I would love to hear this new digital reissue from Decca. Such a GREAT Ring cycle. I once had all the Solti Ring operas on LP and they were marvelous performances and recordings.
A note about this particular thread, however. We are trying to keep this thread limited to discussions of releases from the reissue company High Definition Tape Transfers, also referred to as HDTT. Not transfers from tape generally. The goal is to have a thread folks can scan when considering ordering something from the HDTT catalog and wondering what would be good.
Thanks for the kind welcomes. This thread has been quite helpful to me, though I blame it entirely for destroying my music budget over the last couple weeks…
Ive been shadowing this thread for a while, having been a tape user in the past, and I’ve been considering getting a dsd album or two, basically to see how my streamer copes.
I have one DAC that talks dsd.
The one mentioned sounds like it may be worth a go for me, but in addition, as a special interest of mine, is anyone aware of a hdtt release featuring some well played (and recorded) vibraphone, which I guess means a jazz release?
Cheers
Vibraphone, yeah, great place to start now that I think about it. That special glow that hangs in the air can be really disarmingly real.
I can’t speak to any specific HDTT release but if you go to their home page and type an artist into the search field, it will pop up several titles before you even click Search of albums by or including that name. So the usual suspects of Gary Burton, Bobby Hutcherson, Milt Jackson etc do show some hits. None of which I have and can comment on. Yet.
The vibes in this beautifully recorded DSD256 recording is simply about the best I’ve heard from any recording I’ve ever heard. So rich and so much body! The sound from Joe’s plucking of his acoustic bass and the other’s instruments played are not bad either! Only thing is I didn’t want the music to stop. I wish the album was much longer.
After a lot of testing and experimentation, HDTT is expanding it’s catalog to include a new VRR series of transfers from vinyl. This is the first – a transfer from an original pressing RCA Living Stereo LP. And it sounds stunningly good for a needle drop. No surface noise, very clean, very quiet. It sounds like my memory of this LP: just slightly lacking in ultimate transparency and a little plummy. But the frequency extension and dynamics are very good. Bob writes about the decision to start offering transfers from LPs HERE and provides a free downloadable sample track at 24/192 resolution. As he cautions: make no prejudgments just because it’s not from tape. In some cases, given advances in LP playback and the aging of the source tapes, the vinyl may actually sound better.
Interesting! You are probably right saying “…for a needledrop”. I never heard a needledrop sounding comparable to the vinyl so far, not even from the best possible scenario (Acoustic Sounds DSD needledrop release of Ahmad Jamal Alhambra Alto Edition done with quite expensive gear - even more so than HDTT). No clue why this still was such a noticable step from the LP, although theoretically it should be possible to catch quite a bit of the real thing.
