The album is a beautiful and, at times, delicate work filled with subtle colors and emotional depth, yet interwoven with moments of vehement drama. Lex Jasper’s piano takes center stage, gracefully complemented by Vincent Koning’s guitar, Frans van Geest’s bass, and Gijs Dijkhuizen’s drums. The chemistry within the quartet is unmistakable, creating a profound experience with every note—this is musical mastery in its purest form.

The magical atmosphere of the legendary Vara (MCO) Studio 2, with its warm acoustics, coupled with the superb recording and production techniques of Sound Liaison, brings every nuance of this live performance to life. Available at NativeDSD in Stereo DSD 512, DSD 256, DSD 128, DSD 64, DXD and PCM 768k from the PCM768k Edit Master source. 

“The wise musicians are those who play what they can master”.- Duke Ellington

Lex Jasper has enjoyed a remarkable career, performing alongside legends such as Shirley Bassey, Toots Thielemans, Stéphane Grappelli, and Joe Pass. As well as conducting, arranging, and composing for the renowned Metropole Orchestra.

Lex Jasper Quartet
Lex Jasper, Piano
Vinsent Koning, Guitar
Frans van Geest, Double Bass
Gijs Dijkhuizen, Drums

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It contains songs that are part of new albums from Fone. It is a reference album not to be missed. Featuring Natural sound recording, no editing! All the tracks on this album are heard as they were performed.

Scott Hamilton, Saxophone
Alfred Kramer, Drums
Paolo Birro, Piano
Aldo Zunino, Double Bass
Roberto Gatto, Drums
Alessandro Lanzoni, Piano
Matteo Bortone, Double Bass
Alessandro Presti, Ttrumpet
Fulvio Sigurtà, Trumpet
Gabriele Mrabassi, Clarinet
Enzo Pietropaoli, Double Bass
Marcello Di Leonardo, Drums
Fausto Mesolella, Guitar
Ferruccio Spinetti, Double Bass
Petra Magoni, Vocals

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Cinerama continues the extraordinary series of Jazz albums that Scott Hamilton began with Giulio Cesare Ricci at Fonè Jazz in 2012. It features four extraordinary musicians: Scott Hamilton, Paolo Birro, Aldo Zunino and Alfred Kramer.

The album was recorded at Stereo DSD 64 using the Pyramix DSD Workstation software from Merging Technologies with Analog to Digital Converters from dCS. It is part of the recordings that Giulio Cesare Ricci made on the occasion of the concerts of the 2022 Fonè Music Festival Piaggio. The location of the recording is the Piaggio Auditorium located inside the famous Pontedera Museum, the place where Piaggio was born and where it still continues to produce today.

Scott Hamilton, who for many years has been performing on the best stages around the world as the leader of his quartet or alongside other sacred monsters of jazz, is an interpreter of extraordinarily elegant music, based on impeccable phrasing and a fascinating sound, which already in the seventies, when the widespread trend was to explore particularly aggressive sound alternatives, imposed him for the sweetness of his saxophone and creative imagination.

Scott Hamilton, Saxophone
Paolo Birro, Piano
Aldo Zunino, Double Bass
Alfred Kramer, Drums

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The Michel Legrand Songbook features many of your favorite songs. Including The Summer Knows (Theme From Summer of ’42), Windmills Of Your Mind, A Piece Of Sky, Once Upon A Summertime, What Are You Doing The Rest Of Your Life, The Way He Makes Me Feel and How Do You Keep The Music Playing.

Olah says “I have been thinking about a project based on Michel Legrand’s compositions for approximately 15 years. Much was needed to realize my dream.

Most of all I needed a great singer, who could perform these songs authentically, but in her individual way. I needed a very creative and versatile Jazz trio being the backbone of the production. I needed a String Chamber Orchestra playing at a high level. I needed outstanding soloists, who can extend the color palette of the album with their unique musical personalities. And of course, I needed inspiration for the orchestrations besides the inspiration that Legrand’s songs gave me.

On the one hand, I got inspiration during my travels, as I composed these covers in several cities of Europe. On the other hand, I got plenty of ideas during the past 25 years of immersion in Classical Music. I got plenty of inspirations from Bach’s music, as well. There is Bach hidden in Legrand’s music, so it wasn’t difficult for me to use baroque motifs.

