Jason Victor Serinus

The good news is that the smaller rooms on the lobby level of the Burlingame Crowne Plaza were not plagued with the same treble truncation that sabotaged the larger exhibits. Hence Alon Wolf of Magico had a lot to smile about. Shown here with his two handsome sons, Yonathon (18) and Yuval (14), he paused in the hallway outside the Constellation/Magico room, which showcased Constellation's Virgo preamplifier ($19,000) and Centaur power amplifier ($24,000); Auraliti's L1000 Media Server ($4000) and prototype DAC; Magico's small, classy-looking Q1 2-way monitor loudspeakers ($26,500/pair including stands); and MIT's Oracle MA-X SHD speaker cables ($40,000/pair) and MA-C interconnects ($3000/pair).

The sound in this room blew me away. With the Auraliti combo subbing for Constellation's Sirius HD digital music source, which was overseas in preparation for the Hong Kong audio show—both units are designed in part by Demian Martin—the sound was open, impeccably controlled from top to bottom, maximally colorful and illumined, yet remarkably neutral in timbre.

Can it get better than the mbl and Magico/VAC/Audio Research/Auraliti etc. etc. rooms? Skipping until Saturday the Wilson Alexandria/VTL/etc. room, which took an enormous amount of self-control, believe me, I headed to the large suite shared by Cookie Marenco's Blue Coast Records/OTR Studios and Sony. Blue Coast Records was preparing for their 2pm panel, "DSD: Join the Cutting Edge." Pictured, left to right, are Dr. Andrew Demery, Super Audio Center DSD consultant; Marenco; and Sugiara. (Andres Koch of Playback Designs, also on the panel, arrived too late for inclusion in the photo.)

"Hello. This is the Suzanne at the Cable Company in New Hope. How can I direct your call?" How many years have I heard that familiar voice, over and over? At last, like a very thirsty pilgrim happening upon an oasis in the desert, CAS 2012 presented my first opportunity to hug the real Suzanne Cleary.

With the release of their first Binaural+ high-resolution downloads, Chesky Records and HDtracks intend to take music lovers one step closer to the real musical event. Made possible by work that composer David Chesky, founder of Chesky Records and cofounder of HDtracks, has been doing at Princeton University with Dr. Edgar Choueiri, Chesky's Binaural+ downloads make possible the playback of binaural recordings on both headphones and a pair of loudspeakers.

The California Audio Show returns to the Crowne Plaza Hotel in Burlingame August 3–5. Produced by Constantine Soo's dagogo.com, and sponsored by Stereophile, The Absolute Sound, Wired.com, Audiophilevoice.com, AVshowrooms.com, and San Francisco Classical Voice (SFCV.org), Northern California's only show aimed at audiophile consumers promises 36 exhibit rooms stocked with equipment from at least 100 manufacturers.

At Montreal's Salon Son et Image earlier this year, Peter McGrath of Wilson Audio (left in photo) found the pairing of the company's Sophia 3 loudspeaker ($18,000/pair) and VTL's MB-185 Series III, EL-34-based monoblocks ($15,000/pair) and VTL TL-5.5 preamp w/phono ($10,500) so felicitous that he proposed that he and VTL's Luke Manley (right in photo) revisit the coupling in the US. The opportunity arose at Music Lovers Audio in Berkeley, California, where a public afternoon demo on June 9, 2012 drew a large group of audiophiles who packed two large showrooms at the prestigious, well-appointed store.

This was a very special show. It was a joy to be there.