I always enjoy visiting the MBL room at a show. Not only I am addicted to the quality of the German company's "Radialstrahler" omnidirectional tweeter, which has a delicacy to its presentation that escapes conventional dome units, but MBL North America's Jeremy Bryan is obsessive about set-up. His RMAF system comprised the MBL 116f speakers ($29,000/pair) driven by a pair of MBL C15 amplifiers ($12,500/pair), a C11 preamplifier ($8800), and a C31 CD player/D/A processor ($9200), all hooked up with WireWorld Eclipse cables. (The electronics are all from MBL's Corona line.)
On Peter Gabriel's "San Jacinto," from his New Blood album, the stereo imaging was deliciously precise, with an extraordinary sense of recorded detail, yet without the stage thrust forward at the listener. I finished my auditioning with a recording of what I took to be a baroque ensemble performing a piece by Telemann that had been made by MBL's chief engineer Jürgen Reis. Again the imaging and detail was superb, until the unmistakable theme of "Happy Birthday" disturbed the feeling of 18th-century authenticity. Humor in music. I loved it!
