July PAAG Meeting Featuring Jim Anderson

[MylesBAstor]

PAAG members enjoying the excellent spread provided by Art of Sound!




The downstairs "The Cave" listening room where the water entered the mill in the 1800s!



Lot's of members could be found at the bar!

[MylesBAstor]

Moving upstairs, the Home Theater room where the pulp was processed.



The Demo Gallery room featuring the Sonus Faber Il Cremonese speakers, Devialet and Merrill Audio electronics and an EAT turntable.

[MylesBAstor]

Spencer Bank, President of the PAAG, introducing guest speaker Jim Anderson.



Featured guest speaker Jim Anderson.




Tracks from the long time audiophile favorite Cafe Blue.




The recording layout for the recording of Cafe Blue.



One of the echo chamber/reverb chambers from the famed Capitol Studios.

[MylesBAstor]

PAAG Meeting Art of Sound

Nestled into the sleepy little village of Lambertville, NJ lies the high-end audio store Art of Sound. Now I’m sure if you are like most people your first reaction is where in tarnation is Lambertville, NJ? Luckily, I knew the area well having grown up 20 or so minutes north of Lambertville in Clinton, NJ. For the rest of you, Lambertville is a pretty area located just across the Delaware River from the well-known town of New Hope, Pennsylvania. Like its neighbor across the Delaware River New Hope, Lambertville is known for its arts community as well as culture. Coming back from the PAAG (Philadelphia Area Audio Group) Meeting even allowed me to relive a bit of my youth when we passed through Flemington, NJ and I reminisced to AN member Beau Ranheim who was kind enough to give me a lift to the event about all the stores that I had worked for as a teenager not to mention had come and gone over the many years.

According to Art of Sound owner John Neiermaier, his store has been in its present location on S. Main St. for around 15 months. And few high-end audio stores have a more idyllic setting than Art of Sound. Located in an old 1800’s paper mill, you get the feeling you are walking into a museum than a high-end audio store. The old 1800’s mill is divided into four listening rooms including “The Cave” (where the water entered the mill), The Living Room, The (upstairs) Theater (where the pulp was processed) and The Demo Gallery.

Downstairs at the Art of Audio is also something rarely seen in a high-end audio stores: a beautiful, built-in bar that make visitors feel right at home and home to their beverage of choice. John’s product lines currently include the likes of Sonus Faber, Devialet, Merrill Audio, EAT and Project turntables, Audioquest, Ortofon, Dynaudio, Martin-Logan, Primaluna, BAT and a few more lines.

The July PAAG meeting featured Jim Anderson, Professor (and ex-chairman) at NYU in the Clive Davis Institute of Recorded Music and renowned for his Patricia Barber recordings. Jim gave a wonderful presentation not unlike my interview with him several years ago published in Positive Feedback where at that time covered Premonition Record’s releasing of Café Blue on 15 ips reel-to-reel tape. On this day, Jim shared with the eager audience the ins and outs of the original 1992 recording of Café Blue, then moving onto the later 2011 remixing done at Capitol Studios in Los Angeles. As many have already heard, the major difference between the 1992 and 2011 releases was a change in natural reverb. The original 1992 release was as Jim said, “slathered” in reverb from the stairwell at Chicago Recording Company. The 2011 Café Blue remix allowed Jim to use Capitol’s famed reverb chambers to among other things, improve upon the recording’s reverb sound.

Jim started off the music portion of his presentation with the “What a Shame” track from Café Blue and then continued onto “The Thrill is Gone” and “Ode to Billy Joe.” Jim added that he preferred using natural reverb on his recordings such as that used in the Capitol Studios remix rather than the much more commonly used electronic echo. As an aside, Jim mentioned that one can hear the siren from an emergency vehicle going by if you listen carefully on Modern Cool (on one percussion solo) because of the sound being fed in the stairwell at Chicago Recording Company.

Jim also mentioned that if you listen very carefully you hear a difference between the reverb on the finger snaps and Barber’s voice “Ode to Billy Joe.” The difference are because Jim used chamber 3 at Capitol for Barber’s voice and chamber 4 for the finger snaps.

The next track “Too Rich for My Blood” also came with another interesting bit of trivia. It turns out that this song was licensed and used in one of the episodes of Zalman King’s HBO produced soft porn series Red Shoe Diaries.

Doug Sax had his hands full cutting the next track, “A Taste of Honey,” according Jim. The egg shaker in particular Jim shared, “extended out indefinitely and was causing some big issues with the cutter head.” As a result, Jim and Doug decided to de-ess the shaker so the lathe could cut render the instrument. In addition, Jim pointed out, “A Taste of Honey” was the only track on the album with overdubs of the bongos and shakers.”

