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Software Feedback and will continue to be heard for the simple reason that it is deeply moving and tender, on a par with the great violin music from the classical repertoire. Ernest Bloch’s Suite Hebraïque rewards the listener with another showcase of the violin’s possibilities. The canvas for Bloch’s tone painting is composed of several melodies that he copied from a Jewish encyclopedia in the early 20 th century. Bloch blends them with his own sensibility to create moods and sweeps of notes that every violin enthusiast should enjoy. Though Bloch is remembered primarily for his compositions with Jewish themes, he was fascinated by many other genres. Renaissance, Baroque, Gregorian chant, Chinese, and Native American music. All had a profound influence on his musical life. His interest in exploring the Baroque produced the Concerto Grosso No. 1. Its structure and instrumental content is all Baroque, yet the theme and mood have a distinctly modern feel. There is an elegant edge to the rhythm that is all at once jazzy and reminiscent of the majestic John Sebastian Bach, the king of the Baroque. Profound spiritual expression from John Williams and Ernest Bloch blended into a masterful musical ebb and flow. This is the promise to be found here. Yerba Buena Bounce (LP) Hot Club of San Francisco Reference Recordings RM-2503 Gerard Rejskind: This is Reference Recordings’ most ambitious LP production in a long time. The original HDCD version contained a lot of music, and so, 72 ULTRA HIGH FIDELITY Magazine to avoid omitting anything, RR has cut it onto two discs. Turning at 45 rpm. And on 200-gram vinyl, if you please! And the music is worth it, because the Hot Club of San Francisco is no pale imitation of its inspiration, Django Reinhardt and Stéphane Grappelli’s Le Hot Club de France. Though Americans believe, not without reason, that jazz is their own invention, or at least that of its long-ignored Black community, the delightful genre that is swing jazz is…yes, a French invention. As an aside, I should mention that the Hot Club de France is mainly remembered for the period up to 1940 (Nuages, Django’s most famous piece, was recorded that year). The Hot Club’s sound changed, because Grappelli fell ill on tour and wound up passing the War in England. He was replaced not by another violinist but by a clarinetist. Django himself thrived and even became rich, even though jazz was officially banned by the Nazis as degenerate music, and a million of Django’s Roma compatriots were being shipped to death camps. After the war he was shunned by some as a collaborator, and he became alcoholic, not showing up for gigs, and even forgetting to bring his guitar. He died in 1953. But back to San Francisco. The Hot Club was founded in 1993 by Paul Mehling, who remains lead guitarist (the “Django” of the group) today. He is backed by two rhythm guitarists, Jason Vanderford and Jeff Magidson, as well as bassist Ari Munkres. To reproduce the Hot Club sound of the 30’s, there has to be a violinist. He is Evan Price. This recording, made in 2006, was their tenth. They were featured on another audiophile label, the defunct Clarity Records, before coming across to Reference Recordings. The 16 tracks across the four sides of the LP set include some of the original Hot Club pieces, including Mystery Pacific, with its locomotive rhythm and Rythme Futur, with a similar theme. There are two other Django compositions, Black and White and Improvisation No. 2. There is also the gorgeous Souvenir de Villingen, which Stéphane Grappelli wrote nearly four decades after his Hot Club days. There are newer pieces, such as the Beatles’ I’m So Happy Just to Dance With You (in which Seth Asarno contributes his bandoneon, to give it a haunting tango-like rhythm). and three compositions from Mehling himself, including the title piece. There is David Girsman’s mandolin, added to the three guitars on two of the pieces. The album ends with a jam session, featuring the Club members plus clarinet, trumpet, trombone and tuba, plus Mehling singing the classic Some of These Days. That ends the album on a joyous tone, but really joy permeates all of this music, and that is the best thing one can say about a swing album. Though the group is relatively small, its sound can easily sink into cacophony, as it does now and then on the original HDCD-encoded disc. The sound was far more coherent on the HRx highdefinition version, and the musicians seemed to be playing better. That’s also the case on this excellent analog transfer. The 200-gram discs from Quality Records are dead quiet, but for a mysterious background rumble I couldn’t identify (undetectable however once the music begins). All in all, this is fine music delivered in flawless form. Portraits & Perfume Anne Bisson CAMILIO CAM2 4054 Gerard Rejskind: This is Anne Bisson’s second recording, if you omit one she made a number of years back. She is best known in Quebec as a television host. Though she is francophone, she writes and sings in English. The earlier album, Blue Mind (mentioned in Gossip&News in UHF No. 87) was filled with her own
songs. Except for the frothy September in Montreal, those songs were serious, sometimes heavy, with Bisson’s emotional voice delivering all of their weight. This album, as its title suggests, is a lot lighter. Though the first disc was done with the Quebec audiophile label Fidelio, this one is on her own label, with the marketing done by the juggernaut, Universal Music. Universal suggested she make the disc more commercial by including some standards (read: pop songs that left the hit parade to enter the light jazz realm). She did, though the results are uneven. The Nearness of You and Jobim’s How Insensitive are both gorgeous, but are ill-suited to Bisson’s emotionally-charged voice. So is another standard, In the Wee Small Hours of the Morning, which opens a cappella. That’s risky, and the risk doesn’t quite pay off. With a Little Help From My Friends works much better. She sings it at a much slower tempo than Paul