RMAF 2008

One feature of this year's RMAF that has catapulted it into the major leagues of audio shows was the sheer number of well-attended workshops and panels scheduled at the Hyatt. Over the course of three days, one room featured "Let's Get Digital" with Robert Harley of The Absolute Sound, "Music Everywhere" by Steven R. Rochlin of EnjoytheMusic.com, "The New Music Label" by attorney Ned Hearn, "Adventures in Digital Formats, Unsampling & Dithering" with our own John Atkinson, "Digital Playback Equipment Design Considerations" with David Solomon of Signal Path International, and "Music Discovery" with consultant Sean Leonard. Many of these were panels, with a host of additional participants.

On Saturday and Sunday in the Marriott Aspen Amphitheatre, our own Michael Fremer conducted an Analog Clinic. Each day, down the road at the Hyatt, Roy Gregory of HiFi+ delivered multiple seminars entitled "Set up and Tuning Demonstration", and John Atkinson conducted several sessions entitled "Hearing is Believing—Is Hi Rez Digital the Future of Audio?" What I do know is that the notion that the editors and publishers of Stereophile, TAS, and HiFi+ are forever at each other's throats was relegated to mythdom by the collegial feel witnessed during interactions (including my own).

Pictured is a small portion of the absolutely packed audience for the in-demand workshop/panel that John led on Saturday afternoon. For reasons known only to a higher power, I decided the workshop started a half hour later than it did. When I arrived, just a few minutes after it had begun, the only available seats were in a row of additional chairs pushed against the side wall.