78 of my test tracks

Context is everything. I grew up practicing the classical clarinet and started formal studies at the conservatory before opting out of that career. My older sister and younger brother did not and to this day play the French horn in the Wiesbaden and Hamburg opera orchestras respectively. I've played with string quartets, woodwind quintets, piano and in symphony orchestras. I'm imprinted by their timbres. After I returned from India and my life's trajectory changed, I eventually picked up the musical thread again. This now focused on so-called world music and their exotic instruments. For vocals I dislike understanding what mostly are exceptionally trite lyrics. Bypassing the entire repertoire of English and German songs, I've instead mined Spanish flamenco, Portuguese fado, Pakistani qawwali, Indian ghazals, Brazilian samba, Turkish arabesque, African soukous, Cuban boleros, Mexican rancheras and more. I have a fondness for Manouche Jazz, gipsy music of all stripes, lyrical piano trios/quartets like Tord Gustavsen, the Turkish qanun, organic ambient à la Mercan Dede, the minimalist paisley music of Al Gromer Khan and the happy Jazz pans of Andy Narell. Needless to say, my test tracks reflect all of this. Most of them are recorded well to very well though a few are anything but. That too is by design. Obviously YouTube's compression algorithm disqualifies using any of these as is. The idea here is to furnish introductions. Should you wish to follow up, streaming in at least CD resolution if not better obviously becomes the ticket to double as useful 'test' tracks. Most of these are deliberately simple. I find it easier to focus in on specific performance aspects that way. For me, convoluted bombastic stuff tends to come at the end of a review period which this selection goes deliberately light on. Frederic on staff has begun to duplicate this playlist on Tidal. Also, depending on where you live, YouTube could have regional copyright restrictions in place to not open a given link. C'est la vie. Hopefully enough of them work for you and stay accessible.

Here are some things I listen for. How does a component handle recorded glassiness and strong HF; the blur and amorphousness of excess reverb? Do passages or high notes shared verbatim between performers become a compound singularity or remain separate? How well does it track simultaneous counter textures like hard percussive dry hits and languorous wet legato chords? How visible is recorded space as an ambience clearly different from my own? How expansive are tone modulations whereby a performer coaxes very different colours from one instrument? How cleanly do rapid staccato events remain separated? If a lead vocal is recorded very mixed in with its accompaniment, how easily can I still follow it? How enjoyable or not is a 'bad' recording? How defined and intelligible does bass and sub bass come off? How brilliant, high and long does a triangle or cymbal rise before its decay ends? How well can I follow virtually subliminal brush and tip work? How layered and sorted is a particular soundstage? Does a certain tune's rhythmic verve and attitude telegraph or seem dumbed down? What happens to the timbres of period ensembles? How about the microdynamic expressiveness of a very nuanced performer? How do massed strings come off; and the uppermost range of a piano? To answer such and related questions, I enjoy using particular tracks like a virtual microscope. That I should also enjoy them whilst performing 'technical' assessments goes without saying. Using 'ugly' music just to see how ugly it can get; or poorly played fare that's brilliantly mastered; or popular stuff that I plainly dislike – those aren't my ideas of time well spent. Given my classical music upbringing, I've never learnt to hear guitar overdrive as anything but distortion, hence the musical genres which rely on it don't factor on my menu. Meanwhile massed bowed strings which are mostly alien to such styles do very much. Again, context. It's everything. If you want to know my favourite track of this lot, that's easy. It's the longest one…