There and back again, i.e., my Audio Video Show 2024 ⸜ show report

The Audio Video Show 2024 took place in Warsaw from October 25 to 27, and here are a handful of personal memories.

I don’t know about you, but for me every audio exhibition has a different flavor. Whether it’s something in my attitude, the attitude of the exhibitors, or the collective mood of the visitors – I perceive it just that way, as something almost tangible, sensual.

This is my second exhibition, from which I do not prepare a regular report; A.D. 2023 exhibition report→ HERE. Last year, TOMEK Lechowski and TOMEK Folta from the Krakow Sonic Society performed this difficult task for me (more → HERE), while this time it was JANUSZ TUCHOWSKI, who is also a diligent participant in the meetings of this society (his report was published on November 16 in → HIGH FIDELITY). For me, this means an enormous shift in perspective.

tekxt WOJCIECH PACUŁA

pictures BIRGIT HAMMER-SOMMER / Plan B., BARTOSZ ŁUCZAK / Piksel Studio, Adam Niezbecki / J.Sikora

⸜ A moment of pause – from left: Dirk Sommer (hifistatement.net), Marcin Oleś and Wojciech Pacuła (“High Fidelity”); behind us Masaki Ashizawa (Kondo)

The thing is, reporting on an event of this magnitude is akin to running through a maze. We know its layout, we know where the treats are, but it is so large that it’s just general knowledge. After all, there’s a surprise waiting for us around every corner, and at the end of the day, despite our best efforts, it turns out that we haven’t been to a large part of its nooks and crannies. And not only them – sometimes we also miss something completely obvious, right in front of our eyes, yet invisible to us for some reason.

Therefore, I keep on repeating that an exhibition is something like a jigsaw puzzle for a journalist. They do not compose a full picture out of it, but only a few larger pieces, usually ones that interest them the most. I believe this is the cornerstone of any good report, and it is good for you to be aware of it.

An alternative would be the “trawl” method, chosen by surprisingly many editors. It’s a way to be (almost) everywhere and to take a picture or shoot a few seconds of video in (almost) every room. Except that it’s a “quantitative”, not a “qualitative” method. There is no merit in it, only archival value. It is also important, but for me personally – boring and pointless. What matters to me are selected events, people I care about, and, in the first place, you – HIGH FIDELITY readers. I know that Janusz, who prepared a report for you in the form of interviews with selected producers, thinks the same way.

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THERE • So, I drove to Warsaw on Friday morning with this attitude. The event started at noon. Before that, however, me and BARTEK ŁUCZAK, the graphic designer of subsequent issues of HF, had to distribute printed covers of our magazine around the rooms. By “covers” I mean the graphics located in the upper right corner of the main page, changing once a month. Our magazine is a monthly, hence the cover.

⸜ Presentation of the Statement in High Fidelity award to Jarek Waszczyszyn (centre); on the right, Dirk Sommer, editor-in-chief of hifistatement.net magazine

⸜ And a deep look in the eyes

We were fast, so even before noon we were ready for something we had awaited for almost six months. We are talking about the STATEMENT in High Fidelity awards. This award is given twice a year, once during the exhibition in Munich (the German Edition), and then in Warsaw (the Polish Edition). The awards are given jointly by the German magazine → HIFISTATEMENT.net, whose editor-in-chief is DIRK SOMMER, and HIGH FIDELITY that I am in charge of; more → HERE.

This time, the awards were given to JAREK WASZCZYSZYN for the Ancient Audio Lektor Joy CD player, and to FRANK VERMEYLEN and JÜRGEN SACHWE representing MSB Technology in Warsaw. The MSB company received the award for the Cascade digital-to-analog converter. It’s always a touching moment, because Dirk and I came up with the award as a sort of “antidote” to many other awards that require nominees to pay money or involve other dependencies. For us, it’s a moment when we can express our respect and admiration for manufacturers and their products in a sincere and direct way. And then we invite our guests to a dinner where we laugh, fool around and talk about any topic but audio.

