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The TSD15 is exceedingly fast and robust but also refined. It has texture. It's a reality-check kind of texture where you recognize instruments—especially acoustic instruments—-for their actual tonal character, i.e. what they truly sound like. As stated earlier (working from memory having just turned off the stereo but shouldn’t great music stay with you like a great meal?) the thwack of a snare drum, the spat of a trumpet, the church-like choir vocals of Fleet Foxes, Steve Kupka’s great baritone sax with Tower of Power and such had the EMT TSD15 deliver a musical line like no other cartridge I’ve had in my system. This included Sumiko, Benz, Grado and Ortofon, some as expensive, some less so.

Mozart, Foxes, Tower and Blackwell. Britten Conducts Mozart [London CS 6598, 1968] under Benjamin Britten and the English Chamber Orchestra offers lovely familiar Mozart including Symphony No. 40 K550. This got my juices and the TSD15’s off to a sterling start. It’s an older recording but rich. It made me want to turn up the volume right away, always a good sign in my book. The contrast between the orchestra’s gentle then insistent string lines highlighted the TSD15’s ability to capture and deliver speed and relay the essence of the musical line. That's perhaps the TSD15’s greatest strength. Again and again the TSD15 offered exceptional dynamics, speed, tonality and overall musicality. I forgot that I was reviewing. I got caught up in enjoying record after record. From basso profundo to clarinets peeking through to soaring violins, Britten Conducts Mozart was a revelation of nuance well captured through the TSD15.

During the review process I found a sealed copy of Tower Of Power’s Back to Oakland [Warner Bros. BS 2749] at Academy Music. A true classic of 70s soul, Back to Oakland is TOP at their peak. Songs like "Time Will Tell", "Man from the Past" and "Oakland Stroke" set a soul standard that has never been matched. Not only were TOP great musicians, Back to Oakland is a prime example of their incredible songwriting craft. And thankfully the recording is better than most dead-sounding 70s sessions. David Garibaldi’s drums ring and rock, the brass section shouts with great verve and purpose and the itchy guitar marks chicken scratch to add to the music’s funky jubilation.


The TSD15 revealed the clarity of "Time Will Tell", its dry bass drum sticking the rhythm hard, strings soaring, with overall pinpoint definition and again a simply great sense of ensemble and musical flow. There is plenty of air here from the cymbals and upper register brass. Then it gets right down to the ground with Steve Kupka’s popping baritone sax lines. My system doesn’t really do soundstage nor depth to tell the truth. My rig is flat up against a wall of CDs firing across the short side of a long room. But the TSD revealed pinpoint imaging nonetheless. More importantly there was a real sense of the dynamics, flow and urgency of this great big band. "Man from the Past" was a different vibe, a funky soul ballad that’s pretty low key. But when the large brass section kicks in and begins to strut mid song mirroring the singer’s need to pull himself away from this evil woman who is the object of his sad affections, the soundstage opens and the brass section roars like a band of lions. The TSD15 got the tonality of every instrument perfectly here, exhibiting richness, tautness and robustness.

But perhaps the best recording to evaluate the TSD15 with came as Dewey Redman and Ed Blackwell’s excellent In Willisau [Black Saint SR 0093]. A live duet recording of these late tenor saxophone/drum set masters, In Willisau was recorded in 1985. The sound is superb: alive, rich and full of love and humor. I can’t think of another jazz recording that so well represents the history of jazz with such mastery and humor. Blackwell, a New Orleans drum giant and Redman, a free jazz clairvoyant, magically bounce off each other with an amazing sense of empathy and real joyousness. There is so much drive and color here—more than 50 shades of grey—that it’s like a rainbow exploding before your eyes. I felt the duo was literally in the room before me immersing me in their genius. There was no time delay between a note and its release. It was true transparency. Playfulness, joyousness, mastery. The TSD15 projected the sounds into my living space and as I walked around my apartment, I heard different elements of the music almost following me. A great great LP.