Weird, I realize, but this speaker project included a mental exercise about “proper” playback for Bruckner 7”, how to facilitate hearing and figuring out what is going on with that Music. As ever, I turned different speaker and amp ideas around in my head like a Rubik’s Cube, trying to mentally line up a design with the sonic goals until they “clicked”. I have heard very little Bruckner played live, but brushes with Bruckner’s music, live or recorded, always piqued my interest, even as it confused me. My previous speakers are good enough that I have known for some time that Bruckner uses LF and dynamics “differently”, but I haven’t clearly heard, felt, or understood what he is doing before now. Very generally, I felt like I needed “more” of what I had, and it would be a plus if only the 2 speakers had to change. With these speakers (and the same MA-9S2 amps) I can finally hear and feel the incredibly rich LF sonorities that Bruckner creates. I also hear differently/better and understand better the slow to mid-tempo “crescendos” that eluded me before, now that the rising and falling is better articulated, resulting in certain rich textures that derive from amazing, subtle timbrel and dynamic instrumental contrasts, both assonant and dissonant, at times spread out over surprisingly long intervals, and at times very loud. I also enjoy the way Bruckner uses large ensembles in every register to weave tapestries of sound, including texture. The feeling I get is that Bruckner seems to be in grateful awe of Creation, and his Music makes me feel that way, too. Perhaps, once one hears and understands Bruckner this way, it is possible to hear and feel it from a car radio or a boom box. Anyway, I am just, finally, starting to get it, and it looks like I took a wild shot at this, and it’s working! In truth, when I read about these speakers, I equated them with big JBL monitors I’ve heard, and they “matched up” pretty well with my developing mental picture, which included most of my existing set-up, and I pulled the trigger. I referred several times to this project as my “latest folly”, because I was not 100% positive how this big, difficult, expensive project would work out. Heightening the tension, I built the whole project before I listened, over 3 years, and I basically feel like I lucked out. Others can decide if my 60 years interest in audio, including a fair amount of DIY, and tons of “mental cataloging”, gave me the background to steer myself where I needed to go to get what I wanted. I’ve made plenty of audio mistakes. I’m glad this was not one of them. I should also say that I remain a musical omnivore, and if I’ve lost anything by adopting these speakers, in gaining Bruckner, I have not noticed it yet. I feel like it was Troel’s design; I just curated, and I was lucky. It would be too funny if these speakers only did well with B7, but not other Bruckner!

>Sorry about image size! This is the first time I posted a picture here! It took me several tries. >

Paul S>>

Like I said in my previous post, I lost my tonearm/cartridge synergy a while back, and then I realized that I needed to replace the surrounds on the drivers in my BassZillas, and I shut the system down for some time, until I got The Loudspeakers up and running. So, I’m glad to say, it’s been pretty easy to tell what’s going on with the system via The Loudspeakers, as they break in, and I as blow the cobwebs out of my long-idle electronics. Today was especially nice, starting with some Coltrane, then on to the Scherzo and the Finale from Bruckner 7. Great listening to both LPs, and I still feel expansive enough at this point to say these speakers were “worth it” just for the Bruckner 7! By the end of that LP I was weeping with joy! This Music is magnificent! I really look forward to “getting into Bruckner”. I just now found a few more Bruckner LPs I was afraid I’d just imagined. I guess I’d “set them aside”, then forgotten about them, because they were not where they were supposed to be, in my record racks, where I expected to find them (but couldn’t) last week. I plan to get Wand’s Bruckner 8 that was recorded live in Lubeck. I’ve only seen this performance on CD, so I guess that’s peripheral to this post. As for how, specifically, The Loudspeakers have revealed Bruckner to me, it turns out I got the “more” I wanted. There’s just more Music there now than there was before, and The Loudspeakers do more Music with less fuss and bother; they make it seem natural, and “easy” in that sense. I’m still messing with speaker positioning, pretty much gilding the lily.

