AUDIO SHOW DELUXE UK - Whittlebury Hall, 21-22 March 2026

'Musings is planning to be there and reporting from this high end show in 2026.

2025 Show Report

Show Website

UK Audio Show Deluxe 2025 - Boyer Distribution Takes Sound of the Show Award with Wadax, Engstrom and Kroma Atelier

 

When you go to a show such as Audio Show Deluxe, and you know about the cost of the systems on demonstration, you might hope to be bowled over by the experience in every room.  If you've been reading through the full report, you'll know that this is not a given.  In fact, even at this level, it is still the exception. And here is the exception.

Here is a system that instantly grabs your attention. Not in a by-the-throat kind of way, but in a thats-so-much-more-believable kind of way. Its not that easy to describe a sound that's both outstandingly separated (each instrument or voice is distinct in its on right) whilst being a fully coherent part of the whole musical message. Clarity without being obvious or over emphasised, may be that's the way to explain it?  There's something here that's different - the ability to suspend disbelief, maybe? Sit back, relax and drink it all in.  As a veteran of tens of shows, its perhaps easy to become a little jaded, waiting for that room that you want to spend time in.  Over the weekend I probably spent nearly 2 hours in this room.  That's very disproportionate when there are 30 rooms and only 10 hours spent at the show.  One track that really stands out in the memory is Dim by Syml - its recorded in St Mark's Cathedral - on the Boyer system the acoustic is immense, giving a sense of the sheer scale of the venue - I listened to this tonight on my own system and it seems the Cathedral shrank when it came down my connection to Qobuz.

What goes to make up this experience?  A number of brands that many will not have heard of, never mind had the chance to listen to.  Wadax provided the CD player used as a streamer, being the Studio Player, launched this weekend. Power amplification is from Engstrom - the stunning looking LARS valve monoblocks.  Cables and power were provided by Shunyata Research. Finishing off the system is a pair of Kroma Atelia Jovita speakers in a dark blue finish. At times over the weekend, the amplification duties were delivered by the Orpheus Labs integrated in the front of the pictures.

If you wonder about paying 15 pounds to attend a manufacturer showroom such as Audio Show Deluxe, just consider the value for money you'd get from spending 6 hours in this room and you're sorted...

UK Audio Show Deluxe 2025 - Where the Value for Money Award takes on a new meaning. Congrats to Storgaard & Vestskov with Moon and Newontech

 What is value for money?  I think its a relative term.  Of course if the price stays the same and performance goes up, then that's an increase in VFM.  If the performance stays the same and the price goes down, then that's also an increase in VFM.  But what about something that has reduced performance and reduced price? Is that similar VFM or lower VFM or what?

The reason I raise this here is that I do like to spot VFM options at Hifi shows - usually its a case of a system that's performing above its price point in comparison to other systems at the show - hence its relative. A very good sounding system at 6,000 GBP compared to a poor performing system at 15,000 GBP is an easy call.  But can a 100,000 GBP system really be considered as VFM?  Well, yes and no.  In terms of absolutes, probably not.  But in terms of comparisons at a show that features multiple 500,000+ GBP systems and one at over 1,200,000 GBP, then yes, relative VFM is possible.

Both iterations of this set up involved mainly Moon by Simaudio electronics.  The Moon streamer fed a DAC08 from Danish company Newontech, at around the 5,000 GBP mark it was performing very well in the context of this show. The power amps made up the bulk of the cost at 50,000 GBP the pair.  A reasonably serious front end for a diminutive pair of standmounts from new to 'Musings brand Storgaard & Vestskov. Here they used special one-off versions of their speakers, featuring a finish inspired by the current Aston Martin F1 racing car livery - beautifully done.  This finish added around 6,000 - 8,000 GBP to the price of each pair of speakers, the standard standmounts are 13k GBP, the floorstanders 17k GBP.  Total system prices are therefore in the 100k GBP ballpark.

