It felt like the Good Olde Days, back in the 1990's when
the show was held when the snow was deeper. Winter was still with us in late
March and I camped in my car just south of Champlain, NY. By the time the show
opened at 10am on Saturday I had transferred the amplifiers I had been loaned
for review and met up with my audio buddy Tom Lathrop, also from Rochester,
NY. Tom has become something of an audio show junkie, frequently attending RMAF,
Toronto and Montreal. We work the show separately and Tom was able to
visit some rooms I had to skip, so some of his impressions noted in the
coverage later on will fill in the gaps in my notes. Even though the show was
a little smaller this year due to the proliferation of audio shows across the
continent, I still encountered closed doors due to lines and formal
orchestrated presentations. That's just the way it is sometimes.
Another major factor this year was the converging dates of
the Montreal show and the semi-annual furniture show in High Point, NC, the
following weekend. Consequently, I will cover some of the major highlights in
Part 1 and resume writing when I return and dig into the nitty gritty that
makes this industry so fascinating.
Coupe de Foudre
is a major retailer in Montreal who hosted several small rooms as well as the
Longueuil grand salon in the lower level. Peter
McGrath from Wilson Audio really
has this room down pat. Each year a different Wilson speaker sits on virtually
the same square centimeters and the curved red listening chair nailed down in
the exact same spot. Even the tables on the side walls are in the same
location. Clearly, Peter has blueprinted the room; he is probably the best
set-up man in the business in addition to being a world class recording
engineer. He gets it right every time and he did it again this year with the
new Sasha Series 2 speaker which is the evolution of the famous Watt/Puppy
series that has been emulated by many others. Nobody does it as well as
Wilson.
Peter walked me around back of the Sasha to show me the same
silver step device that appeared on the Alexia last year with both fore and
aft as well as the vertical steps combining for 40 possible positions for the
mid-tweeter module. Single wiring is near the floor below the off-set port in
the woofer cabinet. Impedance has been improved from 1.8 Ohms in the earlier
version to 2.17 in the Series 2 which offers a more benign load for Single
Ended Triode amps — something that was very tempting given the 91dB
efficiency of the speaker. Cabinet resonance has been reduced from already
dead level by 34% thanks to measuring capability of B&K instrumentation
that allows them to measure each square centimeter and make adjustments with
their X material. While the Series 2 uses the same woofers, the tightened
cabinet produces cleaner, but not lower bass. The midrange driver is the same
one used across the entire Wilson line, but the tweeter from the Alexia has
now been brought down to the Sasha necessitating a slight re-design of the
mid-tweeter cabinet. The Sasha was introduced right at the time of the stock
market crash so Wilson tightened their belt and offered it at $27,000, $3000
less than the Watt/Puppy had been. Given the state of the economy, they kept
production rolling by taking the hit in price. For the very short term pricing
is $30,000 but Peter suggested that it will soon go up. Wilson Audio pays good
wages and offers a 401k to their employees, which is necessary to retain
artisans capable of this world class quality. What I find amusing with the
Wilsons is that while so much effort and attention is given to proper driver
alignment (quite successfully), even sitting to the right of the sweet spot,
not to mention walking around the room, the music is exquisite, if not quite
as good. Such is their obsession.
But the Sasha speaker would have been one hand clapping
without the stunning electronics from Dan
D'Agostino. Their Momentum stereo amp and preamplifier are audio
jewelry of this highest order, both acoustically and visually. A large
circular remote control selects the source and controls power, mute, phase,
tone and volume. Imagine that — a tone controls at the highest level in the
High-End! And a "Dock" button, presumably to alert the captain of your
yacht that you are coming on board. Further investigation is warranted. I
couldn't resist giving the huge volume control a slight left/right twist. It
is positively erotic. It wouldn't surprise me to find a D'Agostino display
at Tiffany's. Photographs simply do not do his work justice. A Sound Devices
744T recorder, an Alpha DAC from Berkeley Audio Design and a Mac formed the
digital front end of the rig while a Brinkman Bardo turntable sat idle.
Transparent cables connected most everything. A Dan D'Agostino Momentum
stand was used beneath the amplifier.
StirlingTrayle
of Vana LTD. is the North
American distributor for D'Agostino as well as Vienna Acoustics and Isotek
in Canada. We both agreed that the stereo amp was visually dwarfed by the
large room, but for those with such a problem they offer monoblocks. More
intriguing was to hear about the new Momentum integrated amplifier ($45,000,
200 wpc) introduced at CES this year that melds the stereo power amp with the
preamplifier, isolating the amplifier's transformer into an enlarged base in
the preamp. It will weigh a hefty 85 pounds and be trimmed with ported copper
with much attention paid to keeping the beast cool.
Two doors down in the Jacques Cartier room was a rig fit for
the Queen with large 15" dual concentric horn loaded Tannoy
Canterbury speakers ($30,000) from their Prestige Gold Reference
series delivering a rich, full sound, if somewhat colored. With very high
efficiency and exquisite vintage looking cabinets they will fill large rooms
in most castles. The music was both detailed and dynamic being delivered by
Mac Air via USB to a Cary DAC-100t
with tube output stage. The next version of the 100t will have an Ethernet
input, I was told. A Cary SLP-98 preamp and a CAD 120S MkII 120 watt stereo
amplifier completed the rig. For more modest homes they showed the more
slender model ($17,600) as well as a few of their modern design speakers, all
with high efficiency. While not as neutral or accurate as the Wilson above,
this was glorious, dynamic sound with a dimensionality to be savored by tube
lovers
.
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