DSD-Guide.com

HD Music Day's first event was held at the Hilton Anaheim during the NAMM Show on January 19, 2020.  The half day event was very well received and packed with interested professional audio engineers, artists and others wanting to up the quality of their listening.  AES (Audio Engineering Society) has suggested a repeat performance in October 2020 at the New York City AES convention.  Join the HDMusicDay.com mailing list to stay up to date on activities.

Mark your calendars for January 19, Sunday.  Sign up to receive the latest information at http://hdmusicday.com/

From 10am-2pm at the Hilton Annaheim, NAMM and AES will be giving Blue Coast Music free reign to put on 4 panels for the professional audio community.  Representatives from Sony, Qobuz, Roon, Blue Coast and others will be there to introduce the professional audio community what the consumers have been listening to for years.

CDs, vinyl and cassettes used to be an easy way to give someone you love a gift at the Holidays.  Kind of like baking cookies, it was something we did that could express an emotional feeling from yourself or because you knew the other person so well that you could introduce them to new music or give them a cherished sound.  Do gift cards have the same sentiment?  Can a $20 gift card to Starbucks offer the same feeling as the time you'd spend on those Holiday cookies?  We're going to offer several new ways to express your love and friendship....

We're curious how audiophiles listen.  What's the highest sampling rate of your portable DAC... click here to tell us!

Most people know of Neil Young as the iconic rocker from days of Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young and his decades long career in music that influenced the likes of Pearl Jam and others.  Audiophiles might remember him for the Pono high resolution portable music device.  Wired Magazine offered a wonderful interview of his recent enthusiasm for high resolution music and why he feels Amazon's Ultra HD Music subscription is the biggest event to happen to digital audio in 40 years.

Immersive Sound is the latest term coined by the music industry to mean music that has a consumer playback using more than 2 channels of playback. Surround Sound, Quadrophonic, Atmos, 360 RA, Auro-3D and more.

It's not that you need to care about this question and many of you may not know whether you're listening to a digital conversion or an analog transfer.  Bottomline, if you're happy with your music then GREAT!  Continue listening...

But, for those of you interested in the processes recording engineers often use, then read on.

What is a digital conversion?

Part Three -- The Recording Room. Doug Fearn examines the effect the studio room has on the sound of the recording.

Part Two -- The Recording Chain- examines the steps that music goes through from performer to listener. This is a simplified version, since real-world recording is usually a lot more complex than this. Follow the twelve part series from renown engineer Doug Fearn as he takes us through the recording process and to your speakers.

Recently there has been some curious questions about the meaning of "analog" vs "digital".  Many engineers working with DSD (Direct Stream Digital) feel strongly that DSD digital sounds much better than PCM digital.  Many of us feel that DSD is the closest thing to analog that the digital world can offer.

Technology is what brings us the ability to transform live performances into repeatable audio events using equipement and source material formated for a specific technology.  Over the years, technology advances change for various reasons. 

Do you love ambient, electronic or classical music that has long passages?  More than 30 minutes in length?  If you're a fan of DSD256 or other large files your gear might present challenges.  We're looking to change this issue for the future with your help.

A high resolution music lover wrote in and mentioned that his portable device got hot and battery died faster when he played FLAC files over the same sampling rate WAV file.  Does this happen to you?  Have you compared your battery drain with a similar DSD file?

Kathering N give us a playback description of how she got her Mac to play DSD using Colibri and how to test your Mac as she did.  This is her letter to Blue Coast Music. Enjoy!

"A blaring television commercial may make us turn down the volume of our sets, but its sonic peaks are no higher than the regular programming preceding it."  Greg Milner -- New York Times

DSD is not dead.  In fact, more portable devices are capable of DSD listening than ever.  Sure, file sizes can be an issue but it seems many of music lovers will handle that barrier in favor of better sound.  We'd like to hear from you.   What devices are you listening on?

So many of our readers enjoy sound, music and audio engineering that we decided to find out where your interests lie.  If you're an audiophile, we want to know what formats you listen to.  If you're a musician, what instrument do you play.  If you've recorded something, what gear are you using.  Take our survey and help us out!

Here's the link to the survey.  You'll need to have a gmail account for this to work best.

In today's world, it's hard to understand that systems of tuning used in the majority of popular music have only been established for about 150 years.  That's a short period of time in the scope of music history.  How does it affect your experience of music?

This is a question that has perplexed many of us who record in high resolution audio.  Sure, our focus is on DSD / one bit recording...  but why are most audio engineers recording at 44.1 or 48?  You think it would be easy to move to PCM 9624 or 192.  Heaven forbid anyone should move to recording in DSD!

