Nick, I once saw a documentary about the late Vladimir Horowitz on his concert tours. His most important man was his piano tuner. And before he started tuning, the piano was moved back and forth millimeter by millimeter...until Horowitz was satisfied. I can imagine that your activity as a piano tuner has a massive positive effect on your hearing and your acquired listening experience.
Now it is "expected" that a hi-fi system "completely neutrally" reproduces what, for example, Mr. Horowitz subjectively wishes for as the ideal for a concert evening...and that in our living room, not in the concert hall...
Peter, it would be a great pleasure to listen to your quad system once in a lifetime. Unfortunately, I have never heard the ESL 63 or even your newer ESL 2912, which probably also works on the principle of the central point with sound velocity simulation to the outside?
That would be great, after the Corona time (I just invite myself, oh dear, that is rude
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I have restored old Quad II power amplifiers (with new capacitors etc. according to instructions) I had a 33/405 combination in use with the old HPD295 Tannoy for a very long time from 1982 to 1995. I love Quad. I still have the old original ESL in my collection, two pairs, which I had one above the other in a rack.
Despite all efforts to be objective about the different manufacturers and their respective technical concepts, I must honestly say that such a thing does not really exist, maybe there are good approximations.
My very subjective examples:
I've never heard classical guitar music better than on BBC LS systems.
String quartets never better than with the old Quad ESL (single placement, each side just one speaker).
Jazz Trio to Sextet, Bigband Brass, Drums, Vibraphone Double Bass etc. never better than with the current Tannoy
Female voices never more beautiful than with the small LS3/5.
Unfortunately I haven't heard the Klipsch Cornwall (not the Corner Horn!) yet, but many people on the Klipsch forum say that this is the best speaker for hard rock, even e.g. old Deep Purple recordings - with its directly radiating 15" bass...as dirty as a guitar amp.
Perhaps the oversized Klipsch Jubilee are still best able (from what I know) to reproduce all of the above similarly well with the same speaker but just as a good compromise. The specials strengths of the Jubilees is that unbelievably room filling but precise sound reproduction even of biggest orchestras.
Now I've established the big Tannoy, and if I want nice silky 3D sound every now and then, I put the small LS3/5 in front of them
What I mean to say is that even the most neutral or best hi-fi system has strengths and weaknesses in relation to the program material.
