I nearly feel bad for people whose only connection to hifi is gear.
But I don’t feel bad because we all come at things in our own way. My way, for most things, is centered around people and stories. Old fashioned I know, which is one reason AI-generated art holds as much interest for me as margarine.
High End Munich is a kind of reunion, a reunion with friends I otherwise don’t get to see. And there’s nothing like actually sitting down and talking over your beverage(s) of choice as compared to any form of What’s App’ing, Zooming, texting, emailing, or what have you. I’d love to be able to say music plays an important role at hifi shows, but I’d be lying.
High End Munich is also a place for conducting business, something I do along with socializing, eating, drinking, listening, photographing, and laughing. Lots of laughing.
While it’s the case with any hifi show, difference is apparent but even more so at High End Munich simply due to scale—512 exhibitors occupying 30,000 square meters of space in four halls and three atriums, and 22,198 visitors from 108 nations including 588 media members (holy crap!). And behind every one of those 22,198 visitors and exhibitors (and even the media) is a story. A human story filled with unique experiences that shape interests and outcomes. Obvious stuff, but it bears emphasis here because this humanness accounts for the differences in the gear we all love and live with more than any other factor. This fact is so obvious I don’t even feel the need for a snarky analogy, as much as I love a good snarky analogy.
High End Munich has something for everyone because it’s the most diverse show, in visitors and gear, as any I’ve attended by a very wide margin which makes it my favorite show by a very wide margin. Especially so when adding in the friend-(and food & beer)-factor.
Bravo! to everyone involved in making High End Munich 2024 a resounding success!
Epilogue
“The high end industry is dying.”
I heard this old chestnut—something I’ve been hearing for more than 20 years—resurrected a number of times at Munich High End amid the over-crowded halls, impossible to fit another body into exhibit rooms, even over lavish dinners paid for with hifi money.
My only guess at the beginning of an explanation for this premature burial is simply this—some people view change as a kind of death. Especially so among those who think they know more than anyone can possibly know, who think they can suss out what ‘young people’ want and need regardless of how many generations of separation are in play. Do you believe that a stranger’s parents know what you wanted and needed in every stage of your life? How about some stranger’s grandparents? Do you think they had a firm grip on your teenage desires?
Seeing things for what they’re not and asking the wrong people the wrong questions are good ways to draw bad conclusions.