Back to the UK (part one)

In the past I have been very often to the UK mainly south of London (Surrey) and London city but also to Birmingham, Blackpool and Bournemouth.
For few years I was coming practically every month during a weekend.
After retiring from ballroom dancing I never went back again and that was about ten years ago…
Last Friday at last it was time to go back. This time it was not for hard ankle and posture work but to visit a few members of this forum. Nevertheless it was quite an emotional moment since England is after Switzerland the country I have been in the longest.

At Heathrow I met Ian and we went to the city (Paddington Station) with the Heathrow-Link. This was new for me: I still remember those 50-60 minutes in the tube… or the long cab journey for 35£.

Then we went to Ian's apartment and we listened to 'his' music. What I liked the most was:
- Ahmad Jamal: Live at the Montreal jazz festival 1985
- John Zorn: Bar Kokhba
- Rabih Abou-Khalil: the cactus of knowledge
- Roland Kirk

At Ian's place I realized what lots of the members meant when they talked about the size of the rooms and compromises. In London city the space is even less and I really believe that it can cause lots of trouble to find a hifi, which fills your desires and at the same time fits in those rooms.
Ian's compromise is to avoid the trouble that could be caused by the frequencies below 150-200 Hz. Also his thoughts about disturbing the neighbours with super bass were not out of place and I understand his concerns.

The first impression I had from his system was that the high frequencies felt slightly 'metallic' or “tinnyâ€Â. The lack of the low frequencies and therefore the body of the music can causes, at least in me, this impression. When Ian's played his music, it sounded good, a lot better than when hearing complex music like big symphonic works. I wasn't impressed by the imaging but talking to him about it he said he doesn't care about it! I just thought fair enough, he listens to the music from his desk, or from his chair which is 90 degrees from the loudspeakers or in other rooms.
On the other hand he was annoyed about all the external interferences (RFI) which his new internal phono stage was catching. Changing the setting down to 100Ohm made it much better. It is a pity that the stage cannot be set to 200 Ohms or 1K because I think with that cartridge it could sound better with those settings. Personally speaking I wasn't concerned about those interferences… So you can see how different can be the approach to hifi…
I believe though that a lot of tuning can be done in Ian's system to sound better (to my ears of course) and therefore I cannot go in detail about the single units. The most important fact is that he likes it and he is happy about his system and he is convinced about it. He knows its limits and which compromises he took after hearing many other units. Maybe I wouldn't be able to do better than he did.

After the afternoon spent at Ian's apartment we went to the first concert in programme and met Graham there. We had therefore the opportunity to hear how should music sound like and never sounds like when amplified!

After the concert I went to Graham's. In Guildford! Now that's the place I went several times to take ballroom dancing lessons. My thoughts went back to those days. I liked those streets only for pedestrians and those houses. On top of the street near the church was the dance school…
And since we always came with the train, we had to walk over the bridge and on the left side there was that Hifi shop with Linn, Nain and, and. So when we arrived to Guildford Graham and I went to see if that shop still exists. And there it was in the middle of discos! My thoughts are censured here…

So we came at last to Graham's house and listen to music until past one.
As most of you know we both love classical music but above that we are quite different.

- He goes to hundreds of concerts a year, I not more than 20.
- He is mostly interested in having one interpretation of every piece in the repertoire while I just get what I can get cheap and therefore like to compare different interpretations.
- He has much more, wider knowledge about classical music. Especially the English music and the new releases (composers and performers).
- He listens only to CDs while I mostly to LPs

Actually I believe Graham and I are quite complementary. This reflects also our collection of classical music. Put them together and you won't find many duplicates!

So I bet you all want to know what I think about his system! Shall I really say what I think?
Wadia 861 into LC Patriot V100 and out of the Meadowlark Heron-i.

It was a very nice feeling to hear that system. During the whole time when listening I was never attracted by any strange sound, actually I was impressed mostly by the low frequencies. The imaging was very nice. At the beginning I had the feeling that the centre of the image was quite weak, but that disappeared after moving the speakers about 3-5 cm together . The system gave a huge airy feeling. To my taste maybe slightly too much on the top frequencies which sometimes were somewhat “thin†(?). Maybe!
What was missing me to make the system even better (IMO) was the lack of some frequencies in the lower mid range. I pointed out to Graham some passages in which I could hear it in the violins. I couldn't hear the case (body) of the violins enough. Another point which could improve IMO his system is the tuning, He should put his great units on racks or well made shelves and avoid resonances . Especially later if he wants to add a TT. Also playing with the position of the speakers could bring some improvements (or the opposite) in the sound.
Anyway it was very, very pleasant to hear that system: Compliments.

