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INTRADA Announces...
Thanks for the info, I was just being comedically hyperbolic (with some adapted "Planet of The Apes" quotes as well).
But as far as I can see, it's not explicitly stated that the CD itself is 16-bit, just that a 24-bit digital release will become available later.
I purchased with the assumption that the CD will be 16-bit anyway though, even though it has been remastered from 24-bit elements - though I'm happy to be surprised if it ends up being a 24-bit CD pressing.
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Posted: |
May 3, 2021 - 11:44 PM
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By: |
Amer Zahid
(Member)
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An extensive Update from Doug Fake Celebrating this fantastic new release :
5/3/2021
http://store.intrada.com/s.nl/sc.13/category.60330/.f
"Our spectacular re-recording of Rio Conchos has been in the film music market since 1989. The so-called target audience is most likely familiar with it by this point. Perhaps there are other listeners not yet on board and maybe this new presentation will bring them under the fold. I refer to it as spectacular because at the time, the concept of recreating earlier film scores was still a relatively new concept. Engaging the composer of the score at hand was new, as was the locating of original scores and parts to work with. Hiring the composer’s primary engineer was another luxury, recording everything in the famous Abbey Road Studios in London was an unusually lavish decision… and most spectacular of all, employing the full resources of the world-famous London Symphony Orchestra, augmented by more unique orchestral colors including banjos, guitars and accordion, brought everything to vibrant life. All of this before film score re-recordings became much more routine.
Jerry Goldsmith was, at this point in his legendary career, not particularly interested in looking back on his early career. In fact, it was Intrada that managed to convince him in 1986 that there was merit in doing just that when we commissioned a brand new recording of his 1977 score for Islands In The Stream, his own personal favorite work at that time. While not requiring the more ambitious research and orchestral accoutrements of Rio Conchos, it was still an extraordinary achievement to coax Goldsmith into making this happen. As far as accomplishments with this incredible composer go, we are pretty happy about having achieved such an important landmark in the preservation of film music.
Rio Conchos was the score we elected to focus the lavish attention on simply because it was my own favorite of Goldsmith’s numerous western scores. At that time, almost none of these earlier film scores were yet available in any format, with high licensing costs and missing master recordings all contributing factors. There just wasn’t yet the economic practicality of bringing old film scores into the commercial marketplace. In fact, it was Intrada, formed in 1985, that actually played a significant role in changing that situation. What had always drawn me to Rio Conchos was the incredible architecture that Goldsmith fashioned into his music. The score literally started with the main theme played as a single line on solo accordion without harmony, accompanied only by light percussion to establish a tempo. But by the (literally) explosive finish, unusually nihilistic for westerns of that day, Goldsmith had developed that gentle opening tune into the most powerful, dynamic and climactic piece of ending music of his then-growing career. And few scores following it ever achieved such a spectacular finish, replete with crashing percussion and piercing military-style trumpet figures ornamenting over and above a broadened and now triple-forte declamatory statement of that once-simple tune.
Our 1989 recreation of the score, courtesy Bruce Botnick’s perfect engineering, the magnificent musicians of the London Symphony and, in particular, Jerry Goldsmith’s enthusiasm for bringing it all to life remains a grand accomplishment. He really “got into it” all, became excited about the score itself and frequently conferred with me in between takes as to tempos and dynamics of the various cues. We shared lunches together and had fascinating talks about his music. He was enthusiastic for sure! As the album producer, upon first arriving at Abbey Road, I initially asked Bruce Botnick if we could just ensure everything sounded clean and crisp and he said he’d set up his array of microphones exactly as he would were this a brand new feature film recording - at that time certainly not the standard audio technique of recording orchestral music for listening purposes and marketed to the so-called “classical” music enthusiast. And the results were exactly what I had hoped for. Rather than a broad, reverb-heavy concert hall sound, we got clarity and extreme detail. You can hear where every instrument is positioned within the orchestra! And you can hear and feel that architecture of the score and how it goes from simple to massive with stunning detail.
