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In the “MQA- Deep Dive” thread - https://www.audiosciencereview.com/...i-published-music-on-tidal-to-test-mqa.22549/ - there was some discussion of whether bit depths >16 and sample rates >1Fs were necessary.
I thought it would be useful to allow ASR readers to test this idea for themselves. In 2020 Naxos released an album I co-engineered and mastered of the Portland State Chamber Choir performing works by Latvian composer Eriks Esenvalds. In particular I request you audition the track “In Paradisum.”
I can’t share the master files, as this would infringe on the copyright. However, you can stream the 24/96 version from Qobuz and the Red Book (non-MQA CD) version from Tidal. There is also a YouTube version (not sure of the provenance) at
When I mastered the CD version from the 24/96 file, I tried several different decimation filters and types of dither and noiseshaping. The CD was prepared using a combination that the music director, producer, and I independently felt sounded closest to the hi-rez original. However, there was one 16/44.1k version I prepared early on that all three of us decided didn’t sound close enough.
You can download an extract from this rejected version from DropBox:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/y2ipkrinaqgbkwm/In Paradisum Version A.wav?dl=0
I will be interested to learn if ASR readers find audible differences between the 4 versions.
(You can find more information on the album at
https://www.stereophile.com/content/recording-june-2020-eenvalds-translations )
John Atkinson
Technical Editor, Stereophile
I thought it would be useful to allow ASR readers to test this idea for themselves. In 2020 Naxos released an album I co-engineered and mastered of the Portland State Chamber Choir performing works by Latvian composer Eriks Esenvalds. In particular I request you audition the track “In Paradisum.”
I can’t share the master files, as this would infringe on the copyright. However, you can stream the 24/96 version from Qobuz and the Red Book (non-MQA CD) version from Tidal. There is also a YouTube version (not sure of the provenance) at
When I mastered the CD version from the 24/96 file, I tried several different decimation filters and types of dither and noiseshaping. The CD was prepared using a combination that the music director, producer, and I independently felt sounded closest to the hi-rez original. However, there was one 16/44.1k version I prepared early on that all three of us decided didn’t sound close enough.
You can download an extract from this rejected version from DropBox:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/y2ipkrinaqgbkwm/In Paradisum Version A.wav?dl=0
I will be interested to learn if ASR readers find audible differences between the 4 versions.
(You can find more information on the album at
https://www.stereophile.com/content/recording-june-2020-eenvalds-translations )
John Atkinson
Technical Editor, Stereophile