In the 1986 film Ruthless People, Judge Reinhold plays Ken, who works as a salesman in an audio store, the kind with boxes of cheap receivers stacked on the floor. In walks a gum-smacking heavy ...

You’re thinking, do we really need a new complete set of Beethoven symphonies, especially from an unfamiliar orchestra and conductor? Well, if you’re an audiophile of the analog persuasion, you may conclude that these six ...

The codec known as MQA (Master Quality Authenticated) is clearly in its ascendancy. The Big Three record labels have signed on, Tidal is streaming hundreds of MQA-encoded albums, and there’s a steadily expanding amount of ...

Ralph Vaughan Williams’ Job was inspired by a set of early 19th-century illustrations by William Blake. The composer was developing a distinctively English style of ballet, and the music includes aristocratic dance forms from the ...

When Magico, LLC announced the imminent introduction of the S3 Mk II loudspeaker late last year, it wasn’t exactly shocking news. After all, two other members of Magico’s S Series, the S1 and the S5 ...

Generally speaking, audiophiles like to own their music. Borrowing from a vast and undifferentiated stream with practically limitless choices just doesn’t sit right—at least not as the only option. We tend to grow our music ...

The Fifth Century, a 42-minute work for choir and saxophone quartet by the English composer Gavin Bryars (b.1963), has been described as “music that makes eternity audible.” Bryars sets texts by the lesser-known 17th-century metaphysical ...

Magico loudspeakers have impressed a good number of TAS equipment reviewers. No fewer than seven Magico models are endorsed in the 2017 Buyer’s Guide and the most ambitious designs have served as references for Robert ...

For the 2015 Rocky Mountain Audio Fest, my beat was loudspeakers costing less than $20,000 per pair and, in advance of the trip to Denver, I meticulously studied the show guide and made a list ...

Photo: Jana Dagdagan Marantz “brand ambassador” Ken Ishiwata Late last year, DMGlobal, the corporation that now owns Marantz (also Denon and Boston Acoustics), announced the new Marantz Premium 10 Series and arranged for members of ...

Non-audiophiles watching a member of our tribe move towards the purchase of a costly assault-on-the-art loudspeaker may believe that acquiring that component guarantees sonic nirvana. We members of the tribe know better. That understanding is ...

There’s something to be said for a high-end loudspeaker manufacturer actually making its own drivers. The number of companies that do this is relatively small, though many try to obfuscate the matter by declaring that ...

Due to the incomplete state of the extensive renovations undertaken at the Marriott Denver Tech Center, a number of loudspeaker manufacturers were disadvantaged by rooms that were less than ideal—that is, too small—to demonstrate their ...

Reference Recordings garnered seven nominations for the 2016 Grammy Awards, including two for Woman at the New Piano. The disc premieres six works written in 2013 by four composers, three of whom, like Shpachenko, live ...

We’ve all had the experience of auditioning an audio component of interest at a dealership—with the salesman standing right behind you. Not too much pressure, right? Well, imagine doing it with ten people watching, and ...