Sunday audio show

A small, cute audio show in a magnificient location: Villa Godi-Maliverni, some km north of Vicenza, Northern Italy, where I arrived in a mild - unnaturally high temp for the season - sunday morning, riding my motorbike...

The architect who designed this beautiful villa was Andrea Palladio, about 500 hundred years ago...

An incredibly beautiful, quiet place with a breathtaking vista... and for today, hosting B & W speakers, CONVERGENT Audio CAT SL-1 preamp, Fabrizio Baretta's Faber cables and... ELP Laser vinyl disc player!

I only previously saw it as a static, non-playing unit...

Today, I was able to her a disc as played NOT by a conventional arm and cartridge, but from some laser beams.

What I heard wasn't only music but... crackling, popping dust noises of any sort and music.

The KL washing machine also present at the show wasn't only a cool, useful accessory, but a necessity, as any dust debrises were felt as cannon shots through the speakers, also with brand new, sealed discs.

The sound, among pops and cracks, wasn't bad... maybe a little fat and veiled, but the thing was nonetheless sounding.

The ELP was connected at the phono stage of the CAT SL-1, so not using its built-in phono circuit, maybe including some sort of digital correcting, thus making things much more silent.

I really don't know what to think about it...

A technical exercise for sure, yet not an achievement of any sort, sound-wise.

... but, sure as hell, a nice, nice experience... like being able to say hello to my old mentor, Lorenzo Zen, also present at the show.

Lorenzo Zen and yours truly... silver-foxes;-)

... to sum it up: love my Garrardzilla even more!