I just read a Rolling Stone article that discusses the fact that dynamic compression has been sacrificed in the pursuit of higher volume, sufficient volume to be easily heard on i-pod headphones on a noisy bus, etc. This reduces overall sound quality, particularly when the music is being played on good quality speakers.

Artists like Norah Jones and Diana Krall that really emphasize voice tend to offer cds with good sound production. Are there alternative music artist that offer a similarly good sound quality?

I think you might have meant "dynamic compression has been increased in the pursuit of..." Or, "Dynamics have been sacrificed in the pursuit of..."

Most new ablums have too much dynamic compression (the epitome of this is The Red Hot Chili Pepper's By the Way album or Californication for that matter). If you have less dynamic range, you can increase volume, etc. and be more "radio-friendly." Of course, engineers have being doing this for a long time. The goal back in the '50s, '60s, etc. was to have the highest possible volume to stand out on the radio. That is still what is happening, except they are now using compression to reduce the sound to the most narrow possible band of frequencies and then blasting the hell out of it!