Real DSD 64, DSD 128, DSD 256 & DXD Master Recordings
Our vision is to make Direct Stream Digital (DSD) music downloads available to listeners anywhere in the world. This includes obtaining original DSD Edit Masters as well as Analog Master Tapes that are transferred to DSD. Bringing you, the listener, as close to the original performance as possible.
In the last eight years, the NativeDSD platform has seen tremendous growth. Today offering over 2,400 albums from over 85 labels – all available in DSD (and sometimes DXD). More record labels are joining this platform store as DSD is becoming the go-to format for acoustic recorded music.
NativeDSD Music created the first-ever DSD 512 Sampler album in May 2019 to coincide with one of the largest audio shows of the world – Munich High End – as content for hardware partners presenting new DACs and Players capable of DSD 512 playback. Read more about DSD 512 and how this is created in this help article.
Founders
NativeDSD.com was founded in 2013 and launched early in 2014 by Jared Sacks (Channel Classics Records founder and recording engineer) and his son Jonas (cinematographer and music/web enthusiast). Starting out with just the Channel Classics Records catalogue and two other small labels with about 170 albums (in DSD at the time), their goal was to create a central place where highest resolution music fans could go to find the best quality recordings in the world in both Stereo and Multichannel, directly from labels recording in DSD and/or DXD.
As a professional musician, when I became a classical music label owner, it was my passion to not only bring great music to our listeners, but also to transfer the emotion of that music’s creation. I found that recording in DSD best met that need, and it is why we started this platform.
The listeners at home now hear what the recording engineers, musicians, and mastering engineers heard in the recording: the sound, levels, balance, interpretation, ambiance, overtones, and the emotions – exactly the way they are intended to be heard.
— Jared Sacks
Artists and engineers are my favorite type of people. When I started photographing and filming artist for Jared’s label Channel Classics, I knew I wanted to be involved in a bigger part of the production process.
Starting this platform was an answer to that longing, delivering the beautiful engineering done by my father and all the other labels of course, to a worldwide audience. I would like to expand NativeDSD’s offerings to include more video as I think it can increase the emotional involvement of the listener.
— Jonas Sacks
The Team
NativeDSD.com would be nowhere without a small and dedicated team that keep the site up to date, ingest the deliveries made by the labels and update the individual album pages with reviews.
Jared, having grown up in Boston Massachusetts, schooled at Oberlin Conservatory and the Amsterdam Conservatory of music with 15 years of experience playing French Horn, decided to make his hobby of recording a profession in 1987. The label started in 1990 with the name Channel Classics coming from the street he lived on in Amsterdam. His extensive DSD recording experience and the network were the grounding spirit for NativeDSD.com
Jonas, growing up in a musical family/business, started producing and shooting interviews and musical essays with artists for his dad’s classical music record label Channel Classics in The Netherlands. While earning a Bachelor Degree in Audiovisual Media Design at the Utrecht School of the Arts (Netherlands, ‘08) he worked on numerous short narrative films, commercials, docs and music videos as a cinematographer. Later on he was admitted to the American Film Institute for the Cinematography Master Program in Los Angeles. His visual interests combined with technical can-do mentality were the founding force behind Native.
David is Product and Communications Manager, responsible for making sure all the new releases end up in the correct place after being in extensive contact with the Producers, Engineers and Artists making the recordings.
Tom is our Mastering Engineer. He will take any DSD or DXD file and make sure that it is up to our standard before publishing it for sale in the store’s catalogue.
Ted is our Technical Advisor from the start, he knows all things JRiver, Tagging, Archiving, and gives listeners a lot of feedback on the gear involved to get it all audible.
Brian came on the team as a Technical Advisor after being a customer for a brief time. Soon he had so much feedback for our improvement that we just could not do without anymore. He has an integral part in making sure all the posted information is up to date and is on the lookout for new music to add to the catalog.
Bill is our Senior Reviewer and guide through it all. He will review any music we throw at him. As a professional Radio broadcaster, he has a lot of listening experience, and shares his findings in the blog.
