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Test Your Speakers: A Rate-a-Record Challenge
Using female vocals to assess music playback
One of my articles yet-to-be-written looks at how the female voice is one of best ways to test your speaker system (especially the crucial midrange). I’m abbreviating that post here as a challenge: how do these three performances stack up (1) against each other and (2) as a test of your own playback system (whether a cell phone or a state-of-the-art audiophile set-up)? Please comment on either or both. Standard parameters: 35–98, thanks to Dick Clark and the original challenge by Terry Barr.
If possible, ignore these lo-fi YouTube uploads and opt for high quality streaming or better still, cd’s (alas, the vinyl for the first two albums can fetch several hundred, so keep an eye out if you’re a thrift store devotee like me).
Ethel Ennis, “Lullaby for Losers”
A classic though woefully unknown vocalist in the Billy Holiday tradition but with her own spin, Ethel Ennis expands the possibilities of what a torch song can do.
