Katzenberger Music Productions 03 on CD and Blu-ray Audio

What do you think of when you hear the term "German jazz"? Would it be too ethnocentric to assume that it would be precise, rigid and exact? They say that about Japanese jazz and I just don't see eye-to-eye with them, whoever they are. But I've always maintained that much of classical music reflects the nationality of the composer--Russian music always sounds sad, French music always seems playful, Italian music always sounds emotionally expressive and German music always sounds, well, precise, rigid and exact. So if you have an argument about projecting that onto jazz, I'll hear you out.

My rebuttal, of course will be this third CD/Blu-ray audio selection from Katzenberger Music Productions, which is predictably titled 03. (I've reviewed 01 here and 02 here.) This jazz quartet, led by saxophonist/flautist Heinrich von Kalnein and featuring Sebastian Gille on saxophone and clarinet, Henning Sieverts on double bass and cello and Jonas Burgwinkel on percussion, is as loose and sloppy as can be--in an extremely good way. It's also a rare jazz quartet that includes two saxes, bass and drums, which makes it all sound even more lively and jumpy.

KMP producer Ulrich Katzenberger goes out of his way to stress that the music in 03 is meant to be a pure expression of music-making joy and even goes as far as to offer this famous Leonard Bernstein quote as an epilogue: "Jazz is the joy of playing music and therefore it is entertainment, in the best sense of the word." These compositions, written mostly by Heinrich von Kalnein, are so loose-limbed, laid-back and unrestricted that there are times when the genre boundaries fade and 03 just becomes gorgeous shifts in complex moods.

While tracks such as "Simple As That" and "Resistable" do sound like lost jazz standards with just a touch if dissonance thrown in, quieter and more expansive tunes such as the humorously titled "Sixty-Nine in the Wild West" are uneasy ballads bursting with hypnotic beauty. By the time you get to the three "Wildon" interludes, you're firmly in the land of the avant-garde with plenty of unusual instrumentation and sound--the percussion in particular may remind you of Shelley Manne's more experimental excursions back in the late '50s and early '60s.

The technical aspect of this amazing recording is noteworthy as well. Like the other recordings from KMP, this 24 bit/192 kHz CD was recorded without equalization, compression, reverb or any other type of artificial processing in the studio. In an effort to preserve the incredible dynamic range of this recording, you might notice that you'll need to crank the volume knob higher than usual--the liner notes state that "due to the special care given to dynamics in this production, it might seem less loud than the normal standard for recordings." The Blu-ray disc is even more incredible since it was recorded in surround sound. Actually, it offers two different surround mixes on the one disc--one for a system with 5 main loudspeakers and one for a system with 2 main speakers and three smaller speakers!

Now that I've reviewed all three of the KMP discs, I need to ask myself a couple of questions. First, I just discovered that each of these discs retails for $60, and that sounds like a lot for a digital format--even one jam-packed with amazing technology and a wide variety of format options. (Remember, you do get two discs here.) In addition, you get it all in a hardcover book-like package with incredibly thorough liner notes. But I usually like to reserve that amount of money for rare LPs or even box sets. So, the question is this: does the sound quality justify the price? I think it does--these three discs set a new standard for space, air and soundstage three-dimensionality. But you should have a hi-fi good enough to let you hear the reasons why these discs are $60 each.

The second question, of course, is whether the KMP discs are better than the offerings from other labels that specialize in hi-rez digital--like the ones I've been raving about all year. I don't know if I want to compare KMP with 2L and FIM and the others--it's all so good and amazing and lifelike. I finally really like the sound of digital playback--which is something I never thought would happen. In other words, I think these discs are worth it. Kudos, Katzenberger Music Productions.

You can find out more information at the KMP website.

Katzenberger Music Productions' 02 on CD/SACD Hybrid

This one is for me.

