Album Reviews

Originally licensed in 1959 from British Decca and issued by RCA Victor in America on its lavish Soria series as LDS-6065, the "Gala Performances" performed by The Royal Opera House Orchestra, Covent Gardens conducted by Ernest Ansermet continues to draw new enthusiasts to what many consider one of legendary engineer Kenneth Wilkinson’s most spectacular recordings.

Original pressings of the two LP boxed set in good condition regularly go for around $1000. In the 1990s Classic Records reissued this as a double LP in a gatefold jacket with booklet and as a multi-LP 45rpm single-sided box set, first on 180 gram vinyl and later on 200 gram vinyl. Classic also issued in a very limited edition a slipcase replica of the original.

Analogue Productions’ Classic Records buyout brought with it metal parts for many albums, cut by Bernie Grundman, including for this record, though other Decca licensed RCA titles were re-cut from the original master tapes, with Analogue Productions then having the luxury of choosing the best for release.

To press the first fifteen hundred, AP chose to produce a new stamper using the “mother” cut from the original master tape by Bernie Grundman. The Kingsway Hall remains astonishing in every way, every play.

The perspective is closer than mid-hall, which produces an enormously wide stage, and sensational front-to-back instrumental separation. Hyper-transparency and full bandwidth help create a believable (if not somewhat unbelievable) soundstage.

The hall “rumble” is fully present so if your system goes really low you may at first think you’re hearing turntable rumble. The in-between band silence lets you know it’s the recording not the pressing or your turntable.

I am not a musical expert here who’s spent time comparing Ansermet’s readings of The Nutcracker, Swan Lake, La Boutique fantastique (which had a profound impact on the film scores of Bernard Hermann) and the rest of the ballet favorites here with other performances on record so I can’t tell you how they compare but I seriously doubt any of them better or even match the sonics.

I did compared this 33 1/3 reissue to the Classic 33 1/3 reissue and to an original pressing that I’m lucky to own and what I found shouldn’t have been surprising. However, this was the first time it was possible to compare pressing plants because both the Classic pressed at Record Technology (RTI) in Camarillo, California and the Analogue Productions reissue pressed at QRP (Quality Record Pressing) in Salina, Kansas were sourced from the same metal parts.

The only variable was the plating of the mother to produce the new stamper used here, which was done at QRP’s plating facility. While both records were sourced from the same metal parts, and while both sounded superb by any standard, the two sounded very different.

It’s also important to note that records can vary sonically, even when pressed from the same stamper on the same press, depending upon a variety of factors, with which you are no doubt familiar.

I visited QRP when it first opened and I was shown a few of the innovations and modifications done to the presses. Record-to-record consistency had been greatly improved thanks to Allen-Bradley temperature control units that had been installed within the press tools along with temperature controlling and monitoring functionality.

The “why didn’t anyone else think of that?” moment came when I was shown that the presses sat on large damping wafers instead of on the cement floor as they are just about everywhere else, and more significantly, the hydraulic assembly that shakes, rattles and rolls had been removed from the press chassis and placed on the floor.

One can only imagine the sonic difference that might result from the press not shaking and vibrating as the press closes and the soft, partially melted vinyl puck spreads across the stamper surface.

I was assured during my visit that it did make a difference but other than hearing and enjoying QRP’s mostly really quiet pressings, how could one be sure it had anything to do with the hydraulic decoupling?

Well, though I can’t be certain the differences I heard between the two BG mastered pressings were attributable to the press modifications, it made sense that they were.

The QRP pressing was definitely more open, extended and focused on top and transients were sharper though in a completely natural way. The Classic sounded somewhat softer and veiled. If you’ve got both, you’ll hear it in the percussive transients first and then consistently throughout.

It’s what you would expect to hear if the press wasn’t violently shaking as it pressed a record. Skeptics might say that the enormous press mass, especially of the moving parts, would reject such vibrations and if that’s so, it’s up to them to explain the so easily audible sonic differences.

Nonetheless some might prefer the Classic’s more “romantic” sound, but not me! As for the original it has its own spectacular qualities, especially in terms of the air, space and nuances only “fresh” tape can produce but the vinyl was far noisier as was the mastering chain.

If this is one of your “go to” sonic spectaculars and you have other versions, you ought to consider adding this one, though you'll have to wait for the re-re-press. Both the sound, including dead quiet vinyl, as well as the packaging are first-rate.