Mozart, W. A.: Don Giovanni.

Mozart, W. A.: Don Giovanni (highlights). Nicolaus Esterhazy Sinfonia, with the Hungarian Radio Chorus and soloists. Recorded in 2000, at the Phoenix Studio, Budapest, Hungary. Engineer: Janos Bohus. 76+ minutes. Naxos 5.110011.

This is the only DVD-A release in this batch of recordings, and it is a bit unusual in that it was recorded at 44.1 kHz, with 24-bit resolution. Most of the DVD-A material I have reviewed was at 96 kHz, but the readout on my Onkyo DV-S939 player confirmed the listed information. The audible effect of this lower data rate should be zero.

One of the first things that I noticed when I first listened to this transcription (other than the richness, clarity, and depth of the sound) is that the engineer chose to make serious use of the center channel. More to the point, he made skillful use of it. The left/right blend across the soundstage is wonderful, with proper half-left and half-right imaging, and the front/back perspective and integration of the soloists and supporting instrumental and vocal ensembles was done just about as well as it can be. The soloists are maybe just a tad closer up in perspective sometimes than they might be at a live performance, but the balance is not objectionable in the least. If your favorite seat at the opera is within the forward-row sections in the hall you will love this presentation.

Lately, many American recording engineers have been fretting about how to properly use the center feed to get a decent soundstage blend without having centered performers sound like they are in a mono recording. Some do not know how to generate a center feed that includes hall ambiance, and there appears to be some concern about proper half-left and half-right imaging. Quite a few are apparently paranoid enough to not make use of the center feed at all, or at least to only use it just enough to not offend listeners who have a center speaker set up. This center-channel situation is the norm with both DVD-A and SACD recordings as best I can tell.

Admittedly, there is a certain non-paranoid logic to this, because in many home-system cases the center speaker is not properly height positioned in relation to the left/right mains, and it is also usually oriented wrong and often rather cheaply built to boot. These height, orientation, and quality problems can certainly blow good soundstaging to pieces, even if the recording makes astoundingly proper use of the center channel.

In any case, Bohus took his chances with center-speaker quality in the systems that may play this recording. He did the job just right, with proper hall ambiance surrounding the centered soloists and top-tier half-left and half-right imaging, even from off the preferred sweet-spot listening axis. I suggest that angst-cursed US recording engineers hop some planes to Hungary and see how the job is done. Do the work right and listeners will go out and obtain good center-channel speakers and position them correctly.

The only technical problem (or shall I say philosophical problem) I had with this release involved a short section within the ballroom scene. For a brief interval the solo performers and even some of the instruments were placed both up front and in the surround channels (to simulate a ballroom situation all around, I suppose) and the effect was momentarily disconcerting. No doubt some listeners will like this, and obviously someone in charge of production did. Indeed, the technique was slightly used to good effect in the final scene--but just with the chorus. However, I was glad when it was over and the surround channels went back to reproducing only hall ambiance.

This was a neat trick (and useful with rock recordings that are ends in themselves and not simulations of a live performance), but it is not something that could easily be done in a concert-hall environment. Those with dipolar surround speakers (mine are wide-dispersion monopoles) might find the relocated-soloist effect even more disconcerting, since the performers will sound a bit larger than life as well as relocated from the soundstage.

In addition to the DVD-A tracks, the disc contains Dolby Digital tracks (448 kbps) and DTS tracks (1509 kbps), and for the life of me I could not see where the latter two were in any way subjectively inferior to the data-reduced systems. Indeed, because one can apply bass management and distance compensation to the Dolby and DTS material, they actually will sound better than DVD-A on most home AV systems.

This disc cued up quickly and played easily, and it is not necessary to have a video monitor at all to access menus or enjoy it. There are no moving pictures or any other extras, and the only thing you will see on the TV screen are stills of paintings that relate to the opera. Ballroom surround tricks notwithstanding, I cannot recommend this disc highly enough.