Joseph Crowe Speaker System No.2675
Bang & Olufsen beolab 8000.. long gone
Yes to most "older" Sonus Fabers
When does a speaker stopped being a speaker and becomes a piece of art!
A recent discussion on a single driver speaker prompted me to engage fellow audiophiles. In my experience, a speaker stops being just a speaker and becomes a piece of art when it transcends its core functionality. When it no longer feels like a device that conveys sound but instead becomes a medium for emotion, craftsmanship, and human expression.
I am referring to a speaker design that evokes feeling before it even makes a sound — the materials, form, and finish carry it’s maker intent.
The sound dissolves the boundaries between reproduction and reality; you stop analyzing and start feeling. The speaker maker’s philosophy and listener’s soul meet, where engineering and art align to serve music itself.
At that point, it’s not about specs or frequency plots. It’s about connection.
A true piece of audio art doesn’t just reproduce music — it reveals humanity through it.
Feel free to brag, if you already own such a piece of art (speakers) or hope to own one in very near future.
- ...
- 83 posts total
I think it’s very hard to beat Sonus Faber for the elegant look and finish. I’ve owned Serifino and Il Cremonese and both were absolutely beautiful Audio furniture. They are also very well constructed and deliver good, but not quite natural sound. If they were a football team you would say they look good getting off of the bus. |
I have to say, I find rectangular wooden boxed speakers so boring anymore. There are so many on the market that look so similar to one another. I would echo @fastfreight's remarks: "I find my Vivid Giya’s beautiful in both sound and appearance. ...their form enhances their function." After spending time listening to and looking at a speaker like the Vivid Audio Giya series speakers, the sound quality and aesthetic gel together producing a thing of beauty! There's no way I could go back to a rectangular wood box. |
@lalitk wrote:
Indeed, the aesthetic of functionality. @devinplombier wrote:
Thanks. Sometimes what’s sought after doesn’t come in the expected package. In this audiophile endeavor we’re easily conditioned into certain approaches and choices, and to me at least it became something of a straitjacket. The challenge as an outset has then been marrying qualities from different sectors in a sense - hifi and pro - but to my surprise pro segment products can actually improve in areas that are usually thought of as being "earmarked" to the hifi ditto - in addition to being (much) more dynamically astute and a more robust physical package overall. Controversial to some, pretty straight forward to others in the actual, unbiased experience of it. @pindac wrote:
Change has to make sense to me, but sometimes an explorative approach comes with the need for a rather steep learning curve, not to mention taking a leap of faith. Payoff isn’t always immediate, and so a new path can take time to mature into its fuller potential. To me at least it has been about finding what I regard as the fundamentals or core/macro parameters in audio reproduction, and then improve within that framework (why it may seem static on the outside). My gripe with many if not most hifi speakers is that they don’t even attempt to get a grasp with the fundamentals, despite being very highly priced. Like, when a +$100k pair of floor standing highend speakers run out of headroom at crescendos at about 100dB’s peak at the LP while being unable to extend to honest ~25Hz without bottoming out, subs or not, it’s indicative to me that we’re not on the same page. Physical prowess in audiophilia has become ridiculously expensive. |
Very true, but that wasn’t always the case. Look at 80s and early 90s high-end Infinity speakers, pre-Harman - of course it’s easy to blame Harman, but to be fair JBL (Harman) has been quite adept at straddling the pro / hifi line, to this day with their summit series.
|
- 83 posts total