|
van
den Hul The Orchid RCA Review
at AudioGone.com
by Garrett Hongo of Ultra Audio
May, 2006
Perhaps an oddball among audiophiles, I listen mainly to classical
music--Renaissance choral, symphonic orchestral, and romantic
opera to be specific. Yesterday, while listening to Le Chapelle
Royale's 1986 Harmonia Mundi recording of Josquin Desprez's
motets (dir. Phillippe Herreweghe), I dropped a
1m RCA Orchid into the system and, immediately, the clarity
and separation of voices was remarkable
in comparison with my reference IC, an Audience Au24, which
I like very much. I use Audience cabling throughout the system
(Cary SLI-80, Lector 0.6T CDP, Sonus Faber Grand Piano speakers,
Audience Au24 speaker cables, Audience PC on the amp) and
had been committed to consistency
regarding cables, but the Orchid is turning my head. On Renaissance
choral music, the Orchid is not only more refined in
its separation and spacing of voices, but in finesse too--transients
are more delicate,
realistic, so the pulsing of voices feels more natural.
Last night, I stayed up a couple of
extra hours just listening to what the Orchid can do in my
main system,
as my friends Dale and Chris Shepherd, owners of Eugene Hi-Fi,
needed the cables back for a morning recording session. They've
loaned me several pairs of interconnects to audition over
the past few weeks
and had been urging me to try the Orchid even though I'd thought
my cabling "had arrived" already.
And I must admit I had become somewhat smug about my success,
until I dropped The Orchid into my system yesterday and heard
how much more air and vocal separation it gave to yet another
CD--
"Utopia Triumphans," an anthology of choral pieces
by various composers performed by the Huelgas-Ensemble.
With orchestral music, the Orchid was
especially good with Beethoven's "Eroica" performed
by the Cleveland Symphony, conducted by Dohnanyi. From the
first timpani strikes and then throughout the
first movement, the Orchid was wonderfully dynamic, speedy,
and detailed. And the most
pleasing thing of all was it handled string attack transients
terrifically, bringout out the pulses
of string phrasing as the violin sections quietly "strike"
their own notes in response to the energy of
the timpani. Only two other cables I've tried captured this
exciting effect--the Atlas Titan from Scotland
and the van den Hul the Second XLR. Other cables, as good
as they are, don't quite reproduce the suddenness of the violin
phrasing, those shuddering attack transients and correspondingly
sudden silences between phrases. Beethoven's symphony is written
as if the violin section was a regimental detachment of light
cavalry--quick to strike and even quicker in getaway. The
Orchid captures this.
The Orchid is also fabulous with operatic
voices, particularly lyric sopranos like Renee Fleming and
Anna Netrebko and dark, lyric tenors like Rolando Villazon.
While a very few select cables can reproduce the general tessiturae
of an aria (the Orchid easily among them), big, fat virtuosic
moments of rangey dynamic and treble peaks can overwhelm the
capabilities of most. Rare too is the cable that can render
subtly complex pianissimo passages with fine, note to note
nuance. The Orchid sailed through the entire scale of vocal
performance without the treble hardness, upper register glass,
or tenor blattiness other cables are prone to reproduce when
called on by operatic majesty. And, with the ones that do
succeed in representing the operatic range, they mainly
do so by softening attack transients and rolling off the top.
In the Orchid, I could hear none of the lively transient sounds
rounded off or the upper registers overly smoothed in order
to better capture the bigger vocal dynamics--there is no sacrifice
of vocal evanescence and pure presence. Again, as I said about
the Orchid's performance with choral music, there's an unusual
degree of detail, finesse, and refinement here.
In my search for equipment to handle
the range of music I listen to, it's been very difficult to
find any one piece in any category that can handle energetic
symphonies, the beautifully lyric and the powerfully virtuosic
operatic arias, and Renaissance choral music full of complex
treble harmonies, delicate tones and phrasing. This is the
one cable I've auditioned that delivers most completely across
the broad spectrum of my listening. In short, the Orchid is
aptly named--bold and delicate both. It's now become my reference
interconnect.
Associated gear:
Cary SLI-80 integrated amplifier;
Cal Audio Labs CL-15 CDP;
Lector 0.6T CDP;
Shunyata Diamondback PC (CDP);
PS Audio Plus PC (amp);
Audience Au24 speaker cables (2.5m);
Sonus Faber Grand Piano speakers.
Similar products:
Audience Au24
Audience Maestro
Atlas Titan
Atlas Navigator All Cu
Analysis Plus Solo Crystal Oval
van den Hul "The First Ultimate"
Garrett Hongo
Distinguished Professor of the College of Arts & Sciences
5243 University of Oregon
Eugene, OR 97403-5243
|
|