⸜ Presentation of the Statement in High Fidelity award to Frank Vermeylen (centre)

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SOMETHING COOL • But that was yet to come, as the meeting was scheduled for Saturday evening. Before that, I had a moment to see what was going on at the Sobieski, or, officially, the Raddison Blue Sobieski Hotel. Although it was quite random, a few things caught my eye.

I liked, for example, how music was played in the → NOTE SOUND LABS room. It’s a Polish company from Piątnica, celebrating its 10th anniversary this year, offering a DAC, a preamplifier, power amplifiers and an integrated amplifier. And it was the latter that played the coolest. Equally interesting was the room of another Polish manufacturer → BONA WATT. It offers tube amplifiers in a modern, really interesting design and this year it presented a powerful amplifier giving 250 watts of output.

⸜ Polska firma Notte Sound Labs

Other interesting things that I saw and heard were upgraded Eltax speakers, a Fezz Audio power strip (a very cool one that is supposed to cost around 7,000 PLN), new Pylon Audio Jade 10 speakers (smaller versions of the Jade 20, which were also available in the “High Fidelity” version), a Bob bass module for the Ogy speakers from Closer Acoustics, an Ancient Audio Step player, a More Audio CS100 amplifier, and a few other products. Interestingly, the vast majority of what sounded really cool at the Sobieski were Polish products. They are really well made, look professional and, on top of that, play music well.

⸜ Triton amplifier from Polish company Bona Watt

We ended the Friday with Bartek, who has already been mentioned, at a very cool pub just below our hotel rooms. Drugie Dno is a “pizza pub,” but with craft beers and really good wines. It’s not very big, but somehow we managed to cram in and end the day in a good mood. And we needed both that and strength, because Saturday was hectic.

⸜ AC power strip from Fezz Audio

As I wrote, and this is not coquetry, the most important aspect of the exhibition in Warsaw for me is the opportunity to meet you, “High Fidelity” readers. One way is meeting you face to face. I am incredibly grateful to you for coming up to talk, sharing your stories, problems and doubts about your audio systems. I often got genuinely emotional, but just as often we laughed together.

It all culminated in a confession I heard on Friday, already after my last presentation. I was sitting at a table in the Tulip Hotel, getting ready to depart for home, when a really nice gentleman came up to me and, completely seriously, though with warmth in his voice (you can’t fake that), said: “Mr. Wojtek, there are people of John Paul II generation, and we – we are of your generation! :)” I added an emoticon at the end because I heard the humor in this confession. I thought to myself that it was probably my time to die, my mission was over.

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DIRK x 3 • The meeting cycle began on Saturday at 12.00 at the Tulip Hotel, in Golden 1 room, with the presentation of the “master” tape of the Live at The Villa Belvedere: Bugge Wesseltoft album. The recording was prepared by DIRK SOMMER and BIRGIT HAMMER-SOMMER, representing their record label → SOMMELIER DU SON. The plan was to show you what can go wrong during the production of an LP.

⸜ Birgit Hammer-Sommer, next to Dirk Sommer and the writer of these words; on the left, Robert Szklarz, owner of the Nautilus salon

Two different acetates, and thus two test press discs, were created. The first one was recorded too loudly, so the sound was distorted in several places. We also wanted to compare two versions of the production tape, that is, a copy for the pressing plant made from the “master” tape. One of them was encoded in Dolby SR, and the other was not. According to Dirk, the person responsible for the mastering of this album, last year’s Grammy nominee Christoph Stickel, said that tape without noise reduction is problematic when cutting acetate.

And what? And it was a disaster indeed, but on our part. After listening to the first track from the tape deck, we switched the input to phono and… Well, it just rode the speakers like a tractor in heat. Dirk Räke, representing Transrotor, did whatever he could, frantically switching and disconnecting devices, but nothing changed. Only after all this was over did we find out that the problem could be solved by completely disconnecting the tape recorder – both the power supply and the interconnects. We tried this, but separately, never together, hence our failure – also the failure of our imagination.

