First off, UMe touts this reissue as "...newly remastered from the original 1949 analog tapes for the first time since 1957." That's nonsense: Bernie Grundman cut this from the original analog tapes for Classic Records back in the 2000s. And I believe the RVG CD did as well (correct me if I'm wrong). Facts matter.

Any resemblance between Sumiko’s $899 “Songbird” high output moving coil cartridge and the rest of the Reference line’s “bird” cartridges—the $1249 Blackbird (available in both low and high output versions) and the new $1899 “open architecture” flagship Starling is strictly intentional. Sumiko has been in the cartridge business for decades and these are all made in the same reliably high-quality factory that I visited a few years ago.

Though my initial February review of Ortofon’s $999 MC Quintet Black S cartridge was quite favorable, one part of my system wasn’t best optimized for the cartridge: the Rega RB330 tonearm’s lack of adjustability meant that my VTA was off by two degrees (90 degrees instead of the preferred 92-93). To combat this issue, AnalogPlanet editor Michael Fremer and I installed Acoustic Signature shims underneath the back of the Rega tonearm. However, with sufficient shims installed to increase the VTA to 92 degrees, unless the tonearm was raised from the record surface, the dust cover wouldn’t close. Since in my house a dust cover is absolutely necessary, I sacrificed having ideal VTA and we only ended up installing a set of 1mm shims to increase the VTA by half a degree.