Search - Johann Sebastian Bach, George Frederick Handel, Boris Pillin :: Double-Reed Ensemble

Great Except Audio Quality

Gary Morrison | Austin, TX United States | 02/20/2004

(3 out of 5 stars)

"This is an excellent CD for double-reed enthusiasts, if it were not for some audio-quality problems that seem highly likely to be in the recording master itself, and not in my particular copy of the CD itself. In particular, the left channel periodically drops out. It does so on at least three CD players I've tried, and it does so reproduceably in the same places on the CD, so there's no doubt that the problem is on this CD rather than the players. The reasons why I'm pretty confident that it's on Crystal's master are: First, if it were a manufacturing problem with the CD, there would be bit dropouts which would result in clicks or tracking problems, and there are no such problems. Second, when the left drops out, it drops out only partially, and volume changes can't occur digitally on playback.Other than that though, the performances and choice of music on this CD are generally good, spanning a curious combination of Baroque and modern styles. My only substantial complaint is that the contrabassoonist's sound is a tad buzzy."