Alex Halberstadt

Brilliant Corners #42: the First Viennese High End Show

Alex Halberstadt Aug 19, 2026

The Klipsch-OJAS storage container outside the High End Vienna venue.

Whenever I spend time in Vienna, I never think I'm going to eat schnitzel every day, but somehow it happens anyway. The truth is that when done right, schnitzel is a scientifically perfect dish: unexpectedly light, texturally complete, and oddly comforting.

Brilliant Corners Headphone Reviews Media Server Reviews Phono Preamp Reviews

Brilliant Corners #41: Allnic H-7000 phono stage, Grimm MU2 streamer, Campfire Audio Andromeda 10 Earphones

Alex Halberstadt Jul 22, 2026

Most of us, most of the time, live in the world of good enough. On a Saturday, we might drive our Ford Fiesta to pick up a polo shirt at Banana Republic, then dine at Outback Steakhouse, and later get ready for bed with a mug of Celestial Seasonings Caramel Apple Dream tea while watching an episode of Hoarder House Flippers.

Brilliant Corners Interviews

Brilliant Corners #40: Sound Practices, Setting Hi-Fi Back Decades, One Listener at a Time

Alex Halberstadt Jun 30, 2026

Joe Roberts, the one-man band behind Sound Practices. Photo by Christian Rintelen

In audio as in life, there are moments when you find your people and, if you're lucky, discover something about yourself. For me, one of these happy junctures took place in the mid-1990s when I came across an issue of Sound Practices.

Brilliant Corners Phono Cartridge Reviews

Brilliant Corners #39: Koetsu Reborn

Alex Halberstadt Jun 02, 2026

I find myself appreciating more and more the way perfectionist audio—a peculiar mix of art, craft, and engineering—tends to attract idealists. Temperamentally, hi-fi people tend to be unlike people involved in the manufacture of ring-joint gaskets or digital kitchen timers—activities that, without a doubt, have their own scales of excellence.

Brilliant Corners Phono Cartridge Reviews

Brilliant Corners #38: Listening to the Aidas Violet Phono Cartridge

Alex Halberstadt May 06, 2026

Aidas Svazas is an artisan residing in Lithuania's second largest city, Kaunas. Svazas started out as a cartridge repairman, and our first encounter took place when, on a friend's recommendation, I sent him a Fairchild 225-A, a mono cartridge from the 1950s, to be restored.

Brilliant Corners Digital Processor Reviews Integrated Amp Reviews Phono Preamp Reviews

Brilliant Corners #37: A Lejonklou System

Alex Halberstadt Apr 14, 2026

The more I listen—to gear I'm reviewing as well as other people's hi-fis—the more I believe in intangibles. One of these intangibles is the art of system building.

Brilliant Corners Miscellaneous Stand Loudspeaker Reviews

Brilliant Corners #36: A New Listening Space, Jean-Marie Reynaud BLISS Jubilé loudspeaker, Stein Acoustic Discs

Alex Halberstadt Feb 18, 2026

It's difficult to put a positive spin on moving. A recent survey ranked it as life's most stressful event, ahead of divorce, losing a job, or becoming a parent. Forty-two percent of respondents said it brought them to tears. Thirteen percent said it was worse than a week in jail.

Brilliant Corners Capital AudioFest 2025 Music and Recording Reviews

Brilliant Corners #35: the 2025 Capital Audiofest and a Classic Frank Sinatra Album

Alex Halberstadt Jan 19, 2026

"You should come to CAF," Ken Micallef said. He has been saying this for what seems like decades. "It's cool, smaller and more manageable than AXPONA. You'll like it."

Brilliant Corners

Brilliant Corners #34: You Still Believe In Me

Alex Halberstadt Dec 30, 2025

One of my foundational memories of becoming an audiophile was waiting to listen to a pair of speakers at Sound by Singer in Manhattan. Perhaps a more apt verb is loitering, because I was in my mid-20s and always felt on the verge of being thrown out.

Brilliant Corners Stand and Rack Reviews Tube Power Amp Reviews

Brilliant Corners #33: Ampsandsound Mogwai SE, Townshend Seismic Isolation Products

Alex Halberstadt Dec 04, 2025

"None of the amps I build are better than the others," Justin Weber of Ampsandsound told me not long after we met. "They are just different." I may have smirked inwardly. According to his company's website, Weber makes no fewer than 23 amplifier models, ranging from the $2700 Kenzie OG to the $38,000 Arch Monos. Are they really all equally good?, I wondered.