Paul S

Something about The Loudspeakers that shoppers have likely noticed is that the original design electrically splits the 18” woofer from the MF, HF and UHF drivers.  And, just to be clear, there is sound thinking based on lots of experience behind this design. It takes lots of power to get deep, Musical bass at concert levels from a loudspeaker, and if there is a work-around here, I have not heard it yet. To be clear, I am not talking about sound effects or Mobile Sound Club systems, but I am talking about serious Music via home systems. Troels saw/heard the wisdom of Hypex for LF, to allow for better sounding amps for the other drivers. And anyone who goes another direction (as I have done) will want to think it through carefully (as I have done) before committing funds and effort. I am still playing with my Loudspeakers, but another thing worth thinking about is that a woofer that does 200 Hz Musically won’t be doing Musical 18Hz at the same time. Based on things I read, it looks like plenty of vocal audio people think “good bass” means prominent bass, just like “good HF” means lots of details and “air”. I think I will not get on my soapbox but I will answer questions about this if/as they come up. Meanwhile, 18” woofer notwithstanding. The Loudspeakers have nothing to do with prominent bass or sound effects but everything to do with the unaffected revelation of the Music that’s in the recording, at least this is true of my version. I will say I would not be happy if I found myself mentally parsing the Music as I listened to it. I am OK with the compromises embodied in The Loudspeakers (my version, anyway) because they have a very broad range of Musical expression that allows me full access to my Music Library.>>

Paul S

I’m thinking I’ve never mentioned on this board that the listening room I’ve used for the past 16 years is 21’ X 17 ½’ X  8’. It has three large openings into a very large house, including a long, wide hallway and successive open rooms. This means The Loudspeakers have a big job to do in order to charge this room. My strategy so far has been plenty of amplifier power, and sitting close to the speakers, which I have well out in the room, over 7’ from the front wall. The sound I am after at this time is the sound that charges the room and “appears” spread out behind the front wall, loading into the room from there. There is little to nothing in the way of standing waves, and I am amazed to get plenty of HF from my horns with the speakers slightly toed out. Orchestras can be very powerful, depending on how they are mic’d, and well recorded solos and ensembles sound and feel like that, according to the production. As far as the drivers go, these are not high directivity, quite the contrary, so they lose those benefits but gain in terms of room loading. Between the 18” and the 10” direct drivers and the M/HF compression driver with its very short, fast horn, these speakers really do seem to charge the air, itself at all frequencies. I am surprised and pleased that the Visaton UHF horn also, somehow, gets its contribution into the mix off axis. I will say, as I have opined before, that there is such a thing as too big for a listening room, and I feel like I am right at the limits of what I can use with these speakers and my present amps. While there seems to be plenty of electrical and mechanical power for more volume, I think I would have to do something to contain the sound to keep the air charged if this room were any bigger. I would also say that a smaller room would be fine with these speakers, and one might then use smaller amps for MF and HF, although I stick to my previous observations regarding LF and amp power: Even in a smaller room it takes big drivers and big power to get orchestral LF.>>

Paul S

Today was a good day in The Loudspeaker Land. I’ve been using The Loudspeakers to do some targeted listening, with excellent results. I already mentioned at the start of this thread that I had lost my cartridge/tonearm synergy a while ago, and today I got it back. From there I used better Sound to dial up the MOSFETs in my phono stage, also with great results, including more depth and vertical ambience, and I’ve re-positioned the speakers closer to the front wall, resulting in greater room charging.. I think (hope) all this will keep me pie-eyed and not thinking about Reverb Injection for a while.>>

