Some of my favorite hifis are the kind of hifis that are as easy to slip into as a well worn pair of 501s.
The Living Voice Auditorium R25A Loudspeakers are one such piece of this kind of hifi puzzle and I was eased into their welcoming sound within minutes of getting them properly set up and playing in Barn. And let’s get something straight up front—easy and relaxed have no negative connotations when I use them, they are words meant to convey high praise.
To put it another way, I am not a member of the HiFi Sadomasochism Boy’s Club who feel that some amount of pain and displeasure equate to “high fidelity”, which ranks as one the silliest ideas floating around the great home of all manner of silliness, oh what a tangled web we’ve wove.
When I listen to music on the hifi, I want to get right into whatever music I’m in the mood for at that very moment without even the slightest thorn pricking out from music’s great bloom. If you look at my system, you’ll see what is for me one great example and the Living Voice R25A paired with not one, not two, but four integrated amplifiers is another.
Those integrated amplifiers were the Barn resident Leben CS600, the review Aurorasound HFSA-01 (more info), the review Octave Audio V 16 (more info), and the reviewed Enleum AMP-23R. Three tube, one solid state and no matter the mate, the system sound with the Living Voice Auditorium R25A was pure, sweet, bloom.
An aside (that’s not really an aside): How long did you take to set up your speakers? In total? While I didn’t take note, I spent real time (an hour+ over a few days) getting the R25A singing their best in Barn even though I know exactly where the Barn resident DeVore Fidelity O/96 are happiest down to distances of less than an inch. Every pair of speakers that reside in Barn for review get the same treatment, real time spent getting them into their happy place because one place does not fit all when it comes to placing speakers in room. And the difference between OK positioning and finding the exact right spot can be dramatic, a difference in sound quality that can be greater than the difference between things like different DACs. Give me 10 minutes in any room, and I can make any system sound like crap just by moving the speakers. Unfortunately I don’t have the same level of confidence in the reverse—make any system sound better—because some rooms just won’t allow it. Thankfully the Barn has a very fat happy place.
In terms of favorite amp partners, my personal pick of this particular lot would be the Aurorasound HFSA-01 and/or the Enleum AMP-23R with both fitting nicely price-wise and sounding superb. Delicious, really. But all of these fine amps brought out the Auditorium R25A’s satisfying voice, with slight shadings and differences in aspects of reproduction, as you might expect from such a diverse set of integrated amplifiers. The Octave V 16’s 8 Watts of output power drove the R25A’s just fine, which is great news for low powered amp lovers. But since this is not a review of amplifiers, I’m going to focus on those traits that traveled with the Auditorium R25As no matter the dancing partner.
The drivers in the Auditorium R25A are from Scanspeak, specifically a 26mm dome tweeter with a double ferrite magnet and fabric dome diaphragm paired with a pair of 17cm doped paper-cone bass/mid drivers made specifically for Living Voice all set up in MTM style. Living Voice rates the sensitivity at a friendly 94dB with a 6 Ohm nominal impedance producing a 35Hz–22.5kHz frequency response.
The Auditorium R25A are offered in a number of premium furniture grade book-matched natural veneers including Cherry, Walnut (as seen in the review pair), Maple, Rosenut, Black Ash, Flat White. The black plinths that raise the cabinet up and to my eyes add a touch of extra elegance, attach to the speaker proper with included dabs of Blu Tack (not so elegant but it does the job). The included spikes add a bit more height and offer a nice stable base when pushed into the Barn’s Gabbeh rug (the things we do for love).
I left the grill covers in the boxes for the duration of the review as I prefer the look of the Living Voice without ‘em. During their nearly 8 week stay, I found myself looking fondly at the Auditorium R25A for their understated quiet grace.
Understated grace is also an appropriate way to talk about the Auditorium R25A’s sound as well as I’ve already more than hinted at up front. I would not call the Auditorium R25A the most incisive sounding speaker as they impart a very slight softness in sonic form to the sound of music. This plays out as a complete lack of metallic sheen or artificial edginess that some speakers add in and around upper frequencies, typically lending music a bit more bite than I like. I know some of you are thinking, “Sure! It’s got a fabric dome tweeter not aluminum or some other hard-sounding hard material.” and I won’t argue the point even though I am not a fan of making blanket statements like these because they always come up short in my experience, failing to cover every real-world implementation. And if you’re thinking something about “accuracy” or “I wonder how they measure!”, we listen to music on the hifi for different reasons.
“Party” from Aldous Harding’s wondrous album of the same name is a delicate beautifully awkward beast of a song, like being enticed into a romp with a Pseudomantis albofimbriata. The song builds as it goes, with other voices and instruments, grounded by bass clarinet, joining Harding and building to a dizzying slow climax. Every detail, every voice was released into the Barn by the Auditorium R25A with a richness and drive that suited these proceedings to a T. Party is also a beautiful sounding record, thanks in part to producer and long-time PJ Harvey partner-in-records John Parish, that unfolds in space in every direction. I’ve heard more air and space reproduced from this record by the Barn-resident DeVore O/96 (review), but we’re talking about a speaker costing about two and a half times the Auditorium R25A’s asking price.
