{"id":9767,"date":"2026-01-10T13:15:48","date_gmt":"2026-01-10T18:15:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ultraanaloguerecordings.com\/new\/?p=9767"},"modified":"2026-01-10T13:16:58","modified_gmt":"2026-01-10T18:16:58","slug":"review-of-shostakovich-kodaly-sonata-tapes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ultraanaloguerecordings.com\/new\/review-of-shostakovich-kodaly-sonata-tapes\/","title":{"rendered":"Review of Shostakovich &amp; Kodaly Sonata tapes:"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>My first choice was&nbsp;<strong>Shostakovich\u2019s Cello Sonata in D minor, Op. 40<\/strong>, performed by Narek Hakhnazaryan, the Armenian cellist who won the gold medal at the 2011 International Tchaikovsky Competition. All of Ed\u2019s musicians are selected personally, and their credentials are unimpeachable. I was particularly interested in this title because I already owned the same work on tape from Zavalinka Records, also reviewed favorably by Dave Denyer, and I was curious to hear how the two compared.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The performance itself was excellent\u2014but it was the&nbsp;<em>sound<\/em>&nbsp;that stopped me cold. I had enjoyed the Zavalinka recording, but Ed\u2019s version operated on an entirely different plane. The illusion of being present in the space\u2014Ed\u2019s private home, as it happens\u2014was extraordinary. The cello had body, texture, and resonance that felt uncannily lifelike. The sound of bow on string was vivid and organic in a way I had simply not experienced on my system before.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The second tape I ordered was&nbsp;<strong>Kod\u00e1ly\u2019s Sonata for Solo Cello, Op. 8<\/strong>, performed by Hayoung Choi, another major competition winner. This recording left me genuinely floored. The sense of physical presence was so strong that it felt as though one could reach out and touch the instrument. The performance itself is commanding and emotionally direct, but it\u2019s the combination of musical authority and spatial realism that makes this tape so compelling. At this point, it represents the finest sound I\u2019ve heard from my system, without question. (Here\u2019s a video of the performance:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-embed-handler wp-block-embed-embed-handler wp-embed-aspect-16-9 wp-has-aspect-ratio\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<span class=\"embed-youtube\" style=\"text-align:center; display: block;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" class=\"youtube-player\" width=\"848\" height=\"477\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/0kf9ClmcWcE?wmode=transparent&#038;version=3&#038;rel=1&#038;showsearch=0&#038;showinfo=1&#038;iv_load_policy=1&#038;fs=1&#038;hl=en-CA&#038;autohide=2\" allowfullscreen=\"true\" style=\"border:0;\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts allow-same-origin allow-popups allow-presentation allow-popups-to-escape-sandbox\"><\/iframe><\/span>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>That\u2019s not a statement I make lightly. Over time, I\u2019ve accumulated a number of outstanding tapes: Horch House releases including Rubinstein\u2019s&nbsp;<em>Chopin Nocturnes<\/em>&nbsp;and Martha Argerich\u2019s Chopin; Open Reel\u2019s&nbsp;<em>Thelonious Monk<\/em>; The Tape Project\u2019s&nbsp;<em>Oliver Nelson Orchestra<\/em>; Hemiola\u2019s&nbsp;<em>Kind of Blue<\/em>&nbsp;and&nbsp;<em>Blue Train and many others,<\/em>&nbsp;along with several Analogue Productions titles. These are all excellent releases, many of them truly reference-quality. And yet, none quite matches the combination of detail, immediacy, and atmospheric realism achieved through Ed Pong\u2019s recording chain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Dennis<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>My first choice was&nbsp;Shostakovich\u2019s Cello Sonata in D minor, Op. 40, performed by Narek Hakhnazaryan, the Armenian cellist who won the gold medal at the 2011 International Tchaikovsky Competition. All of Ed\u2019s musicians are selected personally, and their credentials are unimpeachable. I was particularly interested in this title because I already owned the same work [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":40,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[28],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9767","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.3 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Review of Shostakovich &amp; Kodaly Sonata tapes: - UltraAnalogue Recordings | Toronto Analogue Recordings of Classical Music<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/ultraanaloguerecordings.com\/new\/review-of-shostakovich-kodaly-sonata-tapes\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Review of Shostakovich &amp; Kodaly Sonata tapes: - UltraAnalogue Recordings | Toronto Analogue Recordings of Classical Music\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"My first choice was&nbsp;Shostakovich\u2019s Cello Sonata in D minor, Op. 40, performed by Narek Hakhnazaryan, the Armenian cellist who won the gold medal at the 2011 International Tchaikovsky Competition. 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