Ken Micallef

Ken Micallef  |  Nov 12, 2023

Ampsandsound is perhaps best known for his amplifiers made to drive either headphones or loudspeakers. (See for example Herb Reichert's Gramophone Dreams #47.) At this show, however, Ampsandsound manufacturer/designer Justin Weber was showing his Arches monoblocks ($50,000/pair), which put out up to 65W each with KT-88 tubes or 85W each with KT-150 tubes.

Ken Micallef  |  Nov 11, 2023

The Hear This room included products from Von Schweikert Audio, WestminsterLab, Lampizator, Small Green Computer, Sonore, and MasterBuilt.

Ken Micallef  |  Nov 11, 2023

Can you judge an exhibitor's products by the music he plays? Perhaps not, but when I walk into a room playing "Hotel California," that mad percussion ditty "Music for Bang, Baa-Room and Harp," 90s grunge (footnote 1), or God No! Jazz at the Pawnshop, it's all I can do to stay put and not scream.

Ken Micallef  |  Nov 10, 2023

A dependable first stop for any show attendee, Jeffrey Catalano’s High Water Sound room got down to business and quick. Offering a similar system to last year's but with new Cessaro Horn Acoustics’ Wagner II Horn Speakers ($65,000/pair), the system had considerable jump and force paired to a liquid midrange and absolutely clean, nearly medicinal, certainly soul-enriching highs.

Ken Micallef  |  Nov 10, 2023

I have yet to hear a pair of Joseph Audio speakers I didn't marvel at. That includes the small-in-size but huge-of-sound Pulsar2 Graphene standmounts ($9999/pair) in a room commanded by Rogue Audio. I left the room saying "Crazy! Crazy" to Rogue’s Nick Fitzsimmons and Bill Magerman, but before then I sat in dumbstruck silence.

Ken Micallef  |  Nov 10, 2023

In room 801, David Cope of Old Forge Audio, in conjunction with Phonographe Distribution, played a joyous-sounding system that included my and Herb Reichert's current favorite loudspeaker).

Ken Micallef  |  Nov 10, 2023

Presenting the new GoldenEar T66 floorstanding speakers ($6900/pair in Gloss Black, $7200/pair in Santa Barbara Red), Ken Forsythe (AudioQuest), aided and abetted by Chet Pelkowski and Chris Volk (both from GoldenEar), got down and dirty, and insisted I join in. I did!

Ken Micallef  |  Nov 10, 2023

Like candy to an audiophile baby, Capital Audiofest 2023 is officially in full blast mode, a phantasmagorical thrill ride for listeners of all ages, and this age. The venue as in 2022 is the Hilton Twinbrook Rockville, Maryland.

Ken Micallef  |  Sep 22, 2023
Can an audio brand maintain a "house sound" if the original creator of that sound is no longer among the living? If the brand in question is Ayre Acoustics, the answer is a resounding Yes.

When Ayre founder Charley Hansen passed in late 2017, Ariel Brown, who is now Ayre's vice president and chief technology officer, was ready, waiting in the wings. Brown has worked for Ayre since he was a sophomore in college. As John Atkinson wrote in his February 2019 review of Ayre's EX-8 Integrated Hub, "Brown says that for better or worse, he was indoctrinated in Hansen's way of thinking and design. 'I only know the Charley way! Charley never wanted to introduce a product unless we had something new to offer with that product. 'New–Better–Different' was his philosophy; every product had to be a step up from before.'"

Ken Micallef  |  Sep 20, 2023
Today's scrappy record labels understand that an intimate brand connection captures consumers. Every major label has its own boutique imprints, from Columbia's Legacy to Blue Note's Tone Poet and Classic Vinyl. Craft Recordings, the catalog label for Concord, is set up well for achieving such a connection, since the parent company also owns Fania, Prestige, Milestone, Pablo, Telarc, Vanguard, Concord Jazz, and Riverside (not to mention Stax, Rounder, and Sugar Hill). For vinyl reissues, that's the jazz motherlode.

Craft created Jazz Dispensary to reissue some of this music, with shall we say uplifting goals: "With jazz as its source, ... Jazz Dispensary blurs boundaries and opens minds to the psychoactive potential of music, introducing a new generation to the grooves that elevated the hippest heads of the '60s and '70s." One Jazz Dispensary review copy came with branded rolling papers.

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