| Meetings and other Notices |
|
|
|
| The
December
In
Person
only Meeting |
|
Date:
Sunday,
December
14, 2025,
2:00 PM EST
Featured Guest:
Ed Ting
Where:
Colonial
Cadillac
of
Woburn,
201
Cambridge
Road,
Woburn
MA,
01801
Please
do not
park in
customer
area in
front of
the
showroom.
Topic:
What
does a
conductor
do?
What
makes a
successful
conductor?
Is it
their
knowledge,
their
preparation
skills,
their
charisma,
or
something
else?
Having
spent
most of
his life
trying
to
decipher
conductors
and
conducting,
Ed Ting
decided
to find
out.
As a
grad
student
at
Dartmouth,
he got
accepted
into a
class
taught
by a
national
conducting
competition
teacher.
What
transpired
next was
not what
he
expected,
and the
experience
taught
him a
new
appreciation
for
conductors
and
their
art.
Ed is a
well-known
amateur
astronomer
whose
works
have
appeared
in Sky &
Telescope,
Skywatch,
Astronomy,
Discover,
and
Popular
Mechanics
magazines.
He is a
National
Science
Foundation
Ambassador
to
Chile, a
Mission
Patagonia
ambassador,
and a
NASA
Solar
System
Ambassador.
His
science-themed
YouTube
channel
has
65,000
subscribers
and gets
two
million
views a
year.
Ed’s
creative
works
have
appeared
in
literary
journals.
He is a
past
winner
of the
NH State
Flash
Fiction
contest
and was
selected
as
Writer-in–Residence
at the
Noepe
Center
for the
Fine
Arts in
Edgartown,
Massachusetts.
He
teaches
creative
writing
at New
England
College
and at
various
writing
retreats
across
New
England.
Ed holds
a BS in
Electrical
Engineering
from the
University
of
Illinois,
an MFA
from New
England
College,
and a
MALS
degree
from
Dartmouth,
where he
produced
an
award-winning
thesis
on
astronomical
imaging.
He is a
retired
Category
3
bicycle
racer, a
classical/New
Age
pianist,
and an
enthusiastic
fudge
confectioner.
The
meeting
is not
Zoomed
|
Hope to see you
there.
|
|
|
THE BAS MESSAGE
December 2025 |
Miscellaneous News
1.
Eternal 5D data
storage could record
the history of
humankind
Scientists
at the University of
Southampton have
made a major step
forward in the
development of
digital data storage
that is capable of
surviving for
billions of years.
Using nanostructured
glass, scientists
from the
University’s Optoelectronics
Research Centre (ORC)
have developed the
recording and
retrieval processes
of five dimensional
(5D) digital data by
femtosecond laser
writing. The storage
allows unprecedented
properties including
360 TB/disc data
capacity, thermal
stability up to
1,000°C and
virtually unlimited
lifetime at room
temperature (13.8
billion years at
190°C ) opening a
new era of eternal
data archiving. As a
very stable and safe
form of portable
memory, the
technology could be
highly useful for
organizations with
big archives, such
as national
archives, museums
and libraries, to
preserve their
information and
records.
The documents were
recorded using
ultrafast laser,
producing extremely
short and intense
pulses of light. The
file is written in
three layers of
nanostructured dots
separated by five
micrometres (one
millionth of a
metre). The
self-assembled
nanostructures
change the way light
travels through
glass, modifying
polarization of
light that can then
be read by
combination of
optical microscope
and a polarizer,
similar to that
found in Polaroid
sunglasses.
Professor Peter
Kazansky ,
from the ORC, says:
“It is thrilling to
think that we have
created the
technology to
preserve documents
and information and
store it in space
for future
generations. This
technology can
secure the last
evidence of our
civilization: all
we’ve learnt will
not be forgotten.”
2. Vintage Bozak
Symphony B-4000
Modern speakers
looking for a good
home. Each speaker
has 2 woofers, 1
midrange, 4
tweeters. They are
large speakers, but
only half the size
of the Bozak Concert
Grands! Manufactured
by Bozak in the
1960s, I bought
these in the early
1970s. I have not
used them for some
years now. I have
recently set them up
and they sound fine.
Cabinets need some
TLC. At 60 years
old, the crossovers
probably need the
electrolytic
capacitors
replaced. Located in
Watertown MA, 26.5”
wide, 16” deep,
44.5” high. They
deserve a good home
and I will give them
away FREE to an
audiophile who would
appreciate them.
Contact Mike Krasner
at
mike@oxysys.com.
3. Apticon -
This inaugural event
features the
technology of the
products of Apt
Corporation,
Cambridge, MA
introduced between
1977 and 1982. This
includes the
Apt/Holman
Preamplifier, the
Apt 1 Power
Amplifier, and
others. There
will be talks on the
preamp, power amp,
and ancillary
products, panels of
technicians on
repairing and even
improving on the
original design,
sources for
components,
demonstrations like
at the original CES
intro, and a clinic
for products brought
to the seminar. The
venue is in Burbank,
CA, June 6,7, 2026
4.
The BAS is looking
for a new webmaster.
The current
webmaster will train
you and hand it over
to you, and provide
support as
necessary. The
website is written
in simple HTML. You
will need a computer
and a high speed
internet connection
(you will need to
download a 6GB
backup in a
reasonable amount of
time). The annual
payment is $300. You
may be asked to
support
administration of
the BAS Facebook
pages as well.
Boston
Audio
Society
PO BOX
260211
BOSTON,
MA 02126
978-944-6481
|
|
Below, other meetings and notices which
may be of interest to BAS members |
|
|
JUST RELEASED !
A fantastic historical video!
