Today's Fresh Catch: Tony Bennett at Carnegie Hall
Today's Fresh Catch is the Tony Bennett at Carnegie Hall 2-LP reissue set that was mastered by Ryan Smith at Sterling Sound from the original 3-track master tapes, and pressed at Quality Record Pressings. I've been away for four day road trip to Boise, Idaho, getting my parents' house prepped for sale after they moved into assisted living... Read More »
Today's Fresh Catch: Ellington At Newport
Have you ever thought that you knew about something, then found out that you didn't know as much as you thought, and felt like a real jackass? That's what I felt like after listening to the Ellington At Newport LP by Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab. You see, sometime back I had vowed to myself that... Read More »
The Third Annual ANVIL Award Celebration!
Labor Day weekend here in the States signals the greatly anticipated arrival of the annual ANVIL Award gathering put on by those inveterate audio statesmen, Stephaen Harrell (6Moons) and Pete Riggle (Pete Riggle Audio Engineering). In the photo below, that's Stephaen on the left, Pete on the right, and this year's ANVIL awardee, 'My Last... Read More »
Other Stuff: Good food, good times, and Mauviel M'Heritage Copper M250C.
You might have noticed that the tagline on my Jeff's Place blog is "Music, Hi-Fi, Fotografie, and Other Stuff". This post is about the 'other stuff'. It's a lot of fun to combine food and music, like I did recently when visiting Sante Restaurant & Charcuterie in Spokane, Washington, with Cindy, while taking in the nine-time... Read More »
Stephæn’s Black Pearls Aquarius Phono Stage Article is Live at 6Moons!
I just got a note from Stephaen that his Black Pearls Aquarius phono stage review is live at 6Moons here. Check it out, it is a fun read! Thanks for stopping by!
Upcoming Review Ideas: Vintage McIntosh, Leben, and Lenco. What do you think?
I've had a couple of ideas for reviews that I've been wanting to write up for Positive Feedback Online for a while now, but time just hasn't allowed for it, as life has been incredibly busy both on the day job and on the personal front. Now there appears to be a little window of... Read More »
Pido and Stephæn Visit Jeff's Place: Black Pearls and the Sign of Aquarius
It was a true pleasure to have my friends Stephæn Harrell (left) and Pete Riggle (right) stop by for a little hi-fi tomfoolery on Saturday. Stephæn brought by some tasty pizza from Greek Islands Cuisine, and we had a grand time sipping a little Pinot Noir from the Sonoma region of sunny California, along with some Newcastle brown ale... Read More »
Fanfare for the Common Man: The RS Line of Duelund Capacitors
I just heard about the recently released line of Duelund RS capacitors, which I had totally missed because I was so engrossed in writing the Duelund-WRSE Project Part 2 article for Positive Feedback Online. I'll try to find out more about the recently released line of Duelund RS capacitors from Frederik (a future interview perhaps?), but... Read More »
Pete's Place: Pete's got a sixteen inch Woody and a massive pair of B's
It's always a real pleasure to visit the irrepressible Peter Pan of audio, Pete Riggle. It was a real bonus that Ron (below center left), Leo (not pictured), Stephaen (center right), Bill (lower right), and John (left) were there too, they're my audio heroes one and all! Some of you may remember Bill from my 6Moons... Read More »
The Duelund-WRSE Project, Part 2: Duelund CAST Silver Capacitors and Duelund CAST Silver & Copper Autotransformers – Listening Impressions
Here's my listening impressions for the Duelund CAST Silver Capacitors and Duelund CAST Silver & Copper Autotransformers. I hope you enjoy it! Listening Impressions The Stock Westminster Royal SE Loudspeakers Let me repeat myself a little, with excerpts from the Part 1 article of the Duelund-WRSE Project, to put everything in context for the Part 2 changes... Read More »
Today's Fresh Catch: The Jazz Messengers - At The Cafe Bohemia Volume 1
"Wow!" was my first reaction as the music began to pour out of my loudspeakers from the Music Matters 45-RPM reissue of the Blue Note hardbop jazz album The Jazz Messengers - At The Cafe Bohemia Volume 1 that was recorded by Rudy Van Gelder, and mastered for this release by Kevin Gray and Steve Hoffman.... Read More »
The World of Music, The First American Edition (1963), and The Leopold Shakspere (circa 1870's)
If you read the post where David King checked in to tell us about the beautiful leather bound volume (below) of ‘The World of Music’ by Kjell Bloch Sandved, you know I was intrigued, and I ordered a copy of a later edition from a used book seller on Amazon (because I couldn't find the same one... Read More »
Part 2 of the Duelund-WRSE Project is now live at Positive Feedback Online!