However there are many other possibilities in these songs, which can be turned in several music directions. I think, in spite of the various musical sounds of the album, Legrand’s personality and immediately recognizable tunes make the production unified.”

Andrea Malek, Vocals
Kalman Olah, Piano, Arranger & Conductor
Roby Lakatos, Violin

Trio Midnight
Kálmán Oláh – Piano
Elemér Balázs – Drums
János Egri – Double Bass

Danubia Orchestra Óbuda
Janos Bodor – Concertmaster

Guest Musicians
Paul Lakatos – Guitar
József Czibere – Percussion

The post The Michel Legrand Songbook appeared first on NativeDSD Music.

Morning Glory is part of 2xHD’s Historic series of Jazz releases and not part of their high resolution audio series.

It is a Mono recording from a low speed 7 1/2″ quarter track analog tape that was restored and then remastered in cooperation with the Bill Evans Estate.

Bill Evans – Pianist
Eddie Gomez – Bassist
Marty Morrell – Drummer

The post Morning Glory (Historic Monoaural Release) appeared first on NativeDSD Music.

The classic songs on the album include Only the Lonely by Sammy Cahn & Jimmy Van Heusen, Bewitched by Richard Rodgers & Lorenz Hart, Angel Eyes by Matt Dennis & Earl Brent, The Summer Knows (Theme From Summer of ’42) by Michel Legrand, Gone With The Wind by Allie Wrubel & Herb Magidson, What Are You Doing The Rest Of Your Life by Michel Legrand, I Guess I’ll Hang My Tears Out To Dry by Sammy Cahn & Jule Styne and Don’t Worry ‘Bout Me by Rube Bloom & Ted Koehler. Vaz also contributes You’re Too Good which he composed.

Vaz says “The making of this album reflects such a cycle for me. Closing a chapter and the start of something new, while being thankful for what has been and at the same time opening up for the unknown.

The pieces selected for this album connect to this process. I found great joy in the beauty of these compositions. The recordings of Frank Sinatra were another inspiration for picking these songs. He inspires me to approach the music in a way a singer would do, to play the trumpet in a more vocal manner and to connect with and portray the essence of the song.”

Each recording starts and ends with the main artist alone in the hall, the only interplay being the acoustics of the hall and his mind. No audience is present except the ghosts from the past. The music must create an Arch, going from the single-instrument performance to the more complex band performance and back to the last solo performance.

The same principle goes for the engineering; each recording starts out with only one Josephson C700S 3-channel stereo microphone. As the music gains in complexity more microphones may be deployed, the only limit being the imagination and technical skills of the recording engineer. The producer and engineer must aim to make the album have a unifying sound, despite the different recording techniques employed.

Gidon Nunes Vaz Quartet
Gidon Nunes Vaz – Trumpet & Flugelhorn
Timothy Banchet – Piano
Cas Jiskoot – Double Bass
Yoràn Vroom – Drums

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In their 14th DSD release at NativeDSD Music, Amsterdam Sinfonietta and their Director and Violinist Candida Thompson join baritone and pianist Thomas Oliemans and guest musicians Bert van den Brink, Ruben Drenth and Jens Meijer to bring our listeners Formidable! an album of French Chansons in Stereo and 5 Channel DSD.  The album is an early DSD release at NativeDSD, coming to our listeners 2 weeks before the official release date. 

Formidable! is exclusively available at NativeDSD in Stereo DSD 512 plus Stereo & 5 Channel DSD 256, DSD 128, DSD 64 and DXD.  This is a DSD Exclusive, Not Available on SACD release.

Notes from the artists

I have had French chansons in my head for as long as I can remember on a scratchy car radio or a cassette player, in the back seat for hours on end on the way to the Vendée or Dordogne, or softly issuing from a gramophone record in my father’s study below my bedroom, a compilation such as Vive La France or Jean Ferrat sings Aragon.

