometimes the nature of the beast with these early pressings, but once you hear just how good sounding this copy is, you might be inclined to stop counting ticks and pops and just be swept away by the music
  • We had a devil of a time finding audiophile quality surfaces on this title — it’s hard to imagine there will be many quieter copies coming to the site, and the ones that do will be unlikely to sound as good as this one

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Frank Sinatra – Sinatra’s Sinatra

More Frank Sinatra

More Nelson Riddle

  • Sinatra’s wonderful 1963 release finally returns with STUNNING Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound throughout
  • Forget the reissues – the stereo original we are offering here is the only way to go if rich, tubey, dynamic, musical sound is what you are after
  • Frank rerecorded some of his biggest hits in stereo for this album – the record is just one Sinatra Classic after another
  • “Some of his biggest hits and most famous songs are included in his picks, including “I’ve Got You Under My Skin” and “Young at Heart.””
  • Amazon 5 Stars: “Riddle’s arrangements are, as always, top-notch, and Sinatra is in fine, engaging form.”

Great bass and weight coupled with lots of space and correct tonality in the midrange add up to only one thing: Triple Plus or close to it sound on both sides!

Copies with rich lower mids and nice extension up top (to keep the strings from becoming shrill) did the best in our shootout, assuming they weren’t veiled or smeary of course. So many things can go wrong on a record! We know, we heard them all.

We know a fair bit about the man’s recordings at this point. As of today we’ve done commentaries for more than 21 different Sinatra shootouts, and that’s not even counting the ten or twenty other titles that either bombed or were sold off years ago. (more…)

Coltrane / Hartman – John Coltrane and Johnny Hartman

More John Coltrane

  • An incredible copy of this classic Jazz Vocal album, with Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound or close to it from start to finish
  • Here are just a few of the things we had to say about this killer copy in our notes: “very big and rich and weighty”…”piano and vox jump out [of the speakers]”…”so spacious and sweet”…”present and lively”
  • We had been working on this title for at least five years and had been coming up short time and again, with bad sound and bad vinyl on most of what we’d been buying
  • Five years ago we cracked the code for the right stampers to look for, and we had hoped to do shootouts for this wonderful album on a more regular basis, but that turned out to be a pipe dream
  • They are ridiculously hard to come by, so ridiculously hard that we would be surprised if it doesn’t take another five years to get this shootout going again
  • The sound is huge and spacious with richness and Tubey Magic like nothing you’ve heard
  • I defy anyone to name a Male Vocal record produced in the last forty years that can hold a candle to this one, sonically or musically
  • A wonderful collaboration between a horn player and a singer, perhaps the greatest of all time
  • 5 stars: “John Coltrane’s matchup with singer Johnny Hartman works extremely well. Hartman was in prime form on the six ballads, and his versions of ‘Lush Life’ and ‘My One and Only Love’ have never been topped. Classic, essential for all jazz collections”
  • We’ve recently compiled a list of records we think every audiophile should get to know better, along the lines of “the 1001 records you need to hear before you die,” with an accent on the joy these amazing audiophile-quality recordings can bring to your life. John Coltrane and Johnny Hartman is a good example of a record many audiophiles may not know well but would be well advised to get to know better.

This could very well be the greatest collaboration between a horn player and a singer in the history of music.

I honestly cannot think of another to rank with it. Ella and Louis has the same feel — two giants who work together so sympathetically it’s close to magic, producing definitive performances of enduring standards that have not been equaled in the fifty plus years since they were recorded. And, on the better copies, or should we say the better sides of the better copies, RVG’s sound is stunning. (His mastering, not so much.)

Hats off to Rudy Van Gelder! Here’s an album that justifies his reputation. Not all of them do, you know — or should know — but try telling that to the average jazz-loving audiophile. (more…)

Thelonious Monk / Big Band and Quartet

More Thelonious Monk

More Large Group Jazz Recordings of Interest

  • This amazingly well-recorded big band concert from 1963 returns to the site for only the second time in years, here with solid Double Plus (A++) grades throughout this black print Stereo 360 pressing
  • Both of these sides are doing just about everything right, with sound that is remarkably rich, Tubey Magical, spacious and lively
  • Monk alternates between a 10 piece Big Band and his standard quartet, with magical results
  • 5 stars: “This is one of pianist-composer Thelonious Monk’s greatest recordings and represents a high point in his career.”

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