gershrhaps

Gershwin / Rhapsody In Blue / An American In Paris – Bernstein

More of the Music of George Gershwin

  • This vintage 6-Eye Stereo pressing boasts INCREDIBLE Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) grades from top to bottom
  • Here is sound that is both tubey and real, with much more space and a much bigger and more realistic presentation of the hall than any of the other copies we played
  • 4 1/2 stars: “Paired with his buoyant 1958 performance of An American in Paris with the New York Philharmonic, Bernstein’s rendition of Rhapsody is lively, flashy, bluesy, and intensely romantic in feeling, and these positive characteristics no doubt contributed to keeping this album in print for many years as one of Columbia’s great successes.”

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Letter of the Week – “You’ve created something really special here in Pittsburgh.”

More Letters from Customers and Critics Alike

Hi Tom,

I know you will be delighted to know that you’ve created something really special here in Pittsburgh.

Last night, Bill had us over for a listening session. Brisket tacos, Japanese whiskey, and his newest pile of White Hot Stampers. The official reason for the get-together (not that we needed any excuse) was because a work colleague of ours, David, had made an offhand remark a couple weeks ago that “vinyl doesn’t sound good.” Bill took that as a direct challenge!

The evening started with some Tidal streaming to Bill’s Chord DAC. David was selecting tracks off his iphone, and he put on The Chain. That was all Bill needed – he grabbed his White Hot Stamper of Rumours, and once the song ended, we switched over to vinyl.

Before the music even started, we could all hear the crackle and pop in the run-in groove. David commented, “see, that’s what I don’t like about vinyl.” We sat and listened to the rest of the song. The crackle of course vanished from our consciousness once the music started, or rather, it kind of hung out in a different space from where the music was. At the end, as if evaluating a fine whiskey, David offered that the bass was more clearly defined on the vinyl, less dominant and bloated, and that there were details he was hearing in the vinyl that he just hadn’t noticed in the digital. He characterized the vinyl/digital difference as, “I guess it depends on what you’re going for.”

I had brought my EAR with me. Bill swapped a few cables, and with the EAR in place, we listened to The Chain again, now utterly enraptured. I turned to David at the end, and all he said this time was, “that was fantastic.”

From there, there was no stopping us. We listened to Wish You Were Here. Tchaikovsky’s violin concerto. Rhapsody in Blue. Abraxas. All just mesmerising, room-filling sound. Once a record went on the table, it didn’t come off until the side was over.

David had brought along a stack of his dad’s records. In the pile was SRV’s Couldn’t Stand The Weather. Turns out Bill had just come across a super-clean copy in the used racks at one of our local shops. We played Tin Pan Alley back to back, first with David’s copy then Bill’s. David found out for himself that no two copies of a record sound the same. And Bill was reminded that he can’t just walk into a store, buy a Near Mint record, and expect to get something that sounds great.

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Gershwin / Concerto In F & Rhapsody In Blue / Previn / Kostelanetz

More George Gershwin

Reviews and Commentaries for the Music of George Gershwin

  • This Columbia Six Eye has Shootout Winning Triple Plus (A+++) sound for the Rhapsody in Blue on side two – reasonably quiet vinyl too, especially for an early stereo LP
  • As would be expected, both sides are exceptionally rich and Tubey Magical, but the clarity, deep bass and powerful, dynamic sound of side two surprised the hell out of us – we’ve never heard the work reproduced with this kind of authority or fidelity
  • The first two movements of the Concerto in F found on side one earned a solid grade of Double Plus (A++) for their full brass and especially clear, solid, present piano, one with practically no trace of vintage analog tube smear
  • Performed with consummate skill and attention to detail – the results are magnificent!

Finally, the sound we’ve been searching for – rich, tubey and real, with nicely textured strings. The piano is solid, rich, high-rez and percussive — there is hardly any Old School smear or hardness to be heard, always important to the proper reproduction of any piano recording, whether the music is jazz, classical or rock. (We talk about smeary, hard pianos on many of our listings for those of you who take the time to read them.) (more…)

Rhapsody in Blue – We Finally Broke Through in 2015

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of George Gershwin Available Now

This original Six Eye LP has the smooth brass and full-bodied strings that allow this wonderful music to astound. This is our favorite performance of Rhapsody in Blue.

Smooth and solid, not brash or blary, what really impressed about the sound here was how full it was, yet it was never thick or murky. Instead it was transparent in the lower mids and below, and that sound was just glorious after listening to too many thin and brash pressings. The piano is solid, rich, high-rez and very percussive — there is no tubey Old School smear to be heard, and that too was a surprise.

I’ve always loved these performances, but the shrill Columbia sound has been hard to get past. So many copies suffer from upper-midrangy, glary, hard sound and blary brass. I’ve come to accept that this is nothing more than the “Columbia Sound,” and as a consequence we rarely put much effort into surveying their recordings, even their more famous ones.

I won’t say all that’s changed; it really hasn’t. The vast majority of Columbia classical pressings are still going to sound as awful as they have in the past.

What has changed is that finally, with this copy (and the stereo/room we have in 2015) we’ve found the sound that we’d been looking for on the legendary MS 6091. (more…)