Telarc Releases Beatles Tribute In SACD Format

Technology And Art ?Come Together? On Super Audio Compact Disc

5-Dec-01

Telarc International, an industry leader in digital recording for more than two decades, announces the re-release of the 2001 collaborative recording Erich Kunzel and the Cincinnati Pops Orchestra Perform Music of the Beatles featuring King?singers on Super Audio Compact Disc (SACD).The new SACD format, created by Sony and Philips, provides unprecedented sound quality in stereo and discrete multi-channel surround. To achieve its sonic performance, SACD employs a radically new digital encoding technology called Direct Stream Digital. DSD samples the musical signal at a phenomenal 2.8 million times a second - 64 times greater than traditional CD recordings. The result is an extremely smooth digital waveform with unparalleled frequency response and dynamic range. Telarc is now recording all of its projects using the DSD process.The potential benefits of SACD do not stop with its performance. The SACD format supports several disc configurations, including a Hybrid SACD designed to be completely compatible with the millions of CD players in the market today. Hybrid SACDs actually contain two complete layers of music information. One is the conventional CD layer, which can play on any standard CD player. The other, high-density layer contains both the original DSD two-channel recording as well as a DSD six-channel recording that can be played in the new generation of stereo and surround SACD players. Each of the six channels can be recorded separately with full 100 kHz frequency response and 120dB dynamic range; the two-channel section achieves even greater frequency response and dynamic range across the audio band. Both the six-channel and the two-channel sound images have unparalleled resolution and transparency.Combine this additional layer of recording technology to the layers of musical talent in the original Kunzel/Cincinnati Pops/King?singers recording, and the result is an unprecedented musical experience for the listener. Since the six members of King?singers came together at King?s College in Cambridge, England in 1968, they have developed an astonishingly diverse repertoire that embraces the classical and the popular, the sacred and secular, the Middle Ages and the new millennium.Whether singing a sixteenth-century Madrigal, a newly commissioned work: a Japanese folksong, or one of their trademark close-harmony arrangements of a Top 40 hit, the King?singers convey to the listener color and emotion in song. The ensemble brings a flawless blend of musical precision, wit and panache to innovative arrangements of hits by the Fab Four. The recording opens with a flourish, in a sweeping orchestral version of ?Eleanor Rigby? that segues into a high-energy vocal arrangement - by famed Beatles? producer, Sir George Martin - of ?All You Need Is Love.?The King?singers? crowd-pleasing humor comes to the fore in droll a cappella arrangements of ?When I?m Sixty-Four,? and ?Octopus?s Garden.? They provide their own vocal ?accompaniment? in a smoothly articulated rendition of ?Eleanor Rigby.?Interspersed with the all-vocal arrangements, Kunzel leads the Cincinnati Pops Orchestra in lush renditions of the lyrical ?Michelle,? and ?Yesterday;? plus the hits ?Ob-la-di, Ob-la-da,? and ?Penny Lane.?The six singers - David Hurley, counter tenor; Nigel Short, counter tenor; Paul Phoenix, tenor; Philip Lawson, baritone; Gabriel Crouch, baritone; and Stephen Connolly, bass - display their signature sound and impeccable blend as they join with the orchestra for expressive performances of the pop ballads ?Across the Universe,? ?Because? (both in arrangements by Martin), ?The Long and Winding Road,? and ?Let It Be.? Also featured is a vivid and dramatic setting for voices and orchestra of the immensely popular ?Hey Jude.?Maestro Kunzel has led the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra for more than 35 years. Since his appointment as Conductor of the Cincinnati Pops in 1977, he has led the ensemble to unprecedented success with music lovers worldwide who have discovered the CPO through tour performances and more than seventy Telarc recordings.Telarc currently has nine titles in various genres - classical, jazz, contemporary jazz and blues - available in multi-channel (Hybrid) SACD. Approximately 36 titles will be available in the six-channel SACD format by June 2002. Visit the Telarc website, www.telarc.com, for the most updated information on our new SACD recordings.

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