Devore or Audio Note or other sensitive speakers: wanting to listen in Denver

Is the thought that AN and Devore are "in a different class" -- presumably higher?

in general, yes

higher price (to all 😄) and quality of sound (to most)

you should listen to the monitor audio platinum, their MPD tweeter is better than any AMT on the market it goes to 100,000 clean and their driver technology is way ahead of everybody else's.

Check out the Devore Crew fan group on Facebook and maybe you will make some new friends.

You are always welcome to visit here, in Austin, with a little advance notice. 

I will tell you that the amp-speaker combination makes a huge difference. I've been running Avantgarde Duos since around 2006-7, and they sound better than ever due to other things in the chain:

Lamm ML2

Additional subwoofers, using DSP

Change of cartridge using stone bodied Koetus, which have more gravitas and tone in the low end. 

This system does not represent anything more than my personal preference based on the components I've chosen to use; I'm considering a more involved antiquarian horn system once I have the ability to travel. 

The high efficiency, SET route is one path among many; I found bliss in it, but there's also a fair amount of set-up/trouble shooting to lower inter-component noise, assuming good power coming in; another thing in which I "invested" (no doubt at a loss).

And, with that, you are still limited by the room. I can't scale to a 2,000 seat auditorium, even if I had the equipment to do that. So, the room is obviously going to play a part. 

But, I'm down with high efficiency speakers and low powered tube amps as a good way to reproduce music. 

I just went through the process of auditioning high efficiency speakers. I liked Audio Note, DeVore, Klipsch and I especially liked Volti. Any of those would have been fine but I bought a pair of Charney Companion Excaliburs with Voxative drivers. I thought they gave more of that magical feel than any of the others.