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Balance is certainly a lovely concept, as well as a lofty ideal. But achieving an optimal sonic balance in a high-end audio system—whose final sound is determined, in part, by interactions among any number of components and that great bugaboo, the listening room—while maintaining some semblance of psychic equilibrium can be the hardest goal of all.

Dominic Miller: Silent Light
Dominic Miller, guitar; Miles Bould, percussion
ECM 2518 (CD). 2017. Manfred Eicher, prod.; Jan Erik Kongshaug, eng. DDD? TT: 41:06
Performance *****
Sonics *****

It was a pairing that seemed right from the very start: ECM's founder, Manfred Eicher, a man renowned for having an unmatched ear for talent and exacting sound-engineering skills; and guitarist Dominic Miller, an internationalist who was born in Argentina, raised in Racine, Wisconsin, and now lives in Provence, France, and who's spent more than 20 years playing and writing with Sting. Along the way, Miller has been a hired guitar slinger with everyone from the Pretenders and Chris Botti to Rod Stewart and Plácido Domingo. He's made 13 solo records, has recorded the music of J.S. Bach on guitar, and says his favorite album is Deep Purple's Made in Japan.

Chord's extraordinary DAVE—"Digital [to] Analog Veritas [in] Extremis (Truth in Extreme)"—D/A processor takes pride of place on its cover, but the June Stereophile is packed full of good stuff. Art Dudley reports on Peachtree's "Made in America" nova300 integrated amplifier; Herb Reichert and Jim Austin live with high-performance preamplifiers from PrimaLuna and PS Audio; Kal Rubinson checks out a two-channel AV integrated amplifier from Arcam; Ken Micallef reviews a truly loud speaker, the horn-loaded Rival from Volti; and Robert Baird listens to great-sounding vinyl reissues of recordings of the legendary pianist Bill Evans.

The final utterance of a great band dissolving has completely stood the test of time.

In anticipation of this week's Munich High End, which takes place May 18–21, MQA has announced several breakthroughs. The first involves its hardware partners, who have expanded to include AudioQuest, CanEver Audio, dCS, Esoteric, IAG, Krell, Lumin, Mark Levinson, Moon by Simaudio, Pro-Ject Audio Systems, TEAC, and Wadax. These are in addition to its existing partners, who include Aurender, Bel Canto, Bluesound, Cary, NAD, Brinkmann, Meridian, MSB, Mytek, Onkyo, Pioneer and Technics. All of the latter are expected to demonstrate MQA at the Munich show, with yet others showing at the Los Angeles Audio Show June 2–4.

When Tom Norton asked if I'd like to review an entry-level turntable from SOTA, I responded with a resounding "Yes!" I've long felt that there's a conspicuous absence of affordable, good-sounding record players on dealers' shelves. With the AR ES-1 package deals no longer available and the Rega 3 now selling for $775, at $599, SOTA's new Comet promised to be stiff competition for the Basiks, Revolvers, Duals, and Thorenses of the world. Also, due to my tenacious embrace of vinyl, I try to encourage as many music lovers as I can to experience the satisfaction derived from LPs and the fun and excitement of collecting them. If I can point them in the direction of a competent, sanely priced analog rig, I'll consider a good part of my mission accomplished.

"Amrita" is Sanskrit for "nectar," and indeed, the Amrita owner's manual states that they are confident their speakers "will provide Nectar For Your Ears." Although this Iowa-based manufacturer offers a large range of loudspeakers, I decided that Stereophile should review their small AMRIT-MiniMonitor ($875/pair) after Martin Colloms mentioned in his report from the 1987 SCES in Vol.10 No.5 that it sounded "pleasantly balanced on both rock and classical material." We received a pair for review in the summer of 1988, but it turned out that only one was working, the other having a very restricted low-frequency response below 100Hz. After repeated requests for replacements, Amrita's John Andre personally delivered a pair to Santa Fe in the Spring of 1989. This time, both worked out of the box!