⸜ In front, Dirk Mahlstedt explaining the intricacies of working with musicians

The problem with the records forced us to change the program. The third Dirk present in Golden 1 room that day, DIRK MAHLSTEDT, spoke much longer than we had planned. He is the owner of an art agency under which this CD was produced, representing artists whose records are released by Edel and ATR. He talked about how he managed to invite Bugge Wesseltoft to this unique project, with interesting facts and “inside” information. And we also listened to music from the tape longer.

We were particularly impressed by the last of the pieces. The pianist played not only on a Yamaha piano purchased for the Eltville villa last year, but also on a MiniMoog and a laptop with looping and sampling programs. Bugge Wesseltoft then made the signals available for further processing via a jack output. They were then sent through di-boxes to a small mixer, which prepared them for the active ATC three-way speakers that were to be used for the sound system. The piano was to be left completely unamplified, and the speakers for the electronic sounds were to be set up so that they could not be heard on the Earthworks Piano Mic microphones, which were used for the Yamaha recording. And it was this piece, with its unusually low bass, that somehow redeemed our faults…

We also succeeded thanks to the system we were able to use, prepared by Nautilus. The source was a beautifully maintained Studer A-80 tape recorder, the electronics came from Accuphase, and the speakers were top-of-the-line Estelons, while the cabling was Siltech, mostly from the Master Crown series.

Birgit, moreover, pointed out another interpretation of what had happened. Sommelier Du Son, which she runs with Dirk (Sommer), is a purely analog record label using the SPARS code: A | A | A. Meanwhile, the “three Dirks” created a situation in which the code: D | D | D appeared in front of you, denoting a completely digital realization. I have no problem with this, but for those who think otherwise it was blasphemy. The issue of blasphemy will be addressed again further on.

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ADAM • It so happened that my next meeting with you was at the PGE National Stadium. And it was in an hour. So, I teleported myself and I was there fifteen minutes ahead of time. As usual, I could count on you, because the J. Sikora hall was full. We had already rehearsed the idea for the meeting in previous years. Together with ADAM CZERWIŃSKI, a jazz musician, but also the owner of the record label → AC RECORDS, We wanted to play you some songs from its latest album, tell you some interesting facts about the music, the recording, etc.

This time, however, the record was even more special than usual. First of all, the main name on it was ART FARMER, about whom Adam told us wonderful stories. Secondly, this CD is part of our magazine’s 20^th anniversary celebration, hence its full title: High Fidelity Presents: Art Farmer in Wrocław. It’s a two-disc 45 rpm album, released both on black vinyl and in a clear version.

And the way it sounded! Simply unbelievably good. And then there’s the music! Adam was nodding his head and whispered to me during an interval that those were the days when he was still “banging… so hard” that it surprises himself. What Piotr Lukaszewski managed to achieve in the Custom34 studio is impressive, considering that his source was DAT tape (PCM 16-bit, 44.1 kHz material). Let’s add that the album was made by the X-Disc pressing plant literally two days earlier, and as late as Thursday evening Adam was still handwriting the numbers on the obi strips.

⸜ Adam Czerwiński

⸜ Robert Sikora presents the transparent album High Fidelity Presents: Art Farmer in Wrocław

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ZBYSZEK • Before we had even cooled down for good, we were already welcoming my next guest, ZBYSZEK BIELAK. Architect, illustrator, artist, designer of music album covers, especially for rock and metal albums: Carcass, Darkthrone, Mayhem, Paradise Lost, Mist and Vader; author of concert sets for Ozzy Osbourne and the band Ghost.

I came up with the idea during an interview I conducted with the artist in a car, on our way to and from an exhibition of his works at Pieskowa Skała castle; more → HERE. He immediately agreed, apparently curious to see how metal music, including hard rock, but also very deep death metal, would perform in an audiophile exhibition setting. And that was our second blasphemy.