Set of Five from the Abel-Steinberg-Winant Trio (1991) is an adventurous set of works for piano, violin, and percussion from John Cage, Henry Cowell, Alan Hovhaness, Somei Satoh, and Lou Harrison. I will share that two of my most cherished Barn things is a tiny signed drawing/musical quote by John Cage and an inscribed copy of Henry Cowell’s “New Musical Resources” so this music strikes a chord. In terms of sounds, William Winant’s percussion adds much of the worldly spice to these pieces that are all tinged with influence from the far east. This is also friendly, lovely, delicate music (friendly not exactly a word that leaps to mind with contemporary classical music) and the Living Voice R25A loved, loved, the varied acoustic voices contained herein bringing them into the barn with dimensional weight and clarity. Some of the sounds coming from Winant’s unknown to me percussive instruments were thrilling in their attack and 3 dimensional resounding body. Thwack! (decay…..), while Julie Steinberg’s piano sounded rich, forceful and full with David Abel’s violin dancing over the top like a honey bee in search of a lost hive. Lovely.
Switching gear into low grumbling industrial noise, Activity’s Spirit in the Room served two purposes—it satisfied my desire for hard crush crunch and it proved that the Auditorium R25A can do hard crush crunch loud, louder than I care to listen.
From the liner notes:
On their sophomore album Spirit in the Room, Activity is haunted.
Haunted by technology. Haunted by the loss of loved ones. By capitalism and humanity’s relentless death march towards environmental destruction. Produced by Psychic TV’s Jeff Berner, the album is an emotional seance held through an unearthly haze of menacing trip hop, ambient electronica, and synth-based noise rock.
It’s really not that bad, he says in a barely convincing tone, and this music does have its sweeter moments with Travis Johnson’s kinda hushed vocals over Jess Rees’ guitar, Bri DiGioia’s bass, and Steven Levine’s drums providing emotional support on the aptly named “Heaven Chords”. This kind of music brings me back to my college days when I was listening to bands like Psychic TV, Zoviet*France (however the heck you’re supposed to spell it), and early Einstürzende Neubauten to name but a few and there are days and times these days when I need to swim in these kind of dark waters for a good cleanse. With the Living Voice/Enleum combo in charge fed by the Auralic ARIES G1.1/totaldac d1-unity DAC, I was easily able to fully submerse for the full 38-minute duration of Spirit in the Room and come out…relaxed.
As is my want and ritual, I also ran through a bunch of “test tracks” to test out aspects of the Auditorium R25A’s way with specific sounds and voices—human, instrumental, and electronic. One such track is “Spit” from Show Me The Body’s Corpus I featuring Princess Nokia on unsettling vocals and here the Leben CS600’s added weight, heft, and bass whomp served this music proud. There’s a reason I own the Leben CS600, and have done for many years, and that reason is it does all music proud, always sounding perfectly controlled, rich but not overly ripe, and as full figured and weighty as music gets. While a bit of a price mismatch at $8995, or more than the cost of the R25A, this combination offered the most convincingly full-bodied reproduction of the bunch. For my music and taste, the R25A’s go perfectly low, especially so when paired with the Leben, but I admit that I rarely think about just bass.
Another favorite track, test shmest, is Tirzah’s “Devotion” from her 2018 album of the same name, and its a favorite for its broken sexy infectious beat, Tirzah’s smoky sung and spoken vocals backed by Coby Sey, and Mica Levy’s skeletal structure. With the Living Voice/Leben power combo in charge, this moving music filled the Barn with its lovely longing energy that necessitated two back-to-back plays. Yea, I can be that greedy when music sounds this good.
Another super important feature of an easy to drive speaker like the Auditorium R25A is they come alive, startling alive, at low listening levels without the need for much power from the accompanying amp. For my preferences and tastes, I wouldn’t have it any other way.
You can keep your starched, creased to a slice stiff slacks. One nice thing about getting older is the need to impress dissipates with each passing year. What I’m after, what I crave, is the ability to fall into music as the bottomless pit of enveloping beauty it is without the mechanics of reproduction or the voice of the gear getting in the way. The Living Voice Auditorium R25A offer a fast pass to just this kind of experience and their easy to drive load means you have a big wide world of wonderful amps to choose from. I enjoyed, relished, our time together and just remember that when it comes to listening to music on the hifi, there’s nothing wrong with pure pleasure.
Living Voice Auditorium R25A Loudspeakers
Price: $6350/pair in Cherry, Maple, Rosenut, and Walnut | $6650/pair in Flat White and Matt Black
Company Website: Living Voice
US Dealer: Border Patrol
Specifications
| Sensitivity: | 94dB |
| Nominal Impedance: | 6 Ohms |
| Loading: | Reflex port to rear of cabinet |
| Frequency Response: | 35Hz–22.5kHz |
| Power Handling: | 100 Watts |
| Cabinet Dimensions: | W 215mm x D 270mm x H 1030mm |
| Plinth: | W 215mm x D 270mm x H 140mm Black textured finish |
| Gross Weight: | 19Kgs per cabinet |
