High End Audio-Gaining Higher Ground?

My response to a few good points above...

Yeah, high end stereo stores suck. They will die off completely over time. Online is the future source if all high end audio. 5 years ago it was hard to buy any high end audio online. Now there's lots of it available. It will continue to go that direction.

No good modern music??? I laugh at that. We are experiencing an explosion of superb new music. More available than ever before. PM me if you want to be on my free email list for new notable music.

I agree completely that young people already have a cheap option for excellent sound quality. It's called an ipod. An ipod actually sounds very very good. Even compressed 256k mp3s sound great. And if you invest $90 in a decent pair of earbuds it can sound excellent. That's the ugly truth.

There are many good bands out there today but it seems for the most part we're shielded from it for some reason. Perhaps not enough advertising money in it for that demographic? I'm fortunate to live in an area that has a member funded radio station (wfuv) which exposed me to many excellent bands and artists I would have otherwise never heard of. I've long ago had it with the classic rock stations. There is also another station in Westchester county which is privately owned that is very good as well
I tend to think these type of stations are few and far between limiting us to what advertisers and promoters want us to hear

Enitely too much snobbery in it's current state. I would assume most if it will die off and then encounter a renasance at some point in the future.

So my 15 year old son had a bunch of his friends over for a birthday party. What did he do beforehand? Pull out a bunch of his albums (yes, vinyl) and laid them out so that they could choose what to listen to while they hung out and played video games. Gorillaz, The XX, Green Day, Coldplay, etc. He was interested in music from the time he was born, and I did my best - giving him my Dad's old Technics table, Infinity bookshelf speakers and Yamaha receiver. I bought him some of the records, and bought him a Project Debut Carbon when his older table died. My Dad did similarly for me - in fact, he bought me those Infinity speakers for my 13th birthday (some 35 years ago). I'm sure in part I'm just lucky. My daughter couldn't give a lick about a stereo... but she plays piano and sings beautifully. She gets songs stuck in her head and has to play them.

Separately from my personal experience, I've been hanging out on the Facebook vinyl communities - Vinyl Addiction, Vinyl Junkies, etc. I'm surprised at how many women are there, and how young they are. One really smart, active poster has to be about 16 years old. She's awesome. Most of the people there are resurrecting old mediocre tables and receivers - or maybe considering the Project Debut Carbon or Music Hall but are afraid of the prices. They're buying lots of thrift store and Craigslist vinyl. Great music from the 70's and 80's for $2 or $5 a pop. Jack White's Lazzaretto just broke a 20 year old record for vinyl sales in the first week. Many of these folks will step up to higher-end audio if there's a path for them. The future is good.

Do I have concerns? Well, yes. High-end companies keep going higher. $20K components, which are now common, are not exactly a stepping stone. But... For every Ferrari that a 20 year old lusts after, 10 VW GTI's will be sold. Artists are having a hard time making money on streaming music, but for fans finding great music has never been easier. It's not what it was once, but it is what it is now.

Thanks to those who responded regarding my question about what defines "high end" in dollar terms. I understand, it's all relative. With that in mind, I agree with previous posters that many high-end companies will go out of business, but that's par for the course in most industries. How many automobile manufacturers existed in 1915?

What will maintain "high-end" audio into the future is the same human longing from which high-end audio was born - the desire not just to have music in one's life, but to connect with it. A person could take the position that there's no point in buying physical artwork anymore, when you can hang a high-definition screen on your wall that rotates through digital images of thousands of pieces of art for a fraction of the cost - but there's something about being up close to an original acrylic on canvas, the smell of it, the depth to the brush strokes, and the way it changes at different lighting angles. It's very organic, the way it affects the senses, and humans have been drawn towards objects of creation for thousands of years for that reason.

The average 18 year old may not appreciate an original Monet today, but there comes a day when they not only appreciate it, they seek it out. It brings us down to earth, like a good cup of coffee, or the smell that hits you when you walk into a florist's boutique.

It's the same with music...high-end audio isn't about the coolness of the devices, or the spec sheet - it's about letting us be right there as a musician's fingers glide across a guitar's nylon strings.

In fact, given what the millenial generation is about to go through, regarding debt overload, social upheaval, geopolitical turmoil, I see them (re)discovering a love for music reproduction as a way of escaping and finding their own sense of organic peace. Humans have loved music for centuries, and that will continue - and technology that gets us that much closer to the origin of the music will always be in demand. JMHO.