What is your personal reference audiophile recording (best sound quality)?

[mwheelerk]

Since we are talking about Alison Krauss, I absolute enjoy the quality mastering of Raising Sand.

 

 

I did not know there was a HD 24/96 version of it:

https://www.hdtracks.com/index.php?file=catalogdetail&valbum_code=HD011661907522

 

This will be on my buy list during their next sale.

 

I would love to hear anyone's impression of the HDtracks version.

 

Though I absolutely love the music of this album I find the recording heavily and disappointingly compressed.

[pooger]

I listen mainly to smaller scale works, with occasional bouts of Opera and Gomez. I'm typically less interested in gross dynamics than other aspects of a recording—correct harmonics, tonal balance, and, ideally palpability and soundstage. If I'm using specific pieces as tests, to see what changes get wrought by whatever it is I'm comparing, then along with being a great recording, it also has to be something that I will enjoy, repeatedly, over and over! (As an aside, this is so much easier now than it was in the LP days—I tried not to play the same cut more than once in 30 minutes, to allow the grooves to normalize.)

 

In any case, I have my Audirvana demo playlist so I can do this so easily now. These first two cuts are ones I have really been relying on a lot lately—but the entire albums are great if you like the genres. These three are all Bluebook.

 

1. Gauceim Faudit- Troubadour Music of the 12th -13th Centuries, Keckés Ensemble, Hungaraton. My test cut is "Chant e deport." This is really well recorded male vocal, with old instruments accompanying. Great palpability and a large, deep and tall soundstage. Truly beautiful music, to boot. Besides the vocal quality, there is a bowed instrument that plays counterpoint—the string sound and how well the voice and string separate are very fine tests. If you don't know if you will like this type of music—but like folk music, or music with microtonality, give it a shot!

 

2. Come Into My House, Junior Wells, Telarc. Favorite test cut is "Whatever Momma Told Me." Starts with just harmonic, then vocal, then the (electric) band comes in. The bass has lovely growl that propels the song forward. This is a well recorded session. I'm sure it's multi miked, but I get a much stronger sense of where everyone is sitting and standing, with a good deal of cohesive, if not palpable, imaging.

 

3. Lately, Salt for Salt, Brown Bird has been playing a lot. "Thunder and Lightning" has much syncopated kick drum and bass plucking going on, with a lot of frequency overlap. Great slam, and getting that balance of slam and distinctness is the goal here.

[oso]

I just saw that the Sound Liaison label have come off theit high Horse and have started to sell Flac files as well. And the price has gone down too, from 20 euro to 12 euro for a complete studio master flac file. 24/96

I already have everything in Wav so no need for me to buy, but for all you guys who do not care if it is the original studio master with no conversion(wav) or a converted file (flac), this a really good offer.

Music Store

 

[Musicophile]

Live a FIP one of the GREAT live albums of all time. Highly recommended on my behalf as well. It is the only Hadouk Trio I own and I have no idea why I never bought more. Are their other albums in downloadable format or all CDs?

All of you guys above, thanks for recommending the Hadouk trio. Just got "Live at FIP", and am really amazed. I'll need to get more of this.

[Priaptor]

All of you guys above, thanks for recommending the Hadouk trio. Just got "Live at FIP", and am really amazed. I'll need to get more of this.

 

I bought a whole bunch of their other albums but none compare to Live At Fip although still very good.

 

Live at Fip is just one of those very special albums that the bar gets set so high that most of their other albums while very good are a letdown compared to that.

