Best Of Capital Audiofest 2023
Capital Audiofest Report / Chronicles Part 11
Show Report By Rick Becker

Part 8    (See Part 8)
Odyssey Audio   Montrose
Last year this room with Symphonic Line amplification and an analog front end was the most emotionally moving experience for me as we listened in the faux-candlelight. This year, I visited much earlier in the day, and while the room retained its high-quality sound, I didn't have that same overwhelming emotional connection. Sometimes timing is everything, but I can still salute Klaus Bunge's excellent presentation. It was a room everyone should have experienced.

Arion Audio   Plaza Ballroom III
Last year I was befuddled by what others thought of Arion Audio. They were in a different room last year. In this larger room, the presentation seemed much more organized and the music was locked in focus. A different room or a better set-up? Or maybe the full DSP with the Apollo 12 open baffle line array? Or the additional dual-pack woofer package? And as good as the sound was, it was using a loom of Synergistic Research Foundation SX cables, so there was even more quality to be had from higher-up Synergistic cables. For whatever reason, this was a vast improvement over the previous year.

NOLA   Regency
Like the Arion room above, last year the Nola speakers were amiss for some reason. I suspected it was poor speaker placement and this year they had moved them back closer to the front wall in this room which was larger than necessary. They had also made several significant improvements to the Baby Grand Reference Gold 3 speakers and were using the new entry-level VAC Essence 80 monoblocks. The combination of changes produced significantly improved music from their hybrid open baffle line array speaker with woofers in the enclosed cabinet below.

Matterhorn Audio   Plaza Ballroom I
The huge Kroma Turandot speakers ($242k) from Spain were not only visually impressive but filled the large ballroom with very high-quality music driven by the Aavik preamp and power amp seen earlier in room 310. It was a rare opportunity to hear Aavik driving something other than Borresen speakers. Ansuz cables and accessories were also present here, as was the flagship Technics SL-1000 turntable equipped with an Ortofon MC Diamond cartridge ($10k). It felt like being at a concert in a venue with magnificent acoustics.

Classic Audio   Roosevelt
It seemed like nothing was new in the Classic Audio room. The abundance of figurines of Nipper, the RCA listening dog, spelled "vintage." That said, there was a sense of space and dynamics, both macro and micro, that these modern takes on vintage horn speakers conveyed that was not heard elsewhere at the show. The low-powered tube amplification provided a sense of air and tonal color that had a coterie of believers glued to their seats the entire time I wandered around the room.

VPI   Jefferson
The big attraction here was the new Acora VRC flagship speaker that has drawn acclaim at every show it has appeared this year. The room was hosted by VPI so the front end was their Titan Direct Drive turntable with a van den Hul cartridge. Amplification at all levels was from Audio Research, now owned by Val Cora who also owns Acora. Having heard the VRC in a much larger room in Chicago, I was under whelmed at first with the presentation in this smaller room. Part of the beauty of this speaker is that for its relatively small size, it can play in very large rooms without visually overpowering the space. And with its 94.5dB/W/m sensitivity, it should also play very well with low-powered SET amps, though that remains to be heard.

Part 9    (See Part 9)
The Voice That Is   Wilson
The presentation of the new Tidal Contriva G3 speaker driven by Tidal amplification was very similar to a presentation I had heard the previous month with Tidal's Akira speakers driven by more expensive amplification from Karan. The excellence was the same, confirming the house sound of Tidal speakers. It was like being upfront at a live concert with the musicians on a brightly lit stage — a real 'you-are-there' experience where the music captivates your attention and won't let you go.

Convergent Audio Technology   Truman
Ken Stevens updated his usual presentation with a pair of the new Magico S3 speakers which sounded much more inviting driven by CAT amplification than the S3 did elsewhere at the show — and this was with his small stereo tube amp, not the larger monoblocks. Unlike the Tidal room next door, the music here lured me into the experience of live music in a more relaxing way. The CAT cabling here was supplemented with power cords from Essential Sound Products.

Part 10    (See Part 10)
Legacy Audio   Montgomery
Bill Dudleston typically sets up several complete systems in large rooms at shows. I heard the largest speakers, the Aeris XD ($23.4k) which sounded like a very good value driven with the Wavelet II preamp with digital crossover and DSP and the iV2 Ultra high current dual mono stereo amp. Their speakers tend to be on the high-efficiency side, making them useable with lower power tube amps, but Bill is partial to solid state and he's at the forefront of DSP with his Wavelet and speakers. Excellent workmanship with the speakers.

Distinctive Stereo   Room Frederick
Larry Borden of Distinctive Stereo typically curates a veritable circus of equipment with multiple systems and manufacturers, often represented by the owners and designers. I spend an inordinate amount of time here listening to an outstanding Analog Audio Design reel-to-reel tape deck ($20k), the new $18k Hyper Sonic X-4 phono cartridge, a very affordable Genesis Minuet speaker ($8k) from their reincarnated 7 Series, and ogling the new, more affordable Merrill Audio Clay Michael preamp and Element 110 GaNFET monoblocks ($12k/pr.). And let's not forget the excellent Heed electronics from Hungary. On top of that were interesting conversations with most of the principals involved with the equipment.

The Audio Company   Room Potomac
The show in this grandest of spaces at the Hilton featured Von Schweikert's more modest Endeavor Special Edition speakers bi-amp'ed with a quartet of new monoblocks from Valve Amplification Company, along with top shelf front ends from Transrotor (turntable) and Esoteric (digital) and Aurender (streaming). In a room that typically features much more expensive Von Schweikert speakers, the Endeavor SE more than held its own. On silent display, there was a more modestly priced version of this speaker with a wood veneer. It was an interesting chess move by Damon Von Schweikert.

Halftime At The CAF Corral
With the above review, I have briefly acknowledged most, but not all of the systems that I could live very happily with, given an appropriate size room in my home. The Part number of the Capital Audiofest Chronicles has been listed to encourage you to go back and read the more inclusive comments and see the photos of rooms that you find particularly interesting.

It would be meaningless to acknowledge all these rooms as Best Rooms at the show, but I'll reiterate that the overall quality of rooms this year seemed exceptionally high. At the risk of appearing like a judge at the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show, I've selected a lesser number of rooms that sounded exceptionally fine or brought something exceedingly interesting to the show that moves the High-End audio industry forward in some way. They have been listed, once again, from the top floor down in the order in which I encountered them.

---> See our final picks for Best Of Capital Audiofest 2023.