Measuring up


For a first impression, I plunked down the Swifts in front of my -- by comparison towering -- Avantgarde Duos. The latter's terminals were shorted out to prevent especially their woofers from becoming sympathetically absorbent bass traps. This casual siting in my 13' x 19' x 10' reference room -- as measured from their front baffles -- placed the li'l guys more than 7 feet from the front wall. That'd be great for soundstage depth but not so great if they required LF reinforcement from the wall.


I used my customary Cairn digital front-end but substituted the $13,000 worth of Bel Canto PRe1/AUDIOPAX 88 combo for the 1/10th as dear Unico integrated, which I've listened to a lot of late. Since my ears were still calibrated to it from the previous night's listening love fest, I cued up Jai Uttal's neo-Kirtan release Mondo Rama [Narada World, 72438-10978-2-3].


Surprise, surprise! No major letdown. In fact, the sheer size of the soundstage hardly suggested a downscaling at all.


The most obvious differences? Softer leading edges for a warmer, "woodsier" presentation with less acutely drawn image outlines; slightly less extended treble, reduced HF air; naturally less weighty bass but, totally unexpected, with perfectly sufficient reach into the high 30s to capture all save for the occasional synth accent I knew to hide far deeper in them pits.

Far more important than these given quantitive reductions, the Swifts presented a wonderfully fleshed-out midrange that showed a real lover's touch for human voices. This gave no indications that, no matter how carefully selected, these Vifa units must be fairly modest to find their way into such stylish, attractively priced cabinets.


The only overt giveaway of being in the presence of less-than-ultimately resolved speakers? A pervasive but easily forgiven sense of subtle reverb. As though notes didn't finish off with the kind of exacting, highly damped precision I've come to appreciate from my -- very expensive -- hornspeakers. They may well present an epitome of sorts for these precision-related qualities. The Swifts injected a modicum of "hot air", the flimmering that steams off desert soil to render scenery just slightly fuzzy. This modest softening -- of rise times and 6-caliper breaking power, of hot-knife-in-butter slicing, of expanded spaciousness between instrumental lines -- created the already-noted sense of becoming warmth. This was the polar opposite of the wearing sharpness that's so often synonymous with affordable speakers, having to impress with cheap tricks on the sales floor. Stand out. Be noticed. Move! Quickly!


Interestingly enough, this minor soft-focus effect was least notable in the lower bass where leading edges could be shockingly potent. A function of the BASSIC tuning? I suspect so. What I can attest to with positively no fishing is that McGinty's claims for his 5-inch woofer -- for unusual extension and a concomitant reluctance to overload even at higher volumes --are anything but empty marketing hype. I didn't attend The Home Entertainment Expo in the Big Apple this year. Too busy launching 6moons.com. But I certainly did follow the various show reports of unhinged disbelief at the Swift's fullrange prowess.


It's all true!


It has the Swift clear the most important hurdles that could prevent it -- due to small size and no-snobbery expense -- from being considered a serious contender. Looking for all intents and purposes like a kindergarten-sized version of a slugger despite all its roguish swagger, the Swift produces real-world bass, to play real-world music. It's got enough clean, undistorted output potential to work in even larger-than-standard rooms with rather frisky source material.


Before we move these birds into my 20' x 28' x 10' living room for proof of that last statement, first a quick spin of the Jacques Loussier Trio's Plays Debussy [Telarc 83511] to assess double bass and expertly recorded piano and percussion.


"Prélude à l'après-midi d'un faune" takes Benoit Dunoyer de Segonzac' bass all the way down his fretboard into the lowest open string while André Arpino explores the whisper of swirled brushes, the hovering decay of struck triangles; never mind the master's deft piano touch, from the most subliminal expressionist caresses to thunderous full-fingered chords.


De Segonzac's bass didn't miss a single beat due to out-of-range dropout. Arpino's triangle, in ultimate terms, didn't propagate quite as endlessly as possible but nailed the intrinsic timbre of metal against metal with its clash of excited harmonics aflutter.


Only in the piano's rubato-laden delivery with heavy use of the sustain pedal did I again detect a mite added ambiance -- like the acoustic echo of a lively room -- that by now I recognized as part of the Swift's delivery versus the mighty Avantgardes. But the Swifts didn't pull punches when Loussier fell into the keys from higher up for that added impact. Nor did their subliminal resonance thicken proceedings enough to interfere with intelligibility. Not to put too fine a point on it, but - Lousier's Telarc recordings are about as good as piano recordings come. That includes extremely well-recorded bass and percussion. In other words, upper-crust demo material that can shame many an expensive component into acknowledging frailties.


The Swifts put on a stout show quite in excess of jaded non-expectations. Therein hides a wellknown audiophile perversion. That of conceitedly patting affordable components on the back with remarks like "not half bad for your breeding". Or, "quite charming indeed, old chap (considering that getting into last night's Country Club concert set me back $250 smackers per seat). This always suggests that folks with more moderate expense accounts in matters audio are nothing but third-class citizens. They're somehow not entitled to expect perfection.


That's pure horseshit, says I. Perfection exists, albeit down-scaled in profundity. My favorite image here is the balanced scale. Once in perfect equilibrium, teetering neither here nor there, one can add endless weight to each side. This open-ended potential suggests higher and higher degrees of attainable perfection. More importantly, a state of balance -- regardless of weighting -- already symbolizes perfection; just a particular state thereof.


Why this bit of existential philosophy? Because from that perspective, the Meadowlark Swift is perfect: It's perfectly balanced. No single quality stands out over against another to cause discontinuity, disharmony, disruption or lopsidedness. The Swift, as well it should, errs by omission - you can purchase lower bass, faster response, airier treble, more incisive resolution. But you can also spend significantly more and attain less balance.


Especially considering the sins of attrition commonly committed by affordable solid-state electronics, the compromises so cannily worked into the Swift strike me as both realistic and ultimately more beneficial than going after more flamboyant and flashy qualities. Once the new-purchase honeymoon wanes, the worth of a speaker is not in how exciting it is. When the endless pillowtalk subsides, how much does it get outa the way? How much does it bug you? How well does it allow you to forget it's there in the first place? It's in these self-effacing quarters of serving that true long-term value shines.


And it is here -- I reflected while moving equipment into the adjoining room -- that the Swift makes its greatest promise; an appeal to folks who hanker after responding emotionally to the music because their systems refrain from feeding their minds with data that are only analytically relevant. Who appreciate the maturity of moderation over the razzle-dazzle qualities of adolescence.


The exciting thing about this level of maturity here is how little, comparatively, it'll set you back. In a human being, you'd call such arriving before one's time precocious. But back to actual music...