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Best female vocal recording on CD?

i am a sucker for great warm rich smooth female vocalists, especially on tube gear and speakers that image well. but i am almost always faced with a great voice/song but a sonically inferior recording (examples too numerous to list) or a great recording of a mediocre voice.  rickie lee jones (pop pop) comes to mind- fab recording, but come on lets be honest about her voice. however, i will almost always pick great recordings and leave the bad recordings for the car.

 so i am asking for what you use as a reference female vocal recording/track. right now i come back tp bonnie raitt "you cant make me love you" from luck of the draw.  big, warm, strong voice. not a perfect recording. but hmmmm that voice.

my only requirement is it has to be on CD. and we all know of great vinyl that did not translate into great CDs.  so help me out here, what should be my next music purchase 
meiatflask

Showing 3 responses by bdp24

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bdp24
9,412 posts
 
Oh yeah, Mary Gauthier is a fairly new discovery of mine. I have a couple albums of hers, still have to get the one produced by T-Bone Burnett.
bdp24's avatar
bdp24
9,412 posts
 
Wow, some great suggestions. I am once again reminded that I’m amongst kindred spirits here on AudiogoN! The mention of Joe Boyd (who does really quality work, starting the great label Hannibal Records) has reminded me of an album produced by Boyd containing a female vocalist in reference quality sound---Shoot Out The Lights by Richard and Linda Thompson. Not only stunning sound, but great songs (chronicling the break-up of their marriage), Richard’s incredible guitar playing, and Linda’s (and Richard’s) fabulous singing. An absolute must-own album!
bdp24's avatar
bdp24
9,412 posts
 

Old favorites of mine are Maryann Price and Naomi Ruth Eisenberg, the two singers of Dan Hicks And His Hot Licks in the 1970’s. They’re great on the studio-recorded Striking It Rich and the recorded-live-at-The Troubadour Where’s The Money? As a bonus, both are unusually good sounding recordings.

And then there are all the Iris Dement albums. I would love them no matter the sound quality, but fortunately they’re pretty good. I used her My Life album as a demo source at CES in the late 90’s.

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