RE: RMAF
Chris Woodward
So, I think we can safely say that the rumors of the death of RMAF were greatly exaggerated. The big tent for CanJam was weird, but they packed it with vendors, and some of the rooms at the Marriott were dedicated to headphones, also. The lighting in the tent, and the floor inside, were pretty lousy, but there were plenty of great headphones and headphone amps to be heard. As I was telling Tony, there really wasn't a single headphone amp/headphone pairing that (to my ears) didn't sound good enough to live with. This was in contrast to the 2-channel speaker rooms, of which maybe only 20% were live-withable, and out of that bunch, only a much smaller percentage were truly first-rate. To be fair, though, I'd say that's pretty much par for the course at RMAF.
My favorite rooms were the ones with the best sources. There was a Sony room that was playing an Analogue Productions 1/4 inch reel-to-reel tape recording that sounded awesome. My favorite room was one that didn't have the best sound, but which was playing great vinyl lp's. Kubotek had a dedication to the late Harry Pearson of Absolute Sound fame (whom we had the pleasure of meeting a few years ago at the RMAF). What I didn't realize as I was visiting their room is that the Kubotek founder, a Dr. Kubo, acquired Pearson's vinyl record collection, and they were playing copies of some of Pearson's favorite records. I heard the Mercury recording of Dorati doing Stravinsky's Firebird. Compared to much of the digital dreck heard elsewhere, it was extremely refreshing. I sat glued to my seat until the record ended.
I heard some MQA recordings. They sounded good, and very detailed, but I couldn't possibly know how they stack up with DSD without doing a head-to-head comparison.
Overall, it seemed like there was more digital than analog at RMAF than in recent years. There weren't quite as many vendors, but there were still a lot, including many international vendors. Some of my favorites weren't there (deHavilland and Soundsmith come to mind), but there also weren't quite as many attendees, which made for a somewhat more relaxed atmosphere. Having all of the vendors in one tower was actually very convenient, because you could just walk down the stairwell from one floor to the next. Floors 11 to 2 were all dedicated to RMAF, and I hope they do it that way in the future. I only needed to use the elevator going up a couple of times.
The renovations to the Marriott, by the way, were pretty impressive. They've done a nice job of revamping it.
The biggest surprise of the event was seeing San Antonio Spurs legend David Robinson, an NBA hall-of-famer, wandering around listening to systems. I wanted to warn him not to buy anything from the mezzanine, but I didn't have the nerve. I think he figured it out on his own, though.
All in all, it was well worth attending. I'm glad that we still have a major audio show within driving distance of New Mexico. The organizers deserve credit for dealing with the situation as well as they did.
Chris
Hal Espen
Chris
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Deb
I wondered who that really-really-really tall guy was!! I hope he enjoyed himself. I, too, enjoyed the different-ness of the show - it was great to have everything in one tower for a change - nice and compact. My favorite room was that of a new exhibitor, young, from Dallas - Bandwidth Audio - they were displaying their own amplifiers and particularly showcasing a prototype phono preamp - lovely vinyl sound - no doubt enhanced further by the pair of Tannoy speakers they were using (I am rather partial to Tannoys). We were also intrigued with Austin Audio - another new, young exhibitor working on tube amplifiers. Very nice to see some new and younger folk. I agree with you --- it was agreeably different and definitely not dead. Good to see you there!
Deb