Part 2 of the Duelund-WRSE Project is now live at Positive Feedback Online! Enjoy!
The Duelund-WRSE Project, Part 2: Duelund CAST Silver Capacitors and Duelund CAST Silver & Copper Autotransformers - Introduction
I just completed the second Duelund-WRSE Project article and sent it to Editors Dave & David at Positive Feedback Online. I ended up at 42 pages of Word text and 69 photographs by the time I finished it. I have to say I'm pretty excited about the article, and I really hope you all enjoy... Read More »
David King Checking In: The World of Music
David King sent me a really interesting heads up about a music book that I know all of you will be really interested in: 'The World of Music' by Kjell Bloch Sandved. (All the photos below are of David's copy, and it looks like a beauty of a book!) As soon as I read David's message I... Read More »
Danny Bar Checking In From Poland - Warsaw and Krakow
It's always nice to hear from Danny Bar. This time Danny's adventures have taken him to Poland, where he shot some great photos in Warsaw and Krakow. Danny used his Leica M9 camera plus Summicron-M 50mm f/2 lens for the color shots, and I love they way they look. I've shot lots of very nice... Read More »
Today's Fresh Catch: Custom McIntosh Audio Cabinets (and a short Duelund Update)
Hi Everyone! Like usual, I've had way too many things going on at once so it has been hard for me to get some new posts up for you. One of the things I've been wanting to tell you about is some custom McIntosh audio cabinets that I have run across that I think look really... Read More »
David King Checking In: 4-Point Support for Tannoy Westminster Royals
It's always a pleasure to hear from fellow enthusiasts, and David King always has some great things to share with us about getting the most performance out of Tannoy Westminster Royals. In David's latest message he tells us about his result experimenting with 4-point support for the big West's: Enjoy! Tannoy Westminster Royal HE -... Read More »
Deep Into Duelund - Updated With Listening Notes
I've really been enjoying the charms of all things Duelund, and I am hard at work writing Part 2 of the Duelund-WRSE Project for Positive Feedback Online right now. The focus of Part 2 of the Duelund-WRSE Project are the 6.8uF Silver Duelund CAST Capacitors for the C1 position of the crossover (shown above), and... Read More »
Sunday Afternoon at Jeff's Place
I had my friends Leo, George, Ron, Stephaen (6Moons), my girlfriend Rosalie, and Santos, over for a listening session last Sunday afternoon. First we listened to some interesting grounding loops from Mark Coles (Sablon Audio) that can be used on speaker cables, interconnects, and the Duelund-WRSE connections. Mark says the grounding loops are basically short loops of... Read More »
Fotografie: The 2014 Tulip Festival in Washington State
I was really looking forward to getting out and shooting some photos with my new Leica Summilux 1.4/35 ASPH FLE lens on the end of my Leica M9. Towards the end of April every year there is The Tulip Festival north of Seattle in the area of LaConner and Mount Vernon. It's been about four years since... Read More »
The Week in Review and a Look Ahead!
It has been a busy couple of months here at Jeff's Place, with lots going on across multiple fronts. On the hi-fi front it has been non-stop excitement with the Duelund CAST components from Frederik Carøe in Denmark as Part 2 of the Duelund-Westminster Royal SE External Crossover Project kicks into high gear! Duelund-WRSE external crossovers... Read More »
Get Better Sound! Quarter Notes, Issue 15. Thanks Jim!
