Dallas Southwest Audio Fest 2024 – Show Report

Michael Broughton reports from the Dallas Southwest Audio Fest (March 15–17, 2024), where he presented music from NativeDSD in collaboration with Locrian Audio, day by day.

Day 1

So it begins: day one of the Dallas SWAF. I keep talking about the need for pre-planning, today that planning paid off. We had loaded all the equipment in our vehicle on Wednesday the day before. Thursday today is setup day we arrive early in the morning, to early my eyes were telling me as they were nothing more than slits allowing in just enough light for me to navigate.

Basile and my other compatriots were beginning to stare at me. It appears I have been growling and grumbling about the uncivilized hours, the wisdom of my decision making powers and no coffee in this early morning wasteland.

A few hours later and many exhausting trips up and down the tower elevators at the Anatole/Hilton where our listening room 1239 is located we have everything in the room. Stage one complete.

First the placement of the LiveVibe platform racks and brass. Those lovely looking pieces of jewelry that work so well in supporting the audio system and allowing the music to flow freely through the equipment. Trust me when I say you would do well to become one of the LiveVibe Tribe.

The Accuphase pieces are installed in the LiveVibe rack followed by the Ypsilon preamp. Then comes the Emm labs Dac and streamer. In goes the Thales turntable we do a temporary placement of the German Physiks speakers, make the connections with Fm acoustic cables, power up and Ha! Voilà we have music.

It’s exactly 12:00 noon the rest of the audio hordes that haven’t even arrived and are left in the proverbial sonic dust. Now begins the burn in of the system. All of these components will stay on, cooking so to speak until the end of the show.

The Rembrandt Trio. A wind invisible sweeps us through the world. As this music slowly gains one’s full attention the mind is filled with the hope of new life, as with the rose when it first blooms. Any thing is possible in this new fresh world.

Day 2

It’s Friday morning I have spent a good part of the previous night tuning the room. If you know me I’m a big proponent of acoustical treatment in listening rooms. I acquired a large set of acoustic materials back in the nineties. They have been used to some degree in every room I have set up over the years.

There are a few rooms I have run into that didn’t take acoustic materials well for what ever reason this is one of the rooms. I spent hours placing and listening. One positive in the sound created a negative else where in the sound. In the end we used one panel for room treatment. Thats all it took and I’m good with that.

We opened the doors at 10:00am sharp, the room was full with listeners pretty much all day long. If you were there you know what I’m talking about when I use words like open, transparent, natural, produced by this very musical system.

I played a number of NativeDSD pieces of music during the day. Some I have mentioned before and some new pieces all were received well.

• A Handful Of Stories – Angelo Verploegen
• The First at Last [Pure DSD] – Jasper Staps, Rembrandt Frerichs
• Clique! – Patricia Barber
• NOLA: Music and Drawings from New Orleans (One Microphone Recording) – Red
• Gypsy Jazz Trio [Pure DSD] – Creni, Gattone Gypsy Jazz Trio, Viglione
• Ballads – Ben Webster
• Berlioz: Symphonie Fantastique, Op. 18 – Concertgebouworkest
• Rimsky-Korsakov: Shéhérazade - Noseda (Version 1 + 2)

Day 3

Today is Saturday. We had a large steady stream of listeners yesterday which was great. What’s even better is some of those faces have returned numerous times.

I must say, due to the hard work of everyone involved we have an outstanding presentation as well as a wonderful sound. We have had some of the magazine people come to the room to listen, we shall have to see how that turns out.

I would like to point out something that doesn’t seem to happen very often. That is to give recognition to the designers of the musical products we listen to.

The designer of the German Physiks line is Holger Muller and his team in Germany as the name states in their logo where the German Physiks lines are manufactured. Well done Holger, well done.

The same recognition should go to the musical artists from NativeDSD. Our thanks and admiration to all you musicians that have joined with NativeDSD.

Again here are some of the NativeDSD musical pieces we played through the show.

• Moments Musicaux [Pure DSD] – Petrit Ceku
• A Drum Thing – Atzko Kohashi, Tony Overwater
• Gustav Mahler - Symphony No. 1 – Concertgebouworkest
• Sequentia! – Joachim Eijlander
• Mahler Symphony No. 2 – Concertgebouworkest, Daniele Gatti
• Manuel de Falla - Noches en los jardines de Espana, El sombrero de tres picos – Orchestre de la Suisse Romande

Day 4 (final day)

Well folks It’s Sunday around 2:00 pm. Time to disassemble this wonderful sounding audio system. Our deepest thanks to NativeDSD for supplying the music they did. And the manufacturers that supplied the equipment. German Physiks, Accuphase, EMM Labs, Ypsilon, FM Acoustics and Thales.

Our thanks also to the folks who organized and produced the Dallas SWAF, may there be many more to come.

For those of you who live in the Dallas area feel free to contact Basile at Locrian Audio for a private listening session. If you like what you heard at the Dallas show you will be even more please with what you hear at Locrian Audio’s studio.

Talk to you next time and all the best. Look for the after show report in a few days when the magazine comments start rolling out.

– Michael Broughton Audiophile Source.

How it started: preparing for the Dallas Southwest Audio Fest 2024.