Post by nucaleena January 31, 2011 (21 of 30)
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hi rammie, i agree that it's good to see universal still in the business but its at the fringes i'm afraid, - negotiating japanese sites then paying $52 a disc and getting "only" stereo makes it a non-commercial proposition compared to buying in the SACD mainstream. Sigh.
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Post by canonical January 31, 2011 (22 of 30)
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nucaleena said:
1) surely if someone buys a bluray disc because of the audio content and timing, and the artist, then that's effectively an audio purchase and use. E.g. the Schiff bach, - will be bought by q. a few people for the hi res audio, not the fairly dull video of a man playing a piano.
I disagree. The video discs you refer to ... such as Schiff Bach ... are not being produced as audio discs ... they are produced as video discs. For example, Track 1 of Brahms Violin Sonatas Bluray with Mutter is not music .. it is:
Track 1: Opening Credits 38 secs
Track 12 is: Closing credits: 1 min 21 sec
Track 13 is: music again. lol.
If I buy a car because I think it looks nice in the lounge, bully for me ... but it's still a car ... not a piece of furniture. And these are clearly video discs, produced as video discs, marketed as video discs, and ... for most people ... consumed as video discs.
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> 2) Again, were not talking "more stuff" but an adequate run time for, say, Mahler 3rd to be on one disc.
That was EXACTLY my point: SACD already provides enough capacity for Mahler 3 on one disc, in hi-rez ... or basically any complete opera on 1 single disc ... if you drop the hybrid CD compatibility which limits you to 70 minutes. For example:
Britten: War Requiem - Masur
was produced for SACD as 1 disc (single-layer) ... but the same recording on CD is 2 discs. Did it sell well? Nope. Bluray offers no real-world difference or advantage here over SACD: it is exactly the same ... Bluray offers longer running times than CD by dropping CD compatibility.
> 3) Schiff playing Bach on blu ray is definitely NOT the same old DVD/video of a bloke playing a piano. Its a hi-res recording in 24/192 !!
Just out of interest, how do you know it is a 24/192 recording? All I could see stated on the box is PCM 2 and DTS-HD Surround Sound ... which is like saying an SACD is stored in DSD (stereo/mc) ... but how does one know how it was actually recorded?
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> 4)My point was that we in SACD land have lost all the high profile artists within the Universal stable who once, albeit briefly, graced SACD. NOw we have a chance to have them back in hi-res again.
Well:
(a) I don't think we ever lost them ... those discs exist, you can buy them, collect them, and covet them, even if some have sold out and now command high prices.
(b) There are more Universal SACDs coming out this year than I have seen in the last 4 years. The Japanese ones may be very pricey at $50 ... but the Schiff Bach bluray video you mention is not dissimilar at $41 on Amazon. And then you have to listen to your bluray's opening credits, and the closing credits, and the box doesn't fit into your CD rack so you have to store it in the drawer, and you can't play it on your CD player ... Fine if you want a music video /// but otherwise not for me.
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Well, admittedly 4500 yen is a price point at even the audiophile in Japan would think is high. 3300 yen has been the typical price at which the better releases have been pegged at. A regular RBCD of an old recording can go for as little as 1000 yen.
In the end, though, Universal Japan has absolutely no relation to Universal US or Europe. It's akin to Tower Records in Japan and Tower in the US. Japan Tower long ago bought out the rights to the name and is the only Tower that's still running brick and mortar stores (and still quite successfully, I might add) in Japan.
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Post by Phil W February 2, 2011 (24 of 30)
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For those interested, SFS has abandoned DSD recordings. Future discs will be 24/96, per an email from SFS.
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Post by Cilea January 24, 2012 (25 of 30)
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Post by hiredfox January 24, 2012 (26 of 30)
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Thank goodness for that.
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nucaleena said:
3) Schiff playing Bach on blu ray is definitely NOT the same old DVD/video of a bloke playing a piano. Its a hi-res recording in 24/192 !! and that IS a competitor to an audio format, - the video being almost incidental, at least to me.
I hate to disappoint you, but most classical audio/video concert, chamber, opera, ballet Blu-rays are at 48K, including this Schiff disk, which I enjoy very much. I have yet to encounter one A/V BR disk among hundreds I have that is more than 48K. That is using the Display button on my Oppo 93, which provides that information.
The bit depth is not always explicitly given by the Oppo's display feature, but on PCM stereo playback of this disk, the display reads 48K 16b, whereas the Mch DTS-MA HD merely says 48K. I take that to mean it is 48K 24 bit.
It is not totally clear why BR producers are holding down the audio resolution on BR disks. The key reason may be concern for space on the disk, as the hi rez sountrack would gobble up considerably more space, even compressed via DTS - MA HD. It may also be due to the fact that normally a release is done both on BR and DVD. The limitations of DVD may inhibit engineers from using higher recorded resolution, but I am only guessing.
It is a different matter, of course, on audio-only BR's, where there is plenty of space on the disk and audiophiles would demand higher resolution. So, 2L, for example uses 192K, to their credit, and the Oppo display indeed confirms that.
Nontheless, I find the Mch sonics of Blu-rays to be generally quite excellent. I love the sound of SACD, but the added video content on concert Blu-rays is, to me with many BR disks, THE most satisfying home music reproduction experience I know of. I have yet to turn the video off on repeat plays. I always see and hear something new in the performance which keeps me even more immersed in the musical experience.
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Post by SteelyTom January 25, 2012 (28 of 30)
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Great news, indeed, about the John Adams SACD. Both works should benefit from DSD, and the album will be a way to compare MTT's SFSO with de Waart's.
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Post by Hitters January 25, 2012 (29 of 30)
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SteelyTom said:
Great news, indeed, about the John Adams SACD. Both works should benefit from DSD, and the album will be a way to compare MTT's SFSO with de Waart's.
Sure! This is good news. How come we hadn't thought of Adams for SACD before? The media suits his music perfectly.
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Post by seth January 25, 2012 (30 of 30)
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Only 47 minutes -- are they charging full price?
Good to see that they're recording music from their "American Mavericks" Festival, but no "Amériques"? What a huge missed opportunity for the SACD format.
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