Claude

My worst Mosaic decision was the Moncur Select, I love the music but the sound is inferior to the previous CD releases.

It has 500MB flash memory http://www.laptop.org/faq.en_US.html

I consider myself a liberal, but I think having sex at work is quite a misconduct, independently how discreetly it is being done. Not that these teachers must be fired immediately, but the decision by the school directors is defendable. Especially since teachers have a certain model function, and the loss of authority of these two teachers toward their pupils must be huge. BTW, what shocks me more is the fact that this news items states the full names of the teachers. That's not necessary. They are not sex offenders that people need to be warned about. They could suffer from the consequences for years to come, for example when looking for a job. The potential employer googles for their names and finds out about this embarrassing but insignificant incident.

Her website says that "Tom's Diner" has been remixed 30 times. Maybe we will finally get a big band version

Joachim Ernst Behrendt (who died in 2000) is widely considered as the german pope of jazz. He wrote the "Jazzbuch", a general introduction into jazz that has been translated into many languages and was constantly updated. He was a radio show host, organized concerts and produced records (mainly for MPS). His introductions during concerts tended to be a bit too long, maybe because he considered jazz to be an art worth of some explanations, and not just entertainment.

At least Gitte Haenning has a little bit of jazz credentials, because she recorded a jazz album, called ... "Jazz" http://www.amazon.de/exec/obidos/ASIN/B00031R5HC/

Wow Reinier, I didn't know you own (?) JazzCenter. I discovered the store by chance during a business trip in 1994 and I was in heaven. I had never seen a specialized jazz record store before, and found many CDs which I had been looking for for years (much more difficult without the internet back then). In the following years, I passed at the store whenever it was possible.

people who died of hunger today : 28,438

This was announced as a K2 remaster, but never materialized. I would have preferred the K2 reissue.

Racism is a big problem among football fans in many european countries, and in general in east german cities (where there are less than 5% non-german inhabitants). The level of racial intolerance is simply incredible to someone who comes from a country where blacks and other minorities can live peacefully. The german authorities are taking this problem seriously, but only because they are afraid their country will give a bad impression during this event. I guess that after the World Cup it will be business as usual and nothing will change. The german African Council has launched this warning: http://www.prevent-racist-attack.org/index_english.html But I'm confident that no swastikas will be displayed, as Germany has the toughest laws in the world against Nazi symbols.

Japanese version? Or chinese

Me too

I don't think their reissue series Apex and Elatus are that bad, except for the covers. http://www.jpc.de/jpcng/classic/search/-/d...hnaeppchen/4205 http://www.jpc.de/jpcng/classic/search/-/d...hnaeppchen/4204 Anyway, what they own (1970's-1990's recordings from the Teldec and Erato catalogues) is not as prestigious as the Universal (DG/Decca/Phillips), Columbia or EMI back catalogues.

Just like in jazz, there has been a tendency in classical music that the small labels are the most active, while the large companies focus on their back catalogue. But Naxos must also be counted among the "majors" now, since it is the largest classical label in terms of in-print recordings and recording activity.

Silly news indeed. Imagine that back in january and february, this 5 Euro item only sold the fourth time it was re-listed: http://cgi.ebay.at/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=8369410421 http://cgi.ebay.at/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=8373344659 http://cgi.ebay.at/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=8376979130 http://cgi.ebay.at/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=8392608656

A "Workin'" RVG wouldn't make much sense, since a 3CD set with the complete Miles/Coltrane sessions for Prestige is being released at the same time.

The only professionally made counterfeit jazz CDs I've seen so far on Ebay were some russia-made ECM albums. Garbarek, Metheny, Jarrett, etc

Wow, that would have been a great bargain if the job had been done. Over her, despite the recent arrival of many well-trained professionals from the east-european countries, prices are much higher, so people generally prefer DIY.

