Skrowaczewsky, 1996


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Newsgroups: rec.music.classical.recordings
From: Tony Movshon <movshon@nyu.edu>
Date: Fri, 08 Sep 2000 00:49:06 -0400

"F.A.E." wrote:
> > : -Skrowaczewsky/Minnesota (Telarc)
> >
> > What's a "regular" CD player?  It sounds excellent (assuming 
> > you like that sort of close-up sound) to these ears 
> > whether played on my main equipment at home or a walkman.
> 
> I thought this specific recording was intended for some new generation
> of CD players (high definition or something). I probably misread.

Reference Recordings use a system called "HDCD", which uses some minor
trickery to extract a little more dynamic range out of a 16/44 CD. The
discs are fully compatible with regular players, and difference in
sound when there's an HDCD decoder in the circuit is pretty subtle;
the sound is very good either way, though perhaps not as fabulously
glorious as some on the audiophile community would have you believe.

I like the Blomstedt recording for the reasons already mentioned, but
don't much care for the Skrowaczewski. Unlike his Arte Nova recordings,
in which the orchestra sounds entirely at home with the idiom, it seems
to me that the Minnesotans are just too four-square in their phrasing,
and that (perhaps for related reasons) Skrowaczewski is rather cold and
rigid. I hope that Arte Nova releases an SWF 9th of his some time.


Tony Movshon
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