Capital Audiofest (CAF) 2017 & CanMania Show Report
Dynamic Sounds Associates, Studio Electric, Tweek Geek, AURALiC, Miyagima, And VPI
CAF 2017 Show Report By Kemper Holt

  The Adams room was about as far away from the Atrium as possible, but it was worth finding. David Scknolnik is a gracious and fun host who knows his way around 3 armed turntables, and why everyone should have one, hint one arm holds a mono cartridge. The electronics from DSA were similar to last year's CAF, but the speakers were a big change up. Dave McPherson brought a pair of unassuming floorstanders, Studio Electric FSX speakers ($11,500/pr) to the party this year. They sounded anything but unassuming in the system and the room created quite a buzz around the halls of CAF.

Vinyl is King here and David played a wide spectrum of musical genres all sounding engaging. We heard Dave Mason's "Only You Know and I Know" and it brought back wonderful memories from that era. Next David pulled out Ella Sings the Cole Porter Songbook from Analog Spark, chose the Miyagima Zero-Mono cartridge ($1,995), and lowered the arm. Wow! Just a beautiful voice dripping with emotion, perfectly focused and centered, and the band displaying wide dynamic swings.

The Studio Electric FSX speakers 100% disappeared and Ella and the band appeared in front of us, spread wide left to right and she was in the room singing. Perhaps the most interesting was another Analog Spark recording of West Side Story with Carol Lawrence singing the part of Maria. She sounded like she was on stage in front of us, clear vocals, finger snaps were scarily real, whistles also were real sounding and it again felt like we were at a theater looking at the stage. I listened to music in this room many times during the show, and for the Saturday evening Analogue Productions demo, I was taken by how the system just faded away and let the venue and artists just burst through portraying a very life like experience.

Dynamic Sounds Associates provided their electronics for the room, DSA Amp 1 Class A mono amplifiers ($25,000/pr) DSA Pre 1 line stage ($16,500) and DSA Phono II phono stage ($13,500). A VPI Avenger Reference "Magnetic Drive" with three VPI tonearms ($30,000) held an Ortofon MC A95 cartridge ($6,500) Miyagima Madake cartridge ($5,995) and the aforementioned Zero-Mono. Mike Garner of Tweek Geek supplied his own cables, Dark Energy. He also was instrumental in room set-up using Stillpoints Aperture room treatments and Stein Harmonizers. The heavy duty racks were supplied by Kanso Audio Furniture. Digital was handled by an AURALiC Aries streamer ($1,595) and AQUA supplied a La Diva CD transport ($8,500) and sensational DAC, AQUA Formula ($14,000).

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