News

Friday, November 22–Sunday, November 24: The Hi-Fi Expo Sofia will be held at the Grand Hotel (1 Gurko Street, Sofia, Bulgaria). Over 250 high-end brands are expected to exhibit. Show manager Gergana Boeva reports that attendance has grown steadily over the show's first three years, attracting visitors from all throughout Bulgaria, as well as neighboring countries Serbia, Macedonia, Greece, and Romania. For more info, including a complete list of exhibitors, visit the show’s official website.

The long-anticipated opening of Brian Berdan’s high-performance audio store, Audio Element, took place on November 1 and 2 in Pasadena, CA. The store’s prime location in the heart of Pasadena’s retail- and restaurant-rich Oldtown helped sweeten the unveiling of America’s newest high-end emporium.

For some, the Toronto Audio Video Entertainment Show (TAVES 2013) is the show of the future. For others, it may signal a possible decline in the supremacy of two-channel audio. Either way, just two weeks after RMAF in Denver, with hardly any space between Stereophile's comprehensive coverage of that major two-channel show, TAVES 2013 takes place November 1–3 in the classy King Edward Hotel in downtown Toronto.

At a 9am press conference Saturday, October 12, whose attendance was curiously dominated by Stereophile and our sister computer audio online site, AudioStream.com, Jared Sacks of Channel Classics and Philip O’Hanlon of On A Higher Note announced the November 1 launch of nativedsd.com. A world-wide accessible, multi-label download site dedicated exclusively to native DSD recorded stereo and multi-channel studio masters, the site promises centralized shopping for native DSD recorded Edit Master files, along with information and discussion of both software and hardware. We are also assured of “extensive site-wide search capability through the use of ID3v2 compliant metadata across all labels.”

The 2013 Burning Amp, the DIYAudio forum's "annual experiment in temporary community dedicated to radical self-expression and self-reliance," got off to a slow start. Although a semi-hidden posting about the one-day, all-volunteer event, held in six rooms at San Francisco's Fort Mason Center on Sunday, October 6, appeared months ago, the email blast to the Burning Amp mailing list only went out late on October 3. As a result, attendance was light, making it much easier to listen to music in the extremely live, audio unfriendly rooms.

Central to every Burning Amp is Nelson Pass (above), whose boundless generosity and support to DIYers worldwide has made him a father figure of sorts.

In what may be a record period for audio show acquisitions. Connecticut-based trade show company JD Events has acquired AXPONA (Audio Expo North America). The announcement follows on the heels of UK-based The Chester Group's announcement that it has bought Montreal's Salon Son et Image, and gotten out of the way of AXPONA Chicago by moving its New York Show to a fall date in Brooklyn.

In its own words, JD Events "is dedicated to the creation of targeted and innovative industry-leading events that deliver results. The company brings together highly qualified buying audiences, education-rich content and high-level networking opportunities—all geared toward increasing business transactions in the markets it serves."

Roy Bird's UK-based Chester Group, which currently produces the New York Audio Show, has announced the acquisition of Montreal's Salon Son et Image. While the show will continue to take place in Montreal's Hilton Bonaventure in late March—March 28–30 in 2014—Sarah Tremblay, former co-producer of Montreal show with her husband, Michel Plante, will join the Chester Group team and assume overall management of both North American shows.

In addition, to avoid 2013's industry-taxing situation of the Montreal, Chicago, and New York shows taking place with only two or three weeks between each, the Chester Group has decided to move the New York show from April to September.