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Karl Suske Violin Recordings

Karl Suske's sillky violin tone has continued lingering in my mind even after I lifted up the Da Vinci tonearm. Thie cost of this rare LP box set of Mozart complete violin sonata costs is dearable but worths every penny. After listening to Henryk violin tone for so long, I want to experience some other violinists. I am not ready for Kogan's strength and energy yet. Milstein sounds excellent but I cannot find any Mozart recording with his name. I tried a few LPs by Ricci and Arthur Grumiaux but I ended up playing Henryk most of the time until Karl Suske's arrival.

Karl tone is beautiful. It is hard to describe but let me try by the process of elimination first. It is not the type of signature warm tone like Dave and Elman. It does not resemble Menuhin's white tone too.

Karl, on the other hand, can always present musical notes in a very coherent manner. Musical notes under the control of his bow flows like a very calm river in spring. It always carries a sense of serenity. He can be fast, slow, but the silence-between-notes are always present and yet they are not discreet but continuous.

The experience is very different from listening to Henryk Szeryng, who always beautifies his tone by revealing more of the color and texture of his violin to the listener . I don't know how he does that but his skills on displaying different color of his violin always honeys my ears.

My knowledge on thse great violinists is still scarce. I am learning more and more from all these old vinyl treasures. It also makes me under the CONTROL of high frequency more. In order for violin recording to sound good and up to certain standard, it is not a matter of rounding or smoothing out the upper trebels and boosting the mid range in order to make it easier to get into the ears. As Santamomo pointed out in his writing, making the violin sounds like an Erhu is as easy as ABC.

However, it does not mean squeezing every bits of trebel extension will do the job either. It is a matter of control, which most would think only the bass compartment requires control. The frequent listening to soprano recordings these days makes me understand the control of high frequency much more. I am glad that the DV arm with Dynavector XV1-S excels so much in these important areas. I am now longing for the arrival of the Da Vinci Grandezza Ref Cartridge, which is developed by using master tapes as listening references. I was told it is not made by comparing to other top catridges. I hope that cartridge will teach me even more of everything.
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