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I drove down from NYC to visit friends and go to the Capital Audiofest - after years longing for the old Stereophile/HE shows I could not resist. The show was a lot of fun. I hope that some pictures surface of the event, for the day I went (Saturday) there was finally a crowd that was not entirely post-middle age and white (I am sort of in the first part and definitely in the second part of the standard audio audience myself). I think that the presenters can be very happy with the mix of people at the show. Yes the rooms, many of which had some treatment, were a problem - but when is that not true for any show?
OK, so I wanted to hear the mega systems, like the GTT room with YG Acoustics speakers. Pretty great, but like a lot of places, they were playing simple audiophile stuff when I was there so the system did not have to break a sweat. The same was true for the Nola and MBL set ups, but it might just have been the time I was there? I hope more discerning ears than mine can talk about the merits of the mega setups. I’m a tourist at that level.
The other motivation I had was looking for some lower priced speakers for a friend. I was particularly looking forward to checking out the Sonist room and the Salk room. I’ve wanted to hear Salk and AVA for a long time. Jim played a CD of mine on the Song Towers and they sounded very good. On my second trip to the room they were playing the SoundScapes which sounded great, they are in a in a different league from the Song Towers. I broke my promise to come back on Sunday. One should never make promises in the throes of passion. Did I mention that I had an armload of vinyl that I bought at the show too?
I had already visited the Sonist room, and heard the slim Recital 3 and the larger Concerto 3. Listening to the speakers I was not sure what to think, the Recital 3 was fast sounding, but lacked something (like some muscle) in comparison to the Concerto 3 (this could be considered obvious). The Recital 3 made a good initial impression with the audiophile simple music that was playing, and it made the Concerto 3 seem a bit reserved in comparison. The comparisons cold be done quickly by turning the volume on his two Glow amps
I have a natural distrust of some audio initial impressions just as I distrust the legion of hi-fi speakers that “crack” and “snap” so excitingly - but really (and we should face this) really artificially. So while I thought about that I spent some time happily with the Living Voice Speakers and the Border Patrol amps and the Luxman/Joseph Audio set up by Command Performance AV. My thanks to the guy who was manning the Feickert turntable playing all types of music including a cut from Dolphy’s “Out to Lunch” LP.
Still the Sonist thing was bothering me. I wanted to hear some of my music on it. And to cut the whole narrative thing. After playing music I was familiar with on the Concerto 3 they soon showed themselves to be musical winners. In my opinion, not shared by Randy (Mr. Sonist), was that the 6-watt Glow amps were limiting the performance of the speakers on more complex material, so maybe this accounted for my earlier impression of their being too relaxed for me? The amps did deliver, and could handle dynamic swings pretty well, but (and I’m used to this from my single drivers) life begins at 40 - or maybe 12-15 watts. You want Up, Down and Out from a crescendo. Volume was never an issue.
I was drawn in to the sound of the Concerto 3 and spent a long-ish time evaluating the tonality and musical/performance feeling of the speaker. I’m convinced that it has the potential to be something special for what is becoming a dream of low watt amp makers everywhere - conventional looking high-efficiency speakers.
Luckily he has a dealer on Long Island so - though I’m not I the market - I’ll see if I bring the friend and maybe see what he thinks. The qualities of a very musical speaker are there, I’ll be curious to hear how it reacts to different typologies.
I’m looking forward to driving down again next year.
Gregg
Follow Ups:
I took a bunch of pics from the show, which I'll try and dig up and post somewhere. ;-)
All in all, good show. I enjoyed "Mr Sonist" & his speakers quite a bit. Great unit, great pricing. Very nicely made cabinets, if I may say so.
As for best in show, the two Joseph Audio rooms kinda blew everything else away (at least for me), but I really did like the Border Patrol/Living Voice room as well.
On the flip side, I thought the YG setup was pretty blah -- thin and mechanical sounding. I really liked the MBL room, but while the soundstage was incredible, the whole dropping-the-bass-off-a-cliff thing was disappointing. And the Nolas sounded terribly lumpy.
I thought it was a fun show. Too bad more dealers didn't show up. I was there all three days (and followed Max Dudious around for one of them, that guy is hysterical), and the crowds were pretty impressive -- especially for a first-show.
I hope you post your pics. If you have several of someone digging in the records - that was me.
I’ve heard MBLs sound good in shows (although some times the HF would bother me), I’ve also heard the little ones in a home and the bass was there and musical. Very good for a speaker without a bottom, of course.
I was probably too close to the Nolas; it might not have been the best idea to try to feature both. I can’t imagine sitting so close at home. I hope to hear them again in a larger set up.
Like I said, I did not hear the YG’s very challenged, but I like what I head. I have heard Josephs a lot. My favorite was a 250 triamped Manley room with 3 channel RCA recordings.
All praise to the people who ran the show.
The irony is that my friend was looking for a smaller speaker, so although I liked the larger speaker, he'll need more motivation. He's married.......
Gregg
However, I thought that the HF sounded slightly disconnected from the rest of the spectrum at times. I was wondering if this had something to do with the room or is this the nature of the speaker? If it wasn't for that I would get a pair for sure.
I heard these speakers at 2008 RMAF. I thought they had one of the best sounds in their league. They have a review of a pair at the Stereophile website.
Bob
A good friend likes these a lot. When I was at the show, Randy was apologizing that the larger pair (Concerto 3) was missing a tweeter -- loose connection, as it turned out -- so I never heard them. The smaller pair (Recital 3) sounded okay but kinda boxy and resonant and I thought as one of the other posters did that the amps were doing them no favors. We played a couple CDs I brought and the classical one (remastered Previn/Walton 1st sym. on EMI) was way too much for the small Sonists to cope with.
You probably intend to use these amps with a PP amp or higher powered Pentode SE amp, both of which can produce good dynamics.
Can SETs reproduce very dynamic music? This is a question I have been asking myself a lot. Based on what I have heard the answer is no, not unless you spend a lot of money. I'm talking about high-end Audio Note, Lamb, and.... there are undoubtedly others.
But why do you want 90-95dB speakers to play your non-SET amps? I agree that 2-ways can indeed capture dynamics in their frequency range, but why do you need a horn tweeter? Or is this just sort of a happy accident: the fact that these speakers are relatively sensitive?
"What did the Romans ever do for us?"
SETs can be extremely dynamic sounding, provided they are coupled to the right speaker. I particularly like the liveliness and dynamics of my setup. I don't play music at high average or absolute volume level. To me that is not comfortable or conducive to pleasurable listening. Within a reasonable maximum volume level, I get better dynamics with my SET amp than with other amps I've had in my system (Speakers are 99db/w efficient, amp rated at 8 watts).
I covered the Sonist room at CES and it was one of my 5 favorite sun $10k rooms. You may be right about the glow amps - perhaps less so on the power and more-so on the quality. They're less that $800 so there is only so much one can expect and even then they sounded better than a lot of rooms that probably had cables that cost more than the entire Sonist room!
It would be interesting to audition the speakers with my amp or a little more upscale SET and source.
I heard Sonist speakers at LSAF and I think it was the smaller model playing. First class sound, thought I. For my 12X15X8' room, you might have thought so, too.
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