Ken Berger and Kenton Forsythe are the founders of EAW (Eastern Acoustics Works) and they discuss, with terrific overlaid graphics, the history of, well, pretty much every audio thing Boston from the early 70's.
18 minutes and right here: https://youtu.be/fPfQEK0b0mI
|
|
|
|
|
A Boston issue - As MIX magazine reports:
Sound Museum owners cry foul as their tenants likely secure new spaces without them
While the headline sounds like someone has sour grapes, the complete story of how the closure of this crucial Boston rehearsal studio is being handled is far more nuanced and complicated -- particularly since it brings up issues of gentrification, government support of the arts, non-profits' ethics and more. Full Story HERE (WBUR-FM Boston (1/11/23)
And here's an update:
www.wbur.org/news/2023/01/25/charlestown-rehearsal-studios-musicians-boston
|
|
|
MAHLER 3
In the recent (April 2022) performance of Mahler’s Third Symphony at Boston's Symphony Hall by Ben Zander and his Boston Philharmonic, the recording was done with the three main spaced omnis with two more farther back. No accent mikes or chorus microphones were used nor, it turns out, were they needed. Remarkably, this produced a recording that is as close to the Symphony Hall experience as may be possible.
The info is here: www.bostonphil.org/concerts/2021-2022/bpo4-mahler3
Here is the recording in its entirety as a single .WAV file; 44k / 16 bit; 1hr 47 min
Mahler Sym 3 CD.wav 1.1GB
(For those of you with editing software note that the .wav file HAS markers to denote the movements.)
Here is the exact same Symphony 3 with the movements separated as FLAC files, 48k / 24 bit as a ZIPped file: Mahler 3 Zander as FLAC.zip 1GB
IF you'd like further Gustav Mahler info... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gustav_Mahler
|
|
|
Shop Talk
Shop Talk was a WBUR program about Hi Fidelity, music, speakers, tape recorders, etc. Enjoyed by many during the 1970s, the program's format was ‘talk’ and interviewing major audio luminaries. It was a forerunner of the popular program Car Talk!
Peter Mitchell and Dr. Richard Goldwater were the original hosts. They were later joined by Brad Meyer. Here, John Allen interviews Scott Kent:
Shop Talk John Allen talks to Scott Kent on SPEAKERS.mp3 (81Mb 1:27)
Shop Talk John Allen talks to Scott Kent on TAPE RECORDERS.mp3 (79Mb 1:26)
There is also an episode track on the BAS CD and here is that Description:
Track 12. "Shop Talk", WHRB-FM, November 5, 1984.
Peter Mitchell (on the left), Richard Goldwater, MD (center) and E. Brad Meyer (right) introduce the show with a 1932 stereo recording and prepare to talk with guests Mark Davis and David Moran, both then of dbx corporation.
Shop Talk, which through most of its ten-year life on WBUR featured just Mitchell and Goldwater, was the precursor of Tom and Ray Magliozzi's "Car Talk". As we finished our 9:00-10:30 stint every Saturday morning, Tom and Ray would take our places and begin joking with each other. Eventually the station manager figured out that they were funnier than we were, and that more people drove cars than owned hi-fi equipment, and fired us. Until then, the show publicized the Boston Audio Society, vastly increasing attendance at our monthly meetings. The show came back for a time during the '80's on the Harvard station WHRB, where we appeared once a month as guests of HRB stalwart David Elliott. [EBM]
|
|
| BAS MICROPHONE CLINIC REPORT ! |
| In September 2009 the B A S held a microphone clinic, testing 37 different microphone models. The ambitious nature of the clinic effort, the extent of data collection, the number of individuals involved in microphone testing and in writing various sections of the report, and the complexity in determining how to construct the clinic report and make it available to members resulted it not being published until now. The dataset is extensive.
Representative samples were included in the abbreviated report in "The B A S Speaker"
(Fall 2015; v37n3)
Go to the MICROPHONE CLINIC PAGE for more...
...and don't forget, here is the master list of microphones in the world
|
|
|
When collecting and plotting "noisy" data it is often useful to have Microsoft Excel plot a Trend Line through it. If that data is to be used for further work, it may be necessary to have an X-Y table of the Trend Line. That is not easy to get and this paper will show how to do it.
Joseph DeMarinis has an article here: Extracting Numerical Data from an Excel Trend Line
|
|
|
Foster's Test Bench !
by Alvin Foster ! Click the logo: —> |
 |
|
|
The rapidly-becoming-famous BAS Headphone Test Article is now available in the BASS VOLUME 25, ISSUE 4, on Page 17, available HERE  PDF 3mb |
|
|
Visit our PODCAST PAGE for:
The LIVE video podcast of our meetings,
Archived video of past meetings (only one so far!),
and Audio Podcast interviews by Alvin Foster |
|
|
There is a supplemental and further explanation addendum paper to the E. Brad Meyer / David Moran paper published in the September, 2007 issue of the AES Journal. That page, which documents the experimental protocol and audio systems/source material is here:
www.bostonaudiosociety.org/explanation.htm |
|
| There is a Power Point Presentation of the lecture given by Dr. Barry Blesser at the March 2007 Meeting. The Meeting page synopsis is HERE; the Power Point Presentation (as a web page) is HERE |
|
|
Some earlier BASS issues, previously available only directly by mail, are now available online, on the BAS SPEAKER page, HERE
Show your appreciation for the immense amount of dedicated work that went into both the original writing, gathering, editing and printing, PLUS the more recent scanning and conversion to PDF format, by joining the Society, HERE !
|
|
A L L O F F S I T E L I N K S O P E N I N T O A N E W T A B O R W I N D O W
- AND FOR CONVENIENCE -
|