[wwaldmanfan]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Analyzed folder: Rickie Lee Jones/Flying Cowboys

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

DR Peak RMS Filename

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

DR19 -3.25 dB -26.42 dB 01 The Horses.aiff

DR13 -9.19 dB -25.86 dB 02 Just My Baby.aiff

DR24 -0.55 dB -26.59 dB 03 Ghetto Of My Mind.aiff

DR16 -6.79 dB -25.98 dB 04 Rodeo Girl.aiff

DR17 -4.66 dB -25.15 dB 05 Satellites.aiff

DR18 -7.53 dB -32.43 dB 06 Ghost Train.aiff

DR16 -6.05 dB -24.18 dB 07 Flying Cowboys.aiff

DR14 -8.79 dB -26.33 dB 08 Don't Let The Sun Catch You Crying.aiff

DR19 -4.11 dB -25.35 dB 09 Love Is Gonna Bring Us Back Alive.aiff

DR17 -6.45 dB -29.29 dB 10 Away From The Sky.aiff

DR14 -4.39 dB -24.25 dB 11 Atlas' Marker.aiff

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Number of files: 11

Official DR value: DR17

[oso]

The latest download is maybe the best they have made so far.

Ecm recording artist Wolfert Brederode has made a new band with fellow Dutch musicians and they have composed a suite of music inspired by Hemingway´s , the Old man and the Sea.

Great music and unbelievable sound stage.

 

BATIK (WAV)

 

I still think that the Sound Liaison recordings are the best to be had at the moment.

I have all the downloads from this little label and just a couple of days ago bought the latest, the

''After Silence'' by master trumpet player Andre Heuvelman.

It a stunningly beautiful album. These musicians dares to play with a deeply felt emotion.

 

The download has that typical Sound Liaison sound, deep black background and a vivid representation of the instruments,lush sounding room sound but without going over the top, as I find some audiophile recordings tend to do.

 

The label are giving away free tracks at the moment of this album and the now well known and often bespoken ''Thousand Shades of Blue'' from Carmen Gomes.

 

Highly recommended.

This is the link for the free tracks:

FREE TRACKS

 

[christian u]

[video=youtube;u35c-p-tSqU]

The latest download is maybe the best they have made so far.

Ecm recording artist Wolfert Brederode has made a new band with fellow Dutch musicians and they have composed a suite of music inspired by Hemingway´s , the Old man and the Sea.

Great music and unbelievable sound stage.

 

BATIK (WAV)

 

[oso]

I still think that the Sound Liaison recordings are the best to be had at the moment.

I have all the downloads from this little label and just a couple of days ago bought the latest, the

''After Silence'' by master trumpet player Andre Heuvelman.

It a stunningly beautiful album. These musicians dares to play with a deeply felt emotion.

 

The download has that typical Sound Liaison sound, deep black background and a vivid representation of the instruments,lush sounding room sound but without going over the top, as I find some audiophile recordings tend to do.

 

The label are giving away free tracks at the moment of this album and the now well known and often bespoken ''Thousand Shades of Blue'' from Carmen Gomes.

 

Highly recommended.

This is the link for the free tracks:

FREE TRACKS

 

Very good indeed, you tube links for those of you who might be curious:

[oso]

Hey we forgot Hope!

16/44.1 but this sounds good!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r0IxBHEBsGI

[Boris75]

Hey we forgot Hope!

16/44.1 but this sounds good!

 

The Analogue Productions SACD of Hope is great.

[Lefatshe]

I bought a whole bunch of their other albums but none compare to Live At Fip although still very good.

 

Live at Fip is just one of those very special albums that the bar gets set so high that most of their other albums while very good are a letdown compared to that.

 

Thank you for this suggestion. Hadouk Trio is new to me and and they are wonderful. Thanks to everyone that contributed to this thread. I returned from a day at the Capital Audio Fest and wanted some good new suggestions to test my home systems. Too much today was lacking dynamic variation. This thread is a great place for suggestions. Some tracks I heard today, and others in this thread are even better than what I heard.

