Evan
Junior Member
Posts: 99 
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Post by Evan on Mar 22, 2016 5:24:04 GMT
Hello all.
I'm in the market to upgrade my copies of Miles Ahead, Porgy and Bess, and Sketches of Spain. Does anybody have any thoughts on mono vs. stereo for these titles?
I've heard a preference for stereo expressed, even from people who'd normally lean towards mono. Your input would be appreciated.
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Post by bassman on Mar 22, 2016 7:58:06 GMT
Hello all. I'm in the market to upgrade my copies of Miles Ahead, Porgy and Bess, and Sketches of Spain. Does anybody have any thoughts on mono vs. stereo for these titles? I've heard a preference for stereo expressed, even from people who'd normally lean towards mono. Your input would be appreciated. In my humble opinion, the best Miles Ahead is the one made by Phil Schaap in 1995. It is, musically, the same material as the original mono LP version, but based on original stereo master tapes. It is in stereo. However, I don't know if there is a vinyl version of it. The worst Miles Ahead is the Columbia Jazz Masterpieces version, because it consists of quite different material than the original mono LP. I don't like it a bit. |
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Post by gregorythefish on Mar 22, 2016 16:05:58 GMT
no preference here, although if you're super into gil, it's important to remember that his writing was usually meant for large ensembles in a big space, suggesting stereo, but he knew his recordings in that era would only be mono.
tough to say, i fear. i lean to mono because i like the way they look on those rec 6-eye labels and stereo tends to irritate me. i have very bad anxiety about symmetry. it's fascinating, really. so i suppose that was actually no help at all. hooray!
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Post by bassman on Mar 22, 2016 17:22:48 GMT
no preference here, although if you're super into gil, it's important to remember that his writing was usually meant for large ensembles in a big space, suggesting stereo, but he knew his recordings in that era would only be mono. tough to say, i fear. i lean to mono because i like the way they look on those rec 6-eye labels and stereo tends to irritate me. i have very bad anxiety about symmetry. it's fascinating, really. so i suppose that was actually no help at all. hooray! GTF, I suppose you are talking about Miles Ahead ("he knew his recordings in that era would only be mono"), not about Sketches, Porgy, and Quiet Nights, which were issued in both mono and stereo from the start. I have always regretted that Prestige 7120 (Gil Evans & Ten) wasn't recorded to two-track, because Bob Weinstock didn't embark on stereo until 1959 if I am not mistaken. In fact, I wonder why Rudy Van Gelder was still recording to full track (or was he??) for Prestige in late 1957, while at the same time recording to two-track for Blue Note. Does anyone know? |
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Post by gregorythefish on Mar 23, 2016 14:33:25 GMT
i guess i should clarify: gil didn't have much control over panning in those days, i don't think.
am i wrong about this? did gil have the ability to tell the engineers which instruments to put in which channel? because early stereo was basically just hard panning.
as for blue note/prestige, i imagine that rvg did as his bosses asked for mono/stereo recording.
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Post by bassman on Mar 23, 2016 15:39:45 GMT
i guess i should clarify: gil didn't have much control over panning in those days, i don't think. am i wrong about this? did gil have the ability to tell the engineers which instruments to put in which channel? because early stereo was basically just hard panning. as for blue note/prestige, i imagine that rvg did as his bosses asked for mono/stereo recording. You're right about hard panning in early stereo, but it doesn't really bother me. Gil's "New Bottle Old Wine", recorded just a few months after "Gil Evans & Ten" (not by RVG), is a little bit on the hard-panned side too, but I rather like the increased contrast between sections and the clarity of solo instruments in the recording. Anyhow, I may be biased in these matters, analytical if you like. Given the choice, I tend to prefer stereo in those late-fifties recordings. |
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Post by alunsevern on Mar 24, 2016 9:24:08 GMT
Personally, I would want these in stereo, I think, because of the greater complexity of the instrumental parts and the larger line-up. My MILES AHEAD is a Japanese pressing from the early-90s, I think, and seems an improvement on other (non-original) versions I have owned. My SKETCHES (and KIND OF BLUE for that matter) are very early-2000s issues from Classic Records in its Quiex SVP pressings series and these are the best versions I have ever heard -- although I don't and can't include original pressings in that comparison, never having heard one.
Further life of me I can't remember what PORGY AND BESS I have. I seem to remember upgrading a Columbia Jazz Masterpieces LP to something else but I'm damned if I can remember what. I shall have to check.
