News

I'm a great fan of the musical theater: musicals, operetta, and opera, more-or-less in that order. A typical summer vacation for my wife and me involves driving from Toronto to the East Coast, stopping off to see musicals (and some plays) at places like the Barrington Stage Company in Pittsfield, MA, the Goodspeed Opera House in East Haddam, CT, the Paper Mill Playhouse in Millburn, NJ, , and the Ogunquit Playhouse in Ogunquit, ME. The Glimmerglass summer opera festival, near Cooperstown, NY, is not far from the route we usually take, but I never thought of visiting it because my impression has been that they specialize in performances of modern and obscure operas, which are not quite our cup of tea.

My discovery of the fact that Glimmerglass has greatly expanded the range of its offerings came about through sheer serendipity. . .

For Vivendi">http://www.vivendi.com">Vivendi Universal SA, when it rains, it pours. Just two weeks after chief executive Jean-Marie Messier ousted Pierre Lescure, the president of France's Canal">http://www.canalplus.fr">Canal Plus television company—an event that caused demonstrations in the streets of Paris and paroxysms of nationalistic fervor among France's 18 presidential candidates—a complicated stock deal got vastly more complicated, resulting in a $250 million payment due to A&M Records founders Herb Alpert and Jerry Moss.

It's sometimes amazing how courtroom adversaries can become bosom buddies. This week's example: on May 21, Vivendi">http://www.vivendiuniversal.com">Vivendi Universal SA agreed to acquire Internet music portal MP3.com">http://www.mp3.com">MP3.com Inc. for $372 million (423 million euros) in cash and stock—or $5.00/share for MP3.com stockholders. The announcement followed Vivendi's April 5 acquisitionhttp://www.stereophile.com/news/11015/">acquisition; of Emusic.com for $24 million. The targeted companies' boards of directors unanimously approved both deals. MP3.com will continue to offer music from non-Universal labels, according to a company press release.

Saturday December 9, from 12pm to 4pm, Suncoast Audio (7353 International Place, Unit 309, Sarasota, FL, 34240) says they are sending 2017 out with a bang! They are hosting a year-ending event with Vivid loudspeakers, Gryphon electronics, and Shunyata cabling.

Multiple product premieres take place at Berkeley, CA store Music Lovers Audio (2116 Blake Street), Saturday December 5, from 1pm–6pm. Philip O’Hanlon of On A Higher Note is presenting the North American premiere of the Vivid B1 Decade, 10th Anniversary, limited-edition loudspeaker (above). John Quick of dCS will show the new dCS Rossini D/A processor, and Peter McGrath of Wilson Audio Specialties will present the Wilson Sabrina loudspeakers in a system featuring the Spectral DMC-30SV Super Veloce preamplifier.

At AXPONA 2026, Ken Micallef speaks with Volti Audio Owner Greg Roberts about the gear shown in the company's room at the show, including Volti Audio Lucera speakers, Mojo Audio Mystique Z and BorderPatrol Audio Zola DACs, and a Cary Audio SLI-80 integrated amplifier.

Last week, the Electronic Frontier Foundation's (EFF) Fred">http://www.stereophile.com/news/031306eff/">Fred von Lohmann talked with us about how fair use created unexpected riches for Hollywood, created the iPod boom, and how dismantling it could prove disastrous for consumers. This week, we resume that conversation with a discussion about digital rights management (DRM) and why the computer industry is willing to support it, even though its consumers never asked for it.