Upgrading from Rega Apollo

In that price range I would suggest you strongly consider the Modwright Sony 5400. I got mine back about 2-3 weeks ago and I now have about 120 hours on it, so it is still burning in. Dan tells me to expect continued improvement even into the 400-600 hour range. I can tell you that this piece has already exceeded all my expectations. It is just a lovely sounding player. Very accurate timbre! Listening to small ensembles, eg, Stravinsky's Dumbarton Oaks, Soldier's tale Beethoven's septet, and similar works reveals that this player excels in spacing between instruments. Low level detail, black background etc are superb. One disclaimer, I listen to mostly SACD. Perhaps another owner would comment on redbook performance.

Your priorities aren't exactly Rega's strongest points, so I'll stay away from suggesting a step up their ladder or even Naim's ladder.

Have you looked into Bryston's BCD-1? A good bit under your $4k-ish ceiling.

Or if you want to try out discless digital - Bryston's BDP-1 and BDA-1 combo. A bit over $4k, but just outstanding sounding IMO. I just heard the combo the other day. Wish I had the money to make it happen.

Also...

I heard some Densen gear a few years ago. Top notch stuff IMO. Very hard to come by here in the States. Hopefully the new distributor can give them a bit more presence. The old distributor is a great guy and runs a great shop, but he just doesn't have the business model to be a national distributor. He imported the line because his shop is about 45 minutes north of NYC and he wanted to be able to get people just about anything they wanted - in a good way, not in a shady sell anything at all costs way.