In response to requests for a more affordable cable that's truly high end, High Fidelity Cable founder Rick Schultz has introduced the company's entry-level Reveal interconnect ($699/1m pair) and speaker cable ($1399/2m pair).
Amidst the glorious sound of Scaena loudspeakers and Veloce's battery-powered electronics (among other goodies) ran Rick Schultz's new High Fidelity cables. Alan Eichenbaum of Scaena reports that when the Schultz sent him some samples, he gave them a try and thought they were "quite good." I'll say. Only available with RCA terminations, Eichenbaum used them as interconnects and speaker cable in his demo, mating them with Nordost Odin power cables. If you judge cables by the company they keep, High Fidelity's are surely upper class. Although Schultz was not present, I later discovered that his Texas-made cables are distributed in the US by Brian Ackerman of Aaudio Imports pictured above.
As I entered Jeffrey Catalano's High Water Sound exhibit, I was immediately taken by the beauty of Herbie Hancock's Watermelon Man (Cisco LP re-issue). Listening to a recording of the music of Heinrich Biber further underscored the beauty of this system's midrange. Heard were the turntable owned by the First Chair violinist of the Vienna Philharmonic, the TW Acustic BlackNight ($40,000) with TW 10.5 tonearm ($5500) and Dynavector XV1T cartridge ($9000), TW Acustic Raven phonostage ($9000), Thöress linestage ($8000), Thöress 300B 6W monoblocks ($10,000), Horning Aristotle 98dB-sensitive loudspeakers ($15,000) with Zigma Ultimate Plus Lowther DX65 drive-units, Stealth cables, and Silent Running Audio Equipment rack ($12,000).
I’m afraid I hit High Water Sound’s room at the end of the fourth floor at a time when, overwhelmed by how many systems I had left to visit before show’s end, could only muster the words “very nice sound” in my notes. Clearly I owe you an apology, and Jeffrey Catalano’s high-end emporium a visit the next time I’m in New York City.
In a room dominated by Cessaro Horn Acoustics Chopin loudspeakers ($40,000/pair), whose tweeter reminds me of the donuts I gave up many decades ago, I found the sound on a recording of electric guitar extremely direct and realistically bright. I didn’t get the name of the blues recording that Leslie Mazer was playing on the platter, but the music was great. This wasn’t a room for those who like their sound sugar-coated, but for music lovers who want it served up straight, it was heaven.
Paddling all the way from NYC, Jeffrey Catalano's High Water Sound, aka “2 channel with attitude,” featured the premieres of Hornning Hybrid Systems Eurfrodite Mark IV Ellipse loudspeakers ($30,000/pair) and Tron-Electric’s flagship Syren II GT preamplifier ($55,000) and Seven phono/mono ($15,000). The speakers have eight 8” bass drivers in push-pull configuration, a back-loaded horn, and a PM 65 Lowther midrange, all of which help account for their 9899dB sensitivity. Jeffrey called the Tron preamp “a work of art,” with an outboard power supply, “all-silver everything,” and proprietary caps and transformers.
Although I was only able to stay long enough to snap a few photos and hear moderator Ken Kessler’s (Hi-Fi News) downer of an introduction, Friday evening’s post-show panel included, from left to right, HiFi Plus editor Alan Sircom, recording engineer Peter McGrath of Wilson Audio Specialties, Kathy Gornick of Thiel Audio, Michael Fremer of Stereophile and AnalogPlanet.com, Roy Hall of Music Hall and "why don’t you join me for a shot," and Kessler himself. Dan D’Agostino of D’Agostino, Inc., founder of and former designer at Krell, turned up after I had shot my photo.
John Atkinson adds: Kessler’s thesis was the high-end audio industry is dying by its own hand; that if it is to continue to exist, let alone thrive, high-end audio has to emulate the example of the luxury watch, pen, and car industries...
(February 28) High End 2020, aka Munich High End, has been canceled “due to the current worsening trend with respect to the spread of the novel coronavirus.”
So why is Amanda Sweet from Telarc smiling? Well, in addition to being a wonderful person, she's happy that the Concord Music Group chose to sell its wares in The Venetian. Rather than the nightmare everyone predicted, customers only had to walk 20 steps to the official CES cashiers to purchase their SACDs and CDs from Telarc, Heads Up, Concord, Prestige and the like. With only one other CD vendor—5.1—in the area, Telarc did a booming business.
Craig Oxford and William Carpenter, CEO of Consensus Biotechnology and Consensus Biolabs of Little Rock, happily introduced me to the successors to Pipe Dreams loudspeakers, the HighEmotion Audio Pyra Bella 7 monitors ($6000/pair), Bella Basso 28 subs ($4000/pair, with 2 pairs in use), and Passare XOL crossover ($3000). (I did not audition the second system with the HighEmotion Audio Festune Bass Module). The HighEmotion speakers, which employ "a substantial amount of new technology", are the result of years of research into brain imagining technology, and "the emotional responses to music, auditory system function, physics, and electrical engineering."