Sasha Matson

Recording of June 2023: Barbra Streisand Live at the Bon Soir
Recording of the Month
Sasha Matson  |  May 17, 2023  |  1 comments
Barbra Streisand: Live at the Bon Soir
Streisand, vocals; Tiger Haynes, guitar; Peter Daniels, piano; Averill Pollard, bass; John Cresci, drums
Legacy/Columbia 19658713762 (reviewed as 24/96 WAV, also available on CD, Gold CD, SACD, 2LP). 2022/23. Barbra Streisand, Jay Landers, Martin Erlichman, prods.; Roy Halee, Adjutor Theroux, Paul Blakemore, Jochem van der Saag, engs.
Performance *****
Sonics ***
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May 2023 Jazz Record Reviews
Music and Recording Reviews
Thomas Conrad, Sasha Matson  |  May 11, 2023  |  0 comments
Bobo Stenson Trio: Sphere; Kirsten Edkins: Shapes and Sound; Franco Ambrosetti: Nora; Walter Smith III: return to casual.
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Bob Dylan's Bootleg Series Vol.17: Fragments: a Masterpiece as It Is Painted
My Back Pages
Sasha Matson  |  Apr 26, 2023  |  1 comments
Columbia Records continues to extend its Bob Dylan Bootleg Series, which began in 1991. The latest edition in this complex warren of burrows brings us to Volume 17, Bob Dylan—Fragments—Time Out of Mind Sessions (1996–1997).

Fragments—the title—feels inaccurate; these recordings are not shards of some missing whole. Rather, they form a single large, varied portrait. To borrow an analogy from art history, what we have here is the result of cleaning and restoring a large canvas, removing layers of varnish and dirt that had obscured the true colors and textures that were there when it was first painted. Now we can experience this masterpiece in a new way.

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Primare PRE35 Prisma streaming preamplifier
Digital Processor ReviewsSolid State Preamp Reviews
Sasha Matson  |  Mar 31, 2023  |  1 comments
Hygge might not be the first word that comes to mind when contemplating the Primare PRE35 Prisma preamplifier, but in Limhamn, Sweden, that is how Primare likes to describe their products. It means "cozy," and it's a very important concept in the Nordic countries, almost a way of life. Another term that appears in Primare's product descriptions is lagom, which loosely translates as "not too little, not too much—just right."
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Revinylization #37: Little Feat, Still Willin'
Revinylization
Sasha Matson  |  Jan 05, 2023  |  4 comments
One of my favorite comments by an actual participant in rock history is from Bonnie Raitt: "I miss Little Feat like I miss being eight years old." That remark was included in the liner notes for the Feat's 1981 album Hoy-Hoy (Warner Bros. 2BSK 3538), which was released two years after front man Lowell George's passing in 1979.
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December 2022 Jazz Record Reviews
Music and Recording Reviews
Jim Austin, Robert Baird, Thomas Conrad, Sasha Matson  |  Dec 16, 2022  |  1 comments
Ethan Philion: Meditations on Mingus, Jakob Bro, Joe Lovano: Once Around the Room: A Tribute to Paul Motian, Brother Jack McDuff: Moon Rappin', Miles Davis: That's What Happened 1982–1985 (The Bootleg Series, Vol.7), Marshall Gilkes: Cyclic Journey and Noah Garabedian: Consider the Stars Beneath Us.
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Revinylization #36: The Hissing of the Roses
Revinylization
Sasha Matson  |  Dec 01, 2022  |  1 comments
My wife saw me putting on my new LP of Joni Mitchell's great For the Roses album and said: "Oh, our breakup album!" Never mind the confusing details—we're obviously still (or again) together—that's how intense the bonds are for many people with Joni's music: We people of a certain age set the clock of our lives by her recordings.
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Revinylization #32: Analogue Productions' UHQR Are You Experienced LP
Revinylization
Sasha Matson  |  Aug 02, 2022  |  3 comments
Those of you old enough to have heard it when it was new will recall when you first experienced the music of Jimi Hendrix. I was 13, in 1967, when I came home after school with a friend bearing an LP of the just-released US Reprise Records pressing of Are You Experienced. My dad had a floorstanding, monophonic record player.
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May 2022 Classical Record Reviews
Music and Recording Reviews
Kurt Gottschalk, Sasha Matson, Jason Victor Serinus, Stephen Francis Vasta  |  May 13, 2022  |  1 comments
Eric Nathan: Missing Words, Carolyn Sampson: Trennung: Songs of Separation, Brahms: Piano Trios Nos.2 & 3, Brahms: String Sextets, Mahler: Symphony No.4 and Hans Abrahamsen: Schnee.
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Kevin Gray: Vinyl-Mastering Master
FeaturesInterviews
Sasha Matson  |  May 06, 2022  |  9 comments
When I need information about recordings, I go to Discogs. At Discogs, Kevin Gray has more than 2500 entries. That's as good an indicator as any of the amount of ground he has covered in his career so far as a creative participant in the recorded-music art known as mastering. Since starting out in the early 1970s, in Los Angeles, he has worked for all the major music labels and many independents, in all music genres.
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