Sidebar 3: Just a Little Echo, Echo, Echo...
Back in my recording-musician days in the '70s, the studio at which I was the house bass player had an AKG reverberation chamber that found its way onto pretty much everything we laid down on tape. Basically a large metal plate with an electromagnetic exciter at one end and a pickup at the other, this produced reverberation with a not unpleasant sonic signature. In conjunction with discrete tape-delay echoes courtesy of a high-speed ReVox A-77, the effect could be tweaked to give quite a lifelike simulation of a concert hall—or at least one…
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Sidebar 4: The Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival . . .
. . . was founded in 1972. During the first season—the summer of 1973—14 artists performed six Sunday concerts in Santa Fe and toured to several New Mexico and eastern Arizona communities. That season, Pablo Casals was the Festival's honorary president, and a 20-year series of Georgia O'Keeffe posters and program covers began. Today, 26 seasons later, the Festival presents over 80 events during its annual summer season—including concerts, adult and youth education/outreach presentations, free open rehearsals, concert previews and…
. . . was founded in 1972. During the first season—the summer of 1973—14 artists performed six Sunday concerts in Santa Fe and toured to several New Mexico and eastern Arizona communities. That season, Pablo Casals was the Festival's honorary president, and a 20-year series of Georgia O'Keeffe posters and program covers began. Today, 26 seasons later, the Festival presents over 80 events during its annual summer season—including concerts, adult and youth education/outreach presentations, free open rehearsals, concert previews and…
Call me sentimental, but I'm sad to see turntables disappear. They were my original calling. Back in 1973 or so, when a kid from my neighborhood insisted that I see his brother-in-law's "fantastic stereo," I was entranced by a huge Pioneer receiver and walnut AR3a speakers. But most alluring by far was the Marantz turntable. Its brushed stainless-steel controls and gleaming, chromed tonearm made it look like some delicate and expensive scientific instrument. Compared to the all-in-one plastic unit I played my Partridge Family records on, the mere sight of it put me on the audiophile path. (…
Scratchers concentrate more on one turntable at a time. As the record plays, they'll use their hands to stop, start, and rock the platter or LP at various speeds, often with one hand on a volume fader to control the sound's attack and envelope. Though I didn't have the best view, it looked as if they also tap and drum on the LP with their fingertips. The result is a loud, rhythmic collage of sounds—called "forwards," "scribbles," "moving scribbles," "chirps," etc.—that grab your spine and rock it back and forth. It's hard to describe, but there's more than just rhythm in this wall of sound.…
Hoping that a fitter turntable will survive, Vestax recently tried to circumvent this problem. Since skating forces arise from offset headshell angles, they're making a 'table with a straight tonearm and headshell—no offset angle. This reduces skating forces and allows tracking weights to be smaller. The price of this, of course, is that the cartridge will no longer be at the optimal tangential angle to the record's grooves—but that's an audiophile thing, not a turntablist thing. Asking a turntablist whether his table is a "high-fidelity" component is as silly as asking a violinist if she…
My friend Harvey Rosenberg, who had more clever ideas in a day than most of us have in a lifetime, was a Tannoy loudspeaker enthusiast. I, on the other hand, had little experience with the brand before 1995, when Harvey invited me to come over and hear his then-new Tannoy Westminster Royals.
I'm not sure what I expected, although I remember I had to be corrected as to Tannoy's origins: Something about the sound of the name had always led me to think, dully, that the brand was Japanese. As it turns out, Tannoy began life in south London in 1926 when its founder, a man with the improbably…
I returned my attention to speaker placement, paying careful attention to the changes, both measured and heard, as I went along. More than anything else, I noticed that small shifts in loudspeaker and microphone position yielded greater measured differences than I'd expected—although the octave between 125Hz and 250Hz was consistently elevated by at least 3dB relative to the rest of the midband, which may have accounted for the dark quality. It was easy to get flat bass response all the way down to 25Hz, although not so easy to do it without bringing a 6dB peak at 31.5Hz along for the ride. I…
Sidebar 1: Specifications
Description: Three-way, reflex-loaded, floorstanding loudspeaker. Drive-units: 1" titanium-dome SuperTweeter, 1.25" aluminum-dome tweeter, 12" pulp-cone woofer (latter two drivers in coaxial configuration). Crossover frequencies: 1.1kHz, 12kHz. Frequency range: 30Hz-54kHz. Impedance: 6 ohms nominal. Sensitivity: 92dB/W/m.
Dimensions: 47.6" H by 17.3" W by 17.3" D. Weight: 108 lbs each.
Serial number of units reviewed: 029014M (both).
Price: $8350/pair. Approximate number of US dealers: 20.
Manufacturer: Tannoy Ltd., Home Audio Division, Coatbridge,…
Sidebar 2: Associated Equipment
Analog sources: Linn LP-12 turntable with Naim Armageddon power supply and Naim Aro tonearm; Rega Planar 3 turntable with Rega RB-300 tonearm; ZYX Airy S, Lyra Helikon Mono, and Dynavector DV10x5 phono cartridges.
Digital source: Sony SCD-777ES SACD player.
Preamplifiers: Audio Note M3, Naim NAC32-5.
Power amplifiers: Audio Note Kit One (300B), Fi 2A3 Stereo, and Naim NAP110.
Loudspeakers: Quad ESL-989s and Lowther PM2As in modified Medallion horns.
Cables: Nordost Valhalla, Nordost Valkyrja, Naim SNAIC (various), and homemade interconnects;…
Sidebar 3: Measurements
Though the big Tannoy's voltage sensitivity was slightly lower than specified, at 90dB(B)/2.83V/m, this is still usefully higher than average. The impedance remains above 8 ohms for most of the audioband (fig.1), but drops to 2 ohms in the region covered by the SuperTweeter. In addition, the rather extreme electrical phase angle in the mid-treble—note the combination of 4.2 ohms and -51.8 degrees at 7.5kHz—will demand current from the partnering amplifier. Although there is generally not much musical energy above 5kHz, a good design rated at 4 ohms will still work…