| Review by DSD July 20, 2005 (2 of 12 found this review helpful)
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Performance:  Sonics:  |
Sad to say I am very disappointed in the new Water Lily Acoustic SACD. It is a pure DSD recording made in the great St. Petersburg's Hall using only 2 microphones.
Where's the Bass? Where's the midrange warmth? This is the coldest, driest classical recording I have ever heard and one of the worst sounding SACDs ever. What went wrong Kavi Alexander? The only thing I can think of is he had the two microphones in the worst possible place. The old Water Lily Nature's Realm SACD which is on the cold/dry side sounds fantastic compared to this one. Nature's Realm had the excuse of being recorded in a poor hall, but St. Petersburg is a great hall.
Update 08/11/05: The performances of both works on this SACD are superb and would be quite enjoyable if only the sound quality was better.
Mark Wagner my review was originally posted here and I quoted it on the Audio Asylum only.
Robert E. Green wanted to know my motivation for posting a negative review of this SACD. It is a WARNING that this recording is too flawed to be enjoyed and I am one of Water Lily’s biggest fans so it was not an easy thing to say. If this recording sounds correct as REG says then all the other Water Lily recordings sound wrong. If this recording has “plenty of bass” then all the other Water Lily and other audiophile recordings have 50 times too much bass. But unlike every recording I have every bought in a digital format there was NO LOW FREQUENCY RESPONSE below about 100Hz, none, nothing. The bass was even more rolled off than 30 minute sided LPs. I have NO IDEA where the bass went but it is not there. And low frequency energy is there in abundance in every concert hall I have had the privilege enjoying music in.
And Kavi Alexander has never given me a straight answer on where the low frequencies when to. Just for reference the Nature's Realm also on WaterLily has tons of low frequency energy. So where is the bass on the Skryabin/Svetlanov SACD? Also because of the missing low frequency energy the basses and cellos sound threadbare and super thin. No midrange warmth, the coldest, driest classical recording I have ever heard and one of the worst sounding SACDs ever.
I have not heard the new WaterLily Shostakovich or Mahler Symphonies so maybe they are better?
Here is my equipment and I listened in 2 channel stereo: Xindak SCD-2 Super Audio CD / CD Player with E88CC Tubes, Stereo Vacuum tube Pre-Amp CVT 1030, Adcom GFA-555II - 325 Watts per channel into 4 ohm Infinity Reference Standard 7 Kappa 3 way Floor Standing Speakers with 12 inch woofers, 3 inch midranges and EMIT tweeters designed by Arnie Nudel before he left Infinity.
Headphones: SENNHEISER HD 580 DYNAMIC HEADPHONE Frequency Response: 12-38,000 Hz . Power cord is Xandak PC-03 and speaker cables are Monster Cable PowerLine Plus, which is as thick as garden hose.
I play my system in the “Audio Direct” mode with tone controls by-passed and it produces deep, deep Bass with great intensity, presence and power when there is bass energy in the recording. Most of WaterLily’s recordings have excellent low frequency response including Nature’s Realm with the Philadelphia Orchestra, John Hassell and the delightful east meets west recordings. Orchestral recordings need extended low frequency response and this SACD has none.
To read my review Kavi Alexander's great orchestral SACD click here:
Nature's Realm - Philadelphia Orchestra/Sawallisch
Teresa
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| Review by mwagner1962 August 5, 2005 (9 of 10 found this review helpful)
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Performance:  Sonics: |
I usually do not make references to other reviews, but sadly, DSD has brought the same catty comments from another terrible audio site to this quality site. Funny, no comments were made about the music. Sadly, DSD does not even bother to list what gear was used to audition this SACD.
I will counter by saying that this recording has plenty of bass, midrange, spacing, imaging. This is NOT a cold nor dry recording, and the sound ranks up there with the Shostakovich 7th and Mahler 5 that WaterLily did in the same hall. Of course, since it is a live recording, coughing is as serious a problem on this recording as on the other two WaterLily SACDs.
The performance of the Skryabin is top notch. The only other recording I had (sadly, it got scratched) was a Chandos with Jarvi and Chicago. I have played this piece and am well familiar with the trumpet solos as well as the piece as a whole. The trumpet soloist is quite fine here. There is plenty of nice string sound, and I have no problems with bass (on my meager system NOR on the massive systems I have as alternatives to listen with). There is plenty of emotion, and Maestro Dmitriev gets some fine playing from his forces. Special nods to the woodwinds.
The Skryabin is simply top notch, both in sound and in performance.
I cannot comment of the Svetlanov Piano Concerto, as I was not even aware that Yevgeny Svetlanov was a composer. However, the piece is enjoyable though not overwhelmingly convincing. Mr. Ovchinnikov's piano playing is superb, as it should be for a previous Tchaikovsky Piano Competition winner. Not being a piano player, all I can say is that the soloist displays a high level of virtuosity that makes for a convincing performance. I would rather hear the same pianist perform a concerto by, say, Rachmaninoff or Tchaikovsky to at least have another recording to compare performances.
