Copper


Featured


Titanic’s Musicians Knew

Issue 211Featured

Imagine your ship is sinking, your fate is sealed, your life is doomed, and yet you remain calm and of service to others – not over the course of seconds like...

50 Years of PS Audio, Part Three: Getting the D...

Issue 211Featured

In our continuing story of the creation of the Digital Lens we're finally at the point where we have a roadmap of what we want to build. Now it is...

Thoughts on Quality, Style, and Class, in Audio...

Issue 211Featured

Seeing all the brand-new, but distressed-looking Relic Series instruments at Fender on the show floor at NAMM 2024 (see my articles in Issues 210, 209 and 208) reminded me of...

Seated in Sonic Perfection: the Ultimate Hi-Fi ...

Issue 211Featured

Copper has an exchange program with PMA magazine of Canada (and other publications), where we share articles, including this one.   Let’s get one thing straight: audio quality starts with the chair. Sure,...

Subduing Satan

Issue 210Featured

Imagine, if you will, a person living alone in a claustrophobic flat with an audio system which never stops playing, a volume control which doesn’t attenuate sound, and a “pause”...

FIDELITY Visits Eavesdrop, the Brooklyn Jazz Kissa

Issue 210Featured

Copper has an exchange program with FIDELITY magazine of Germany (and other publications), where we share articles, including this one.   The Kissa craze has reached New York – even though in the Big...

The Other Folk Singers, Part Three

Issue 209Featured

I belong to a listening group that gets together to socialize and listen to music. We meet in each of our homes on a rotating basis. The host provides the...

Leveraging Karma for Fun and Profit

Issue 209Featured

My mother was disgusted. “How can he exploit a young girl like that?" she exclaimed as she passed the newspaper. The headline read: "82-Year-Old Millionaire to Wed 22-Year-Old Model." It was accompanied...

My Experience With Commercial Four-Track Reel-t...

Issue 209Featured

Just as I was running out of things to write about for Copper, a mysterious gift landed on my doorstep. One day, someone left a large bag at the reception...

Two Mendelssohn Symphonies: the "Italian" and t...

Issue 209Featured

Copper has an exchange program with AAA (Analogue Audio Association) magazine of Switzerland (and other publications), where we share articles, including this one. The Swiss author Ernst Müller is a...

Why Does Music Move Us?

Issue 208Featured

  Copper has an exchange program with FIDELITY magazine (and others), where we share articles, including this one, between publications.   Five Answers to an Eternal Question We’re all familiar with this: music...

70 Years of the Fender Stratocaster: A Guitar W...

Issue 208Featured

As conservative as Eric Clapton's playing might be for some, the electric guitar he preferred is timelessly versatile. That’s because the Fender Stratocaster was full of innovations when it was...

David Sanborn: Remembering a Unique Voice on th...

Issue 207Featured

There are a handful of musicians in the music industry you’d swear have played on everything. Saxophonist David Sanborn was one of those musicians. His distinctive tone and style on...

Sviatoslav Richter: Legendary Classical Pianist

Issue 207Featured

Copper has an exchange program with AAA (Analogue Audio Association) magazine of Switzerland (and other publications), where we share articles, including this one. The Swiss author Ernst Müller is a...

The 2024 La Jolla Concours d’Elegance: A Stunni...

Issue 207Featured

It was a dark and stormy night, the kind of night that tests men’s souls, the mettle of their courage, and the strength of their convictions. Well, maybe that’s an...

Is Class D Amplification Now Better Than Class ...

Issue 207Featured

  Copper has an exchange program with PMA Magazine (and others), where we share articles, including this one, between publications.   A couple of years ago, a designer of high-end tube equipment...

Musings About the 45-RPM Single

Issue 207Featured

Delving into the psyche of one collector’s reflection of amassing such an assemblage of records that rarely get played It takes a special crate-digging mood to go through a haphazard...

The Other Folk Singers, Part Two

Issue 207Featured

I belong to a listening group that gets together to socialize and listen to music. We meet in each of our homes on a rotating basis. The host provides the...

The Other Folk Singers, Part One

Issue 206Featuredweb-2517

I belong to a listening group that gets together to socialize and listen to music. We meet in each of our homes on a rotating basis. The host provides the...

Treasures from the Vinyl Vault, Part Four

Issue 206Featured

Copper has an exchange program with selected magazines, where we share articles, including this one, between publications. This one's from PMA Magazine: the Power of Music and Audio.   Welcome to my series Treasures from the Vinyl...

A Visit to Italy's Gold Note Factory

Issue 206Featured

Copper has an exchange program with FIDELITY magazine (and others), where we share articles, including this one, between publications. Based in the Florence area, Gold Note is generally perceived as a young company....

A Visit to Loudspeaker Maker Pure Emotion Audio...

Issue 205Featured

Copper has an exchange program with FIDELITY magazine (and others), where we share articles, including this one, between publications. Curiously enough, SPL is rarely considered a criterion when defining what characterizes an exquisite,...

Vampire Hunting, Part Two: What Is Running Up O...

Issue 205Featured

In Issue 203, I provided an introduction to the “vampires” that live in our home, electronic devices that are consuming power while plugged in and idle or on standby. Today,...

In Praise of Live Music

Issue 204Featured

Perhaps that’s an odd title for a magazine that caters primarily to an audience of audiophiles and music collectors. So let me offer a bit of background. I fell in...

Capturing Jazz Lightning In a Bottle: Recording...

Issue 203Featured

As one of the first musical art forms created in the US to attain worldwide acclaim and acceptance, jazz straddles the line between the challengingly cerebral harmonic complexity found in...

Vampire Hunting: What Is Running Up Our Energy ...