After all, just imagine – death metal played on a system worth around a million PLN, in the heart of an audiophile fiesta. As far as I know, never and nowhere before had anyone tried something like that. Zbyszek himself had doubts and asked me if he would not embarrass me by playing such music. It turned out that this may have been the most interesting event in many, many years. And not only because it was controversial, but because the music sounded insanely good on a system with a J.Sikora turntable, Doshi electronics, Kharma speakers and Soyaton cables. Tom Folta, one of the KTS hosts, wrote after the event that it was the most pleasantly spent hour – actually, it was much longer, but an hour had been planned – “in the history of this exhibition.” And, he added, he had been to all its editions, except the first one in 1997.

⸜ Zbigniew Bielak

⸜ Zbyszek Bielak (left), writing these words, and Robert Sikora (right)

Our DJ and remote control master was Robert Sikora, the son of the company’s designer and its representative, while I acted as a hostess showing the audience subsequent covers, a bit like during a boxing match. And there was a knockout every time. Even the old KAT album sounded sensational. And when he played the song Oko by the Polish band Wij, I was overwhelmed, too. What an incredible vocal, what a wonderful, spacious production! To był zresztą moment, w którym Robert sam, z własnej woli pogłaśniał dźwięk, choć wcześniej trzeba go było do tego delikatnie zachęcać. To po prostu grało tak, jak najlepsze produkcje mainstreamowego rocka.

This was, by the way, the moment when Robert himself, of his own free will, turned the music up, although before that he had to be gently encouraged to do so. It simply sounded like the best mainstream rock productions. The aforementioned Tomek could be accused of a slight bias – after all, he has Samael tattooed on him, but just this small gesture, of making the sound louder and being listened to with interest by someone who is not a special admirer of death metal music, probably says everything about this meeting.

And at the very end there was a surprise, as Zbyszek brought with him some large-format graphics of his own making, which he signed on the spot. One of them went to a participant of the meeting, who tried, but failed to decipher the meaning of the letter “M” in Zbigniew M. Bielak. Although “metal” does not sound like “Mikołaj”, which is what the letter M stands for, we did give him the award. There was also one more graphic for the youngest participant in the meeting – congratulations!

⸜ Ladies and gentlemen, our guests, and Zbyszek Bielak

⸜ Robert Sikora discusses the system on which we will be listening to music

⸜ The second of the prints that went to the participants that evening, autographed by the author of course

» List of tracks:

1. BLACK SABBATH (UK), Black Sabbath w: Black Sabbath, Vertigo VO6, 1970 (USA).
2. VENOM (UK), Witching Hour w: Welcome to Hell, Neat Records 1002LP, 1981 (UK).
3. MERCYFUL FATE (DEN), Black Masses w: Black Funeral/Black Masses, 12”, Music For Nations 12 KUT 106, 1983 (UK).
4. METALLICA (USA), The Four Horsemen w: Kill ‘Em All, Megaforce MRI 069, 1983 (USA).
5. KAT (PL), Porwany Obłędem w: Oddech Wymarłych Światów, Pronit PLP0111, 1988 (PL).
6. SARCOFAGO (BRA), Satanas w: Warfare Noise Compilation, Cogumelo Produçōes, 1986 (BR).
7. MORBID ANGEL (USA), Bleed for the Devil w: Altars of Madness, Earache Mosh 11, 1989 (UK).
8. CARCASS (UK), Heartwork w: The Heartwork EP, Earache Mosh 108T, 1993 (UK).
9. DEICIDE (USA), Revocate the Agitator w: Legion, Roadracer Records RC9192-1, 1992 (NL).
10. TURBONEGRO (NOR), Prince of the Rodeo w: Apocalypse Dudes, Bitzcore rec. BC1720, 1998 (DE).
11. WIJ (PL), Oko w: Przestwór, Piranha Music PRNH26, 2023 (PL).
12. TYPE O NEGATIVE (USA), Dark side of the womb/We Hate Everyone w: Bloody Kisses, Roadrunner Records RR-9100-1, 1993 (NL).
13. SAMAEL (CH), Beyond the Nothingness w: Blood Ritual, Century Media 84 97 37-1, 1992 (DE).
14. MAYHEM (NOR), Freezing Moon w: De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas, Deathlike Silence Productions Antimosh 006, Reissue 2020, 1994, (NOR).
15. BLOOD INCANTATION (USA), The Stargate w: Absolute Elsewhere [Tablet I], Century Media, 19802802581 2024 (DE).