McCartney does, but she does it justice, and I was amused by the accompaniment, which closely evokes that of the Beatles themselves. Still, it is her own songs that are worth waiting for. Ripples is a delightful slow ballad, with only Bisson’s solo piano, without the strings and synths of some other songs. The same is true of My Little Boy, which is a love song despite the title. What’s Wrong With Me is a lively big band swing tune, and it is a showstopper. Also terrific is I Like You Too, borrowed from an album that Julie Lebon did two decades ago (with music by Guy St-Onge). It’s great fun, with a plot twist I wouldn’t dare give away. Looking down the list, she has perhaps six keepers out of the dozen, and that as you know is way better than average. Let me mention Guy St-Onge again, since it is evident that without him this recording would not exist. He is Anne’s mentor, arranger, co-producer, and a lot more. There are few instruments Guy can’t play with supreme virtuosity. On Roger Water’s Us and Them he plays piano, bass, drums, percussion, celesta, vibraphone, accordion, barrel organ, chimes and synth. Not at the same time, I would assume, and so thank goodness for multitracking. The recording exists in both CD and LP form, and they are not of equal quality. In the case of Blue Mind, the LP sounded wonderful, whereas the CD was dull and unfocused. I thought Fidelio should have refused it. This time it’s the reverse. The CD sounds terrific (besides, it has three more songs on it), and it’s the LP that left me wanting. Anne Bisson says that her recordings are a hit in Asia as well as North America, and I’m not surprised. There seems to be dozens of pretty female Asian singers with good elocution, but who don’t appear to have any clue what they are singing. Anne Bisson knows exactly what she’s singing. contents. For a start, she wrote a lot of it. Pick up Blue Mind too, on vinyl if you can. reading material for free. WHY A FREE ISSUE to break away from the standard rock format of guitars and drums by introducing orchestral strings in their new band. Ads were placed in British magazines and on the poster board of The Royal Academy of Music, with the happy result that two cellists, a violinist, a keyboard player and a bassist joined the founding fathers. The next challenge was how to capture the string sound on a live stage. Contact mikes sitting on the cello body We remember when a number of competitors were less would than effective, and after two put on line only only the cover image and years the table of experimenting, of their sound engineer solved the problem by using We would tell them that you don’t go fishing technology without bait. which is commonplace today, Sure, we live from what you spend through but our was site new and then — building transduc- the pages of our print issue. But you could ers spend into the days instrument bridges. Was the orchestra’s stage presence We think that’s the only way we can convince all that you different of the from that of the usual UHF difference, guitar, drums, and keyboard format? of why you might want to trust us with the future The string of your section had an image that music or home theatre system. stood out. One cellist wore a monk’s cap, We have readers on every continent except coupled Antarctica. with a full tuxedo and Converse Most of them discovered us on line. All-star sneakers. The violinist strutted They read a lot of our free material. the stage wearing a very long black cape And then they joined us. covering his high-heeled boots. Flower power shirts and the prerequisite long hair and beards completed the look. Sound production left a lot of notes in the lurch in those days. The Moog synthesizer comes off sounding like a slightly strangled French horn, and the overall balance of strings and guitars in the 1972 concert was totally out of whack. By 1974 much had changed. Banks of amps there were not, but the seven instrumentalists on stage were a coher- Electric Light Orchestra Live ent group, with the cellists now off their ELO chairs and onto their feet, dancing all Eagle Vision over the place, even clutching the cello Steve Bourke: With Jeff Lynne song- horizontally, like a bass guitar. The cellos writing, singing, and playing lead guitar have stepped forward into a primary for one huge hit after another, ELO position in the rock orchestra, while scored a baker’s dozen of top ten singles, the violin is barely heard — a dramatic during a run of popularity that spanned change from the earlier arrangements nine years, from 1972 to 1981. These when the violin regularly performed three live concerts from 1976, 1974 and jazzy solos on stage. 1973, amount to a detailed and fascinat- By the time of the third concert ELO ing look at the evolution of rock concert had established itself as full-fledged staging and image-making from an era members of the British and American many of us recall with fond nostalgia. rock elite, thanks to a string of hits on The band that became a rock orches- both sides of the Atlantic. Does its music tra was founded by Jeff Lynne and Roy hold up today, in spite of the enormous Wood, both former members of The explosion of all musical genres since the Move, a UK rock group. They wanted seventies? You be the judge. ULTRA HIGH FIDELITY Magazine 73 Software Feedback
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No. 92 CAN $6.49 / US $7.69 USB DON
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Issue No. 92 Cover story: It’s be
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THE ONLY GOOD DOG EARS ARE… …no
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A note of thanks for your valuable,
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Page 41 and 42: THE ACOUSTIC COLLECTION: This is th
Page 43 and 44: The optical connection Up until now
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Page 49 and 50: Conclusions That we would recommend
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Page 55 and 56: INTERCONNECTS ATLAS HYPER SYMMETRIC
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