Should I buy a VDH Colibri or Black Beauty?

I'm a little concerned that the Colibri only sounds good with excellent recordings

No, no, it's just that excellent recordings can sound unexpectedly "excellent" when you use a Colibri... A few quick notes fm me too:
I too found that the Colibri outperformed BB.
VdH products, when in good condition, are pretty good for the asking price; a few yrs ago, when I used them the value was great!
The Colibri is an annoyingly unfriendly product & I used a slightly/ minuscule negative vta to keep hi frequencies on par with upper bass.
Sibilance (pronounced 6-8kHz): I never got completely ride of it EXCEPT by varying the speed of the record -- and then, only on certain records.
Clearly, if your azimuth is off, you WILL have hi frequency anomalies;

My suggestion:
1) If your phono is "good" (i.e. not outstanding), buy the BB and, perhaps, invest in an even better phono.
2) Breathe down the seller's/ dealer's... etc neck to set the cartridge up perfectly. Including the loading.
Regards

I am surprised that no one has pointed out that there really is NO one Colibri. Each one seems to have been custom made with variations in cartridge body construction, wire used for windings, voltage output, internal impedance, etc, etc. So none of us is talking about the same product. Also, Gregm, did you really mean to say "azimuth"? Azimuth should have zero effect on hf response, let alone to cure "anomalies", such as sibilance.

Dear Fmpnd, No idea about the dimensions of your SME-30
but for my Kuzma Stabi Reference I solved the problem by
ordering from 'Reed L' (www.turntables.lt)one special 'torret' (aka 'base') with one 12" tonearm.
This combo is made after consultation about the relevant
dimensions . So I put this combo next to my TT and enjoy
the luxury of two tonearms. BTW the phono is Basis exclusive with 2 inputs and the tonearms are: Triplanar VII
with Ruby 3 and Reed L 2 A (29 gr.eff.mass) with Phase Tech
P-3G.
Regards,

I think, vdH was the only one who made custom orders (I guess "Colibri"), he had some from his own idea or the customer said (even what kind of "sound" is preferred), what he wanted and vdH tried to do it. But I heard, based on his age, he gave all to Lukaschek (Benz)...

Question regarding loading: I believe the Colibris are 47k. Is your experience that they work best with a phono stage that is also at 47k?