It's not a simple answer.

Have you listened to the same song playing from Tidal? Qobuz? Applemusic?  Youtube?  Do you notice subtle differences?  We're going to explore this concept and welcome your explorations comparing these services.  Where do these companies get their files from?

In a recent discussion at computeraudiophile.com I was asked to participate on a thread about a math experiment that led to this conclusion... "The math says there's no difference between the FLAC and the WAV file".   We do listening tests.. regardless of math.  If we hear a difference... even the slightest difference and it can be duplicated several times, then something is wrong and needs investigation.

More and more people want to get involved with DSD audio but don't know where to start.  What do you suggest to friends who have an interest in better quality sound but don't have the inclination to spend a lot of time or money setting it up?  Send us your best ideas and we'll post here!

Send your ideas to support@DSD-Guide.com

Andrew Jones, legendary speaker designer now with ELAC, explains to John Darko of Darko.Audio web magazine that Direct Stream Digital (DSD) master recording tracks usually transfer into another format such as Pulse Code Modulation (PCM) for mixing, mastering and other processing.  Enjoy the entire 14 minute interview about DSD, new ELAC products and topics discussed at the Munich Audio Show.

Doug Fearn is no stranger to the recording studio. One of his first recordings was in 1968 captured on a 4 track Scully tape machine. His fondness for higher quality led him to launch his company, D.W. Fearn in the early 1990's specializing in vacuum tube products for professional audio engineers. In association with Tommy Mcintyre (guitarist) and support musicians (Hazelrigg Brothers) Doug demonstrates his technique for recording direct to DSD on the Tascam DA-3000.

Why doees my vinyl sound so much better than the PCM 192 files of the same music?

There isn't a simple answer.  Mastering is only the 3rd of 6 stages of degradation that audio has to deal with... the final stage being the home listening system.  Let's start at your listening systems..the 6th Stage.

It's been more than 5 years since Blue Coast Collection 2 debuted.  Blue Coast Collection 1 launched in 2007.  Blue Coast Collection 3 is destined to be another smash for Blue Coast Records.

Paul Wilson writes has an interesting review of his streaming vs other playback devices for high end audio.

During April Blue Coast Music and DSD-Guide conducted a joint survey using their readers (now numbering 32,000) to find out what and how they were listening to music.

There's been an interesting trend in music the last few years.  While hip hop and pop music still dominate the charts, artists are creating sonic calming music that can last as long as 8 hours.  It's not meant to be exciting.  It's meant to relax and sometimes put you to sleep.  Millions of people are tuning in to it.

If you'd like to voice your opinion go to Blue Coast Music's blog post.  With enough interest, you could be finding your next ambient recording in DSD!

Hello music lovers and welcome to the daily ramblings of Cookie Marenco, music producer, audiophile, and lover of sound.  This is her daily blog. 

Positive Feedback is publishing a series of articles written by Blue Coast Music founder, Cookie Marenco, on the various audio shows.  Part 1 in this series provides the difference between the Consumer Electronics Show 2018 (CES held in January) and the National Association of Music Merchants 2018 (NAMM held two weeks after CES in January).

Looks like a great year for DSD recordings!  Nine out of 10 of the top selling albums on Blue Coast Music were mixed to DSD.  Seven out of 10 albums were recorded to DSD or analog tape.  Four albums are led by women musicians, three by men and three are compilations. Three albums are first artist albums (Smolder - Coco Scott, Run With Me - Derek Jones, Just Let Go - Meghan Andrews)

In its 10th year of release, Blue Coast Collection from Blue Coast Records, continues to top the chart at Number 1.  Wow!

Blue Coast Music is ready to test a new concept of creating music for fans of DSD256 called FlashJamm.  The concept is 3 songs performed live in the studio, unrehearsed and under artistic guidance of the producer.  Raw, inspired and recorded at DSD256 live in the studio.  Easy to do, you think?  "Not so", says producer, Cookie Marenco from Blue Coast.

The complete pdf Recommendations for High Resolution Audio Production. Issued in 2017 for the purposes of providing professional audio engineers guidelines for how producing music on a high resolution format.

Are you the kind of passionate music lover that wants to know more about the behind the scenes action that happens for a high end recording?  Blue Coast Music and DSD-Guide are teaming up to bring you something very special in the upcoming months.  Find out how you can contribute to this exciting new effort. Follow the link to read more.

