At 10:30 yesterday morning, Marc Finer of the DEG moderated a panel on high-resolution music (I’m going to have to get used to the new name associated with the new logo). There were representatives from The Recording Academy\u00ae, Warner Brothers Records, Sony Legacy Records, and Universal Music. They discussed some important developments regarding high-res music.<\/p>\n
The first was the importance of education. What steps can content and hardware companies take to educate members of the recording industry about high-resolution music. In March, there was a daylong symposium at Capitol Records on Hi-Res Music. Individuals in the non-technical aspects of the industry were introduced to the latest developments and played examples of high-res music in the famous Capitol Studios. It’s critically important that everyone be included in the understanding and promotion of high-resolution music. And it’s equally important that the message be clear, accurate, and consistent.<\/p>\n
In addition to the new Hi-Res Music logo announced yesterday, the Producers and Engineers Wing of The Recording Academy\u00ae have established a set of High-Res Guidelines that will be distributed to the production community. Yes, the engineers and producers are going to getting the scoop on hi-res music production. This is also a tremendously important – perhaps the most critical step – in getting real high-resolution music produced. As a member of the P&E Wing for the past 15 years and strong advocate for high-res music, I would have liked to have contributed to this discussion…I wasn’t. <\/p>\n
The guidelines include:<\/p>\n
\u2022 The importance of providing masters that have either been digitally recorded or re-mastered from analog sources at the highest resolution possible.
\n\u2022 The value of establishing workflow protocols and procedures for recording new projects at 96kHz\/24-bit and higher.
\n\u2022 The need for utilizing best practices when transferring analog masters to hi-res digital formats.
\n\u2022 The importance of packaging Hi-Res Music files with high quality digital liner notes, credits, and other descriptive metadata that complements these recordings.
\n\u2022 The use of best efforts when documenting the origin format (“provenance”) of these recordings, in order to provide as much transparency to consumers as possible.
\n\u2022 A list of recommendations that support the minimum production requirements necessary to enable music labels to deliver Hi-Res Music content.<\/p>\n
[Note: Nice to see my suggestion for “provenance” being incorporated.]<\/p>\n
They also announced a demonstration program that will roll out in the fall at about 80 Magnolia A\/V Centers (many located inside of Best Buy Stores). Sony is apparently leading the charge and will supply hardware for these locations that will allow customers to actually experience hi-res music. Of course, it will be the content that’s coming from the major labels and won’t include audiophile level stuff but it is a step in the right direction. People have got to hear better fidelity in order to appreciate it.<\/p>\n
Following the panel, I walked through the rest of the exhibits. There were new wireless speakers from Monster that claimed to be ultra high-resolution; there were wireless ear monitors from Headnotes that use Kleer, a lossless transmission protocol, and a squishy “piano” keyboard from Roli that let’s you do all sorts of cool performance things.<\/p>\n
I did my Hi-Res demo sessions in the afternoon, which were troubled by an Oppo machine that proved a little stubborn. The attendees were very impressed and I collected a bunch of business cards of interested press.<\/p>\n
In the evening, I was allowed to participate in the Sony event at the famous Battery Studios. As a recording and music geek, this proved to be a rare treat. I’ll share the details in tomorrow.<\/p>\n
It was long but very positive day.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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