Copper
Up the Ladder
I am responding to the recent article on DACs and the quick brush-off of ladder DACs. (Richard Murison’s “My Kingdom for a DAC”, Richard didn’t brush off ladder DACs so...
Conversion Conversation
Today’s DACs, with a few very rare (and expensive) exceptions, all use a process called Sigma Delta Modulation (SDM, sometimes also written DSM) to generate their output signal. A simplistic...
Son Of 10 More Forgotten Artists
Again with the self-indulgence: Of late, I’ve been listening to weird stuff like Tiny Tim, only to find 1) that his recordings were amazing, even in mono, and 2) that...
Death Of The Brand
The term “brand” is thrown around pretty indiscriminately these days. Newbies in the workforce are urged to “build their brand” (which I would imagine is mystifying advice when one is...
Jaco
When I started out playing bass, like all novices I was pretty lousy. Luckily, you always played in the back behind loud guitar players, best friends who talked you into...
Capital Audio Fest
The Capital Audiofest was held the weekend of July 8-10 at the Hilton Washington DC/Rockville, in Rockville, Maryland. Know for its friendly, informal atmosphere and DIY roots, this year the...
Andrew Norman: Pinball Wizard
As I write this, I am sitting in a grade-school art teacher’s classroom in Poughkeepsie, New York. It’s deserted except for me and my laptop, but in classrooms all around...
Jensen: The Man, the Company, Conclusion
In Parts 1 and 2 we discussed Peter Jensen’s journey from his birthplace in Denmark to California, his involvement in the creation of the moving-coil loudspeaker, and his role as...
My Kingdom for a DAC
One of the nice things about digital audio is that it’s so simple to understand. We ‘sample’ (measure) the analog waveform many tens of thousands of times a second and...
Encountering The Kutandara Tribe
It’s hard to not stare when you meet a new tribe. You know what I mean: you see a group of people, different from the norm but tightly-knit, and you...
It's No Contest
The long-running television show American Idol was often accused of single-handedly destroying American popular music. In its fifteen seasons AI (no, not “artificial intelligence”, although that might seem apropos) yielded...
John Hartford
One day about twenty-five years from now,When we’ve all grown old from a-wondering how,Oh we’ll all sit down at the city dump,And talk about the Goodle Days.Well you’ll pass the...
Stan White: Visionary? Or…?
This column is different from previous installments of Vintage Whine, in two ways: 1. Previous subjects were pretty well known—for anyone familiar with the history of the American audio industry,...
The New Old Way
We can all remember those moments when everything in our systems comes together --- when everything just WORKS. The last time I recall it happening with real clarity was when...
Fully Armed
Once we have established a firm base for our turntable, and have it revolving flutter- and wow-free, we need to add an arm and cartridge to decode all those tiny,...
What Is a Song?
Warning: more Beatles content. Of course, they’re many people’s favorite band (including, obviously, mine), so it’s not a surprise, but there happen to be a number of Beatle-related events around...
The Boganyi Piano
Born into a musical family in 1974, Gergely Boganyi was raised to be a concert pianist, and began amassing awards at an early age. At 19, he won Chopin and...
The Shock of the Old
What’s Old? In classical music, everything and nothing. Steve Reich is 80. Bach is dead; so are Cage and Satie, Ives and Varèse, Morton (Feldman) and Milton (Babbitt). So what?...
Is It Worth It To You?
During election season, we hear a lot of talk about “values”. We are not (thank goodness!) going to pursue the subject of personal values, the much-abused term that is at...
Cocktail Party
You will all know the old chestnut where, if you focus clearly, it is often possible to pick out one individual conversation from among the hubbub of a noisy cocktail...
Opening Salvo
Welcome to Copper #11! Wherever you are, we hope it’s not as hot and dry as it is here in literally-on-fire Colorado. Here in mid-July, most folks are approaching some...
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Opening Salvo
Welcome to Copper #11!
Wherever you are, we hope it’s not as hot and dry as it is here in literally-on-fire Colorado.
Here in mid-July, most folks are approaching some sort of break or vacation. We’ll keep plugging away, but the world of audio shows is about to go on hiatus, following the highly-energetic Capital Audiofest (and we’re happy to offer an amazing photo spread from CapFest by Eric Franklin Shook).
The Rocky Mountain Audio Fest is the next major show in North America, coinciding with the turning of the leaves here in early October. TAVES, in Toronto, quickly follows in November, and rumors are rampant about a show in NYC. We’ll see.
Next thing you know, CES, the show that wouldn’t die (but maybe should), will come along in January. And we start all over again.
Meanwhile: stay cool, hide in the basement, read Copper, and listen to music!
The ACK Attack and Un-common Knowledge
In English-speaking circles, the term “common knowledge” refers to a thing that everyone knows, or at least, should have known when searching for the cause of some wretched decision. As...