Robert Schryer

Next up was another great-sounding room (it felt so good to be back!). Hosted by Mark Elias, owner of retailer Soundstage Fine Audio, this room boasted some high-grade gear, starting with Vandersteen’s new, dark, and handsome KĒNTO Carbon speakers ($49,000/pair), which Vandersteen representative Brad O’Toole seemed rightly proud of, as well as of the company’s 150Wpc solid state, zero feedback M5-HPA High-Pass monoblocks, which were powering the KĒNTO's higher-frequency drivers.

“Hello Toronto Audiofest! It’s good to be back!”

That was my first thought when I entered the Westin Toronto Airport Hotel, the same venue used for the previous, and first ever, Toronto Audiofest in 2019. It was also the thought I had inside the first exhibit room I visited, sponsored by importer Wynn Audio and helmed by the amiable Wynn Wong.

What would it be like to attend an audio show?

It's a reasonable question coming at the light-at-the-end-of-the-tunnel tail-end (fingers crossed) of a worldwide pandemic.

I'm about to find out because I'm at the 2021 Toronto Audiofest, held at the Westin Toronto Airport Hotel from October 22–24.

The first image that pops into my mind when I think of Focal is of the iconic Grande Utopias and how at one Montreal audio show I couldn't believe that the gentlest, sweetest music I'd heard all day was coming out of those massive speakers. I saw it as a paradox of sorts.

Founded in the City of Lights, Focal has been around since 1979, the year Francis Ford Coppola's Apocalypse Now received the Palme d'Or at Cannes and when the average annual income in America was $17,500. Focal started as a twinkle in the eye of engineer and technology journalist Jacques Mahul, who believed he'd built a speaker that would appeal to hi-fi enthusiasts: the DB13. Fast-forward half a century, and Focal, designated "entreprise du patrimoine vivant" (living heritage company) by the French government, employs some 230 people at its large, stylish, multilevel digs.

When I first heard the word "audiophile," I loved it. It sounded fresh and dignified. I related to it instantly. An audiophile! I loved the whole idea of it, the focus on music, on sound. That was me! I'd found myself! And people like me. Other audiophiles, who lived all over the world. To paraphrase Tom Petty, it was like a first flash of freedom.

Reviewing a new loudspeaker from Totem feels like destiny—as if a formative moment 30 years ago has come full circle. That's because the first genuine audiophile speaker I ever owned was Totem's now-iconic Model 1, a product whose arrival altered many audiophiles' expectations of how much great—and wide-range—sound a small speaker can deliver. It's still being made today, at least in spirit.

As per our ritual, Karim and Dan arrived at my door in late afternoon, bearing our ritual's customary offerings: dark beer, wine, cold pork sandwiches, fruit and chocolate tarts, good music on well-recorded CDs, and audio hardware to try out on the host's hi-fi—on this particular Friday, my hi-fi. It's what we did: break bread while gabbing like regular folk about regular things, then bolt for the listening room for an evening of hi-fi fun.