Classical speakers that do violins well??


All my serious listening is classical.

I hate nothing more than steely shrillness on violins or a glare on a soprano's voice.

I love nothing more than the faithful reproduction of the tone colors of unamplified instruments (the wood body of the violin and cello, the felt pad excting the sinewy strings of a piano).

YET, I hate bloated, indistinct, overly warm, billowy lower mids and upper bass (what I gather some think of as "musical").

Do you have any experience with speakers that might meet these needs for $2K, give or take (new or used)? Can be either floorstander or monitor, but with at least enough bass to perform decently on orchestral music. THANKS.
-Bob
hesson11
Like the Martin Logan CLS. With the right room, equipment and so on, it's in my opinion one of the best Jazz & Classical speakers you can get. The bass is light by most standards but people are use to a lot of bass. Face it an acoustic bass will NOT shake the room. The CLS has bass you can hear but do not feel, it's hard to explain but it don't pressurize the room like my other speakers do.

The CLS can be bright in the wrong room with the wrong equipment. Also they are very hard to drive correctly. You need a large tube amp or a solid state amp that is stable into 2ohms.

The CLS can be had for under $1000 to about $2500 depending on what series, I II or IIz. I have the CLS IIZ Limited Edition.

Just my opinion.
hi krellm7:

if you like the iiz, you will like their newest speaker, the clx, arriving in august, to sell between $7000 and $9000. it will be more dynamic and play deeper than your speaker. call the company to get some information.
Yea I have been waiting to hear them. They sure went up in price! The original CLS was about $2000 or $3000 a pair back in the day, My Limited Edition ones were $6000. but hey ML need to make money too right? Hopefully they sound as good as they say.

To be honest, my CLS are sitting in a spare bedroom with covers over them. I use the B&W Matrix 800's as my main speakers right now, but i love to pull out the CLS every once in a while. However when I move i think I will keep the CLS, they are much smaller than the 800's & lets face it, what speaker in the world looks that cool?