Why have capacitors improved so much over the years?


Assuming they have, which is my general impression…
redwoodaudio
but…..i have had both my Modjeski RM-4 and RM-9 apart and there are a few very excellent back in the day boutique caps and R in the right places. Engineering Economics is a class some loathe but others can exploit.

one thing to very carefully consider for all the backyard coupling cap replacer chasers…. Does the musical signal at that point in the circuit have enough voltage to form that big bad cap ?  


Roger designed circuits requiring perfectly matched output tubes
This may be more marketing than fact. Matching to 5% is really hard and does not last much after the tube is put in service. 10% is considered pretty darned good. Industry standard used to be 20-25%.
@ieales Roger Modjeski moved the standard..see RAM tubes, early computerized curve tracing, many variables tested, etc..

Miss him
you might also be interested in talk he gave at last Burning Amp festival…illuminating
I'm well familiar with Modjeski's brilliance. I'm pretty sure he never claimed perfect matching.