Issue 203Featured

The cost of energy is something we consider at least once a month when the utility bill arrives. Like most anyone else reading this, I have seen our household electricity...

2023: My Year in Music

Issue 202Featured

Looking back at 2023, I realized it was a fairly good year for me musically. I don’t buy many new recordings, but I caught up on some reissues from the...

The waVox Museum – A Monument to Willi Studer a...

Issue 202Featured

Copper has an exchange program with AAA (Analogue Audio Association) magazine of Switzerland (and other publications), where we share articles, including this one.     Willi Studer.   Willi Studer's life's work...

Treasures from the Vinyl Vault, Part Two

Issue 202Featured

Copper has an exchange program with selected magazines, where we share articles, including this one, between publications. This one's from PMA Magazine: the Power of Music and Audio.    Welcome to my series, Treasures from the Vinyl...

Long Island’s Audio Den Opens a New Listening Room

Issue 201Featured

The Audio Den has been one of the New York Metro area’s top dealers since 1976. Like so many other retailers, they expanded into home theater and custom installation in...

Tokyo Jazz Joints: Immersion in a Parallel Univ...

Issue 201Featured

Copper has an exchange program with FIDELITY magazine (and others), where we share articles, including this one, between publications.   That smell! Nothing compares! Old record sleeves, the dust of decades past.  ...

Treasures from the Vinyl Vault, Part One

Issue 200Featured

Copper has an exchange program with selected magazines, where we share articles, including this one, between publications. This one's from PMA Magazine: the Power of Music and Audio.   Welcome to the first installment of Treasures from...

Sound Waves and the Roaring Twenties: The Legac...

Issue 199Featured

Copper has an exchange program with selected magazines, where we share articles, including this one, between publications. This one's from PMA Magazine: the Power of Music and Audio.   In the early 20th century, particularly the...

A Classic Turntable's Forgotten Roots: the AR XA

Issue 199Featured

When the AR XA turntable came out in 1961, it was an instant classic – almost immune to external shocks and vibrations, low in rumble, and priced at a shockingly...

The Audio Butterfly Effect

Issue 199Featured

The best-fitting suit is a well-tailored one. You likely would never expect to try on a garment in a store and have it fit perfectly, if taken randomly from just...

The Next Voice You Hear

Issue 198Featured

So you had better do as you are told/you better listen to the radio.” (Elvis Costello, “Radio Radio”) Sanyo catalogued the MR2810 2-Band Radio Cassette Recorder in 1982. I received...

A Visit to Piega Loudspeakers

Issue 198Featured

  Copper has an exchange program with FIDELITY magazine (and others), where we share articles, including this one, between publications. Every reason to be in a good mood: The two managing directors, Manuel...

Two Hands Clapping

Issue 198Featured

It was a lot of money, even with the student discount. He had never been to the symphony, let alone invested in an eighth row center orchestra seat. He wasn’t...

More Scenes From the Los Angeles and Orange Cou...

Issue 197Featured

In Issue 196, Harris Fogel attended meetings of the Los Angeles and Orange County Audio Society (LAOCAS), which included visits to AudioQuest in Irvine, California, and area dealers The Source...

Some Old Jazz Guy: Exploring Michael Franks, Pa...

Issue 197Featured

Part One of our Michael Franks series (Issue 191) covered his first four albums. With this installment, we’ll continue with the next batch of albums. Released in 1979, Tiger in...

How to Improve Your Sound System With Your Mind...

Issue 197Featured

Copper has an exchange program with selected magazines, where we share articles, including this one, between publications. This one's from PMA Magazine: the Power of Music and Audio.   In Part One (Issue 196), I mentioned the phenomenon...

In Praise of Domestic Venues

Issue 197Featured

Some of the lads looked disappointed, others seemed disgusted. You’d think I had just recommended Jack Daniels over Woodford Reserve. The ambience in the room went flat like Sunday morning champagne. Maybe...

The Los Angeles and Orange County Audio Society...

Issue 196Featured

The Los Angeles and Orange County Audio Society (LAOCAS) is one of the largest audio clubs in the country. Its membership spans the greater Los Angeles and Orange County areas,...

Thorens' 140-Year Anniversary: Navigating Vinyl...

Issue 196Featured

Copper has an exchange program with FIDELITY magazine (and others), where we share articles, including this one, between publications.   It’s hard to imagine the record player world without Thorens – and yet...

How to Improve Your Sound With Your Mind, Part One

Issue 196Featured

Copper has an exchange program with selected magazines, where we share articles, including this one, between publications. This one's from PMA Magazine: the Power of Music and Audio.   Your audio system was supposed to...

Zen and the Art of Sound Reproduction

Issue 196Featured

Most of us squander far too much of our time engaged in “self-talk.” Our minds are continually preoccupied with “what if” scenarios and how to resolve them, even though these...

Simple Acoustics, Complicated Spouses

Issue 195Featured

When I was a teenager, I told my girlfriend that I loved her so much that I would die for her. She replied that if I died, her life would...

The Musical Instrument Museum: A World of Music...

Issue 194Featured

The Musical Instrument Museum (MIM), located in Phoenix, Arizona, possesses 14,000 instruments and other artifacts that are housed in a state-of-the-art 200,000 square foot structure containing 350 exhibits. It is...

Dreamin’ Wild: The Movie and the Music

Issue 194Featured

Actress Lana Turner was discovered while drinking a milkshake at Schwab’s pharmacy. Pam Anderson was at a football game when her picture suddenly flashed across the Jumbotron. Justin Bieber’s journey...

Who Would Believe That I Now Like My Parents’ M...

Issue 194Featured

A recent TV commercial plugging some insurance company’s homeowner's policies suggested that it’s really hard not to become your parents. Lately, my music tastes sometimes reflect theirs, something I could...