There is the 'digital' camp and the 'analog' camp and the 'just give me the best of it' camp.  Everyone has an opinion but the truth is... "the best" is expensive to record, mix, master, convert and preserve.  Compromises are made for greatness to provide a supply of new music to the audiophile that is 'affordable'. Sadly, most audio engineers compromise the audio at the first stage of recording.. the multitrack. This is an opinionated article by Blue Coast founder, Cookie Marenco.

Blue Coast Music has been at the forefront of high resolution audio with its efforts recording music, developing an audience and addressing the requirements for large audio file distribution since its debut.  Behind closed doors they have been developing a new website to address the needs of the audiophile music lover.  Blue Coast Music is now looking for beta testers around the world to test the site.  If you would like to be a beta-tester, signup for the newsletter on this page and send a note to support@bluecoastmusic.com with "BETA-TESTER" in the subject line.

Sony unvailed their new Walkman and car media reciever, RSX-GS9 at the 38th Bangkok International Motor Show. With this setup you can play native DSD 11.2MHz in your car. 

Playing back DSD files requires a bit more effort than most other formats, such as WAV or MP3 files. Most computers these days aren’t capable of converting DSD into audio because their audio hardware is limited to PCM files, so you have to use something else. 

Music lover and audiophile, David Slattery, took time out of his busy day to do a comparison of DSD128 to DSD64.  Many people wonder if it's possible to hear the difference between a FLAC, WAV or DSD file.  David gives a wonderful assessment of what he hears.

The music tested was Meghan Andrews from Blue Coast Records Special Event 43. Blue Coast Records offers music recorded in DSD and without overdubs and effects making the comparisons easier than overly processed music.  

Here's what David has to say...

On January 26, 2016, Alex de Grassi and Keith Greeninger became the first two artists to have their music available for on demand streaming at DSD128. The new technology comes from Primeseat, a company from Japan that boasts some of the top technolgists from Sony, Korg and IIJ.

Don't confuse "Quad" with the surround system recordings of yester year - this Quad is Direct Stream Digital at a sampling rate of 11.2 Million samples per second in one bit.  These downloads are huge!  An Album can be 8-10 gigabytes in size.  Another name for Quad DSD is DSD 256.

Today Blue Coast Records announced their foray into delivering Quad DSD downloads to music lovers worldwide.

On April 4, 2015 at 7pm PDT, the world's first DSD128 live streaming concert event will take place. A joint project team of Sony/Korg/IIJ/Saidera Paradiso have joined to demonstrate the future of high-quality streaming with two upcoming concerts.

On Saturday, January 24, 2015, at 1pm, Cookie Marenco will do a presentation at the annual NAMM show held at the Anaheim Convention Center.  Ms Marenco will discuss High Resolution Audio with musicians, equipment manufacturers, professional audio engineers, and instrument builders who go to hear the latest developments in the world of audio.  The presentation is geared towards the entry level and more sophisticated music listeners as well as interested companies who want to take advantage of this small yet growing trend.

Paul McGowan's company, PS Audio, is well known in audiophile circles for being some of the highest quality gear available on the market. We've included a partial list of titles that we happen to also enjoy. For the complete list, visit here http://www.psaudio.com/pauls-posts/pauls-picks or read more!

On stage at the Europe’s largest electronics trade show, IFA in Berlin, charismatic Sony chief executive Kazuo Hirai declared that Hi-Res audio as crucial to the success of its audio products.

Laura Sydell interviews Cookie Marenco (founder Blue Coast Records) about DSD and the high resolution audio movement.

"...Sony Corporation announced a new line of high-end audio components that promise to deliver a better online audio experience. The announcement comes amid growing evidence that music fans are tired of the crappy sound they hear on their portable music players."

Read more here.
http://www.npr.org/blogs/therecord/2013/09/11/219727031/what-does-a-song...

Music lovers tell it best when it comes to DSD Audio!  Tips for free conversion using Korg's Audiogate, links to video interviews, thoughts on ripping Redbook CDs to DSD Audio.

DSD-Guide would like to congratulate JRiver Media. JRiver was recently chosen as a "Best of 2012" product by HomeTheaterReview.com and "Writers' Choice Awards for 2012" by Positive Feedback Online. You can find the complete list of reviews here: http://wiki.jriver.com/index.php/Reviews JRiver Media Version 18 is an excellent choice for a DSD audio song manager

Blue Coast Records and Sony Home Electronics hosted 6 artists from whose performances were recorded to Direct Stream Digital (DSD) at the California Audio Show....

From Blue Coast Records - one of the most critically acclaimed acoustic record companies of the last 5 years.  Used by manufacturers and industry professionals to test their equipment, Blue Coast Records became one of the first to offer native DSD masters distributed to the public as DSD audio.