Archive for Stereophile
Five Stars for the Hermitage Piano Trio in Stereophile
Jason Victor Serious gives a Five Star Sonic Rating to Hermitage Piano Trio’s Spanish Impressions in the November issue of Stereophile: “Here’s a real treat: piano trios by four outstanding Spanish composers—Enrique Fernández Arbós, Joaquín Turina, Gaspar Cassadó, and Mariano Perelló. … Expertly recorded at Skywalker Sound by the family team of Sean Martin and Keith O. Johnson, the hi-rez recording stands out for its excellent dynamics, natural colors, and big, realistically spaced images that…
Break The Chain Vinyl in Stereophile
Doug MacLeod and the LP release of Break the Chain got a nice mention from Stereophile‘s Michael Fremer as part of a review of the Audia Flight FLS1 Pre-Amp/DAC in the April 2019 issue: “Bluesman Doug MacLeod hasn’t put out one bad record in his long career…His latest, Break the Chain (2 45rpm LPs, RM-2519), recorded live at Skywalker Sound by Keith O. Johnson and Sean Royce Martin, with no edits or overdubs, is yet…
Stereophile Highlights PaTRAM’s Teach Me Thy Statutes Recording
The August 2018 print edition of Stereophile Magazine features “Outstanding Choral Recordings” in Jason Victor Serinus’ “My Backpages” column and includes the new PaTRAM Institute release, Teach Me Thy Statutes: “In Teach Me Thy Statutes, 15 compositions by the prolific Chesnokov receive devout performances by the PaTRAM Institute Male Choir… Recorded in hi-rez DSD by John Newton and mixed and mastered by Mark Donahue of SoundMirror… Although the choir’s 42 voices include five basso profundos,…
Stereophile Reviews John Williams At The Movies
Stereophile Magazine’s Jason Victor Serinus reviewed the Dallas Winds and Jerry Junkin’s new John Williams at the Movies recording for a 4th of July feature: “For a major, decidedly American change of pace from our usual fare of Prokofiev, Debussy, Xenakis, Berg, and Beethoven (for starters), let’s lighten up with Reference Recordings’ latest hybrid SACD, John Williams at the Movies? Also available as a 176.4/24 download—the format in which it was recorded and which I…
The Best Shostakovich 5 of the Century
Order Now Kalman Rubinson has an absolute rave review for the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra and Manfred Honeck‘s Shostakovich & Barber recording in the November 2017 issue of Stereophile Magazine: “I eagerly await every new Reference Fresh! release from Manfred Honeck and the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra. Each has been an artistic and sonic delight, and this one is no exception. The PSO is a magnificent, world-class orchestra, Honeck is a mature and innovative leader, and through…
Stereophile Magazine Reviews Adam Schoenberg
Order Now “The three works on the new, vividly recorded Adam Schoenberg hybrid SACD from Reference Recordings, recorded in 24/176.4 surround and played by the Kansas City Symphony under Michael Stern, are deliciously tonal, filled with color and energy, and irrepressibly optimistic. …Schoenberg simply dazzles and delights. Plus, anyone who writes a modern-day Pictures at an Exhibition is someone every music-loving audiophile will want to check out. …the [American Symphony] is variously colorful, exciting, unabashedly…
Pittsburgh Symphony’s Tchaikovsky Symphony No. 6 is “Completely Satisfying”
“I have effusively praised the previous efforts of Manfred Honeck, the Pittsburgh Symphony, and the Soundmirror recording team, and this is yet another winner.…this one rises to the top in recording quality, and the performance is outstanding. … it’s appropriately dramatic and completely satisfying—and the accompanying Rusalka Fantasy, by Dvorák, is a delight.” —Kalman Rubinson, Stereophile See the full review on Stereophile.com Reference Recordings Amazon iTunes Native DSD Arkiv Music
Dvořák & Janáček a Record To Die For!
Stereophile Magazine’s February “Records to Die For” include Manfred Honeck and the Pittsburgh Symphony’s Dvořák & Janáček recording! “Well, this year [the Pittsburgh Symphony] trumped themselves with even more idiomatic performances and an even more naturally dynamic recording. … The realization and performance of the suite from Janáček’s Jenufa is brilliant…Conducted and played with appropriate style and verve and recorded in the best and most thrilling sound, this new disc immediately goes to the top…
RR in RMAF News
After a fantastic weekend (more on our weekend experience soon), everyone in the Audiophile world is still raving about people, equipment, and their time at the Rocky Mountain Audiofest this weekend. Here are a couple of RR-Related tidbits: From Stereophile In the Joseph Audio Room “…the beauty of Reference Recordings’ LP version of Vaughan Williams’ The Wasps confirmed the superiority of both the equipment chain and the Keith Johnson/Sean Martin recording team.” In the ApexAudio…
Exotic Dances from the Opera already a true Reference recording
Exotic Dances from the Opera is already becoming a true “reference” recording! Check out this quick line from Stereophile‘s California Audio Show report: “With Focal Scala Utopias elevated on stands to decouple them from the floor and make their immediacy available to a room filled with audiophiles, a tape of Rimsky-Korsakov’s Dance of the Tumblers from Reference Recordings’ Exotic Dances at the Opera sounded right on.” Make sure to get your copy of this recording…
A fun look back
We’ve shared this interview before, but with our new LP releases, it’s rather fun to once again take a look back at the fantastic interview between our Tam Henderson and Stereophile‘s John Atkinson. The 1989 interview focuses a lot on RR’s move from LP to CD, so it makes for a rather interesting reference as we begin releasing LPs again. Take another look, or a first look if you haven’t yet read it, and pay…
Stereophile gets excited about our LPs
Thanks to Stereophile for the great writeup! We’re getting pretty excited about our LPs coming out on Friday, but it’s great to see that others are too! We’ve seen the excitement on Facebook and Twitter, and so we wanted to share some of the great inside information that Stereophile was able to get out of the RR team. From Sterophile: In 2005, when RR became aware of the vinyl resurgence, they searched throughout North America,…
Jon Atkinson Interviews Tam Henderson (1989)
This interview of Reference Recordings’ Tam Henderson by Stereophile Magazine‘s John Atkinson was done in 1989. But, we came back across it today when speak3raudio.com tweeted it today, so we thought it would be fun to share it here!Tam Henderson, Reference RecordingsBy John Atkinson – June, 1989——————————– When we met, I had intended to ask Tam about a major project Reference Recordings had undertaken to record Fats Waller stride-piano pieces both direct-to-CD and direct-to-DMM-LP. Both…
RMAF Reportings/Info for the Audiophiles
Today we thought we would share a blog with you that came from the Rocky Mountain Audio Festival that we recently attended! It includes some good information on how to play some of our HRx files. Bit-Perfect PlaybackPosted Wed Oct 7, 2009, 1:06 PM ETBy Jason Victor Serinus The sixth annual Rocky Mountain Audio Fest had already closed when I finally had the time to stop by Reference Recordings’ booth to check out their latest…
HRx – An older, but relevant review
Reference Recordings Aims At Your Hard Drive By Jason Victor Serinus January 5, 2008 — Reference Recordings, the Bay Area-based audiophile label founded by John T. “Tam” Henderson in 1976, has adopted a unique approach to computer and music server playback. Later this month, the company will begin to market what they call “HRx” discs. Incompatible with conventional optical disc players, these are data discs containing WAV files intended for playback on computer-based music servers.…