WADA rejects report that cleared Armstrong Result of investigation full of factual errors, Pound claims The Associated Press Updated: 6:31 p.m. ET June 2, 2006 MONTREAL - World Anti-Doping Agency chairman Dick Pound said Friday that a Dutch investigator’s report clearing Lance Armstrong from doping allegations made by a French newspaper is full of holes. “They put as fact things that are suppositions, suspicions and possibilities,” Pound said. Pound said WADA has “completely rejected” the report written by lawyer Emile Vrijman for the International Cycling Union (UCI). The report defended Armstrong against accusations that he used performance-enhancing drugs at the 1999 Tour de France. He said the report had so many factual errors that “pointing them out would probably take as much space as the (132-page) report.” WADA will consider legal action against Vrijman and “any organization, including UCI, that may publicly adopt its conclusions.” Pound said a complete, independent investigation was needed to determine whether the seven-time Tour champion used endurance-boosting erythropoietin, or EPO. The cycling union appointed Vrijman in October to investigate the handling of urine samples from the 1999 Tour by a French anti-doping lab. His report released Wednesday exonerated Armstrong “completely” of any doping infractions. The Paris-based sports daily L’Equipe reported in August that six of Armstrong’s samples tested positive for EPO. After the Vrijman report was released, the newspaper ran an editorial saying it stood by its original story. There was no reliable test for EPO in 1999, but urine samples were preserved and analyzed later when improved testing technology was developed. Pound said the UCI appeared to be more concerned with how the tests became public than whether Armstrong tested positive or not. He said other tests from the 1999 race were also positive, but names of the riders were never released. It should be in the UCI’s interest to make positive tests known to keep up the sport’s credibility, he added. Armstrong has denied ever using performance-enhancing drugs. The American rider said this week he was the victim of a “witch hunt” by Pound, WADA, the French lab, the French ministry of sport, L’Equipe and Tour de France organizers to tarnish his reputation. The Vrijman report found the tests were conducted improperly and that it was “completely irresponsible” to suggest they constitute evidence of doping. It added that the French lab violated rules on athlete confidentiality by making public comments on the allegations and recommended a tribunal be convened to look at possible legal and ethical violations by WADA and the French lab. Vrijman said no proper records were kept of the frozen samples and there was no way to determine if they had been tampered with. Pound said the report was prepared by “a Dutch lawyer with no expertise” in doping control. A WADA statement on Friday said the Vrijman report was “so lacking in professionalism and objectivity that it borders on the farcical.” It added that Vrijman’s report was defamatory to WADA and the French anti-doping lab that tested Armstrong’s samples. And WADA expressed “astonishment that the UCI would expect anyone to have the slightest confidence in the objectivity, methodology, analysis or conclusions of such a report.” http://msnbc.msn.com/id/13106022/ http://www.wada-ama.org

The current selection of CD Recorders isn't very large, as these devices haven't sold very well in the past years because of the competition from PC CD burners. They need dedicated CD-R blanks, which can easily be found but are slightly more expensive. A CD-R burner must be connected to an amplifier just like a tape recorder. You cannot connect a turntable directly because the the phono signal needs to be pre-amplified and equalized. http://www.cdrfaq.org/faq05.html#S5-12

I'm not suggesting to go to McDonald's, but the price of a hamburger at the local McDonald's is actually a good indicator for the general price level. www.mcdonalds.pl says a hamburger costs 2 Zloty and a Big Mac 6.90 Zloty, which is $0.65/2.25. http://www.mcdonalds.pl/html/products/start.html http://www.xe.com/ucc/

I would have liked a more independent report. The cycling federation UCI has no interest in a serious investigation, since doping is so widespread in this sport, and too many financial interests are at stake for thefederation. This is not about Armstrong only. Investigation stepped up to catch blood-doping cheats

Here are some very detailed instructions: http://www.delback.co.uk/lp-cdr.htm Doing such transfers only takes a lot of time if you want to clean the sound by manually cutting out pops. Seperating the various tracks (instead of just having one CD track per LP side) also takes a couple of minutes after you have a certain routine of visually detecting the track transitions in the recorded wav file. If you always listen to complete albums you don't necessarily need to do this. I'm not sure commercial services would do all this work for a fair price.

Rachmaninov is most famous for his 4 piano concertos, of which 2 and 3 are by far the most popular. His Paganini Variations for piano and orchestra are also a good place to start. Symphonic Dances is also my favourite orchestral work. Another work I love is The bells, for orchestra, choir ans solo singers. Other important orchestral works are his 2nd symphony and Isle of the dead As far as solo piano works go, I like his Preludes op.23 and 32, as well as the two suites for two pianos. Some CDs in the midprice and budget price range I have and can recommend (excellent interpretation and sound): - Symphonic dances + Isle of the dead (Naxos) http://www.cduniverse.com/music/pid/1042369/ - Piano concertos 2 + 3 (Janis) http://www.cduniverse.com/productinfo.asp?pid=1191881 (also available on SACD) - Preludes op. 23 + 32 + Sonata 2 (Ashkenazy): http://www.cduniverse.com/productinfo.asp?pid=1170222