LATEST ADDITIONS

Welcome to the wonderful world of firmware and software updates. With almost every audio device now microprocessor-controlled, and the tasks to be performed increasingly complex, it's not surprising that "finished" products leave the factory only to be stymied by reasonable but unpredicted user practices. It's not that we're all becoming beta testers, but we are contributing to the intelligent evolution of product capabilities.

Frank Zappa was well known for a lot of things—his sharp satiric wit, his virtuoso guitar improvisations, his excellence as a bandleader, his fearlessness in combating hostile political forces and crooked record-industry executives. But Zappa is all too rarely given credit for his status as one of the most creative musical imaginations of the 20th century, regardless of genre.

Last Friday at the Jazz Standard, I saw clarinetist Don Byron play compositions from his 1996 <A HREF="http://www.stereophile.com/recordingofthemonth/696/"><I>Bug Music</I></A>, maybe his greatest album, certainly one of the most exciting jazz albums of that decade. It features music from the ‘30s by John Kirby, Raymond Scott, and Duke Ellington—an era largely neglected by jazz musicians and historians.

Vol.17 No.2 (February 1994)

Vol.17 No.10 (October 1994)

Vol.20 No.9 (September 1997)

Vol.22 No.12 (December 1999)