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DINNER • After such a warm-up, then, the meeting at the Stary Dom restaurant, to which Dirk Sommer and I had invited the winners of the Statement in High Fidelity ⸜ Polish Edition 2024 award, was a downright dream ending of the day for me. We have been meeting in the same place for years, and this time we were seated at a table further away than last year, but right next to us landed the team of… J.Sikora, the company that received the award at this place a year ago; more → HERE.

⸜ Dirk Sommer, Jarek Waszczyszyn, Ela Waszczyszyn, Jürgen Sachwe, Frank Vermeylen and Wojciech Pacuła; Birgit Hammer-Sommer with her camera, so invisible, balancing on a high stool

⸜ Jarek (Ancient Audio, right) prepared a joke – he handcuffed himself to the award; on the left Frank Vermeylen (MSB Technology)

⸜ A similar adventure was also offered to Frank

⸜ As you can see, Jürgen Sachwe (MSB Technology, right), did not let himself be drawn in by the

It’s always a joy for us to host interesting people. This year, in addition to Birgit, Dirk and me, there were Jarek Waszczyszyn with his wife Ela, and Frank Vermeylen and Jürgen Sachwe, representing MSB in Europe. And although each of these meetings is different, with different dynamics, this one was a surprise for us. For the first time, our guests immediately liked each other and started talking. It was intimacy of such a degree that after a while we didn’t need to animate the conversation anymore, and our friends resembled a “self-sustaining system”, that is, one that works without external intervention. Excellent food, in my case vegetarian, but meat for everyone else, very good wine, great atmosphere – what else could you wish for, right?

Well, perhaps just a glass of Chopin vodka, which, traditionally, we already had with Birgit and Dirk at the Sobieski Hotel restaurant. And so we did, and our companion this time was the second of the Dirks, Mahlstedt.

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MARK • So, when I woke up in the morning, I still had more toasts in my head. Fortunately, as it turned out after a while, this was the night we changed the time. An hour’s notice was enough for me to prepare myself as it were for the meeting originally arranged after nine o’clock, and to which I arrived half an hour late – a meeting with Mark Levinson. You know that I really liked the Maria 350 amplifier from his new company, Daniel Hertz, now you also know that the Maria 800 amplifier played even better in a system with Chiara speakers. After all, their test is in the latest issue of “High Fidelity”, as well as on its November cover.

⸜ Mark Levinson (Daniel Hertz, right) with the author of the article

Going to Mark, I was prepared for a short interview and presentation. I was mistaken. As it turned out, it was a more intimate, close encounter, during which Levinson shared with me his vision of sound, talked about where the idea for the C Wave, his most important technology, came from in the first place, and then played me a few tracks recorded by him, some unreleased, through his latest Chiara Amber speakers. It’s a two-way system with an Italian coaxial driver, with high efficiency. This is because company founder Mark Levinson believes that low-efficiency speakers convert part of the signal into heat, and that these are usually the lowest amplitude signals. That is, those responsible for naturalness in the sound.

