Digital Processor Reviews

Preparing to listen
With Giolas temporarily grounded by COVID, installation of the Vivaldi was entrusted to Definitive Audio's Gary Bruestle. We began by re-spacing a shelf on the Grand Prix Monza to accommodate three Vivaldi components plus equipment supports.

Lately, an Innuos Statement Next-Gen music server running Roon has been handling file playback on my system. I wanted to sample the Innuos proprietary playback software (which I'll discuss in a future follow-up review), but it wasn't yet equipped to work with the Vivaldi Apex DAC. Because Innuos prefers USB to Ethernet as its optimal way of sending files to DACs, we installed a USB cable between the Innuos Statement and the Vivaldi Upsampler and Ethernet cables between the Nordost QNet Ethernet switch, Innuos, and Vivaldi Upsampler Plus. Switching cables between the Vivaldi and Rossini Apex DACs and Clocks while maintaining distance between interconnects and power cables during comparisons was loads of fun.

Gasp!
Every month, I welcome fresh opportunities to find the right words to convey what I feel when I sit before my system, close my eyes, and listen to great music. But there are times when reactions are so extreme, the awe so overpowering, that eloquence cedes to one-word (or even nonword) exclamations.

Beginning with the Brahms Double Concerto with violinist Anne-Sophie Mutter and cellist Pablo Ferrández, backed by the Czech Philharmonic under Manfred Honeck (24/96 WAV, Sony/Qobuz), my eyes widened as I struggled to take in the size and weight of what I was hearing. I was struck dumb by the impact of that sound and in disbelief at experiencing it in my own music room (and not from a prime seat in a concert hall). I could only utter a single, elemental word: Wow! Was this how gaggles of awestruck teenagers felt standing in front of a gyrating Elvis Presley, screaming? Is this what young women felt at a concert by Liszt? Brahms never attained that kind of popularity, but the deep sense of loss and longing found in much of his music speaks to my every cell. When Brahms's music gets the performance and recording it deserves and is played on a proper sound system, I am catapulted to lonelier times but also transported by beauty to bliss.

Caroline Shaw's superbly recorded The Wheel (24/192 WAV, Alpha 881), our February Recording of the Month, provided another indication that something unique was happening with the Vivaldi Apex. I've written at length about the importance to me of air and space in music reproduction. I've rarely experienced as convincing a depiction of these attributes as in Vivaldi's rendering of this album's "Boris Kerner" for cello and flowerpots. As the timbres and pitches of flowerpots changed in color and intensity, and images shifted position in the soundstage, fantastical images flashed before my eyes. This wasn't a case of being transported to the venue. The excitement was right here in my listening room, where, more than ever, I wanted to stay for a long, long time.

I had to return to The Wheel several times after we decided to expand my original 300-word review into a full-page Recording of the Month piece. As I played it and other music I've never used before in a review, I experienced a newfound ease and flow in the music that made listening a joy.

Compared to Rossini Apex
Two days after my friend, who was staying with us, tested positive for COVID, I awoke to an "uh oh" mix of mild symptoms and internal alerts. I immediately resolved to quarantine myself in the music room, return to reference tracks, and spend as much time as required comparing the Vivaldi Apex/Upsampler Plus/Clock system to the Rossini Apex and its Clock. Only after putting the Vivaldi trio to the test would I subject myself to testing. I listened as if my life depended on it.

First, I streamed part of the second movement of Shostakovich Symphony No.11 from the DG recording Dimitri Shostakovich Symphonies Nos.4 & 11 with Andris Nelsons conducting the Boston Symphony Orchestra (24/96 Qobuz and 24/96 MQA Tidal). This movement builds from a sense of foreboding to an assaultive barrage before settling into chilling silence. It would try any system.

The Vivaldi Apex's depiction of dark and turbulent music in particular was superior to any I've experienced on my system. The air around the snare drum, the clarity of individual instruments in the cello and double-bass sections, the profundity of silences—all amazed me. In contrast, the Rossini Apex depiction seemed lighter and less substantial, with smaller images. The emotional impact of the Vivaldi's pounding bass drum dwarfed the Rossini's. String entrances were less vivid via the smaller single-box DAC, the midrange wasn't as rich, and the top was a mite brighter and noisier. Remember, in my experience at least, the Rossini Apex DAC is unrivaled in its price range, and it ain't cheap.

On Echo, with soprano Ruby Hughes and pianist/composer Huw Watkins (24/96 WAV, BIS 2568), the piano seemed smaller with the Rossini, and Hughes's voice had a brighter edge. Turning to Lou Harrison's Concerto for Violin and Percussion Orchestra (24/48 FLAC, Qobuz/Hyperion)—a fabulous, gamelan-inspired composition that caused one attendee at AXPONA to storm out of the room yelling "That is not music! Next time play music!"—the soundstage created by the Rossini lacked the Vivaldi Apex's ultimate openness. On Patricia Barber's Clique (32/352.8 WAV) and Higher (24/352.8 MQA, Tidal), bass was less immediate and less rich, colors less saturated, Barber's voice less distinct.

Let's switch to positives. On Diana Krall's "Autumn in New York" from This Dream of You (24/44.1 MQA, Impulse!/Tidal), the Vivaldi Apex rendered the guitar larger and more colorful. The Vivaldi Apex conveyed Krall's intimate delivery as though she were singing to me alone, and her voice seemed lifelike. In Grant Green's title track from Idle Moments (24/192, Blue Note/Qobuz), every instrument seemed larger, clearer, and more impactful via the Vivaldi.

I wasn't feeling up to rock music, but I ventured as far as the first tracks of Roger Waters's Amused to Death (24/192 MQA, Columbia/Tidal) and was wowed again by the Vivaldi Apex's ability to harness detail in service to emotion. In Yosi Horikawa's fascinating, gimmicky "Bubbles" (footnote 3) (16/44.1, Tidal), I felt surrounded by the dropping balls at the beginning—uncanny. In "Twilight Song," from bassist Charlie Hayden and pianist Kenny Barron's sublime live recording Night and the City (16/44.1, Verve/Qobuz), every note of the piano sounded like a precious pearl. And on Harmonia Mundi's wonderful period-instruments recording of Beethoven's Archduke Trio, with violinist Isabelle Faust, cellist Jean-Guihen Queyras, and pianist Alexander Melnikov, the sound was so natural and flowing that I closed my eyes and thanked the universe for the glory of it all.

Conclusion
If someone were to give me $100 for every review that extols "state-of-the-art" equipment, I'd have enough money to buy a house on the water with a music room fit for a queen. So, rather than falling into that trap, let's talk instead about music.

Recorded music has never sounded as full, rich, flowing, rewarding, and natural as with the Vivaldi Apex. It is rare, in a home listening room, to experience anew the full impact of great orchestral music heard in a concert hall. But the Vivaldi Apex DAC, Vivaldi Upsampler Plus, and Vivaldi Master Clock together have made that possible, repeatedly. I haven't heard every DAC on the market—certainly not in my listening room, where all other variables are known—but nothing I have encountered in stores or at shows has come close to the Vivaldi Apex. Every listening experience has been extraordinary. The finer and more concentrated an artist's focus, the finer the Vivaldi Apex system sounds. It conveys inspiration and genius like no other equipment I've heard.

I hope that you get to hear and enjoy it, in a system worthy of its company. If you're fortunate enough to own one, you will have read this review with a knowing smile.