Eiji Oue & Minnesota Orchestra - Rachmaninoff: Symphonic Dances / Vocalise

Everyone who knows and appreciates Sergei Rachmaninoff's piano concertos will enjoy these lyrical and dynamic orchestral works by the composer. The “Symphonic Dances” have developed into the most frequently performed Rachmaninoff compositions in recent years. This album was selected as the best release in 2001 by three reviewers from Absolute Sound magazine. In 2003 it received a Grammy nomination for the "Best Engineered Album - Classical" category.

The LP version appears as a 33rpm version in a hinged cover and sounds open and dynamic as usual. If you don't have a turntable, you should look into the HDCD of the same title.

What you should know about the new Reference Recordings LPs:

The Californian specialists for sonorous recordings at the highest technical level took a long time to really try out everything before finally introducing LPs again. This process took more than three years, because you didn't just want to be one of many who put on vinyl again, but wanted to be at the forefront of what is technically possible.

Originally an attempt was made to cut the self-recordings with a typical varnish cutting machine in the RTI press shop in Camarillo, but the dynamic range of the recording was simply too large for the machines there and the varnish cut already contained distortions. The next step led to Germany and a half-speed DMM cut and a test press (at Pallas in Diepholz) were carried out. The result was excellent dynamically, but the sound was almost identical to that of a CD. This might have been worth striving for in the 80s, but today the expectation of vinyl is much higher and reference recordings are no exception.

Die nun erscheinenden LPs wurden auf einer neu aufgebauten Half-Speed-Maschine im Studio von Paul Stubblebine in San Francisco geschnitten. Diese Maschine schneidet klassisch in Lackfolie und verwendet eine Sonderkonstruktion von Altmeister Nelson Pass als Schnittverstärker. Der letzte Baustein in diesem Puzzle jedoch war das neue Plattenpresswerk von Acoustic Sounds in Kansas. Dort arbeitet man seit Jahrzehnten mit Reference Recordings zusammen und presst 200g Vinyl in einer komplett neu aufgebauten Fabrik. Ein besonders Ausstattungmerkmal ist eine 30 Sekunden lange Stillrille vor der Auslaufrille, die es erlaubt den Tonabnehmer vorm Ende der LP anzuheben.

180-gram or 200-gram pressing - a question that is not that easy.

For identical titles from Reference Recordings, there are covers labeled 180 g containing LPs that weigh around 200 g, and vice versa. This is due to the fact that the commissioned pressing plants QRT and RTI in the USA specify a 10 percent tolerance for weight on the one hand and then occasionally simply get the orders mixed up. In terms of sound, the pressings do not differ. 

Track-list:

Side A

1. Non Allegro

2. Andante con moto (tempo di valse)

Side B

1. Lento Assai

2. Vocalise