Anyone who actually reads the booklet will understand the problems encountered by Kavi Alexander. There were no extra sessions, no sound checks, nothing...it was show up, set up the Mic's, and roll the tape. To DSD, if you want to hear a truly terrible SACD, listen to the EBS Mahler 5, with the Wurttemburgische Phil under Iimori. Then you tell me if the this WaterLily is still "the most terrible SACD made".....
Cheers.
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| Review by regtas43 August 5, 2005 (7 of 10 found this review helpful)
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Performance: Sonics: |
The review by DSD is entirely off the mark in my opinion. (I worked on the surround sound on the other two recent Waterlily orchestral recordings and have heard all three of the recordings not only on many private audiophile systems, including my own calibrated reference monitoring system, but also on the ultra-high-quality monitoring facility at the DSD mastering facility in Colorado, which far exceeds in accuracy almost anything a consumer is likely to have. I know what these recordings actually sound like!).
I am not sure what the motivation is of this Teresa person for posting the same (verbatim) negative comments on several different web sites, but I do urge you to ignore these remarks , which are totally incorrect in my view and in the opinions of many other listeners, both consumers and professionals.
If you want to see more accurate reviews from consumers, try MWagner on this site, who makes a far far more accurate assessment in my view. And if you would like to see some professional reviews, please go to my website www.regonaudio.com and click on the links(on the front page) to John Sunier's Audiophile Audition and to the review in Postive Feedback.
Thanks ,Robert E. Greene(of The Absolute Sound)
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| Review by sacd_fan_2007 March 3, 2008 (2 of 2 found this review helpful)
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Performance: Sonics: |
After enjoying two rbcd recordings of Scriabin's Poem of Ecstasy (Jarvi/CSO and Muti/PO), I decided to find more of Scriabin's orchestral on disc. At the same time I wanted to hear what all the fuss was about WaterLily Accoustics on SACD.
Starting with Scriabin's Symphony 3 "The Devine Poem": The orchestra sections under this conductor did such a great job of balancing in performance that I feel the minimalist two mic analog tape approach used in recording was highly effective. The Poem of Ecstasy on digital source rbcd could strain my ears because Scriabin used such thick orchestration with many orchestra sections playing simultaneously. However, the Water Lily sound of this recording is smooth, round, and never strained (although it does take a few moments to adjust to). As mentioned before in other reviews and discussion, Water Lily does almost zero editing. While I understand their argument that even editing one short fragment of sound could set Water Lily down a slippery slope towards a dishonest recording, I believe that protecting the composer's few measures of intentional silence or pause is worth the risk. Audience coughing is inevitable at any live performance, but as you listen through a movement of Scriabin's lush and day-dreamy music and reach a few measures of intended silence... a shrill audience cough intrudes upon this serenity and defeats the composer's intention. Perhaps Water Lily can be more open-minded in future projects about such intrusion? It's all about the music isn't it?
The Svetlanov Piano Concerto portion of the disc is pleasant but forgettable. Let's face it, Svetlanov does not belong to the same class of genius with Scriabin. With limited time and budget for building and enjoying a record collection, the inclusion of the Svetlanov here is disappointing. I'm guessing the artists involved felt they owed this to their late colleague. I would have much preferred more of Scriabin's work on this disc.
Overall, I like this disc, but I CANNOT give it a strong recommendation. Hopefully, more of Scriabin's great music will turn up on SACD in the future.
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| Review by Jonalogic August 13, 2010 (5 of 6 found this review helpful)
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Performance:  Sonics: |
Wow, there seems to be a real debate about this one, so I thought I'd add my tu'pence worth.
On my (very) high-end Esoteric/Goldmund/Martin Logan stereo setup, this is a remarkably transparent, lucid and realistic recording. It's actually far more dimensional, tonally even and comfortable to listen to the Water Lily Shostakovich 7.
Minimalist two-mike recordings like this , if done well, can offer unsurpassed coherence and truthfulness. However, if you:
1) Are not used to the absolute sound of a real orchestra playing in a real auditorium;
2) Are conditioned to the multi-miked, spot-lit phase-incoherent sound of pop productions
3) Have cloth ears or duff equipment...
Then you might just not get it.
However, let us not deny that the music here is distinctly underwhelming, as are the rather sluggish performances by Petersburg's 2nd-division radio band.
I hope for more from Water Lily's Mahler 5, with the REAL Premier-league Petersburg orchestra and recognised conductor, playing great music. This now seems to be back in availability after a period when it disappeared from view. More on this, anon.
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