 

Here are some of my recommendations:

Lalo Schifrin - Letters from Argentina

World Trio (Mino Cinelu, Dave Holland, Kevin Eubanks)

John Williams - The Magic Box

Ralph Towner - Time Line (solo guitar recorded in a church)

Slow Poke (Michael Blake, David Tronzo, Kenny Wollesen, Tony Scherr) - At Home

Sequentia - Lost Songs of the Rhineland Harper

Peter Erskine - As It Is

Erik Friedlander - Nothing on Earth

[Milan]

+1

[video=youtube;u35c-p-tSqU]

[Milan]

Thank you for this suggestion. Hadouk Trio is new to me and and they are wonderful. Thanks to everyone that contributed to this thread. I returned from a day at the Capital Audio Fest and wanted some good new suggestions to test my home systems. Too much today was lacking dynamic variation. This thread is a great place for suggestions. Some tracks I heard today, and others in this thread are even better than what I heard.

 

Here are some of my recommendations:

Lalo Schifrin - Letters from Argentina

World Trio (Mino Cinelu, Dave Holland, Kevin Eubanks)

John Williams - The Magic Box

Ralph Towner - Time Line (solo guitar recorded in a church)

Slow Poke (Michael Blake, David Tronzo, Kenny Wollesen, Tony Scherr) - At Home

Sequentia - Lost Songs of the Rhineland Harper

Peter Erskine - As It Is

Erik Friedlander - Nothing on Earth

 

''As it Is '' that is still one of the best sounding albums that ECM has produced.

[Cycleman]

1. Gauceim Faudit- Troubadour Music of the 12th -13th Centuries, Keckés Ensemble, Hungaraton. My test cut is "Chant e deport." This is really well recorded male vocal, with old instruments accompanying. Great palpability and a large, deep and tall soundstage. Truly beautiful music, to boot. Besides the vocal quality, there is a bowed instrument that plays counterpoint—the string sound and how well the voice and string separate are very fine tests. If you don't know if you will like this type of music—but like folk music, or music with microtonality, give it a shot!

 

Wow, I realize I have this album among the 1700 or so ripped to my hard drive, but cannot remember when I played it.

 

The original CD came to me back in the late 1980s, a couple of years after I bought my first CD player and this magazine -- I forget its name; "CD Review" perhaps? -- was devoted to reviews of music on CDs.

 

And because of the passion many of the magazine's reviews of choral music, often on the Hungaraton label, expressed, I bought those CDs and started to get into renaissance and medieval choral music, often religious but sometimes secular too.

 

So thanks for the head's up. I'll have to play that Faudit album later, and especially note that "Chant e deport" track.

 

Dave

[oso]

Almost any of Alison Krauss' recordings, but especially "Alison Krauss + Union Station LIVE" - incredible, "you are there" realness.

 

This is my favorite; [video=youtube;2-0drZqMdR4]

[PAP]

+1

 

[video=youtube;u35c-p-tSqU]

Yes the Batik download is very very good, but if I may suggest that if one wants to get an impression of the sound quality before actually purchasing the album, you better use this download example and listen to it in all it's 24/96 pcm glory.

 

 

Compare Formats

[pdvm]

Great suggestions here. I downloaded both After Silence and Live at Fip, both wonderful music and great sounding!

[Qhwoeprktiyns]

T-Bone Walker - T-Bone Blues

Sinatra at the Sands (with Count Basie)

[PAP]

They are 16.50 Euros/album.

 

I DLed Carmen Gomes, Inc. "Torn". Incredible artist and outstanding recording quality.

 

They have some problems with the PayPal link: After you pay, PayPal doesn't get you to the DL. You have to go again to their web place and "Inloggen" that means "Login". I wrote them and Frans de Rond answered very, very fast, fixing the problem.

 

Highly recommended!

 

[ATTACH=CONFIG]5143[/ATTACH]

 

Roch

 

Yes, that's a very god sounding download. Very lovely little label with a remarkable high audio standard.

Link for those who might be interested..Torn (SE) (FLAC)

or studio master WAV: Torn (SE) (WAV)

I had no problem with PayPal everything worked fine.

And finally a singer coming to the forefront with something to say and getting a bit of recognition from the press. Generally they write yet another review of some 70+ Rock Stars.