Recording The Artist Who Did Not Want To Paint was also a major undertaking and premiere achievement. The idea of adding it to the sessions became part of a bigger discussion about having Goldsmith lead the LSO in his first live concert with the musicians, performing the entire five-movement work in front of a huge audience in London’s famed Barbican Centre, renowned for its various performing arts events. I was honored to sit next to Goldsmith’s father for this concert. We rehearsed and recorded the work the day after completing Rio Conchos. This “Prologue” is scored for a massive string section with additional harps plus the brilliant addition of a large section of eight French horns, recorded antiphonally and often playing in unison in high registers - an extremely challenging performance task. In fact, it was preparing this piece for recording that required the most rehearsal time - not because it was necessarily busy or intense music but rather because it required incredible nuances in performance. It was full of delicate solo work and ultimately went from delicate musical statements into massive, soaring figures designed to accompany on-screen visuals of the triumphant sculpted creations of Michelangelo. Being there in the studio as Goldsmith brought forth those artistic works to musical life with the score’s towering fourth movement, “The Stone Giants”, is a memory no one could forget. Goosebumps galore!
By the way, a few listeners have asked me about the alternate take of “Wall Of Fire” from Rio Conchos, and what it was about. When we made the first take of the cue, I was particularly enthused at the energy the brass brought to the music and I liked the aggressive tempo and style of everything. The performance wasn’t yet polished but it did showcase what Bruce Broughton once explained to me as being desirable: “Sometimes you want the take where they just go for it, rather than the more nuanced and rehearsed one.” With that in mind, for this one striking action cue, I embraced that philosophy. And since we obviously had the take on our session masters, it just seemed like a cool idea to include it on the album.
The sessions were recorded digitally back in 1989 and all the mixing and editing stayed in that domain. Modern high-resolution sampling standards such as 24bits and 96kHz were, of course, not yet available. For this current new presentation, we transferred everything into the higher resolutions and performed all of the editorial and mastering work in the hi-res format, enabling a modest degree of improvement in the lower end of the recording and a more significant enhancement of the dynamic levels themselves. This is the version to own, whether on the limited availability CD or in the hi-res digital format, where it will continue to live on."
-Doug Fake
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Well, obviously you have more options nowadays to tweak digital recordings than you had 20 or 30 or 40 years ago.
It says there is a "modest degree of improvement in the lower end of the recording and a more significant enhancement of the dynamic levels", anyone can decide if that's enough to warrant another purchase.
I played my RIO CONCHOS album the other day and it sounds splendid, so I am quite content with it and feel no need to re-buy it. But it's good to see this re-released, and if I did not own it now, I'd definitely get the download.
Same with some other albums, I have LIONHEART already (both volumes), so I am not going to get the new Deluxe Edition either.
But I think LIONHEART has LONG been out of print and it's a very worthwhile release.
Both these releases, RIO CONCHOS and LIONHEART, should thrill every Goldsmith fan who does not already have them. And that's as it should be.
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Wait - now I'm really confused.
I'm purchasing from Intrada but the description sounds like it's only 24-bit if you wait for the digital download?
Um....you can't have 24bit on a CD. CDs are by definition 16bit.
Exactly. CDs are 16-bit/44.1khz. That is the Redbook standard. And a higher resolution cannot be distributed on audio CDs.
I think these CDs are obivously just a "by product". Intrada is obviously in the process of preparing new masters for moving their own releases to high-res digital downloads, and they press a small number of CDs for those who might be interested in these new masters but still want a physical CD copy. Obviously, the CD copy cannot have higher resolution sound.
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Exactly, Nicolai. Their approach on this (and the other handheld of things they own or control in perpetuity) makes perfect sense.
Yavar
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So it's clear, the version most of us already own is no longer worth owning. Thanks for telling us. I didn't know I needed another 16bit CD of this fine recording, but obviously I want to own a 16bit CD worth owning, and not be stuck with a 16bit CD that's not worth owning.
