Apparently music is the only stimulation to address the entire brain. When we listen to music all hemispheres of the brain are involved; whereas with something like sex for example, it is just a tiny little corner of the brain, probably at the back of the head where there is only a little oxygen. This must explain why we have to concentrate so hard with sex.
This newsletter is not about sex, thankfully, because I know precious little of this secretive subject. My wife says I know nothing about it....but I digress. This is a story of a truly amazing experience! A stunningly beautiful and amazing evening with a squat, wide and ugly forty year old.
It is a story of music, not marketing. It is a story of amazing realistically reproduced music.
I bought this strangely proportioned loudspeaker about six years ago for around R5000.00 and after listening to it briefly I packed it away and kind of forgot about it. My curiosity was revitalised recently when I saw an advert in AV Forums for her slightly bigger brother advertised for the princely sum of R5500.00! I was a few days late in trying to buy that pair.....sadly. Very, very sadly.
My failed attempt to buy this loudspeaker's two big brothers inspired me to drag the 40 year old pair of "collectors" smaller sisters from the store room. I had been listening to a pair of Martin Logan CLSII loudspeakers in the "communal" lounge in my house for a few years, more for their translucent beauty than their overrated abilities at reproduction (music, not sex). So I pushed my pair of Martin Logans out of the way to make way for these grand 40 year old twins.
My wife remembered them. "Oh no, those ugly things!" her only comment.
The amplifiers I used (more from experimentation than calculated design) was a pair of Quicksilver Silver 88 monoblocks pushing out the princely sum of around 80 watts per channel.....on a very good day (so in theory they should prove a little lacking in power). So much for theory I would soon find out. They proved to have just about enough power to get this little 5 way loudspeaker singing.
I warmed the amps, rummaged through my music collection and picked out a few favourites, and settled in for the evening, my expectations cautiously high.
The first few notes floated crystal clear, seemingly from nowhere such is the transparency of these loudspeakers. I did the customary pushing and pulling to get the soundstage and other stuff sorted and let the fat ladies sing.
I was blown away.
You would expect a small soundstage from this 40 year old. Right?
WRONG!!! The soundstage was so realistic with truly wonderful depth.
The music is rich, detailed, warm and emotionally involving. The dreadfully anemic "detail uber alles" sound found in so many of the more (awful) modern designs is nowhere to be found in this magical loudspeaker. It weaves it's silken web of delicacy encapsulating the nuances of music which caress the listener into a world of charming seduction.
Seductive and warm on the one hand but blazingly fast, and detailed on the other. The huge soundstage is amongst the most convincing I have heard. The loudspeakers simply disappear and the soundstage of such magnitude as to defy its diminutive size. A sound picture painted in space, which floats so much higher, deeper and wider than it's physically diminutive proportions.
It isn't perfect (no speaker is) but my goodness it's so damn close as to render it's small imperfections irrelevant!! It does so much right that the little things it doesn't quite get right, just don't seem to matter at all!
The upper bass is a smidgen full, perhaps. A function of power amp? Room? Loudspeaker? My guess it's the Stereophile Class A rated Quicksilver Silver 88 just adding a little warmth in the bass. I liked it.
As I write this it is 22:00 on Sunday night. The lights are low and I have spent the last six hours immersed in music which flows in a way so unlike so much of the modern mass produced offerings.
It unravels the complexity of music to recreate the sound of music where musicians play individually but combine with each other to create a whole and integrated musical picture. The individual performers are there, together, but not lost or submersed in a musically incoherent mess.
This is an exceptional loudspeaker. The pair I have is unmodified and entirely original.
This loudspeaker is the Dahlquist DQ10. If you can find a pair don't hesitate.....just buy them.
Some interesting reading:-
http://www.classicspeakerpages.net/IP.Board/index.php?app=core&module=attach§ion=attach&attach_id=6110
http://www.vandersteen.com/pages/Pdffiles/Vandersteen%2067%20excerpt.pdf