On Sunday we (Ian, Lee, Graham and I) had in programme a visit to Tone.
It was nice to ride through the English country side even if we were mostly on the motorway. The music of Vaughan Williams came into my mind. After one and a half to two hours we arrived there but no Tone. Well he was there but didn't want to open the door. We had to send one of us at the back court, another called him by phone and the rest shouting in front of the door and banging the windows. At last he gave up and we came in.

I was immediately impressed by the standard of his home. I was used to other standards the years before in Surrey. Particularly the fit out (is this the right word?) including furniture was IMO full of taste. I thought it wasn't the usual English house (from the point of view of my experience of course). I suppose that this mirrors the person who lives inside, a person with lots of interests. Seeing Tone in the kitchen cooking a Turkey korma with tagliatelle (or not? I don't remember at all any more!) and hearing his comments about his relatives in the cuisine confirmed my first impression about him. Unfortunately there wasn't enough time to know / talk more about this and that with Tone.
His hifi room had a professional look which I would love to have with mine but for the one or the other reason it never has. Congratulations Tone, a wonderful place!

We heard his system with three different Wadia combinations. I was very impressed about the low ends. The first thoughts were: wow, those Meadowlark do a fantastic job but then I realized it wasn't only the loudspeakers. Hearing hard rock it sounded like live. When switching to classical music Graham noticed that there was something wrong in the image with the first Wadia combination. For my taste there wasn't the wide orchestral feeling but Tone new that and his system was purposely not conceived or placed for that. I thought that the toe in alignment wasn't the ideal setting for classical music and Tone told me that it was the best alignment to fit the speakers in the room. They have being doing lots of measurements to find the best place for those Meadowlarks. Next year he will have though a bigger and a special room for his gear and I bet it will be super to visit him again then! I suppose the lack of image in symphonic music will disappear then but anyway that is not his concern for the moment. For hard rock it was splashy (or how do you say? Wacky?).
The second Wadia combination gave a much better image although I wasn't so convinced about the timbre of some instruments while hearing classical music. Small details which could be only in my imagination! The low ends impressed me like in the first combination.
About the third combination I can only say I forgot about it. Unfortunately I didn't write down my impressions and it was such an intense afternoon that today I don't remember everything. Pity, damn Titian and you have even brought paper and pen with you!

There are though two points I still would like to mention.
When hearing classical music I was aware of an enrichment of the mid and low ends against the other frequencies. This gave in the pop rock music an impressive physical feeling which you also have in live concerts but for classical music I had the feeling it was too accentuated. But again here comes in discussion the different points of views about music and what each of us wants to achieve. It is a matter of personal taste and Tone has enough knowledge to do the right things to achieve what he wants. And he demonstrated it.
The second point is the fact of having an extended mid low ends made the complex music (mostly big orchestral music) in such a room size somewhat unclear. I am sure in the new rooms this point will disappear on its own.
And again it was a pity not to have the time to talk also about these thoughts with Tone but I hope I will have the occasion in the future to meet him again. Thanks Tone for the wonderful afternoon and best wishes for the future.

End of part one: next part will follow soon

 

It was good to meet Titain & the guys again, and the single best item that came out of the day for me, is that we all had a lot in common with each other, regardless of our own 'Perosnal tastes of delivery' we all enjoy music, and can appriecate each others preceptions, although we may not hold that particular 'presentation or style' at the top of our needs to do list, but we understand that each other does, so I feel we all achieve our our goals in our way, all arriving at the same finsh point, but from different perspectives.
The day wasn't about this cables or tweeks, just see what you feel, I love the live feel, and it even did Graham's organ music ok to & Ians death plink wasn't too bad either.
Maybe we ought to make this regular session, good music, people and the odd spot of alcohol thanks for time and effort guys. Tone

 

A nice diplomatic write-up.

Just as a small clarification, I don't use ATC active 10s mainly for neighbourly reasons, but mainly because I really like them. For me, small monitor speakers are where it's at, musically speaking. Low bass is not a priority for me. Even if I didn't have neighbours, I doubt I would want full-range speakers. I've heard very few wide-frequency systems in a real domestic environment that don't sound slow with a muddy midrange (Titian's is one of the few that isn't like this, it should be said, but it's eye-wateringly expensive). Titian's reference sound is so different from mine it's not surprising he didn't get on with my speakers. By the end of the weekend, when he'd acclimatised to systems with a narrower bandwidth than his own, he was happily listening to LS3/5as and Neat Petites...

Anyway, a very enjoyable weekend, and a nice write-up.

-- Ian