Sounds like a line from Yes Minister. 
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I was hoping there was something like SACD or the hi-res disc like with the LOTR Complete Recordings.
At this point the question is - do the digital downloads come with a digital version of the booklet?
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That is a good question and I will try to remember to ask Doug about it when I do a Soundtrack Spotlight with him later this month.
Yavar
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I was hoping there was something like SACD or the hi-res disc like with the LOTR Complete Recordings.
At this point the question is - do the digital downloads come with a digital version of the booklet?
So far, the Intrada downloads like JULIUS CAESAR or JASON AND THE ARGONAUTS unfortunately do not come with digital booklet versions. Varèse Sarabande often has the booklet included, or BSX.
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That is a good question and I will try to remember to ask Doug about it when I do a Soundtrack Spotlight with him later this month.
Yavar
Thanks!
The way I figure it, if this is really the beginning of Intrada's eventual push to release 24-bit digital downloads for their scores (in perpetuity) then a digital version of the booklet is all that's left to cover their bases.
For me (and probably others) I'm buying the CDs and ripping them to a lossless format to preserve the music from CD rot (or failure), so having reliably 24-bit digital files (which iTunes and Amazon don't reliably have) would be great.
Now I'm reminded to check in on Neil Young's PONOS system and see if that's still a thing...
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Obviously, the CD copy cannot have higher resolution sound.
Nor can the "hi-res" files that are being offered. Upsampling and up-quantizing a digital audio recording do not improve either characteristic (sampling rate/bandwidth or dynamic range). If the original was recorded at 16-bit/48 kHz, then releasing them that way would have made sense. At least the 48 kHz sampling rate will give you a slight improvement in bandwidth compared to the Red Book audio CD (44.1 kHz). But upsampling to 96 kHz seemingly doesn't make any sense, when starting with a digital recording recorded at a lower sampling rate.
So, I was half-joking when I complained about 24-bit vs. 16-bit (I happily bought the CD anyway) but I thought the re-recording WAS done at 48 khz/24-bit?
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Basil Wrathbone: My 1989 release of Rio Conchos sounds terrific. I just listened to it again and can't hear any reason to buy another. I didn't get the Intrada re-release with the additional End Title because I find the ending of the score presentation is better without it (and despite re-recording it, Goldsmith apparently chose to leave it out). I leave it out when listening to the soundtrack version too.
I did detect a very slight extra clarity in the complex battle music of the recent CD re-release of Intrada's Ivanhoe, but would I have noticed without playing them side-by-side? Probably not.
I'm more than happy with the superb-sounding earlier releases of Intrada's Rio Conchos, Jason and the Argonauts, Julius Caesar, etc and won't be buying them all over again.
I might be tempted, one day, to go for the hi-res downloads, but buy them all again as 16 bit CDs? I don't see any point. They sound marvelous to begin with. But for anyone who hasn't already got a version of Intrada's Rio Conchos re-recording and insists on CD presentations, the new one must surely be an essential buy.
Is it O.K. if I buy it just for the notes, and then do the download, Basil?
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By the way, Basil, this is a good strategy on Intrada's part, because these single disc re-releases of proven titles get long-tempted fence-sitters for certain titles, say Who Framed Roger Rabbit? and Howard the Duck, to tack on a couple of those beefy three-disc sets to the title that sparked the purchase in the first place.
All this hullabaloo because I want Intrada surviving as a record label and remastering their stuff, for disc and download; and in general entering the twenty-first century, like all quality record companies should!
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That is a good question and I will try to remember to ask Doug about it when I do a Soundtrack Spotlight with him later this month.
Yavar
Thanks!
Sure! Maybe I should just do a section of listener-submitted questions for Doug, since you all know this Spotlight episode is happening but it hasn't been recorded yet. I'm already expecting it to be a long conversation so if people have specific questions I'll try to ask him.
Yavar
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