Paul S

At some point recently I became particularly aware of the fact that the sound from the Loudspeakers has transformed significantly over the five months that I’ve used them, not in the sense that the character of The Loudspeakers has changed, rather Musical substance has somehow been “added” even as the speakers’ agility and adroitness have increased, which, in a way, “counters” the sense one typically gets with “added material”, especially in cases where it can become “too much”. One way to sum it might be, more information with less fuss and bother. This seems to build on the quality of “Refinement”, which The Loudspeakers share with the MA-9S2s. While I do not generally recommend “doubling down” on one “characteristic” of sound, in my case, where the Refinement is concerned, I’ve actually tripled down, since both my analog and digital front ends sport this quality, as well. I am not just defending myself when I say that I do not think the Refinement has become problematic in my case, because I have turned away components that were “voiced” for someone’s idea of “refinement”, that either seemed relentlessly soft, or syrupy, or velvety, or satin-y, on and on, and I am not a sucker for just any particular version of “refinement”. I don’t like or advocate ever-present or “own sound” for my system. Yet, here I am…  Anyway, in the case of The Loudspeakers this seems to be a result of a long “break-in” period, perhaps the fancy, expensive X/O parts, or the 12 AWG wire, and certainly the “stiff” “pro” drivers. I just tried the “scratch and tap test” on the (paper) direct drivers, and I was surprised to hear how much they’ve changed since I last performed the test, months ago.  Both drivers remain a good deal “deader” than I would have imagined is good for Sound; but the proof is Listening, and they sound very nice, indeed over the frequencies they are allotted when they are actually in use, playing Music as parts of The Loudspeakers. So, what do I know? I have heard plenty of drivers that had the life engineered right out of them; but, lucky for me, Troels could obviously hear, appreciate and design for Life from the drivers in The Loudspeakers in a way that I am able to develop with the MA-9S2s, at any rate. The Big Woofer has been especially transformed, becoming more articulate and generally more helpful at the X/O point. The cone is still quite dead compared to the many 15” drivers I have “on hand”. But, again, I can’t argue with the results I’m getting, as the Music is anything but dead. Live and Learn, I guess. No surprise to hornies, I suppose, but the horns have also gotten better and better the more I’ve used them. I liken the 18Sound CD/horn to my old Pole Star, the JBL 375. Of course, the 18Sound does not go that low, but it shares the Refinement quality with the storied JBL classic unit. And I am just tickled with the Visaton TL16H super tweeter! I never dreamed it would integrate so well for me with The Loudspeakers! Incredibly, it seems to have “color” that ribbons I’ve used lacked. Perhaps this comes from greater output down the spectrum; I don’t know, but I like it!>>

Happy Thanksging (apropos),

Paul S

Just listened to Gould’s unusual Brahms Intermezzi (See Music Board) via the Loudspeakers for the first time. The speakers were powered by the MA-9S2s. Of course I’ve noticed before how Gould deconstructs these pieces. Today I took advantage of the refined, natural sound and I really relaxed and let the Sound and the Music come to me. Naturally, the structure is unusual, and The Loudspeakers certainly reveal that. I could also hear how Gould re-built these pieces temporally, with some surprisingly long and meandering expositions, and how he managed to re-time the notes without losing the emotional melodic threads that join them. The Loudspeakers have no trouble making Music from the sometimes jumbled or "isolated" notes, and they clearly re-create the tumultuous sections, where Gould holds the sustain pedal as he pours forth the notes, which ring and continue ringing as more notes are added, growing into bell-like sonorities, which are sometimes downright thunderous. Folks, this is the sort of thing one might hear from a good seat at a live Gould concert in a nice venue. It’s a great LP/recording, with more attention paid to Gould’s playing than his humming, and The Loudspeakers put the icing on the Musical Cake. Got an "unknown error" code when I tried to upload a photo of the album sleeve,  but I think I listed it on the Music board "review".>>

Paul S

Am I the only one who’s (just) noticed that I have not yet specifically mentioned The Loudspeaker’s midrange driver? This seems odd, in view of the fact that this driver is pretty much the beating heart of The Loudspeaker, playing the range from 200 to 1,300 Hz, handling most of the Musical Energy I’m hearing from The Loudspeakers. Did this driver somehow escape my notice? If yes, is this a bad thing? The driver in question is an 18 Sound 10NMBA520 (10”), with a fancy magnet and a shallow, 28g paper cone, and some sort of a built-in feedback loop that is said to keep the impedance nice. As I mentioned, I have been moving the speakers around since I plugged them in, trying to find a permanent spot for them, including moving them up and down on stands of varying heights. I rather dread the vertical exercise, as my version of the Loudspeakers weigh close to 230 lbs. apiece. So far, stands have ranged from3 ½” to 5 1/2”. A while back I found that I liked the sound and the sound effects (“soundstage”) when I stand between the speakers, putting my ears well above all the drivers. Yesterday I discovered that I get similar-but-more-direct sound if I sit on the carpet, putting my ears at about the center of the midrange driver. The electricity was OK, and the electronics were warmed up when I did this, and I was struck by how much Musical Information I was getting from this driver, and how easily and downright comfortably the driver delivered this information! And I immediately determined that I should at least try a taller (10”) stand, to put that driver at ear level when I sit in my beloved bentwood, Poang chair. I’m casting around in my head, trying to come up with a simple stand that will bear the weight and allow sliding around on the carpet. I’ll get back about this if/when I cross that Rubicon.>>

Paul S