The speakers are constructed from 22mm High Density Fibreboard (HDF), and an internal layer of 7mm MDF coupled by bonding that remains flexible over time, hence acting as a damper.  The front baffle is a very substantial machined aluminium billet which is also bonded to the cabinet using the same damping material.  These boxes are very heavy for their compact size.  High quality drivers are said to come from SEAS for mid-bass and the tweeter looks like an SB Acoustics.

We start with the standmounts - and an observation that applied to both speakers - don't sit in the second row of the dem room - the room node effect in that row ruined the sound. But from the front row this system really sings.  On all kinds of material - rock, deep dirty electronic, opera, americana, EDM, you name it and there was little to nothing to criticise here.  Agile, crisp, flowing, coherent, well imaged, emotional content is all there. Even reasonably deep bass is available.  A really engaging listen.  The floorstanders are also a 2-way design and add more depth but retain all the qualities of the standmounts.  Remarkably high volumes are possible too - without apparent strain from the speakers. Thoroughly enjoyable.

Would like to hear what they can do with their flagship Fenja floorstanding speaker - but wisely they chose speakers that were suited to the size of the demo room.

UK Audio Show Deluxe 2025 - Highly Commended Award - Hegel / EgglestoneWorks as presented by Auden Distribution

 For those attending on Saturday, they will have heard a different system to the one that was being demonstrated on Sunday.  I only heard this room on the Sunday, but understand the Saturday demo was constrained by a technical problem that meant a less than optimum DAC / pre-amp combination was in play - not in keeping with the rest of the system.

Pushing towards the 200k GBP level, from a streaming perspective, this system was fronted by an Innuos Statement feeding the newly launched Hegel D50 Raven DAC (which prides itself on its considered approach to power supply designs), then the Hegel P30A pre-amp and a pair of monoblock H30A power amps.  The floorstanding speakers are the Viginti from EgglestoneWorks.

Here was a system which had clearly been set up with some thought / experimentation on how it was going to interact with the room.  No matter which track was played it was remarkably free of room nodes and boom, which adds enormously to the enjoyment.  This is one of the most balanced / neutral systems on offer this weekend.  So often at the higher end of audio manufacturers are wedded to solving what they see as the single greatest ill of sound reproduction sometimes forgetting that its a complex set of problems, all of which need to be tackled to deliver an overall balanced performance. So here we have deep powerful bass without bloat, power with out shoutiness, clear treble without edginess, vocals with texture without over emphasis...you get the picture.  Its not perfect, there could be a bit more atmosphere, particularly with live recordings, and perhaps a little more subtle nuances.  But that's being very picky.  A very enjoyable listen.

 

UK Audio Show Deluxe 2025 - Highly Commended Award for Kuzma / SJS Arcadia / Living Voice as presented by Definitive Audio

Vinyl, valves, wood.  A very traditional combination of components, yet at the same time thoroughly modern designs and performance.  Thankfully there was a good range and variety of music on offer in this room, so that was good as it gives a chance to have a proper listen.  The Living Voice R80 again performed well in this room and this system combination, despite being right on the edge of being too big for the room.  It seems the Kuzma - SJS Arcadia synergy is delivered well in this speaker - by far the most musical and coherent speaker I've heard from LV (yes, I've heard the Vox Olympians) - airy, punchy but controlled, imaging well and pushing the emotions in vocal performances.  Definitive Audio fed the system from the Audes DT-3600 power conditioner, making a break from their usual battery array, making the system far more domestically acceptable.  The room was busy on each visit - visitors finding it a good place to spend some time listening to music.

UK Audio Show Deluxe 2025 - Highly Commended Award for dCS / Robert Koda / Magico as presented by Absolute Sounds

Absolute Sounds took 3 rooms at the show.  The larger 2 rooms were running 40 minute demos every hour or so.  You needed to book a ticketed slot in advance - so there's a need to get over to the desk outside the rooms to book, pretty much as soon as you get to the show.  

On to the first room we visited.  Absolute Sounds boss Ricardo Franassovici spoke about some of his thoughts on music and the audio industry.  Basically boiled down to 2 things: listen to systems for the music and the emotions the music brings and not for the quality of reproduction of the kit or the production quality of the recording.  The second was never buy audiophile recordings as they feature music and artists you're not interested in.  This blog has long championed the first of these, the second I disagree with - if you ONLY buy these recordings, he has a point, but if you buy these recordings in addition to normal recordings, maybe you even enjoy the artists they represent, then that's your choice. No one should tell you which music to buy and which music to enjoy, as long as its the music you enjoy and not the recording.