Marian handles all the numbers at the accounting desk. NativeDSD pays out to the participating labels every month directly, and it is all handled by her!
Sjoerd has been the head developer for native from the start, he has numerous other projects which makes him very versatile.
Paul is development supervisor since 2023; he has an extensive background in various codebases making him a great fit for NativeDSD.
Baha joined as a developer in 2023 and works with Paul on the various backend improvement we are performing to welcome more labels and music.
Give it a Try
We welcome you to try our free Welcome to NativeDSD Sampler and give us your thoughts. Many people have written on our Trustpilot page about their own findings. In addition to the Native DSD website and newsletter, we also have Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook profile that we invite you to follow to get updates about music and gear in the DSD world.
Cheers to your ears!
Jared, Jonas & The NativeDSD team
2013
Jared and son Jonas start brainstorming an idea for the company. They decide on Native DSD Music. Which later is compacted as NativeDSD Music. Today, ‘NativeDSD’ is a much recognized name in the audiophile industry.
Mid 2013 the website is developed and launches in a beta form in December 2013.
2014
At CES 2014 in Las Vegas, we get together with the founding team for the first time and launch the store. We talk to industry leaders and brands that are in the same realm of business and answer many questions listeners have. CES is not traditionally a place where audiophiles visit, so our stand was still quiet.
On January 7, 2014, the site is available to the public!
Starting with just 5 labels, NativeDSD marks the beginning of offering original recorded DSD content to a worldwide public, as tagged .dsf files. Starting out with just the Channel Classics Records catalogue, harmonia mundi and few other small labels with about 180 albums (in DSD at the time), their goal was to create a central place where highest resolution music fans could go to find the best quality recordings in the world in both Stereo and Multichannel, directly from labels recording in DSD and/or DXD.
2015
In 2015, NativeDSD is recognized by Positive Feedback and receives the PF Brutus Award, 2015.
2017
For 2017, (received in January 2018) NativeDSD is again awarded the Positive Feedback Brutus Award.
2018
For 2018, (received in Jan 2019) NativeDSD is again awarded the PF Brutus Award.
2019
NativeDSD Music created the first-ever DSD 512 Sampler album in May 2019 to coincide with one of the largest audio shows of the world – Munich High End – as content for hardware partners presenting new DACs and Players capable of DSD 512 playback. Read more about DSD 512 and how this is created in this help article.
Later in that year, NativeDSD again received recognition from Positive Feedback in form of the Brutus Award.
2020
In 2020 we made some big changes. We launched a completely new, built from the ground up website that allows us to handle more traffic, offer bundled products, a faster catalog browse page, comprehensive filtering and more.
Downloader
In December of 2020 we release an improved version of the NativeDSD Downloader. An app that can be used on Mac and Windows to offer more controlled track-by-track downloads, which significantly improves the rate of download success. As the ever-increasing file sizes are sometimes tricky to download, especially in more remote areas, the app provides a long awaited feature.
At the beginning of 2021, NativeDSD is honored to receive the Brutus Award from Positive Feedback’s David Robinson for the fifth time.
He writes: “The team at NativeDSD remains strongly committed to DSD and provides reasonable pricing for downloads at their site. You’ll find classical, jazz, some experimental rock, and some ambient music there, with a track sampling function that allows you to try before you buy.”
2021
In 2021, we have made two updates to our downloader app and welcomed several new labels to the store this year.
2022
In addition to our yearly subscription to NativeDSD Plus, we not also offer a monthly subscription. Flac 96 and Flac 192 rates are now included as well in the lower rates access, as a plus member.
Various updates to the NativeDSD Downloader.
2023
We built a feature that allow linux users to download their purchases from the browser, since the NativeDSD Downloader is only available for Mac and Win users at this time.
Added an extensive and bigger main menu at the top of the site, allowing for quicker access to key parts of the store.
2024
We launched the doofinder search feature, allowing you to find and discover new music more easily, and above all, very fast!
