Graham Phantom B44 2 or Taela ?

Pradeep,

It was my pleasure and Paul's to host you in our home. We concur in what you heard. This was our second such comparison, albeit the first with an Orpheus, and the results were the same on both occasions. Thank you also for bringing your Orpheus L. It's a superb cartridge, one of a very few that's come close to the performance of a UNIverse in our system. It might have performed better still if I'd had time to really dial it in.

The Talea's superiority might also be greater than we've heard to date. My relative unfamiliarity with tuning it vs. a TriPlanar may have afforded the TriPlanar some advantage.

More important, we got to meet a true gentleman and a new friend.

Dan and Doug
You are too kind...I am almost blushing!
Seriously, did you get around to mounting the Shelter 901 on the Talea?
I suspect that it may be possible to coax a little more out of the Talea if the cart were to be aligned with a Mint LP.
Thanks for a wonderful time and hopefully in the none too distant future we will get around to spinning more vinyl.
Cheers

Pradeep,

For the sake of your blood pressure and equanamity, I withdraw my earlier comments. ;-)

We did mount the 901 and the results were as Paul and I hoped and expected. The Talea is now the second arm we've heard tame the 901's sometimes over-energetic upper mids (the Schroeder Reference being the other). On four other arms, including our TriPlanar, the 901 sounded edgy. I think it feeds alot of energy into a tonearm but the Talea handled it beautifully. The 901's no Orpheus, XV-1S or UNIverse, but on the Talea it retained all its big dynamics and also made good music, not hi-fi excitement. Proof once again that a great arm (and table and phono stage) can raise the level of a lesser cartridge.

Of course we couldn't resist slipping our UNIverse onto the Talea for a last quick go before Dan and Anne had to. I played one of our favorites: J.S. Bach/E. Power Biggs. The echoes are still fading, my head's still spinning. :-)

The better the reproduction the more superhuman Bach and Biggs become, and the tension they create in an aware listener grows endlessly. On the one hand there's a near overwhelming urge to respond viscerally to the rhythm (toe tapping, head bobbing, etc.). Yet if one doesn't remain entirely relaxed and focused one instantly loses track of the 3, 4 or 5 lines of counterpoint that only Bach's unimaginable genius could weave, and which Biggs' velvet touch, iron-fingered discipline and fiercely accurate timing recreated like no other organist. Thank you Talea (Joel). I've been listening to that recording for forty years, it's never been better played.

Agree about the Mint.

I completely agree that there is more to be had by aligning with a MintLP. I should get off of my duff and order one, but I had to purchase new drivers for my bass horns. Maybe next month.

Yes we did get to mount the 901 for a while. Still sounds like a Shelter to me, but Doug is much more familiar with that cartridge so I'll let him speak more to that if he wishes. I may try my Denon 103r against it next time we all get our toys out, and I think Doug has an MM that would be fun to hear on the Talea as well.

If you get back to NY, you now know which train it is. Unfortunately they don't run up to New Hampshire, but with more time we could still do something farther north.

I read that in the meantime there is already a 2nd generation version of the Talea. Can someone please explain the improvements of this version as compared to the "old" one?