In a second room, an ATC CDA2 Mk2 Preamp/DAC/CD ($5499) teamed up with an Innuos Stream3 ($8000) drove a pair of ATC SCM40A active loudspeakers ($13,999/pair).
In the main room, on Gregory Porter's moving "Take Me to the Alley…
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Lone Mountain Audio's Leland Leard brought a compact but mighty rig to Maryland, including an ATC CDA2 Mk2 Preamp/DAC/CD unit ($5499), Innuos ZENith Next-Gen server ($21,700), Innuos PhoenixNET switch ($4800; $3840 bundled with ZENith), and the US debut of the ATC Classic Series SCM20ASL active loudspeakers ($10,999/pair, standard finish).
Editors' Choice Awards
Magico S5 2024 loudspeaker
Introduced in 2024 to celebrate the California company's 20th anniversary, Magico's S5 2024 may be large and heavy (and expensive), but this three-way, sealed-box floorstanding loudspeaker stepped out of the way of the music with every recording I played. I was particularly impressed by the Magico's uncolored midrange, the control and evenness of its low frequencies, and how the two loudspeakers presented an appropriately large but well-defined soundstage with orchestral recordings. I concluded my review by writing that the S5…
Linear Tube Audio occupied two rooms and demoed their LTA Century Monoblocks in a world-wide debut.
In room 759, Afton Mountain Audio, an interesting dealership from beautiful Afton, Virginia, presented a Pure Fidelity Harmony Mk2 Hawaiian Koa turntable ($8995) with an Audio Origami PU8 tonearm ($6675) and an EBI Khumar MC phono cartridge ($2599). The cartridge fed an Aurorasound VIDA MkII phono stage ($5290).
The digital front-end was an LTA Aero DAC ($3950) supplied by an Innuos Stream1 music streamer/server ($3100). An LTA MicroZOTL Preamplifier ($5950) provided…
Audio industry veterans Walter Schofield and Walter Swanbon have brought their collective energies together in a new venture, 2WA Group. Their joint offerings at the Capital Audio Fest included a US debut.
As described in Re-Tales in the January issue of Stereophile (which will hit shelves and mailboxes around the first of December), Fidelis Distribution and Nexus Audio Technologies have merged their distribution companies to create a single entity, the 2WA Group. 2WA had two systems at the show.
At the core of System One was a pair of Trilogy amplification…
Tom Vu brought a complete Triangle Art system to CAF, with his trademark gold-encrusted turntables at the center of the room—not one, not two, but three! Vu sold the most expensive turntable while I was away fetching coffee.
The cheapest analog front-end on display was the Hathor turntable with the Horus tonearm, offered as a package for $8400. Further up the line were the Maestro ($9900) and Anubis ($18,000) 'tables, the former bearing a Horus 12" tonearm ($4400), the latter with the Osiris Diamond Mk2 12" tonearm ($9000). All three 'tables bore Zeus MC cartridges ($4800 each…
Mahler: Symphony 9
Park Avenue Chamber Symphony, David Bernard (cond.)
Recursive Classics RC3691873 (CD). 2025. James Bernard, prod.; Thom Beemer, eng.
Performance ***½
Sonics *****
Park Avenue Chamber Symphony, David Bernard (cond.)
Recursive Classics RC3691873 (CD). 2025. James Bernard, prod.; Thom Beemer, eng.
Performance ***½
Sonics *****
I was unprepared for the easy, peaceful opening of the Park Avenue's Ninth, with its blended, coolly lyrical violins and focused lead horn. Within clear textures, Bernard shapes and tapers the short motifs to fine effect, and the clarinet makes a point of phrasing its countertheme "across the bars." The brief transitional passage unexpectedly injects an off-kilter dance lilt.
In the…
I strolled into this room not knowing what to expect but seriously intrigued by the pair of large, folded-horn speakers that looked like something from a Grimm's fairy tale.
This was the room of Charney Audio, in conjunction with HiFi Logic and Hapa Audio. The digital source was from two less well-known companies: a Lucas Audio Labs MiniMax server ($12,000) and a Charney Audio 4.1X SE DAC ($24,000)Amplification was also by Charney Audio, the L-3 SE preamplifier ($19,000), followed by the Charney Audio Kit-1 300B amplifier ($10,000). Those speakers? Charney Audio Lumaca IVs, in their US…
Jeff Coates of Harmonia Distribution presented several systems in its two-room suite in Rockville.
Room one featured a Grimm Audio MU2 media player/streamer/preamplifier ($17,500), a PrimaLuna EVO 400 Tube Preamplifier ($5995), a PrimaLuna EVO 300 Hybrid Power Amplifier ($7195), Fyne Audio Vintage Ten floorstanding loudspeakers ($24,499/pair), Fyne Audio SuperTrax supertweeters ($4499/pair), and a Fyne Audio SC1 Premium Cable Kit for the SuperTrax tweeter ($449/pair). A second pair of speakers, Harbeth M40.5 XD2s ($20,990/pair), was also periodically connected..
In room 2, the…
Harry and Mat Weisfeld were up to their old tricks at CAF, wowing the audience with a reference rig containing a pair of vintage JBL Everest loudspeakers in the Jefferson suite and dropping a lower-cost system in the Adams room.
The Jefferson room featured the VPI Vanquish Turntable ($80,000) and its custom stand stand ($60,000) equipped with two tonearms: a VPI Fatboy ($6000) and a Bird of Prey ($15,950) from Thai Scandinavian Engineering. Several cartridges were in rotation: a VPI Shyla ($2200), Grado Statement 3 ($3500), Audio-Technica AT-ART20 ($3200), and Tzar DST ($10,000). Amps…
My mother Lily Mae was a Lutheran from Norway. She sent me to Jerusalem Evangelical Lutheran School so that I'd become a well-mannered, tea-with-her-friends choirboy, with starched white shirts and a secret penchant for wildness that was nurtured by those free-thinking Catholic girls at the elementary school next to ours. I always think of Mom when I install an Ortofon cartridge because their sound character strikes me as so Scandinavian—like my mother: smart, tall, well-tailored, well-mannered, neat, understated.
Everyone knows I think audio components tend to sound like how they look,…