The midrange on Christian McBride's "Hallelujah Time" was excellent, and the deep bass pretty damn fabulous. Ditto for the depth on a recording by Amber Rubarth, and the air on Reference Recordings' hi-resolution version of dance from Tchaikovsky's Mazeppa (you know, the one everyone plays at audio shows). Instrumental timbres were also spot on. Even though Alan Eichelbaum and Sunny Umrao had not been able to successfully tame all the problems in their very slap-happy room—Alan called it "echo chamber"—their set-up persistence allowed the music to come through loud and clear.

A lucky 13 exhibitors held forth in the Audiophile Marketplace in the Westin O'Hare's LaSalle Ballroom, with another eight, including Stereophile, positioned in the foyer. Even on Friday, the areas were packed. Unfortunately, LP purveyors such as Analogue Productions, Acoustic Sounds, Music Direct, and Elusive Disc dispensed their goodies in the world's crinkliest plastic bags. Given how popular vinyl was at AXPONA, you can imagine the racket each time a new person walked into an exhibit room.

As I literally flew through the Marketplace, I wanted to say hello to cable manufacturer Greg Hovsepian of DH Labs. As you can see, however, Greg was but one of many vendors occupied with making a sale.

The ever-kinetic bassist Dean Peer was but one of several musicians providing live music at AXPONA. As you can tell, my camera's indoor, flash-less "Night Scene" setting could not keep up with the movements of Dean and his drummer Bret Mann, who were sponsored by Audio Power Labs and Cardas Audio.

Our own Michael Fremer of Stereophile and AnalogPlanet.com, in whom the serious and hilarious often vie for supremacy, was quite busy at AXPONA. In addition to covering all things analog for both publications, he also led two installments of "Michael Fremer's Internationally Renowned Turntable Set-up Seminar," moderated a "Vinyl Lives!" panel, and spoke on a "Meet the Editors" panel. One of Mikey's unforgettable lines: "I once did this smashed on Tequila, but I wouldn't recommend it."

Somehow I managed to snap a single shot of the large, lobby level show directory signage before another throng of eager attendees covered up my view. On Saturday April 26, when AXPONA was mobbed until the last hour of the show, it would have been impossible to take this photo.

Steve Davis, AXPONA founder, caught on the fly between the "Grab 'N Go" snack area and various presentations. Steve had every reason to smile, given the impressive turnout on the first day of the show. But I'll bet he wasn't smiling in the middle of the second, absolutely packed and tremendously successful day when, somewhere after 2 pm, the fire alarm went off and people were ordered to evacuate the hotel. This, after all, was the second year in a row that an ear-piercing fire alarm went off on the busiest day of AXPONA. Thankfully, it was a false alarm. Within a half hour, everyone had returned to the reality of fine sound.

Venture's Vici 2.1 speaker system ($36,000 total), which mates the AW500 subwoofer with the slim Vici towers, may have looked rather slight for the huge space it occupied, but it managed to fill it with surprisingly big sound.

Even if I couldn't get far enough back to either take a decent photo or appreciate the sonics at their best, I could admire the warm, eminently pleasing sound of Acoustic Zen's Crescendo Mk.II loudspeakers ($18,000/pair) mated with Triode Corporation's TRX-M845 monoblocks ($22,500/pair), new TRX-2 tube preamplifier with MC/MM ($5000), TRX-DAC 1.0 Tube ($2500), and TRV-CD5SE ($3200).

No, we're not talking the theme song of the Log Cabin Campaign of the 1840 election for US president. Rather, I'm referring to Tyler Acoustics of Tyler, KY, whose new green, 95dB-sensitive Tyler Acoustics Insight Speaker System ($5500/pair) sounded very warm and inviting when partnered with Cardas cables and a Rogue integrated amplifier and phono stage. On a Patricia Barber LP played on an old, refurbished VPI turntable, colors may have been a bit homogenized, but the overall presentation was as welcoming and non-fatiguing as can be.