HELP!
You can listen to a short extract of each movement of a musical work by clicking on the track title in the track listings.
To purcase a CD online click on the 'Add to Cart' button at the bottom of the track listing. Your virtual shopping basket will open in a separate window. When you have completed your selections click the 'Proceed to Checkout' button on the shopping cart page.
You can purchase a CD with Paypal or by credit card. Your purchase will be mailed to you from the UK.
If you expericence any difficulties you can contact us by email at info@BigEarsRecords.co.uk
Each musical work is a separate download file so in most cases you will need to select several files if you want to purchase the entire contents of a CD. Clicking on the 'Add to Cart' button beneath the track listing will send the associated soundfile to your shopping basket.
Once you've selected your files you are ready to go to checkout. You can do this by clicking the 'View Cart' button at the bottom of the download page.
NB. Cds and Downloads are sent to different shopping carts so if you want to buy both tangible AND virtual products you'll need to pay separately for each.
You can pay for your files with Paypal or by credit card.
Big Ears files are hosted on a third party server called Mediafire. Once your payment has been processed a Mediafire link will appear from where you can download your purchase. The link will remain active for 48 hours.
How long does it take to download Big Ears' files?
Download times vary depending on a number of factors but typically a 100Mb file will take less than 90 seconds to download with an 8Mb/s Internet connection. With a 2Mb/s connection, the same file will take approximately 2½ minutes and approximately 10 minutes with a 1Mb/s connection.
If you expericence any difficulties you can contact us by email info@BigEarsRecords.co.uk
BIG EARS' audio files are currently available at 16bit 44.1Khz or 24bit 44.1Khz
16bit 44.1Khz files are precisely the same resolution as a commercial Compact Disc. 24bit 44.1Khz files are substantially higher quality and, consequently, are almost twice the size. Some Big Ears productions will in future be made available at 96Khz.
A small test file at
each relevant recording resolution is freely
available on every download page.
Please download and play the test file to ensure that
your music system is equipped with the relevant
software to play hi-resolution audio before
purchasing your sound files. These test files are
located on the website server and are likely to be slow
to download. Our main audio files are on dedicated
servers.
BIG EARS' audio download files are available only in the FLAC format. FLAC files are easy to download and play requiring no expert knowledge.
What is FLAC?
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FLAC is an acronym for Free Lossless Audio Codec.
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Free - Flac is a freely available open-source audio codec that is not protected by any legal patent.
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Lossless – Many of the most common audio files currently available on the Internet are data-compressed to reduce the size of the files in order to expedite downloading. Data compression (not to be confused with audio compression) takes two forms: lossy and lossless. Lossy compression produces small files that are quick to download and that occupy relatively little hard disc space. Even though this form of compression typically jettisons 80% of the data of the original, uncompressed sound file, tests have shown that most listeners are unable to discern any loss in audio quality under most listening conditions most of the time. However, most listeners tend to listen to popular music recordings that typically occupy a very limited dynamic range. Lossy compression is less well adapted to represent music with a wide dynamic range – a category that includes ambient acoustic music recordings.
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Lossless compression works in much the same way as a zip file. That’s to say, although the file is compressed its integrity is not compromised; none of the data is thrown away; it is fully restored upon decompression resulting in an output file that is identical to the input file. FLAC compresses files at a ratio of approximately 2:1, reducing the size of the original by 50%.
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Audio Codec – The term codec is derived from coder/decoder and is a device or computer programme for compressing or decompressing digital media files. A codec incorporates an encoder, to compress the file, and a decoder to decompress it so that it can be played.
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In making Big Ears audio files available for download we hope to achieve the fastest possible download times without compromising the audio content. Although FLAC is only one of several lossless audio codecs it is quickly becoming one of the most widely used with good cross-platform support BIG EARS' FLAC files are currently at 16bit 44.1Khz - precisely the same quality as a commercial Compact Disc - and 24bit 44.1Khz, which is substantially better than CD.
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How to play your FLAC downloads
Once you have downloaded your FLAC files you can use them in any of the following ways:
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1. Load FLAC files onto a Digital Media Receiver or streaming device integrated into your hi-fi system.
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2. Decode the FLAC file to restore the original wav file. A wav file is approximately twice the size of its FLAC equivalent and will therefore require double the storage space. Official FLAC tools are available for Linux, Mac OS X, Windows and other platforms from the FLAC website where a number of links to other encoding/decoding front ends can also be found.
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3. Burn wav files onto a CDR and play them with standard audio CD player. Some CD authoring software packages automatically decode FLAC files and convert them to CD Audio files.
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4. Load FLAC files directly onto a compatible handheld device. A list of compatible hardware is available on the FLAC website.
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5. Play FLAC files directly from you computer with a media player such as:
PC
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NB. Windows Media Player will not currently play FLAC files without the installation of a DirectShow filter.
Mac OS X
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Cog
For other players/decoders see the FLAC website
BIG EARS' audio files are currently stored on remote servers at Mediafire and Payloadz. These secure, reliable, well respected service providers allow BIg Ears to make downloads available at no extra cost to its customers. The free service does however impose a limit on file sizes which makes it impossible to upload an entire album as a single file. However, we believe that by making individual works separately available, instead of obliging customers to purchase whole CDs, actually allows greater freedom of choice.
Individual movements are not available as separate downloads partly because we would like to foster the approach of listening to them within the larger context of the full musical work. Moreover, it is not always possible to separate each movement when, for example, the attack of one emerges from the resonance of the previous movement.