Listening to Now (In Surround) - Volume 2

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DT - Distance Over Time
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INXS weekend for me. I have the Quad DVDS, Kick Blu ray and the streaming albums ready. I will compare and contrast at maximum volume.

Kick Blu Ray is on right now, not looking good LOL :(
 
This afternoon I am Listening to the SQ Quad format of the Miles Davis classis of "Bitches Brew." The separation is very good with this copy. My only complaint is that the lower volume passages are sometimes interrupted with the snap crackle and pops befitting the commercials of breakfast cereals shown on TV on Saturday mornings. Maybe I'll try some of those newer innovative record cleaning methods like wood glue, alcohol or just letting the vinyl roast in the microwave for three minutes to get rid of the very small bio-matter that accumulates on the vinyl records.
 
This afternoon I am Listening to the SQ Quad format of the Miles Davis classis of "Bitches Brew." The separation is very good with this copy. My only complaint is that the lower volume passages are sometimes interrupted with the snap crackle and pops befitting the commercials of breakfast cereals shown on TV on Saturday mornings. Maybe I'll try some of those newer innovative record cleaning methods like wood glue, alcohol or just letting the vinyl roast in the microwave for three minutes to get rid of the very small bio-matter that accumulates on the vinyl records.
There’s always the quad SACD…
 
Dianne Reeves THE CALLING [Celebrating Sarah Vaughan] [Blue Note/Multi~CH SACD] An amazing heartfelt tribute to the incomparable Miss Vaughan by Dianne Reeves and a full orchestra with ample support from jazz legends Mulgrew Miller, Billy Childs, Russell Malone, Clark Terry et alia. Superbly remixed into discrete 5.1 by Erik Zabler. Mastered by Doug Sax at the Mastering Lab.


See the source image
 
Bill Nelson's Red Nose "Sound-On-Sound"
Ooh boy...I was looking forward ti this one and it's even miles better than I hoped!

Super mix by Mr Tayler. Immersive with no gimmicks...all about placements with this mix and it is superb. Always loved the album and was a little nervous that the new mix would be too tame but no disappointment at all.
 
This morning I am playing Carmina Burana, Michael Tilson Thomas conducting the Cleaveland Orchestra in SQ. The separation is very good. My O-scope shows nothing but good separation. However, unlike my usual genre of Jazz, classical music has more dramatic high and low volume passages that high light my breakfast cereal sounds (snap, crackle and pop). I guess the first thing is a better disc cleaner and then I will have to find a way to digitize my library. But, there are only so many hours in the day.

But, I'm finding that I cannot concentrate on work related issues with Carmina Burana so I switched over to John Coltrane's Blue Trane in stereo but the Vari-Matrix setting on the Marantz 4400 is doing a decent job of simulating the Quad.
 
I bought Carmina Burana on SQ as a new release. Was it the quietest pressing? I'm a former employee of another CBS division. I was less than impressed with any of their classical US pressing of this era, except perhaps the later US Mastersound LP's. Yes, I got lots of promo copies. Still, I didn't find this pressing excessively noisy. In the day, I listened through an AT14sa Audio Technica MM CD-4 cart. More recently, have used Ortofon MC20mkii w/MC transformer T-20.

You are likely experiencing debris in the grooves. Possibly residue from too much cleaning fluid. If you purchased it used, lord only knows what is in those grooves.

BTW: this SQ was CBS' classical release LP of the month at featured dealers $2.99 in '76. Tchaikovsky 4th SQ - Bernstein, and Subotnick: 4 Butterfies SQ were offered other months, as was Wendy/Walter Carlos' 2ch Everything You Wanted.

Orff: Carmina Burana by MTT is currently available from Dutton-Vocalion as a multi-channel SACD release coupled with an MTT Gershwin album. You will need an SACD player to access either the multichannel or hi-res 2ch mix in this SACD. Surface noise issue easily solved. I also bought this and recommend it.

https://www.duttonvocalion.co.uk/proddetail.php?prod=2CDLX7369
We were a Marantz dealer at that time. I have a lot of experience with Marantz and have owned several pieces. 4400 is a truly classic quad piece. Had a great relationship with Marantz/Superscope. Their Midwest HQ was in Itasca, IL just a few miles from our store. We often had demonstrations of forthcoming models in our store. IMHO, your scope will assist you in confirming what synthesized setting works best for any 2ch source.
 
I bought Carmina Burana on SQ as a new release. Was it the quietest pressing? I'm a former employee of another CBS division. I was less than impressed with any of their classical US pressing of this era, except perhaps the later US Mastersound LP's. Yes, I got lots of promo copies. Still, I didn't find this pressing excessively noisy. In the day, I listened through an AT14sa Audio Technica MM CD-4 cart. More recently, have used Ortofon MC20mkii w/MC transformer T-20.

You are likely experiencing debris in the grooves. Possibly residue from too much cleaning fluid. If you purchased it used, lord only knows what is in those grooves.

BTW: this SQ was CBS' classical release LP of the month at featured dealers $2.99 in '76. Tchaikovsky 4th SQ - Bernstein, and Subotnick: 4 Butterfies SQ were offered other months, as was Wendy/Walter Carlos' 2ch Everything You Wanted.

Orff: Carmina Burana by MTT is currently available from Dutton-Vocalion as a multi-channel SACD release coupled with an MTT Gershwin album. You will need an SACD player to access either the multichannel or hi-res 2ch mix in this SACD. Surface noise issue easily solved. I also bought this and recommend it.

https://www.duttonvocalion.co.uk/proddetail.php?prod=2CDLX7369
We were a Marantz dealer at that time. I have a lot of experience with Marantz and have owned several pieces. 4400 is a truly classic quad piece. Had a great relationship with Marantz/Superscope. Their Midwest HQ was in Itasca, IL just a few miles from our store. We often had demonstrations of forthcoming models in our store. IMHO, your scope will assist you in confirming what synthesized setting works best for any 2ch source.
Quad Linda, Thank you for your detailed response. The pressing I have owned since about 1974 or 1975. Even though I did not own a Quad system at the time, I was very much interested in it back then. Although I did take good care of my records, I only used the commonly understood means to clean and store the records without the central source of information that we know call the internet. So its probably a cleaning issue.

But, I always found the incredible range in amplitude that classical recordings have and they don't work well for the records I've purchased with the equipment that I have owned in the past. But again, that could be my cleaning techniques and the copies of the recordings I've owned. There is a live musical recording/ playing effect called compression, where the extreme high's and low's of one or more instruments are equalized to where the lower volume sounds are increased and the higher volume sounds are decreased. When I have my musician hat on either in a recording or in a live setting the compression takes away a lot of the notes that I am playing and I don't feel that the sound is what I intended it to be. But, it does make it easier for the recording engineer to do their job.

I've listened to the Walter/ Wendy Carlos "Switched on Bach," I found to not be a problem playing with the extremes of amplitude that most other classical recordings have. I will assume the reason is because the instruments played were electronic and the musician has more control over the extremes in the recording.

My 4400 was not functioning for a few years and I got it back from repair only a few months ago. One of the problems I had was that the O-scope stopped working. Because of that, I am trying to not use the O-scope too often and I am being careful not to over use it for fear of it burning out. Do you have any experience with the O-scopes burning out?
 
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