Anyway, he illustrated his view with about 10 tracks of differing recording quality from the 50s to the 80s.  Normally I'm not a fan of Magico, but perhaps I just haven't heard them in the right system before.  They're normally cold, technical, analytical and not, for me, likely to convey the musical emotion about which Ricardo was talking. The front end was dCS digital playing files from an Antipodes server, a familiar combination that I know can be musical when paired with the right kit.  However, up until this point I'd only heard Magico with Audio Research, d'Agostino or McIntosh electronics. Here the electronics came from Robert Koda, a boutique brand from an island near Japan that produces very very small volumes of kit.

Well this was the first time for me to enjoy music presented through Magicos (in this case the S5) - so I can only imagine its down to the differences between those electronics brands.  I learned afterwards that Koda worked for Kendo and wanted to recreate the Kondo sound with solid state electronics, and that pretty much defines what was on offer here.  The "technical" presentation of Magico was gone - they were far more rounded, friendly and approachable. There was musical flow and no nasty edges pretending to be detail. It was easy to listen to the music rather than the kit.  Even Deep Purple's Smoke on the Water at "realistic" volumes was full of punch, dynamic, powerful anger and hard hitting drums but delivered without any discomfort.  Impressive.

UK Audio Show Deluxe 2025 - Highly Commended and Turntable of the Show Awards for Wilson Benesch

 A big show for WB at Whittlebury this year - they made the World debut of their GMT-1 turntable system. "From" 250,000 GBP, this is a significant product launch - a product already declared by Michael Fremer as "the best turntable for any music, at any price".

Here, Ypison electronics and Wilson Benesch's own new top of the range Eminence loudspeakers and a pair of their infrasonic generators (remember, they're not subwoofers, right?) played the supporting roles to the new vinyl spinner.  The room was moodily lit in a fetching shade of mauve.

I made 3 visits to this room - one of the benefits of there being a relatively small number of rooms, more time can be spent evaluating what's on offer.  The first time, what struck me was the sheer stability of this new turntable.  Perhaps if you're familiar with George Michael's Older you'll know it has some slow paced tracks with long sustained notes.  I think this turntable has brought to the fore one of the reasons I tend to prefer digital sources over vinyl, but perhaps I haven't been concious of it until now. Essentially, on tracks like this, even the best turntables I find less than satisfying.  Today I might've understood why - on those sustained notes this turntable was more convincing than any I've heard before.  Stable in a digital kind of way, if you want to understand how they've achieved this with the direct drive design, take a look at WB's site. More stand out features were the lack of surface noise, clarity and something I'd described as easy dynamics - ie dynamically accomplished but not in a forced over-emphasised kind of way.

Second visit confirmed all of the above, but a chance to stop listening to what the table was doing, and enjoying what the music was delivering.  Third visit included a presentation about the collaborative project that is GMT - including other companies and university input.

On this showing, if you have that kind of money to invest in listening to music at home and you have a significant vinyl collection, make sure you give this table a listen.

See the end of this report for a short video of the turntable in action.

The Audio Show Deluxe Report - Silverstone UK, 23/24 March 2024

Back for a second year at Whittlebury Park, the show that's unashamedly about expensive audio.

It has a smaller number of rooms, most of them a good size that allow the more expensive and physically large systems room to breath. The smaller number of systems means there's more time available to spend time with those systems. There's also a smattering of live music over the weekend including Antonio Forcione. If you want to find out if the upper end of hifi can deliver something special, this is the place to find out.

More information at the show's website:

https://audioshowdeluxe.com/

Here's the report from the 2023 event: http://audiophilemusings.blogspot.com/2023/03/audio-show-deluxe-25-march-2023.html

Sound of the Show System 2023: http://audiophilemusings.blogspot.com/2023/03/audio-show-deluxe-whittlebury-hall_41.html