{"product_id":"fallathree_ansermet_2602_4x__","title":"Falla - The Three Cornered Hat (Complete Ballet) \/ Ansermet - Super Hot Stamper","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e*NOTE:\u003c\/strong\u003e This record was not noisy enough to rate our M-- to EX++ grade, but it's not quite up to our standards for Mint Minus Minus either. If you're looking for quiet vinyl, this is probably not the best copy for you.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003chr\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThis is High Fidelity Audiophile Gold, with bells, drums, voices, trumpets, strings, woodwinds and more, all sounding so real it will take your breath away. The Golden Age tapes have clearly been mastered brilliantly onto this vintage London vinyl.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eNo doubt you have run into something like this in our classical listings:\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cblockquote\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThis London is energetic, dynamic, spacious, transparent, rich and sweet. \u003ca href=\"\/search?q=tag:%22james-walker\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eJames Walker\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/a\u003e was the producer, \u003ca href=\"m\/search?q=tag:%22roy-wallace%22\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eRoy Wallace\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/a\u003e the engineer for these sessions from 1961 in Geneva's glorious \u003ca href=\"\/search?q=tag:%22victoria-hall%22\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eVictoria Hall\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/a\u003e. It's yet another remarkable disc from the Golden Age of Vacuum Tube Recording.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWe were impressed with the fact that this pressing excelled in so many areas of reproduction. The illusion of disappearing speakers is one of the more attractive aspects of the sound here, allowing the listener to inhabit the space of the concert hall in an especially engrossing way.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003c\/blockquote\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eMusic and Sound\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eFor those of you who are not familiar with the work, it starts out with multiple castanets and a group of men shouting, all of which sounds amazing here.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAll that commotion is followed by a woman singing from the back of the stage. She is obviously being picked up by the microphone at the front of the stage, so the huge amount of depth that creates in the recording is really quite remarkable.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWhen the brass comes in it sounds very natural, very tonally correct. Same with the strings. \u003cstrong\u003eOne thing these good Londons have going for them is dead on tonality.\u003c\/strong\u003e For those of us who prize that quality in a recording, it allows us to appreciate these wonderful performances all the more.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eWhat The Best Sides Of The Three Cornered Hat Have To Offer Is Not Hard To Hear\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cul\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eThe biggest, most immediate staging in the largest acoustic space\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eThe most Tubey Magic, without which you have \u003ci\u003ealmost\u003c\/i\u003e nothing. CDs give you clean and clear. Only the best vintage vinyl pressings offer the kind of Tubey Magic that was on the tapes in \u003ca href=\"\/search?q=tag:%221961%22\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e1961\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/a\u003e\n\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eTight, note-like, rich, full-bodied bass, with the correct amount of weight down low\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eNatural tonality in the midrange -- with all the instruments having the correct timbre\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eTransparency and resolution, critical to hearing into the three-dimensional studio space\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003c\/ul\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eNo doubt there's more but we hope that should do for now. \u003ci\u003ePlaying the record is the only way to hear all of the qualities we discuss above,\u003c\/i\u003e and playing the best pressings against a pile of other copies under rigorously controlled conditions is the only way to find a pressing that sounds as good as this one does.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eAn Orchestra with Singers Needs This Kind of Space\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eOne of the qualities that we don't talk about on the site nearly enough is the SIZE of the record's presentation. Some copies of the album just sound small -- they don't extend all the way to the outside edges of the speakers, and they don't seem to take up all the space from the floor to the ceiling. In addition, the sound can often be recessed, with a lack of presence and immediacy in the center.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eOther copies -- my notes for these copies often read \"BIG and BOLD\" -- create a huge soundfield, with the music positively jumping out of the speakers. They're not brighter, they're not more aggressive, they're not hyped-up in any way, they're just \u003ci\u003ebigger\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eclearer\u003c\/i\u003e.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAnd most of the time those very special pressings are just plain \u003ci\u003emore involving\u003c\/i\u003e. When you hear a copy that does all that -- a copy like this one -- it's an entirely different listening experience.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eWhat We're Listening For On The Three Cornered Hat\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cul\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eEnergy\u003c\/strong\u003e for starters. What could be more important than the life of the music?\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eThe Big Sound\u003c\/strong\u003e comes next -- wall to wall, lots of depth, huge space, three-dimensionality, all that sort of thing.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eThen \u003cstrong\u003etransient information\u003c\/strong\u003e -- fast, clear, sharp attacks, not the smear and thickness so common to these LPs.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003ePowerful bass\u003c\/strong\u003e -- which ties in with good transient information, also the issue of frequency extension further down.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003eNext: \u003cstrong\u003etransparency\u003c\/strong\u003e -- the quality that allows you to hear deep into the soundfield, showing you the space and air around all the instruments.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003cli\u003e\n\u003cstrong\u003eExtend the top and bottom\u003c\/strong\u003e and \u003ci\u003evoila\u003c\/i\u003e, you have The Real Thing -- an honest to goodness Hot Stamper.\u003c\/li\u003e\n\u003c\/ul\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eProduction and Engineering\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe hall the \u003ca href=\"\/search?q=tag:%22l'orchestre-de-la-suisse-romande%22\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eSuisse Romande\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/a\u003e recorded in was possibly the best recording venue of its day, possibly of all time; more amazing sounding recordings were made there than any other hall we know of. There is a richness to the sound that exceeds all others, yet clarity and transparency are not sacrificed in the least. It's as wide, deep and three-dimensional as any, which is of course all to the good, but what makes the sound of these recordings so special is the weight and power of the brass and the timbral accuracy of the instruments in every section.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThis is the kind of record that will make you want to take all your Heavy Vinyl classical pressings and put them in storage. Practically none of them can ever sound the way this record sounds. Quality record production is a lost art, and it's been lost for a very long time.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eVinyl Condition\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eMint Minus Minus is about as quiet as any vintage pressing will play, and since only the right vintage pressings have any hope of sounding good on this album, that will most often be the playing condition of the copies we sell. (The copies that are even a bit noisier get listed on the site are seriously reduced prices or traded back in to the local record stores we shop at.)\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThose of you looking for quiet vinyl will have to settle for the sound of other pressings and Heavy Vinyl reissues, purchased elsewhere of course as we have no interest in selling records that don't have the vintage analog magic of these wonderful recordings.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIf you want to make the trade-off between bad sound and quiet surfaces with whatever Heavy Vinyl pressing might be available, well, that's certainly your prerogative, but we can't imagine losing what's good about this music -- the size, the energy, the presence, the clarity, the weight -- just to hear it with less background noise.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eA Must Own Classical Record\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThis \u003ca href=\"\/search?q=tag:%22orchestral-spectacular%22\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eorchestral spectacular\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/a\u003e should be part of any serious classical collection. Others that belong in that category can be found \u003ca href=\"\/search?q=tag:%22core-classical-collection%22\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003ehere\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/a\u003e.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Falla, Manuel","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":51446494527784,"sku":"fallathree_ansermet","price":129.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0257\/3415\/2295\/products\/fallathree.jpg?v=1755017196","url":"https:\/\/better-records.com\/products\/fallathree_ansermet_2602_4x__","provider":"Better Records","version":"1.0","type":"link"}