Torn was inspired partly by the tragic marriage of a close friend coming to an end and a strong artistic need for getting back to basics, The Blues. In a sense it is a concept album. The 9 songs follow each other in a logical order telling the story of a relationship falling apart. ''Come on in My Kitchen'' representing the initial attraction and the ''Thrill is Gone'' the end of love. Carmen Gomes

The Torn album and Carmen Gomes has received white spread critical acclaim:

Her warm, enormously talented and controlled voice is completely unique and she knows how to get pure emotion across to the listener ...

The sound of the album is exemplary with dynamics of an addictive quality......the drums are practically visual and one feels as if one could reach out and and actually touch the singer.

Eric de Boer - Hifi.nl

Gomes Sings “You better come on into my kitchen, ‘cause it’s going to be raining outdoors” and what a wondrous musical kitchen she possesses.

The utensils are the thoughtfully played musical notes. The chef is Carmen herself, serving a dream-like melodic delicacy. We at Adore Jazz, play the music from Gomes’ new CD “Torn” with great joy.

Guy Zinger - Reviewer & Writer, All About Jazz

Station Programming Manager; Adore Jazz on 1 FM

Gomes has a bluesy voice, that balances gracefully between sensual surrender and control.

E. van den Berg - De Volkskrant

When she sings the blues, she sounds as if plucked from the cotton fields.

In a gospel-typed tune, one has to restrain oneself from shouting hallelujah.

Jeroen de Valk - Het Parool

...The most important thing is that she’s got the blues. I don’t mean she sings blues-songs - which also happens occasionally - but more importantly, in her phrasing you can hear everything that the blues stands for. That is quite an achievement.

Kees Polling -Trouw

[PAP]

Another small independent that I did not see in this thread, but which deserves wider recognition is Norwegian 2L.

Classical music with a very high standard of recording. Sound is generally a bit bright but like the downloads mentioned above,

great placement and well realized sound-stage. The sampler from HD tracks is a good place to start;

2L the Nordic sound - 2L audiophile reference recordings | HDtracks - The World's Greatest-Sounding Music Downloads

[Musicophile]

Another small independent that I did not see in this thread, but which deserves wider recognition is Norwegian 2L.

Classical music with a very high standard of recording. Sound is generally a bit bright but like the downloads mentioned above,

great placement and well realized sound-stage. The sampler from HD tracks is a good place to start;

2L the Nordic sound - 2L audiophile reference recordings | HDtracks - The World's Greatest-Sounding Music Downloads

Absolutely.

 

They have several free sample tracks in different resolutions and formats up to DXD. They are a bit hard to find in the pull down menu "2L brand store" on the upper right corner ("Test Bench HD Audio Files")

 

I can recommend these two recordings:

 

https://shop.klicktrack.com/2l/407101

 

Ola Gjeilo: Piano Improvisations

 

 

 

Amazingly beautiful piano improvisations on 1-3 pianos by the Norvegian composer Ola Gjeilo, recorded in a church.

 

And:

 

https://shop.klicktrack.com/2l/artist/90443

 

Hoff Ensemble: Quiet Winter Night

 

 

They call it a small Jazz acoustic ensemble. To me, it is a bit borderline for Jazz, but very beautifully recorded small acoustic music.

[Le Concombre Masqué]

THE hi rez sounds great

 

Though I absolutely love the music of this album I find the recording heavily and disappointingly compressed.

[Milan]

Though I absolutely love the music of this album I find the recording heavily and disappointingly compressed.

 

Album list - Dynamic Range Database

 

lowest is an 8, highest a 12, so Master compression is probably taking place. For sure compression has been used on the individual voices and instruments as a tool to shape their sound. But it is still a nice musical album. but to my ears and taste, not a reference audiophile recording.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JSWe5SuqJKo

[pdvm]

Rachmaninoff's first symphony, the recording I used to test pretty much everything in my system:

 

Nowadays available as:

 

Recorded in the early 80's, sounds like yesterday, and Sergei provides orchestral firework that really requires your system to make an effort (oh, that bass drum at the end of the fourth movement...)