An ancient connection: Monitor Audio began in 1972 when John Bartlett, founder of the innovative retail chain Audio T, introduced me to Mike Beeny, manager of an Audio T branch near Cambridge, and Mo Iqbal, a local electronics wizard. Mike suggested that Mo and I join him to start a loudspeaker company. Monitor was a fashionable hi-fi term, and I suggested we name it Monitor Audio Ltd. Each director put £300 into the company account. It was registered as a PLC at an address in Teversham, Cambridgeshire. We rented an upper floor office in a warehouse close to Mo's home, since Mo worked all hours. There was additional workspace in his huge double garage. Mike directed sales, Mo was responsible for production management and accounts, and I took the position of technical director for research and development. I also helped supervise production. Lorna Parker was our office secretary.

After launching a handful of increasingly viable designs, we reached a then-astonishing turnover of £1 million in our first year and enjoyed a very successful showing at the Paris Festival du Son. But by this point, I was close to an overwork-related breakdown and reluctantly resigned.

To me, Burmester equipment is the audio equivalent of Porsche cars—sleek-looking, expensive, and designed for high performance. And as my visit to the Burmester room proved, Burmester gear is fun and exciting to listen to, which is what I assume driving a Porsche is like. (Maybe one day, I'll let you know for sure.)

In a video on his YouTube channel Jazz Vinyl Audiophile, Stereophile contributing editor Ken Micallef asks Jeffrey Catalano of High Water Sound how he manages to be so consistent—how his rooms wrangle "top 2% sound" at every audio show. The first words out of Jeffrey's mouth are "I know how to listen."

"It's one of my greatest strengths. I know what music sounds like. I just go inside the music and let it tell me how it's supposed to be alive, how it's supposed to live in that space. I know that sounds simplistic and maybe somewhat esoteric, or pretentious even—but it's not.