A wonderful way to spend a Sunday afternoon and a big shout out to the PAAG for arranging this fascinating meeting!

[sbank]

Myles, glad that you were able to join us for this event. Jim is certainly a fascinating guy and very accomplished engineer. We are grateful that he agreed to share his insights with us on Sunday.

Time is always a factor or we would have added more to the agenda considering the attendees who included:

Jim's wife, Ulrike Schwarz, is also an incredibly successful recording engineer with many awards for projects including the BR Klassik recording of Beethoven #9 by Jansons/Bavaria Radio Symphony Orchestra. With stints studying jazz piano at Berklee and as a Govenor of AES, she is amazing in her own right. I can only imagine the music-focused conversations at their family gatherings!

David Hewitt, the "King of Remote Recording", director of remote recording for The Record Plant Studios in NYC and then the as the proprietor of his Remote Recording Services remote truck based in Lahaska, David has a forty year history of engineering countless live recordings at the highest level, from George Harrison's Concert for Bangala Desh, to The King Biscuit Flower Hour, Live Aid, and many PBS TV specials, including The New York Philharmonic and The Metropolitan Opera.

David Waldman, Nashville studio guitarist who recorded with everyone from Dolly to Willie and Project Manager for Sony Music including work on audiophile Vinyl (Classic Records, DCC, Mobile Fidelity), Louis Armstrong Box Set (Grammy Winner), "Kind of Blue" (audiophile vinyl). David also has written for many publications including Guitar Player Magazine.

Although constraints didn't allow each of these guests to present, many of us merely human music lovers were thrilled to get a chance to engage them in casual conversation in John's beautiful store.

[MylesBAstor]

Myles, glad that you were able to join us for this event. Jim is certainly a fascinating guy and very accomplished engineer. We are grateful that he agreed to share his insights with us on Sunday.

Time is always a factor or we would have added more to the agenda considering the attendees who included:

Jim's wife, Ulrike Schwarz, is also an incredibly successful recording engineer with many awards for projects including the BR Klassik recording of Beethoven #9 by Jansons/Bavaria Radio Symphony Orchestra. With stints studying jazz piano at Berklee and as a Govenor of AES, she is amazing in her own right. I can only imagine the music-focused conversations at their family gatherings!

David Hewitt, the "King of Remote Recording", director of remote recording for The Record Plant Studios in NYC and then the as the proprietor of his Remote Recording Services remote truck based in Lahaska, David has a forty year history of engineering countless live recordings at the highest level, from George Harrison's Concert for Bangala Desh, to The King Biscuit Flower Hour, Live Aid, and many PBS TV specials, including The New York Philharmonic and The Metropolitan Opera.

David Waldman, Nashville studio guitarist who recorded with everyone from Dolly to Willie and Project Manager for Sony Music including work on audiophile Vinyl (Classic Records, DCC, Mobile Fidelity), Louis Armstrong Box Set (Grammy Winner), "Kind of Blue" (audiophile vinyl). David also has written for many publications including Guitar Player Magazine.

Although constraints didn't allow each of these guests to present, many of us merely human music lovers were thrilled to get a chance to engage them in casual conversation in John's beautiful store.

Spencer thanks for the invite and great to see you there. Thanks for the additional info!

Glad to have you aboard!

[GaryB]

PAAG Meeting Art of Sound

Nestled into the sleepy little village of Lambertville, NJ lies the high-end audio store Art of Sound. Now I’m sure if you are like most people your first reaction is where in tarnation is Lambertville, NJ? Luckily, I knew the area well having grown up 20 or so minutes north of Lambertville in Clinton, NJ. For the rest of you, Lambertville is a pretty area located just across the Delaware River from the well-known town of New Hope, Pennsylvania . . .

Myles,
Thanks for sharing the story of the latest PAAG meeting. I'm living in California now but I grew up in NJ, not too far from Lambertville, in Lawrenceville. I've got very fond memories of walking along the canals, window shopping, and just generally enjoying the lovely scenery. Haven't been back there in about 4 years. Now there's another reason to go there - the chance to listen to some great systems.
Cheers,
---Gary

[1morerecord2clean]

Cheers to all my PAAG audio friends. Haven't been to a meeting but still think about all those folks.

Mark Brodie

[sbank]

Cheers to all my PAAG audio friends. Haven't been to a meeting but still think about all those folks.

Mark Brodie

Mark, your 3000 mile commute distance is reasonable justification for missing most meetings, but we'll hope to see you again whenever you get back to the east coast for a visit.
Go Padres...I guess. :-)

[1morerecord2clean]

Thanks Spencer. Always good to know you guys are still kicking.