From HH 4-5 2023
THE SOUND
Cumulus Bookshelf 2023 builds a clear, finely chiseled soundstage with a wonderfully warm underlying tendency. The bass sounds crystal clear and at the same time voluminous, bass lines are drawn as clean as a whistle. The double bass played by Ray Brown on .,We get Requests" by the Oscar Peterson Trio (terrific K2-HD mastering with 24 bit) has the typical volume of the large stringed instrument. Voices seem natural and three-dimensional.
From the bass-baritone of Hans Theessink (.,Late Last Night" on .. Call Me"), which stands in sonorous fullness in the room, to the almost spherical duet of Katie Melua and Eva Cassidy (,.What A Wonderful World" on .,The Katie Melua Collection") a completely convincing performance succeeds. With "Jazz At The Pawnshop" we explored the spatial imaging quality. The live recording from 1976 from a jazz club in Stockholm quite rightly enjoys cult status.
Cumulus Bookshelf 2023 reveals even the finest details of this recording, which take place in the depth of the room. Voices and instruments are clearly outlined on stage, almost tangible, right down to the baseline of the speakers and sometimes even a bit in front of it. With convincing and almost astonishing level stability, Cumulus Bookshelf 2023 proves that it doesn't need expansive speaker towers to let the proverbial cow fly - we were spontaneously thrilled by what the compact sound transducers achieved in terms of dynamics that always seemed casual. At the opposite end of the dynamic scale, an unchanged complete and finely detailed sound is pleasing, even when the volume is very clearly reduced. Exorbitant volume is by no means necessary for perfect music enjoyment, although it is of course really fun here.
CONCLUSION
Cumulus Bookshelf 2023 proves that even speakers in bookshelf format can convince in all respects. With a complete, wonderfully warm sound, finest details at any volume, from a gentle breeze to a thunderous hurricane, and a sovereign, wide-ranging spatial imaging, these speakers offer audiophile music enjoyment of the finest quality.
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