Which brings me full circle to my earlier comments about balance and musical coherence. What makes the Mozarts really special is also where they differ from most similarly priced separates systems. Feed any audio system a really great recording and it should sound pretty great. That’s the easy part. What’s more difficult – and what the VA system does so well – is not sound just as good, but just as listenable, on less than stellar material. Whatever you play, the Mozarts make the most of it, their natural tonal balance, seamless continuity and rhythmic and dynamic integrity providing a firm musical foundation for everything from MP3 to dodgy streamed files, SACD on the balanced analogue inputs to vinyl via an external phono-stage. Which from an individual audiophile aspect is kind of nice to have, but in terms of the market and industry as a whole, from the perspective of the target customer, is actually absolutely crucial.
Although I started out by assessing this system in exactly the same way as any other product that comes for review – a process that left me profoundly impressed – it was essential to also recognise the context in which the Infinities will, more often than not, be used. With that in mind, I moved them from the medium sized, dedicated listening environment of the Reading Room, to the lounge, where I hooked them up to the TV (love that HDMI input) the BluRay player and, wirelessly to the home network. I don’t have an X-box but if I had, I’d have hooked that up too… Operating now in a pure streaming mode, with music and TV programmes arriving wirelessly or even off a phone, I was astonished at the stability and musical coherence of the results. Yes, playing a BluRay disc delivered crisper and more dynamic sound than streaming a movie. Once or twice, I had audio streams or TV sound drop out – which never, ever happened with a hard-wired Ethernet connection – but then the walls in our house are over two-feet thick and we struggle with copper cable internet that’s strung on poles in this very windy part of France (so pretty much a worst case scenario). Fibre optic finally arrives next week: hurrah! Still, despite the challenges, the VA system coped admirably and performed flawlessly. Dialogue on film and TV was particularly impressive, the speaker’s rich tonal palette and natural sense of rhythm bringing an unforced intelligibility and character to voices, an expressive quality that heightened wry humour or drama with equal ease.
Die Zauberflöte
As I write this (choosing to do so in my front room) the system is playing the Shostakovich Cello Concerto No.1 (Anastasia Kobekina, Edusei and the Berner Symphonieorchester – a 16/44.1 stream from Amazon) with all the bounce, vigour and dynamic contrast to the first movement that makes this such an enjoyable performance. As the second movement Moderato opens, there’s no shortage of grace and tonal beauty to the longer lines and orchestral layers. Before this I was playing Soultrane (DCC GZS 1046) on the BluRay player and before that I’d taken a trawl on YouTube through the 70’s pop of my misspent youth. Later, I might just watch Spurs crush Newcastle on catch-up, now that I know they didn’t fold in the second half – again!
