Meridian's Bob Stuart
Meridian's MCD CD player was perhaps the first audiophile-quality player to be introduced in the high-end market. I met with Bob Stuart of Meridian at the Winter Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, in January, 1986 (footnote 1). My first question was about the name of the company he runs with industrial designer Alan Boothroyd:
J. Gordon Holt: Meridian in England is called Boothroyd Stuart, right?
Bob Stuart: Yes, the company is called Boothroyd Stuart, Limited, and the trademark is Meridian.
Michael League: That's One Snarky Puppy
"What happens in college stays in college" might be the best policy for most undergrad-formed bands, but Snarky Puppy is an exception to that rule (and a number of others). Bassist/composer Michael League found fertile musical ground in the jazz studies program at the University of North Texas when he formed Snarky Puppy in 2003.
Mike Moffat: Re-Creating the Musical Event
His background may have been in tubed audio product design, but Theta Digital's Mike Moffat is now at the forefront of computer-based digital processor development. His Theta D/A processors are among a handful of products that use Digital Signal Processing (DSP) chips and custom filtering software instead of off-the-shelf filter chips (footnote 1). I recently visited Mike at the Theta factory to get his current ideas on digital audio reproduction and what goes into designing a good-sounding processor. I began by asking Mike if he had always been an audiophile.
Murray Head: Nigel Lives Again
Seeing your album in a record store's cutout bin meant one thing. Despite the label execs' wide smiles, warm handshakes, and earnest promises to the contrary, once the record jacket had a hole punched in it, or its corner clipped, it meant your record label had lost faith and moved on.
Record collectors felt differently. The prices of cutouts were rightusually, from 99õ to a penny under two bucks. And cutouts were better than digging through crates because the records were still sealed . . . even if the jackets were a bit mangled. The beauty of cutouts was that they were so cheap, you could afford to be lavish, and go home with anything that caught your fancy.
Music Matters 2013—John Atkinson at ListenUp, Denver
In April 2013, Stereophile editor John Atkinson took part in two Music Matters evenings held by Colorado retailer ListenUp. JA took time off from the formal presentations to talk to ListenUp's George McClure about how we perceive music and about what matters most when we record and playback music.
Musicians As Audiophiles: Adam Rogers
"For years, I had a terrible listening situation," guitarist Adam Rogers recalls. "I had a Vector Research amplifier that the guys at the hi-fi store called 'Victim Research.' I'd fallen into the contemporary trap of listening to music on computer speakers or headphones, all the while feeling that at some point I would like to invest in a great listening scenario."
Adam Rogers is one of most astute and industrious players in the world of jazz, a native New Yorker who has seen every era of the Big Apple music scene, and risen to become one of the best guitar players in the world...
Musicians as Audiophiles: Billy Drummond
Billy Drummond is a world-class jazz musician who listens to music on what he describes as "high-performance playback equipment." Drummond has not one, but three, working systems in his cozy New Jersey home, each one lovingly tweaked, carefully positioned and closely maintained to reach optimal playback efficiency.
Musicians As Audiophiles: Chris Lightcap
New York City upright bassist Chris Lightcap is an excellent musician with an eye towards vintage environments. He lives with his family in a gorgeous Art Deco building, covets his wife's collection of 1950s and '60s-era cameras, has his own amazing collection of classic electric basses and guitars, and his comfortable apartment was once home to a Mafia hit-man. . . Lightcap's hi-fi consists of a Thorens TD-160 turntable, an early '60s era Fisher KX-100 Stereo Master Control Amplifier, Dynaco FM-3 Stereo Tuner, TCC TC-754 Black RIAA Phono Preamp, and KLH 17 loudspeakers.
Musicians As Audiophiles: Dan Weiss
Drummer/composer Dan Weiss has wide-ranging musical tastes, superb skills, and a rocking little Rega-based system in his cozy Brooklyn, New York apartment. Dan has drummed with many jazz greats, but it's his own projects that have generated the greatest interest. He's a thinking musician's musician, one who astutely assesses the pros and cons of every situation. Dan doesn't enter musical projects or hi-fi scenarios lightly. When considering his first major stereo purchase Dan listened to many combinations of turntable/CD player/amplifier/speaker(s).
Musicians As Audiophiles: David Smith
Arriving at David Smith's comfortable Queens apartment, he walks me into what was once a small dining room. Standing upright like a pair of wood-grained phone booths are the biggest speaker cabinets I've ever seen in anyone's homeanytime, anywhere. What?
Measuring a colossal 23" deep by 26" wide by 66" high, each 20 cubic-feet cabinet holds a vintage Altec 604E coaxial driver wired to a Mastering Lab crossover set in Smith's custom-built MLTL cabinets.