Debussy - Prélude à l'Après-midi d'un faune / Ravel - Valses nobles et sentimentales: - 180g LP

Product no.: SR90213

Debussy - Prélude à l'Après-midi d'un faune / Ravel - Valses nobles et sentimentales: - 180g LP
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AAA 100% Analogue This LP was Remastered using Pure Analogue Components Only from the Master Tapes through to the Cutting Head

Speakers Corner / Mercury - SR90213 - 180 Gram Virgin Vinyl - AAA 100% Analogue 

Limited Edition - Pure Analogue Audiophile Mastering - Pressed  at Pallas Germany

Speakers Corner 25 Years Pure Analogue  This LP is an Entirely Analogue Production
"Speakers Corner has given these recordings the respect they deserve. The packaging is gorgeous: a black album titled "The Living Presence of 20th Century Music" and displaying the Mercury logo holds the three records with their original covers and liner notes. In addition, there are informative annotations on the music and Dorati, and a history of Mercury Living Presence...They sound at least as good and in some ways better than the originals...There are no negatives and not enough superlatives to describe these magnificent reissues. It's rare that performance, sound, and musical value combine at this level in a recording." 
- Arthur B. Lintgen, The Absolute Sound,
 
Sound 10/10 Music 10/10 Essential Purchase HIFI + Magazine
 
Claude Debussy: Prélude à l'Après-midi d'un faune, Petite Suite / Maurice Ravel: Valses nobles et sentimentales, Le Tombeau de Couperin - The Detroit Symphony Orchestra conducted by Paul Paray
 
What exactly is a faun and what does he do in the afternoon? Claude Debussy gives us a musical answer to this question by sending off the lecherous rural deity of fertility to have his pleasure with two sleeping nymphs. The bewitching sound of flutes and harps along with lilting melodies accompany the god while on the hunt. With its delectable, filigree themes, it is hardly surprising that this composition has continued to inspire choreographic interpretations since its conception. Composed, however, as a symphonic poem, the "Prélude à l’après-midi d’un faune", with its iridescent tonal colouring and varying moods, is a sheer delight to the ear alone.
Emotions of a cheerful kind are evoked by Ravel’s Valses nobles et sentimentales with their Viennese verve.
The eight compositions are filled with every sort of joy and bliss that a waltz can offer. The one is sharply contoured, the next is sweetly sentimental, another dreamy, this one is hurried, yet another sweeps along with elegance - and the instrumentation in each case is gloriously sonorous.
This album closes with the solemnly magnificent "Le Tombeau de Couperin" and thus offers a both representative and delightful choice of modern French works.
 
 April 1959 in Paradise Theatre and  December 1955r Old Orchestra Hall, beide
Detroit, USA, with  C.R. Fine / Production: Wilma Cozart and  Harold Lawrence

Musicians:
The Detroit Symphony Orchestra conducted by Paul Paray

Tracks:
Claude Debussy: Prélude à l'Après-midi d'un faune, Petite Suite
Maurice Ravel: Valses nobles et sentimentales, Le Tombeau de Couperin

Debussy\u003A\u0020Prélude\u0020à\u0020l\u0026\u002339\u003BAprès\u002Dmidi\u0020d\u0026\u002339\u003Bun\u0020faune\u0020\u002F\u0020Ravel\u003A\u0020Valses\u0020nobles\u0020et\u0020sentimentales\u0020\u002D\u0020180g\u0020LP
 
25 Years pure Analogue
Are your records completely analogue?
Yes! This we guarantee!
As a matter of principle, only analogue masters are used, and the necessary cutting delay is also analogue. All our cutting engineers use only Neumann cutting consoles, and these too are analogue. The only exception is where a recording has been made – either partly or entirely – using digital technology, but we do not have such items in our catalogue at the present time
 
Are your records cut from the original masters?
In our re-releases it is our aim to faithfully reproduce the original intentions of the musicians and recording engineers which, however, could not be realised at the time due to technical limitations. Faithfulness to the original is our top priority, not the interpretation of the original: there is no such thing as a “Speakers Corner Sound”. Naturally, the best results are obtained when the original master is used. Therefore we always try to locate these and use them for cutting. Should this not be possible, – because the original tape is defective or has disappeared, for example – we do accept a first-generation copy. But this remains an absolute exception for us.
 
Who cuts the records?
In order to obtain the most faithful reproduction of the original, we have the lacquers cut on the spot, by engineers who, on the whole, have been dealing with such tapes for many years. Some are even cut by the very same engineer who cut the original lacquers of the first release. Over the years the following engineers have been and still are working for us: Tony Hawkins, Willem Makkee, Kevin Gray, Maarten de Boer, Scott Hull, and Ray Staff, to name but a few.
At the beginning of the ‘90s, in the early days of audiophile vinyl re-releases, the reissue policy was fairly straightforward. Companies such as DCC Compact Classics, Mobile Fidelity, Classic Records and others, including of course Speakers Corner, all maintained a mutual, unwritten code of ethics: we would manufacture records sourced only from analogue tapes. 
 
Vinyl’s newfound popularity has led many other companies to jump on the bandwagon in the hope of securing a corner of the market. Very often they are not so ethical and use every imaginable source from which to master: CDs, LPs, digital files and even MP3s. 
 
Even some who do use an analogue tape source employ a digital delay line, a misguided ’80s and ‘90s digital technology that replaces the analogue preview head originally used to “tell” the cutter head in advance what was about to happen musically, so it could adjust the groove “pitch” (the distance between the grooves) to make room for wide dynamic swings and large low frequency excursions. Over time analogue preview heads became more rare and thus expensive. 
 
So while the low bit rate (less resolution than a 16 bit CD) digital delay line is less expensive and easier to use than an analogue “preview head”, its use, ironically, results in lacquers cut from the low bit rate digital signal instead of from the analogue source! 
 
Speakers Corner wishes to make clear that it produces lacquers using only original master tapes and an entirely analogue cutting system. New metal stampers used to press records are produced from that lacquer. The only exceptions are when existing metal parts are superior to new ones that might be cut, which includes our release of “Elvis is Back”, which was cut by Stan Ricker or several titles from our Philips Classics series, where were cut in the 1990s using original master tapes by Willem Makkee at the Emil Berliner Studios. In those cases we used only the original “mother” to produce new stampers. 
 
In addition, we admit to having one digital recording in our catalogue: Alan Parsons’ “Eye in the Sky”, which was recorded digitally but mixed to analogue tape that we used to cut lacquers. 
 
In closing, we want to insure our loyal customers that, with but a few exceptions as noted, our releases are “AAA”— analogue tape, an all analogue cutting system, and newly cut lacquers.
 
PALLAS
Audiophile Vinyl - Made in Germany  For over 60 years the family business in the third generation of the special personal service and quality "Made by Pallas" is known worldwide. Our custom PVC formulation produces consistently high pressing quality with the lowest surface noise in the industry. Our PVC complies with 2015 European environmental standards and does not contain toxic materials such as Lead, Cadmium or Toluene. Our vinyl is both audiophile and eco-grade! 
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