I liked this very much. And when he played, loudly, a solo drum recording made by him many years ago on a Studer tape recorder using two microphones, I even jumped. I hadn’t heard something like that in a very long time. It was something that, it seemed, could not be done on home systems, only stage ones. Since we had prolonged the meeting anyway, and there were people standing at the door, eager to meet the audio legend who I had the pleasure of speaking with, I thanked him and said goodbye, because I was about to conduct a meeting that was important to me. Before I left, however, Mark, completely unexpectedly for me, embraced and hugged me. Surprised, I mumbled something there, and he just smiled and said: “Thank you.” I only hope it wasn’t because I managed to meet him despite my difficulty getting up 🙂

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⸜ Two of the four meetings were held in the Nautilus Room at the Tulip Hotel.

DEPECHE MODE • I have already told you what a pleasure it is for me to prepare and then conduct meetings during the AVS exhibition, right? That is indeed the case. But the last presentation this year, dedicated to the single Personal Jesus by DEPECHE MODE, was stressful for me. I had been preparing for it for a long time, but the better I understood what I wanted to say and how, the more nervous I got. You see, the thing is that this is one of the most important bands in my life. And the 1980s, the time of their greatest albums, is a formative time for me musically. As I told the numerous listeners gathered, including Depeche Mode fans, I am a child of the 1980s, at least when it comes to music.

However, I was unnecessarily nervous. People came to the Tulip Hotel, again to a room provided to us by the Nautilus company and professionally managed by Roman, the manager of the Nautilus North showroom in Wejherowo, who were genuinely interested in what I wanted to tell them. And on top of that, they were friendly and just plain cool.

» LIST OF PLATES from the meeting “35 years of Personal Jesus Depeche Mode” → HERE ˻PL˺

It was all the more pleasant for me to hand one of them something really special – Divine Acoustics anti-vibration feet → GALILEO. They were given by Piotr Gałkowski, their constructor. They were the twentieth pair of feet out of the twenty bearing the High Fidelity logo for the magazine’s 20^th anniversary. Congratulations!

⸜ The Personal Jesus single was released almost exactly 35 years earlier

⸜ On the left, Roman who runs the Nautilus salon in Wejherowo

⸜ You guys, the participants in the meeting

⸜ Presented plates and Estelon columns

⸜ Prize – from left Piotr Galkowski (Divine Acoustics), the writer of these words and the winner – congratulations!

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BACK AGAIN • At 1:30 p.m., after several conversations with you, after the confession I wrote about at the beginning, I was ready to travel back to Krakow. Images and sounds were swirling around in my head, and I was pondering what else I could have told you during the meetings, and what I had missed. Fortunately, Bartek Luczak, in whose car I was sitting, told me that the metal music we played with Zbyszek was the music of his youth, with which he totally surprised me, and then he played his second favorite genre from those days, hip-hop music, with which he surprised me a second time. After all, he had got two Pat Metheny first presses from the show, as well as a new album from AC Records.

After a while, we were rhythmically nodding our heads to more Cypress Hill songs, tapping out rhythms and shouting at each other – this music needs to be listened to loudly. Good music is good not because it belongs to one genre or another, but because it stirs something in us that poor music can’t. And that’s what it’s all about.

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And at the very end, a few cover photos. It was great, thank you very much and see you next year! ●

⸜ Norma CD player featured on the April cover of HIGH FIDELITY (No. 240)

⸜ Ferrum on the July cover of HIGH FIDELITY (No. 242)

⸜ Piotr Galkowski, designer of Divine Acoustics, with the July cover of HIGH FIDELITY (No. 243).

⸜ Our December cover story will feature an anniversary AC power conditioner from GigaWatt (No. 248).

⸜ Janusz Sikora and Robert SIkora with the September cover of HIGH FIDELITY (No. 245)

⸜ Pylon Audio from January and Muarah from March this year (No. 237, No. 239).

⸜ Witek Kaminski, constructor at WK Audio, with the cover from August this year (No. 244).

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→ AUDIOSHOW.pl

text editorial

foto Bartosz Łuczak / Piksel Studio

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