55 Goldberg Recording Question

["Sven-S. Porst" <ssp@EARTHLING.NET>]

Hi everybody,

I went shopping for a new hifi yesterday and took my '55 Goldberg
Variations with me as one of the CDs to test the hifis and speakers with.
While this was quite helpful in telling the differences between speakers
(e.g. on some speakers they just don't sound as vivid as I think they
should) there was another aspect:

For the first time I heard static on the recording. I suspect this is due
to the old analogue recording, but on my old, cheap, stereo you just
don't hear it (I guess because there's static with everything...). In
particular it wasn't the amplifier I tested since the static was much
less on the WTC 'bonus tracks' on the CD. The strange thing, however, was
that the amount of static I could hear differed significantly between
different amplifiers (in different shops) an - of course - in either case
the salespeople tried to tell me that (a) the static was on the recording
and the amp was so good that it reproduces it truthfully, in case it was
very audible - or that (b) when I asked why I couldn't hear the noise as
clearly on a particular amp and asked why it isn't as audible they told
me it isn't that much noise on the recording, it's just the other
amplifier that's 'wrong'.

Now, of course, I wonder how much static there 'really' is on the
recording and as I suspect that many people here have listened to it many
times - possibly on high-quality equipment, I hope it's OK to ask,
although it's not strictly a Gouldian question.

Cheers

            Sven

--
Sven-S. Porst . PGP: 0x0085ABA3 . http://homepage.mac.com/ssp
                                          "I am a Golden God."