The Kanta’s distinctive, flatpack stand is an object lesson in combining style and practicality. Its broad footprint is incredibly stable while its constructionist aesthetic and mixed materials perfectly complement the cabinet’s Bauhaus assembly and two-tone finishes. Bolting securely to the underside of the speaker, the uprights are machined from MDF while the four cast aluminium alloy legs incorporate angled wedge sections to bind them securely together. The large diameter spikes can be easily adjusted from above using the knurled knobs, while the underside of each leg sports a felt pad around the spike hole to protect floor surfaces during initial position, done with the spikes raised out of harms way
The end result is one of the most modern looking and strikingly attractive stand-mounts I’ve had in the house. First exposure to the Kanta 2 came as a shock to the aesthetic sensibilities, but shorn of the surprise element (and the baby blue baffle) the Kanta 1 looked right at home from the moment I installed it. Those with a more traditional décor might opt for something a little less striking than the gloss yellow/gloss black combination of the review pair, but then as I mentioned earlier, you are spoiled for choice, including walnut veneer on the curved cabinet body. On paper, that compact and elegant cabinet delivers 88dB sensitivity and a bandwidth that offers a -3dB point at 46Hz, a number that crucially dips just below the all-important 50Hz threshold so necessary for convincing weight and scale. In practice, the Kanta 1 sounds bigger, goes deeper and gets significantly more energetic than that.
At €5,000/per pair, the Kanta 1 sits in speaker nomansland, half way between the high value/high performance of a quality miniature like Spendor’s D1 and the high-end/audiophile pretensions of larger compacts like Wilson’s Duette, the Crystal Minissimo and Raidho’s C1.2. As such, it needs to be able to reach both up and down in search of partnering equipment, as comfortable with a $2,000 integrated as with the likes of Levinson’s 585 or audiophile separates. I ran them extremely successfully with the Icon Audio Stereo 60 integrated, where their generous dynamics and general musical enthusiasm worked beautifully with the warmth, musical flow and energy delivered by the push-pull output stage. But with a host of high-end integrateds in-house, it was always likely that their long-term partner would come from amongst that list and so it proved. Hooked up at one time or another in two different rooms and multiple different amplifiers, the Kanta 1s finally settled in with the Gryphon Diablo 120 in our smaller listening space, a well-vented room that’s roughly 18’ by 20’. In line with Focal’s recommendations it is big enough to let the speakers breathe, not so big as to demand too much of them and it was here that most of the critical listening took place. Both toe in and distance to the rear wall proved critical to performance and I ended up with 50cm/20” behind each speaker, with the baffles angled in so that the main axis hit a listener’s shoulders. If you can’t give the speakers that much space, Focal provide foam plugs for the ports, but I’d suggest that if this is the case you are probably well into “try before you buy” territory. It’s not that the Kanta 1s are fussy; it’s more a case of whether you’ll get their considerable best.
Beryl…
Focal’s Beryllium tweeters have always had star quality and the unit used here is no exception. It may lack that characteristic absence that marks the best diamond units, but it also lighter and better damped than them, which along with the structural benefits of the inverted dome means that it is quicker and delivers more energy than them.
Listen to the Kanta 1s and the air and presence they bring to high-frequencies is immediately apparent. But what really impresses is that Focal have managed to create a partnering driver and cabinet, both of which are well enough behaved to keep up with that exotic tweeter, at a surprisingly affordable price. Even on far more expensive products, like Wilson’s Sasha 2 or DAW, evolutionary development of the woofer cabinets to improve their mechanical behaviour has wrought dramatic benefits across the speaker’s entire range. The overall coherence and musical integrity of the Kanta 1s sound stands as stark testimony to the effectiveness of its radical cabinet design. Even the jingliest of pop recordings (The Byrds Mr. Tambourine Man on MFSL UDSACD 2014 or Prefab Sprout’s Langley Park To Memphis Kitchenware KWCD9)fail to detach or leave the tweeter exposed. Instead the Focals make that energetic brightness cascade like sun appearing on a cloudy day, intense but welcome and uplifting. It’s tempting to say that they are more than just a pretty face, but there are still those who struggle with the looks…