As many of you know, I've always been a big fan of Jim Smith and his efforts to help music lovers and hi-fi nuts like myself get the maximum performance out of the hi-fi systems they already own! That's Jim in the photo below with his beautiful Tannoy Canterbury SE loudspeakers. It's easy to get... Read More »
Duelund CAST Silver Autotransformers for Tannoy Prestige Loudspeakers
In my last post I described the new Duelund CAST Copper & Silver Autotransformers designed by Frederik Carøe to replace the stock Tannoy autotransformer. The same model of Tannoy autotransformer is used in all Tannoy loudspeaker crossovers where an autotransformer is used, and like all of the parts choices in the stock Tannoy crossovers, they were chosen... Read More »
More About the Duelund CAST Autotransformers for Tannoys
The new Duelund CAST Autotransformers that Frederik Carøe developed are truly a watershed product for Tannoy aficionados around the world. As you have no doubt read here in these pages, we aforementioned Tannoy aficionados have been eagerly awaiting the appearance of a high-quality autotransformer solution to replace the stock Tannoy autotransformer with, particularly those of us who have... Read More »
Today's Fresh Catch: Duelund CAST Copper & Silver Autotransformers - Updated
Today's Fresh Catch are the Duelund CAST Copper & Silver Autotransformers for the Duelund-WRSE Project that all of you have been waiting for more information about. I am very happy to report that today a pair each of Duelund CAST copper and silver autotransformers have arrived from Frederik Carøe in Denmark - thank you Frederik! I... Read More »
Today's Fresh Catch: The Sophia Electric Magik Box!
After I finished up my review of the super-sweet Sophia Electric 91-03 integrated 300B amplifier for Positive Feedback Online for Issue 72, Sue asked me if I'd like to give their new Magik Box a listen (below). I told Sue that I couldn't review the Magik Box at this time due to a combination of... Read More »
Review: The Sophia Electric 91-03 300B Stereo Integrated Amplifier
I thought I would start mirroring the reviews I write for Positive Feedback Online here at Jeff's Place. The tradeoff is that my reviews will appear in print earlier at PFO, so if you want the latest reviews you'll want to tune in there. On the other hand, here at Jeff's Place I can include... Read More »
Today's Fresh Catch: Lou Pallo - Thank You Les; Neil Young - Live At The Cellar Door; Two Great LPs!
As I mentioned in my last post, I ordered up a selection of promising looking records from Acoustic Sounds, and so I've been spending an enjoyable afternoon listening to those black magic licorice disks! The first record I put on my VPI Classic & EMT TSD 15 combo out of my new batch of records was... Read More »
Today's Fresh Catch: The Joy of Vinyl
In this age of convenience as CDs arose to prominence, and then when MP3s emerged from the primordial digital soup for portable listening, a lot of people lost touch with their vinyl record collection ... and they forgot ... they forgot how good listening to vinyl really was. For many people music became a soundtrack... Read More »
David King Checking In From England: Get Better Sound from Westminster Royals
I got a nice email from David King, telling me about some of his experiments in setting up his Westminster Royal loudspeakers (below), which I thought would be valuable reading to all of you here at Jeff's Place: "Since I was last in touch I have been doing a whole series of experiments based... Read More »
The Duelund CAST Silver Autotransformer!
Those of you who have been reading about the Duelund-WRSE external crossover project know that pretty much everyone has wanted to use silver wound autotransformers in their Tannoy crossovers to provide the treble energy control (see below), including Paul Mills at Tannoy, Jignesh, Pambos, Frank, and of course, me. The autotransformer in the Tannoy crossover allows the... Read More »
Checking In: Sophia Electric 91-03 Review Online, Sunday Afternoon at Jeff's Place
Hello everybody! I've been missing in action for a while now, with it being a month to the day since my last post. Thanks to those of you who dropped me a note to check up on me to make sure I was ok - appreciated! It has been a rough go for a while... Read More »
Siedy Checking in from the Netherlands ... and Germany! Siedy Struck Gold!
I always enjoy hearing from Siedy in the Netherlands, he's definitely a kindred spirit and always makes me smile! 🙂 Like me, Siedy is a big fan of the Tannoy Westminster Royal SE loudspeakers and the amazing ASR Audiosysteme Emitter II Exclusive amplifiers handcrafted in Germany by Friedrich Schaefer. In fact, it was Siedy who... Read More »
Restored Vintage Turntables at Vinyl Nirvana
I've heard good things about the restored vintage AR and Thorens turntables from Vinyl Nirvana, so I thought I'd let you know about them so you could check them out if you are looking for a nicely done vintage turntable at a fair price. Pictured in the photo above is a "Thorens TD-160 Super Reproduction,... Read More »
Tim Lount of Tannoy Talks About the New Golden Reference Versions of Prestige Loudspeakers
There's a nice video on YouTube by rAVe Publications featuring Tim Lount of Tannoy talking about the new Golden Reference versions of the Prestige loudspeaker range (click here to go to the video on YouTube).
