Alan Sircom

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Jamie Biesemans – HiFi.NL

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Jamie Biesemans – HiFi.NL

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This review is part of a bigger article hosted on stereophile.com. To read the entire article please visit https://www.stereophile.com/content/montreal-audiofest-2025-show-report-wrap-now-complete-page-2#:~:text=Pearl%20Acoustics

Crossing me in the hallway, Galion Audio’s Thomas Tan stopped me to urge me to visit his room to hear the synergy between his company’s Galion Audio TS A20 power amp ($4995) and a new speaker by a company called Pearl Acoustics I’d never heard of.

I already knew Galion’s 20Wpc, solid state, Jupiter capacitor–equipped TS A20 sounded superb, so I assured him I would drop by, and I did—and boy, am I glad I did. Visually, the speaker, called the Sibelius ($12,900/pair with stands), was not what I expected; it’s attractive, but it’s a thin column with a single 4″ driver. In his presentation to the crowd before the music started, Pearl Acoustics’ founder and chief engineer, Harley Lovegrove, a Brit based in Belgium, suggested that “Perhaps the best way to look at the Pearl Acoustics loudspeaker is by seeing it as a microphone in reverse.” From what I gathered, this meant that in a similar way a 1″ microphone diaphragm can pick up the subtlest sounds and the full range of frequencies, the Sibelius’s driver was designed to deliver the same.

What about bass? “The driver sits on top of a large column of air, trapped inside our enclosure, with the only means of escape via the front port,” Harley said. “Just like a double bass, the air in our enclosure is suspended in such a way that as the driver compresses the air from above, the air is simultaneously forced out below, in perfect synergy and with an immeasurable loss of energy due to an almost total lack of internal vibration. This allows our loudspeaker to produce 36Hz with the same amount of energy as 20kHz.”

He concluded his presentation with, “Whenever anyone hears our Sibelius speaker with its tiny 4″ driver for the first time the reaction is always the same. Utter surprise.”

“I’ll be the judge of that,” I thought. Turns out he was right. The ensuing drum solo and songs I heard on CDs played back through a Tone Winner TY-1CD transport ($1700) and Matrix Audio Sabre X DAC ($3000), with Siltech and Transparent cabling everything together, made me wonder what was going on. How could these speakers sound this big? Dynamics were stunning. Bass walloped. Tone was textural. Detail was granular. The soundstage was walk-through enveloping.

My takeaway? Harley and Pearl Acoustics may really be on to something.

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