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Post by bassman on Mar 24, 2016 14:00:03 GMT
Personally, I would want these in stereo, I think, because of the greater complexity of the instrumental parts and the larger line-up. My MILES AHEAD is a Japanese pressing from the early-90s, I think, and seems an improvement on other (non-original) versions I have owned. My SKETCHES (and KIND OF BLUE for that matter) are very early-2000s issues from Classic Records in its Quiex SVP pressings series and these are the best versions I have ever heard -- although I don't and can't include original pressings in that comparison, never having heard one. Further life of me I can't remember what PORGY AND BESS I have. I seem to remember upgrading a Columbia Jazz Masterpieces LP to something else but I'm damned if I can remember what. I shall have to check. Alun, is your Japanese "Miles Ahead" in stereo? If it is, then in all probability the music is not the same as on the original mono LP. Up to 1995, when Phil Schaap painstakingly collected and restored the stereo versions of the takes used on the original mono LP, the music existed only in mono. This new, definitive stereo version is part of The Complete Columbia Studio Recordings of Miles Davis & Gil Evans and, as I said before, I don't know if it is available on vinyl. The earlier Columbia Jazz Masters edition is stereo, but from different (and musically inferior) takes. |
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Post by alunsevern on Mar 24, 2016 14:10:46 GMT
Interesting question, bassman, and I have no idea. I will check and report back. I must admit that until you mentioned it i had no idea that other versions were from different takes / material. And while i know of Phil Schaap from his radio show -- a US friend used to send me cassettes of his shows -- i had no idea that he had prepared an edition of MILES AHEAD for release. Watch this space. Or - to be accurate - the one below it  |
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Evan
Junior Member
Posts: 99
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Post by Evan on Mar 25, 2016 9:17:17 GMT
Thanks, all of you, for your help.
Bassman, it will have to be a record because I don't own a CD player at the moment. I'll keep that CD in mind though, for comparison's sake, in the future.
Despite GTF's asymmetry phobia I'm inclined to pursue these titles in stereo. I can't help but feel that, with the amount of instruments involved, the stereo will afford greater space to each, much as I like mono.
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Evan
Junior Member
Posts: 99
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Post by Evan on Mar 25, 2016 9:19:14 GMT
... i know of Phil Schaap from his radio show -- a US friend used to send me cassettes of his shows ... Old school! |
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Post by alunsevern on Mar 25, 2016 10:29:58 GMT
Bassman, I now have my copy of MILES AHEAD in front of me -- actually it's on the turntable -- and it is this:
Miles Ahead: Miles Davis + 19, CBS/Sony Inc (Tokyo Japan), 1977, 25AP 752, mono.
I now remember that I bought this along with a number of other 1970s Japanese repressings jay a few years ago that my regular dealer had bought in from a collection that included many Japanese LPs in astonishingly good condition.
Now, whether this makes it a good version of MILES AHEAD or not, I must say I have no idea.
And while we're on the subject, my PORGY & BESS is I believe a Canadian first pressing, a deep plum label Columbia six-eye, CL 1274, in mono, for which I paid GBP25.00 in December 2012, according to the note I scribbled on the inner sleeve.
This thread has prompted me to pull these records and play them after far too long a time away from them -- SKETCHES has been the Miles/Gil record I have returned to most in recent months.
I am listening to AHEAD with immense pleasure.
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Post by bassman on Mar 25, 2016 13:18:33 GMT
( ... ) Bassman, I now have my copy of MILES AHEAD in front of me -- actually it's on the turntable -- and it is this: Miles Ahead: Miles Davis + 19, CBS/Sony Inc (Tokyo Japan), 1977, 25AP 752, mono. ( ... ) Alun, I can't tell you how "good" your MILES AHEAD is from a collector's point of view, but it certainly has the original music, in very good sound. I have always been a sucker for those gorgeous final chords on tracks 5 and 10, i.e. at the end of each side of the original LP, displaying Gil's cunning use of harmonics to create that eerie, bell-like sound. They are much less impressive on the aforementioned CBS Jazz Masterpieces stereo version from 1987, because - as I said - they stem from different takes. But they are there on Phil Schaap's version, in stereo. BTW for anyone who wants SKETCHES without Miles (but who would, anyway?), the "Complete Columbia ..." has a "Concierto" with Gil conducting and Miles just listening. Just for the record. |
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Post by alunsevern on Mar 25, 2016 18:11:57 GMT
I shall listen out for eerie bell-like harmonics, bassman. gIl could do extraordinary things with instrument combinations. There is a passage on SKETCHES - it is mentioned in the sleeve notes, if I remember correctly - where tympani play beneath something or other (I can't remember what) and you hear it more as air pressure than sound, and I think Gil says that he wanted just a cushion of air to support the trombones or trumpet or whatever, and extraordinarily that is exactly how one experiences it...
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Post by alunsevern on Mar 29, 2016 13:10:50 GMT
Evan, It seems I should think and investigate before I reply -- as it turns out that i possess moon versions of two our of the three records you mention, and not stereo, as i said my preference was. Bassman's observations mad eye check - and think again. As i said above, my PORGY is a mono Canadian Columbia first pressing, and my MILES AHEAD is CBS/Sony Inc (Tokyo Japan), 1977, also mono. Sorry. It would appear that my a process of elimination i have, over the years, settled on mono for these two but stereo for SKETCHES.
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