Several years ago, a prominent reviewer had this to say as
he was praising the natural and life-like tonal qualities of a particular
speaker:
It’s [speakers] like these that make me
question the priorities of audiophiles who relegate accuracy of timbre to
secondary status. How are the richness and color of instruments, voices,
ensembles, and textures to be reproduced in all their infinite variety and
beauty if a loudspeaker has less than accurate reproduction of timbre? What do
dynamics, imaging, detail, transparency, and the like matter if voices and
instruments don’t sound like themselves?
I’ve come the same realization, late in the game. I recently
made a lateral move from one of the most popular of recent speaker models to a
different speaker, because it sounded so much more natural and realistic in
timbre. I sacrificed a touch of image precision in doing so, but it has been
well worth it. The sound is so much more engaging. It’s like going from a high-resolution
black and white photograph – which is very detailed and impressive – to a color
version of the same photo, but with slightly less resolution. The color version
offers so much more in terms of realism.
So I’m now contemplating the purchase of what I hope will be
my last speakers, with the objective of realistic, natural, and rich (but not artificially
warm) tone being the primary attribute.
What speakers, under $10k, would you recommend? (I’m driving
them with a PrimaLuna Prologue Premium)
