Improvement in Musicality for home theater system

When setting up the system do your 2 ch system first

Absolutely first.

What are your thoughts on getting a good $ 5k amp like Mac, Parasound or Luxman

A Parasound A21+ would work very well with your current system. 

I have an Anthem MRX 540 with a Luxman 507, fantastic combination.  I went from an AVM 50 with monoblocks and the Luxman to this and I'm very very happy to have gotten rid of the extra amps.

Among your list, Parasound would be second, but warm, syrupy by comparison.

Pass and Mc after that. Honestly this makes a good triad. Listen to Luxman, Pass and Mc for yourself, they are different, so different I would never recommend you buy either based on anyone elses recommendation. You’ll develop a very strong opinion of your own.

Best,

Erik

Thanks folks, I listened to the speakers and made the choice of the Revels over the B&W’s bookshelf and happy I made the choice that was right for me. and believe me the B&W’s are very good. Well it seems as though I have to go listen again to the amps all you guys recommended. Not a big fan of Mac, but thru it out just to see what stocked. Parasound, Luxman, and Pass Labs will be my final team, trying to keep it around $5k? I’ll get back to you in a little bit. Thanks for all the help and great suggestions. BRW when I listened to the Pass with the Revels, it sounded real good, but like some folks have said, I missed the engagement. 

Erik is right that all these amps sound radically different.  If you can find somewhere to listen to them, that would be best.  My thoughts:

McIntosh - if you want an engaging and dynamic sounding amp, this is the wrong choice.  The McIntosh amps are very laid back and mild.  If you pair them with a fast speaker, such as Wilson, they can sound pretty special, but in my opinion, it is still a tad laid back.  I walked into the Mac room at RMAF and they had the big monoblocks attached to Mac speakers and it was the most boring and dull sound I have heard.

Pass Labs - like I stated, these have a unique signature/texture.  Very refined and a lot of resolution, but the sound is very "controlled" (best way I can describe it), like it's on the edge of being exciting/dynamic, but just can't quite get there.  The XA amps sound a bit warmer/slower.

Parasound - I would not describe this as "syrupy" like Eric, but they are voiced just slightly on the warm side of neutral.  I have only heard tube equipment sound "syrupy" in the way it puts a glaze type of effect on the sound.  Also, the high frequencies have a dry type of sound (not my preference).  If you compare to Pass, the Parasound is a much more dynamic sounding amp, but lacks the high frequency resolution of the Pass Labs.  Parasound has incredibly clean sounding midrange.

Luxman - is a very high resolution/transparent and very neutral uncolored amp with lots of dynamics.  It really depends on what type of sound you're looking for.  There is a used Luxman L-507ux II integrated amp on usaudiomart for $5500.

For musicality you have another option that I think is better.  Buy an integrated 2 channel amp (almost always better than an AV reciever) that has pre in.  keep your current AV amp for watching movies.

Run a preamp out signal from your AV amp to the Pre-in input on your 2 channel amp.  When listening to music the AV amp isn't even turned on.  When watching a movie, run both amps with your 2 channel amp on Prep-in.  Pre in is also called direct or ht-bypass.  --Jerry