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Speakers that do pianos really well

I recently had the good fortune to listen to a half a dozen pretty well-regarded speakers back-to-back. For these kind of sessions I like using piano recordings - either solo or jazz trio - as a measure because, to my ear at least, it seems that speakers that can reproduce piano really well seem to be pretty well sorted on everything else. The surprising thing was how many of these speakers did NOT do piano well. Of the group there were only two - Vandersteen and Verity - that I thought really captured the big chords, shadings, timbres, and reverberations cleanly and naturally. The rest - and I'm not going to call them out by name - offered a mixed bag of over-brightness, distortion, and general unnaturalness. I was very surprised by the results as I expected better from some of these speakers based on their reviews and reputations. So my question is, Does anyone else use the piano as a litmus test, and what speakers do people use that they think do pianos really well? Regards.
grimace
almarg's avatar
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almarg
9,670 posts
 
I agree that piano music is an important litmus test, and I would go so far as to say an essential litmus test.

I have been especially pleased with how well piano music is reproduced by my Daedalus Ulysses speakers, driven by my VAC Renaissance 70/70 MKIII amplifier. Fast transients are handled cleanly, but at the same time there is never any undue brightness (on well engineered recordings), and at the same time timbre and tonal balance seem just about right.

If it helps to put that into context, I'll mention that my listening is 90% classical, 5% rock, 5% miscellaneous.

Regards,
-- Al
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joefish
66 posts
 
I find that my Ohm 1000's are by far the most satisfying speaker I've heard in terms of their reproduction of piano. Other speakers that I've owned made all piano sound about the same. The Ohms bring out textures, timbres, harmonics, and details that let me hear clear differences between pianos. It's much like being able to hear the difference between a Stratocaster and a Les Paul. These speakers have actually caused me to buy more piano based music. The Ohms are excellent all around speakers, but my 1000's absolutely shine when it comes to piano. Joe
hamburger
132 posts
 
Let me respond by saying that these speakers made techno, trance, electronica unlistenable to me, but played super fantastically on piano music!

http://www.brodmannacoustics.com

;)
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mapman
22,314 posts
 
Agree OHMs set up well are hard to beat for piano.
marqmike
840 posts
 
Hamburger
I feel also that that those speakers sounded absolutely fantastic on piano. I have never heard piano better, and not very good otherwise. I have never heard such a disparity before. I was wondering if I was the only one that thought that.
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