I'm referring to the fact that I reviewed Katzenberger Music Productions' 01 with certain audiophiles in mind--the ones who need the female voice to evaluate audio gear. 02, however, is a stupendous reproduction of solo harp, and for years I've been using the harp as one of my many tools to gauge the sound of an audio system. The problem I've had, up until now, is that I don't really own that killer harp recording that clearly measures the space a harp occupies and how, like a piano, the notes come from precise locations along the instrument as the musician moves up and down the scales. (In some cases, depending on how the microphones are placed, those notes may move back and forth instead of side to side.) The closest thing I have to a decent harp recording demo is Joanna Newsom's The Milk-Eyed Mender or even the epic Ys, and I've learned that while her harp playing is utterly transcendent, her voice polarizes listeners to the point of distraction. Personally, I love Ms. Newsom's Lisa Simpson-esque voice, but there are songs in her catalog that may clear a room.

Anne-Sophie Bertrand, for what it's worth, does not sing along while she plays the harp. She's not a pop singer, for one, and these musical selections from Albeniz, Faure, Bach, Mendelssohn, Handel, Debussy and Prokofiev wouldn't be favorably enhanced by such modern embellishments. In addition, 02 sounds distant and remote in terms of soundstage and imaging, just like 01 did--and like Joanna Newsom doesn't. 01, however, succeeded at capturing the illusion of two performers creating music in a relatively large space. 02 was recorded in another large space, the Festeburg Church in Frankfurt-Preungeshime, which is renown for its excellent acoustics. You won't hear the same vast room boundaries, but you will hear the same distant perspective--a seat several rows back, more specifically--coupled to a clean, pristine and intimate point in three-dimensional space.

None of this spaciousness and perspective matters if the content isn't extraordinary, which it is. I knew I was in for a different type of harp recording after just a few seconds of the opening piece, Isaac Albeniz' Suite Espagnole. I've heard this piece many times before, but never on a harp. Miss Bertrand infuses a liquid, wavelike momentum into the piece that may remind you of the opening movement of La Mer. The music rises, falls, swells and bursts, and the usually demure timbre of the harp does not quell the excitement one iota. I've heard so many harp recordings focus on quaint beauty rather than real emotions, but Suite Espagnole possesses so much sheer drama that your heartbeat might increase before the end of the piece. Good harp recordings may induce goosebumps, but how many of them will get your motor running? This one will.

The rest of the album is equally exquisite--particularly a world premiere recording of Jean Francaix's Suite pour Harpe that makes you wonder why anyone waited to present this to the world. The rest of the programme spans three centuries and seeks to illustrate the harp's history--the adoption of polyphonic patterns, for example, as well as the continued popularity of the instrument well into the 20th century. In 02 you have that rarity, a stunning performance of striking material that sounds incredibly real. For now, it's my reference harp recording, the one I want to play when I need to hear what a harp would sound like in my listening room. Highly recommended.

Katzenberger Music Productions' 01 on CD/SACD Hybrid

"What are those speakers called, Opera? Yeah, you should be playing only opera on them if you're gonna call 'em that. No, I'm serious. Don't laugh. That's how I evaluate audio gear, by listening to sopranos only. Do you have any sopranos I can listen to? Okay, thanks. Hmmm. I don't know this music. I can't tell if these speakers are any good or not. I'm going to have to go back home and get my CDs."

Ah, my favorite show attendee from last year's AXPONA Show in Chicago. A short thin man in his seventies, this guy darted around my exhibit room like a hummingbird, nervously cradling his chin in his hand while he constantly shook his head. He made Dr. Sheldon Cooper seem like that Ty Webb guy in Caddyshack. He never came back with his music--I'm not even sure if he made it out of the parking lot of the hotel in one piece. As strange as that guy was, however, I still feel like I let him down by not having a proper recording of a soprano to wow him and make him buy my stuff. Now I do.