When I started to learn the piano and got into the habit of singing along, it was obviously French chansons that I picked up by ear and sang entirely phonetically. Julien Clerc with his franglais of This Melody, and Brel with his La chanson des vieux amants. The French teachers at my secondary school put me in for the Concours de la Chanson, which I promptly (and by accident) won. And all of a sudden, the path opened for me to become a professional singer or pianist, or at any rate a musician. It led me primarily into the world of classical singing, in opera, lied and oratorio, in which there was much to discover for my further development.

But the chanson was never far away. Indeed, at each stage of my musical development it appeared to grow with me. (…)

— Thomas Oliemans, voice & piano

Artistic curiosity runs in the veins of Amsterdam Sinfonietta and has resulted in numerous extraordinary projects. Under the successful title Breder Dan Klassiek [Broader Than Classical], for example, Amsterdam Sinfonietta presents classical music in combination with pop, Indian classical, rap or jazz, and has appeared with artists including Rufus Wainwright, Patrick Watson, De Dijk, Wende and Typhoon. Essential to this is the exchange of ideas and a genuine interest in each other’s repertoires and worlds.

Amsterdam Sinfonietta has a strong bond with the baritone Thomas Oliemans. In recent years he has sung classical repertoire with the orchestra. Until one evening he sang from the piano Charles Trenet’s Que reste-t-il de nos amours. An idea was born: a joint project focusing on the French chanson.

– Stephan Heber, artistic programmer, Amsterdam Sinfonietta

Recording ‘Formidable’ was a daunting task in such that I wanted the recording to sound natural and spontaneous. Listening to the original recordings of a.o. Jacques Brel and Charles Aznavour which used a good deal of compression/limiting, in a dry studio, it would be a challenge to make use of the DSD technique with its depth of sound and dynamic range to record Thomas singing (who was also playing the piano at the same time).

During post-production I spent hours fine tuning the balance of Thomas (manually adjusting his voice) to match the ensemble. If Thomas was too loud – the orchestra was too soft, and vice versa. Listening softly in many different playback settings, even my iPhone, we got to the right mix to please everyone. I guess this mix will not be targeted for listening in the car!

— Jared Sacks, Producer, Recording Engineer and Mastering Engineer, Channel Classics Records

Amsterdam Sinfonietta
Candida Thompson – Director & Violin
Thomas Oliemans – Baritone & Piano
Bert van den Brink – Piano & Accordion
Ruben Drenth – Trumpet & Flugelhorn
Jens Meijer – Drums

For the physical CD, visit www.channelclassics.com

The post Formidable! (French Chansons) appeared first on NativeDSD Music.

The Analog Recording has been transferred to Stereo DSD and DXD by Rene Laflamme at 2xHD from the Original Analog Tapes. Re-introducing this classic offering for modern audiences! NativeDSD has created a special Stereo DSD 512 edition of the album for our listeners – only available at NativeDSD.Com

Producer Bill Borden says “Dick recorded all the material we are using in three consecutive sessions. We did not have to do any splicing, mixing, or ‘fiddling’ with the takes chosen, an experience new to me since the advent of tape, and a highly pleasing one to Dick. It would be superfluous to comment on the various improvised performances, as they speak for themselves. However, it should be pointed out that these are all titles he has not previously recorded, for each of which he feels a personal affinity, and which have been among his most requested numbers.”

Dick Hyman – Piano

The post Genius At Play appeared first on NativeDSD Music.

Album Producer Peter Bjornild tells us “This recording is true to the visual image of Ack and Juraj in the hall. Juraj is to the left at 10 o’clock and Ack to the right at 2 o’clock. We captured not only the 2 dimensional placement of the musicians but also the depth and wideness of the hall. Creating a Visual Sound is a question of moving the microphone slightly forward and backwards and listening critically. I must say that I keep being impressed by Frans de Rond’s expertise in this field.

The album was recorded with the Josephson C700S microphone. We did support the piano ever so slightly with a pair of DPA microphones just to add a hint of definition.”

Ack van Rooyen – Flugelhorn
Juraj Stanik – Piano

The post Soft Shoulders appeared first on NativeDSD Music.

Each time she released an album, Johnny Carson and Merv Griffin showcased her proudly on TV. Vaughan would unleash the most sumptuous voice in jazz, then chat shyly in a little girl mumble.

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