Hi-Res Downloads

192kHz/24-bit FLAC/DSD64, Fidelio FACD044 (supplied by www.highresaudio.com)

This collection of chilled-out country/folk songs by the curiously-named June In The Fields duo of composer Jean-Michel Renaud (guitar/vocal) and singer Mélissa Brouillette hails from Canada’s Fidelio Musique audiophile label. Visit a hi-fi show in North America and you might bump into recording engineer René LaFlamme – who runs Fidelio Musique in Montreal – demonstrating his recordings promoted with the tag line: ‘We capture the feeling…’. This is an intimate set, the duo accompanied on tracks such as ‘Andaman Sea’ and ‘Summer Road’ by Sebastien Saliceti on double-bass to flesh out the sparse arrangements. The vocals in particular have been beautifully captured by LaFlamme’s all-tube mic and preamplifier set-up to produce a ‘charming’ sound that’s exceedingly cosy and seductive, if a tad lacking air and space. A pleasing debut outing from this Canadian folk duo. JB

Sound Quality: 84%

Hi-Fi News Lab Report

Recorded direct to analogue tape with no pitch correction or mixing, the bandwidth of this 192kHz/24-bit digitisation is necessarily slightly limited (a 96kHz transfer would have captured no less). But it’s very pure indeed. PM