Greetings friends, I hope you are doing well.

We are in the midst of Fall weather flurries here in Washington State of the USA, with the temperatures dropping, and inclement weather making more frequent appearances. 

Temperatures have dropped down into the low 40F range making it a bit chilly to go for motorbike rides on my new BWM R 1250 GSA, so my rides are more infrequent of late.

I did go out for a night ride this last weekend to see if I could see the aurora borealis that became visible in the Northern US due to a solar storm, but to no avail, it wasn't visible from where I was at.

I also went out for a rain ride to test out some of my riding gear's level of waterproofness, and fared well on the staying dry front, so that was good. 

Otherwise, given the swing into colder weather, its time to plug the BMW and my aging Toyota 4Runner into their trickle chargers to maintain battery health as the weather gets colder as we move deeper into the cold weather of the Fall and Winter seasons.

This time of year is the start of 'virus times', so I got my flu shot, and my 'old guy' Pfizer booster shot for coronavirus. My first dose of the Pfizer vaccine had some small side effects for a day or two. The second does of the Pfizer vaccine had no side effects. I was expecting the same result from my third Pfizer booster shot as the second Pfizer shot (no side effects), and early on after the injection that was the case.

Then the arm got sore at the injection site, followed by a mild fever, extreme fatigue, and aches & pains similar to flu. I slept away most of the day after the injection, the second day I did normal activities in spite of some discomfort, but now its been three days and I feel like somebody roughed me up in the boxing ring.

The side effects made for a nice excuse to have hot toddies in the evenings!

So, I am convalescing indoors as the weather turns chillier today, which makes for a great time listening to music, playing hifi games, and playing my guitars.

My friend and jazz guitarist David Gitlen and I get together every Thursday, which is always a lot of fun. David teaches me a jazz guitar lesson, and then we retire to the living room to listen to some jazz albums that David brings along, while sipping some espressos.

David's got great taste in jazz, keen insights into the artists performances, as well as excellent hearing, so David can hear what's going on with the hifi gear that's in residence. David has really helped me build up a jazz guitar collection of albums. I've even installed them into my Arai XD-4 motorcycle helmet's Cardo Black communication-music system so I can listen to jazz guitar while I'm riding. 

David and I have been having a blast listening to jazz, and talking all things jazz guitar.

At the moment, my main music system consists of the superb Audio Note (UK) CD 2.1x/II Level Two Red Book CD player (HERE) as a source (vinyl front end is down for the moment awaiting installation of a phono stage), the Triode Lab 45 EVO Single-Ended-Triode integrated amplifier (David's favorite amplifier, above, HERE), and my Duelund-ized Tannoy Westminster Royal SE loudspeakers. Interconnects and speaker cables are Duelund DCA16GA, power cords are a mix of Acoustic Revive and Sablon Audio.

David brought over the Paul Desmond Quartet 'Live' album for us to listen to. 'Live' was of course, recorded live, in Toronto at the Bourbon Street jazz club, and features Paul Desmond on alto sax, Ed Bickert on guitar, Don Thompson on bass, and Jerry Fuller on drums.

What a fantastic album! First of all, it is a live album, so you hear all of the intimate audience interactions in the Bourbon Street jazz club, kind of like you do with that old audiophile favorite, Jazz At The Pawnshop.  

It is of course, the late Ed Bickert, one of my jazz guitar heroes, that makes Live an easy recommendation for inclusion in The Jazz Guitar Chronicles.

As much as I love the music on Jazz At The Pawnshop, Live is in another league musically, with Paul Desmond, Ed Bickert, Don Thompson, and Jerry Fuller in fine form at Bourbon Street in 1975.

The recording quality is superb, the through the Audio Note (UK) CD 2.1x/II Level Two Red Book CD player, the Triode Lab 45 EVO Single-Ended-Triode integrated amplifier, and my Duelund-ized Tannoy Westminster Royal SE loudspeakers, it sounds and feels like Paul, Ed, Don, Jerry, and Bourbon Street appeared in my living room to do a performance just for David and me. 

Just listen to the beautiful tone in Live, the intimate and live-like presence of the musicians, the masterful arrangements of the jazz  standards, and you'll think you've gone back in time to 1975 for a concert.

Whether you're trying to build a jazz guitar collection like I am, or whether you just love good jazz, The Paul Desmond Quartet, 'Live' album deserves a place in your collection. 

Ed Bickert. Ed Bickert. Ed Bickert. A must have! Available at Amazon.

David also brought over Larry Goldings' Caminhos Cruzados album featuring jazz guitarist Peter Bernstein.

Larry Goldings on Hammond B-3 organ, Peter Bernstein on guitar, Bill Stewart on drums, Joshua Redman on tenor sax, and Guilherme Franco on percussion, play a brilliant set of Brazilian bossanova and samba standards. 

This is one of those albums that I enjoy more every single time I play it, picking up on new nuances, and gaining creative insights into the music.  

I love hearing Larry's Hammond B3 playing, and of course Peter Bernstein is fantastic on guitar, and the reason for including this album in The Jazz Guitar Chronicles. 

The recording quality is excellent, the musicianship superb, and this brilliant set of Brazilian bossanova and samba standards deserves a place in your jazz collection.

This one is a little harder to find, but I found a copy on Discogs, so you might look there.

I'm closing in on finishing up the Leben Hi-Fi Stereo Company CS-300F integrated amplifier review for Positive Feedback. 

I've really been putting the CS-300F through its paces while listening to movies, analog LPs, and music CDs. 

In honor of Hyodo-san's background of watching / listening to movies with his movie projectionist father, it seemed appropriate that this review should be centered around my vintage Altec A5 Voice of the Theatre loudspeakers based audio-visual system.

This review could have been written Hans Christian Anderson, as the story line loosely follows his story The Ugly Duckling.   

The Leben CS-300F was an 'ugly duckling' from a sound quality and musicality standpoint early on, but developed into a 'beautiful swan' by the time it was fully run-in, which took on the order of an astounding 600 hours! A lesson in patience for yours truly.

The CS-300F is providing perhaps the best 'movie' sound on BluRay discs and streaming services that I've ever heard from my big Altec A5 Voice of the Theatre loudspeakers, no doubt due to insights gained by Hyodo-san from all that time spent in the movie theater with his film projectionist father. 

The CS-300F's 15 watts of output power is way more than enough with the highly-sensitive A5 loudspeakers, and readers with CS-300Fs also tell me it is brilliant with BBC LS3/5A and LS5/9 designs on the market. I've always loved those small BBC loudspeakers, one of these days I'll have to listen to some BBC LS3/5A in my own home to hear the combo for myself. 

I probably shouldn't mention this right now, but for you DIY enthusiasts out there, I am told by CS-300F enthusiasts that installing a set of Arizona Capacitor PIO coupling caps in place of the stock coupling caps takes the CS-300F next level in sound quality and musicality.

I'm a sucker for DIY projects, so if I can get Yoshi-san's permission, at some point in the future I'll do some coupling cap surgery and report back on the results.  

Anyways, that's what's going on at Jeff's Place at the moment, and I should have the Positive Feedback review of the Leben CS-300F wrapped up in the next couple of weeks, so stay tuned for that one.

That's all for now. Stay safe and well my friends, live long and prosper, and may the tone be with you!