LATEST ADDITIONS

Back in the 1990s, I lusted mightily for the large ESP speakers with their tall, slim shapes and their angled driver panels. A large-room demo of the Concert Grands with Sonic Frontiers electronics still reverberates in my memory. Unfortunately, just as I evolved to the point where I could consider buying a pair of Concert Grands, the company folded its tents. Recently, I heard a rumor that ESP might be returning, and an email exchange with founder and designer Sean McCaughan has confirmed the good news.

John Gourlay, Stereophile's publisher since 1998, left the company at the beginning of November. John had been a valued collaborator and the moving force behind the launch of the 2004 Stereophile Buyer's Guide (see related story). We all wish him well in his future career.

"Imagine a lake," reads the website of the Noise Pollution Clearinghouse (NPC) , "filled with semi-tractor-trailer trucks, magically skimming across the water.

The talented loudspeaker engineer is a man who is always in competition with himself. When PSB's Paul Barton put the finishing touches on his Stratus Gold model back in 1990 (footnote 1), I'm sure he had more ideas in mind that he could have used in a flagship design. Yet the Gold offered so much performance at such a competitive price—$2000/pair in 1991, rising to $2100/pair by 1997, then $2400/pair for the the Gold i, an evolutionary development—that it was not surprising that Barton applied his talents to developing ranges of more affordable speakers, such as the best-selling Alpha and Image series.