I've already previewed these new recordings from Katzenberger Music Productions of Germany, so you can read about their uniquely elegant packaging and overall approach to digital recordings. KMP specializes in the use of "natural sound recording and mixing techniques" to achieve an "organically pure sound quality." This means they focus on purist recording techniques and avoid filters, compression and other effects. While that almost sounds like KMP creates recordings that should remind you of your treasured Living Presences and RCA Shaded Dogs, modern digital recording technologies present a sharper, more focused and slightly distant perspective in comparison--sort of like 2L Recordings of Norway has done over the last couple of years. All of KMP's recordings, by the way, are 192kHz/24-bit and are also available as hi-rez downloads.

In 01, the first KMP recording, we are treated to a lovely survey of the Lied genre, a German musical form founded by Franz Schubert. Mezzo-soprano Barbara Hofling and pianist Grainne Dunne float through a slightly dreamy yet distinctly Teutonic program of Mendelssohn, Schubert, Schumann and Faure. The former composer is French, of course, but he quietly brought his own influences into the Lied catalog.

What I noticed first while listening to these lush, romantic pieces, is that the perspective is very relaxed and laid-back and, like I said, distant. You might be surprised by this placement--both performers sound like they are suspended in a large, almost liquid environment. It took me a minute or so to sort it out, but I eventually realized that this was a recording of two performers in a very large space--something that is confirmed in those thorough liner notes. In this recording you can hear those vast room boundaries defined with each shift into the high register. That's when you really appreciate that somewhat distant perspective--this is an extremely dynamic record and you should probably set your volume levels in advance.

This, of course, is all very good news. Listening to such a lovely voice--I've always preferred the more vulnerable, delicate sound of a mezzo-soprano to a soprano, especially when the work is in German--is a huge treat in its own way. With this recording, however, KMP has proven what a lot of people already know--a vocal recording without compression can be incredibly lifelike, and it's hard to imagine sometimes why anyone would want to do this differently. Once you start taking away those peaks and valleys, you've made the leap from "live" to "Memorex" and all the excitement is gone. This purist approach is equally welcome with the amazing Schimmel-Piano K 280 T--you can easily hear those wonderful spatial cues from the piano's soundboard that can be buried in the mix on inferior recordings.

That means, of course, that the very first release from Katzenberger is an unqualified hit, an instant sonic reference. I've already listened to 02 and 03 quite a number of times, and I can tell you that all three of these KMP are consistent spectacular, and for slightly different reasons. But it's safe to say that with 01, I feel like I now have the definitive trade show recording for those souls who need a soprano in order to hear the music.

All photos were taken from the Katzenberger Music Productions website.

Three New Discs from Katzenberger Music Productions

An interesting package from Germany landed in my mailbox yesterday. (I'll date myself by saying that I kept telling everyone it was from West Germany. I don't know why.) Katzenberger Music Productions, which released three new digital recordings late last year in Germany, is set for a launch in the US at the end of this month. These first three recordings, titled 01, 02 and 03, are presented in the opulent hardcover booklets you see in the photos. The packaging is gorgeous, right down to the rubbery pucks that hold the discs in place (no more broken bits of clear plastic!), and the little booklets themselves contain pages and pages of liner notes and photographs. In other words, this is a first class production in every way.

I'll review each of these three titles separately in the near future, but after listening to each one I can say that the sound quality is absolutely state-of-the-art, and the performances are very, very lovely. The first CD features mezzo-soprano Barbara Hofling backed up by pianist Grainne Dunne. The second CD--my favorite so far--features Anne-Sophie Bertrand on harp. The final CD is a collective of four musicians--Heinrich von Kalnein, Sebastian Gille, Henning Sieverts and Jonas Burgwinkel--playing a very loose, very un-German set of improvisations that are primarily jazz yet meld into blues and even classical. The level of detail in this final disc is nothing short of breathtaking.

What's even more interesting is the varying choices of digital format offered with each disc. 01 and 02 are offered in CD/SACD hybrid formats, while 03 includes both a hybrid disc and a Blu-ray audio disc--presumably to take advantage of the surround sound technologies used in that particular recording. Each of the titles are 192 kHz, 24 bit recordings that have those silky, effortless high frequencies that only hi-rez digital possesses. I can't wait to spend more time with each of these discs--so far they're winners.