Aliso Viejo, CA (October 9, 2013)—Merging Technologies equipment captured seven jazz groups in DSD256— the highest resolution digital audio format—at the Third Soka International Jazz Festival in California.
The Performing Arts Center at Soka University in California hosted the Third Soka International Jazz Festival, organized in conjunction with BluePort Jazz, at the end of September. Merging’s Pyramix 8.1 and Horus connected via RAVENNA were able to record 12 channels of 11.2 MHz Quad-DSD without any problem throughout the weekend. BluePort’s Jim Merod was on hand to produce the recordings while Joe Kubala operated the equipment. As well as running the BluePort label and organizing the festival, Merod is also the Professor of Philosophy at the university.
After listening to several sets from the musicians, which included headline act the Delfeayo Marsalis Octet, Merod commented, “The sonic quality of Merging Technologies’ ‘Quad DSD’ is impossible to fully summarize. However, one can honestly assert that dynamics are more stunning and life-like than any previous audio standard I have used; harmonic complexity carries more delineated tonal nuances; staging is truer-to-the-life of the event; and a vivid sense of ‘you are there’ musical reality defines sonic capture.
“Although the drawback at present with Quad DSD recording resides with the need to deal with its glorious transparency and accuracy in PCM, the fact remains that sonic transfer from quad- to double-DSD reveals enhanced signal information not as mere ‘data’—technical details implicit or virtually available—but clearly rendered with relaxed musical clarity that approaches explicit analog delicacy.”
DSD and DXD will be the subject of several panels as well as a workshop chaired by Dominique Brulhart, Merging’s head of software development, at the New York AES Convention starting October 17. The recordings from Soka will be mixed down by Kubala and made available in time for AES by permission of Merod and Delfeayo Marsalis.
Merging Technologies
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