Hello all, I'm Jamie. Some of you will know me from the Wam. Hi to all the South-coasters.
For those that don't I'm fairly catholic in taste, both musically and in terms of hifi. I listen to about 60% classical, everything from Renaissance polyphony to Steve Reich by way of Bach, Mahler, Sibelius and Gershwin. I grew up listening to R3 and playing flute and piano (badly). R3 is still a big part of my listening, Prom season always being a joy. I like jazz, mostly old but I've seen Polar Bear (here in Hastings!) and like some newer stuff. More into ECM than EDM! Anouar Brahem, Beck, Jeff Beck, Eno, Krautrock, some prog and a lot of 70s and 80s bands. I don't have much experience of folk but I adore June Tabor. Her album 'Ashore' on vinyl last night was superb.
As for hifi, like many here my system(s) have steadily improved over the years and I'm pretty happy with the sounds I get whether as a desktop system or in the living room on bigger speakers. I've tended to favour solid state on my audio journey but with occasional, mostly enjoyable forays into valve territory. There was a brief but spectacular encounter with a huge BAT VK-75SE power amp which put out incredible amounts of heat and some compelling sounds into Revel Ultima Gems (Mk1). I currently have valves only in my preamp, a Modwright 36.5 DM, and it is not a particularly valvey-sounding amp at that. The first one of these I had (the single box version) came from Montesquieu (hello Tom) and I fell in love with the sound - a great match to me with a Plinius SA-103 amp, albeit with a tiny gain change necessary into the power amp's high gain. AmpRegen (Graeme/Valvebloke) did this for me painlessly and it improved the volume usability with no loss of SQ - top job. This puts out 125W, the first 50 of which are in Class A. More than enough to drive Revel Ultima Studio 2s or occasionally, Wilson Watt/Puppy 7s. I'm a fan of Revel speakers which I think are under-rated in the UK.
As I write, (and necessitated by home improvements) I'm listening to a lopsided system, very near field: Old but faithful Dynaudio Audience 42W speakers on my desk are putting out some great retro sounds from the classic Getz/Gilberto album on original mono vinyl. They are spaced quite wide apart as my monitors need to go between, but the voices and sax are rock solid and the timbre is wonderfully floaty from the AT-33 mono cart. That is the second cartridge on my SME Model 10, a fuss-free, compact deck that I've come to realise suits me well. So much so, I briefly had two (so I could do a little kwality DJing) The remaining one is a minty example, not yet toddling and will probably outlast me. The AT cart has come to me originally from Petrat of this forum via Jack (Non-Smoking Man) - hello guys - barely run in with about 20 hours on it. It is getting a few more hours now I've managed to set up a second SME Series IV for it on a Timestep dual armboard. The arm lead (which came with the arm) is an Audio Note AN-V silver, a little out of kilter with the phono stage it's attached to - Simaudio Moon's 110LP. The primary arm is a Kondo silver-wired SME IV with an Ortofon Cadenza Blue MC cart running via a Zavfino 'The Highlands' arm cable into a Sutherland 20/20 phono stage. Ron Sutherland is another maker whose approach I find interesting and whose products are not well known in the UK. I'm not much into cables (nor a total disbeliever) but Jack and I have heard noticeable differences with low-level cables and I do think these make a worthwhile improvement. CD/SACD and DAC duty (mostly from Tidal) is covered by a Luxman D-08U which (as a DAC) has comfortably improved on the Lux DA-06 DAC that preceded it. Big Luxman fan too, natch! All of this feeds the 36.5 DM pre and a pair of Primare A34.2 amps in mono mode, so instead of the tiny Clones PM-55 mono chip amps that normally drive them, the little Dynaudios are getting a somewhat grander 550W tickle. Dyns I've had have always seemed to take some driving; they seem to be loving it.
I have another love for long things with sharp bits on the end - Dachshunds, specifically standard smooths, but (even as a non-cable fanatic) the wires are great too
Best regards to all.