Ode to the Past at Oswalds Mill Audio, CanJam NYC 2024
Since the pandemic, the quality of my social life took a dive. Many of my friends shifted careers, moved/work remote or simply don’t stay in touch as often. While many of us have work friends that we can grab a drink with, finding a true quality friend is a challenging endeavor. It can take months to build up such a connection and finding the right combination of personality, ethics and values. The past few years of active participation in the Watercooler have led to an apex of personal connection. Where family and friends intersect on a journey of music, artistic discovery, engineering curiosity and pursuit of our nirvana. I may have not just found one, but a whole group of such quality friends in The Watercooler.
I was lucky to be part of varied experiences during this trip to CanJam NYC. Attempting to write these experiences in a single post would be challenging, so I have opted for an anthology. A collection of short stories and experiences, which add up to greater than the sum of its parts.
Nearly 10 years ago, I saw a
video from Bloomberg which showcased a speaker manufacturer Oswald Mills Audio, boasting of using Pennsylvania Ash and Pennsylvania Slate to build loudspeakers, featuring an enigmatic founder by the name of Jonathan Weiss. He spoke in flowery subjectives and superlatives, explaining the overlooked ‘peak of Hifi’ in the 1930’s with RCA horn designs. His philosophy is to brush aside the common tropes of modern hifi, that originated in the 1970s. Pickup any audiophile magazine today, they all read the same. Adorning the front pages of such publications, you’ll typically find speakers, requiring several hundred Watts to sound their best, weighing several hundred pounds, almost always featuring amps with Class A bias (re Class AB) design. Back when I saw Jonathan Weiss for the first time, I wasn’t sure if he was insane or pulling a giant con. It’s tough to decipher the line between silliness and genius. I have monitored his company carefully, observing if he can survive the game of longevity. A company with poor products in a fussy world of two channel hifi can only survive for so long. Over the past decade, he slowly and steadily built a strong reputation. Starting from his flagship Imperia speakers, down to the entry level DeVille speakers from OMA’s sister company Fleetwood Sound at 15k a pair. OMA’s products and by extension, Jonathan’s reputation is analogous to the Campfire Audio Trifecta. Some are infatuated, others are bewildered. Taking advantage of being in Times Square, a mere 30 min train ride to his showroom in Dumbo Brooklyn, I setup an appointment with little expectations. Nothing prepared me for the journey I was about to embark upon.
Walking into his shop, you are struck with Jonathan’s appreciation of yesteryear, an aesthetic emblematic of an ode to the past. Retro posters, walls of vinyl, the wafts of a lone incense burning at the entrance door. Looking around, I notice every OMA design makes use of wood and metal, and featuring wood joinery. This is unusual in the high end two channel space, which is typically dominated by artificial materials such as Wilson Audio’s V material, carbon fiber of Magico, or custom metal alloys married with carbon fiber which are signature of Rockport speakers. OMA’s signature materials are are combination wood, slate and metal. Immediately, Jonathan greeted my father and I, and much to our surprise a fellow CanJam attendee was present, a representative from Innuos, a company that makes digital music servers and streamers. We began chatting with Jonathan about the origins of his company, his philosophy, and how his approach adds value to the competitive landscape. As the conversation progressed, I took a tour around his shop, looking at some of his works from discontinued speakers like the Ironic, to masterpieces such as the Special K amp.
Soon after, Jonathan asked us what speakers we would like to experience, I quickly interjected “The big ones!”. I was referring to the Imperia. Jonathan began rifling through some vinyl in a crate on the ground, intent on creating a pure analog experience. Much to my delight, he found a Muddy Waters vinyl and put it on the K3 Turntable. Putting this experience into words is a challenge. The sound filled the room with absolute ease, and only on a 4 Watt tube amplifier. The vocal was utterly convincing, with a vibrancy and organic realism, this is distinct from ‘fidelity’ which I’ve heard before on other systems. The custom horns OMA sources in Italy reproduced the vocals as if I was sitting in the mouth of the singer, as opposed to hearing the recording, such intensity was new to me. With other summit fi flagship speaker systems I’ve tried (Sonus Faber, Wilson, Focal etc) the speaker will reproduce the recording very well, but I always want to turn up the volume. And if I did not sit in the perfect spot, the stereo imaging would be imbalanced. No matter where I sat in the OMA studio, the wall of sound didn’t suffer from the ‘vertex problem’. With the Imperium (or any OMA speaker I tried that day), the stereo image seemed to blend together close to the point source, instead of at the seat. I asked Jonathan about this, he cited OMA/Fleetwood Sound designs speakers with directivity that doesn’t restrict listening position in mind from the beginning of the design. The result is a system which isn’t fussy about where the listener sits in relation to the plane of the speaker. Bass thundered throughout the room as it spread throughout the space with the same effortless nature of the horns. What stood out to me throughout this experience was how this system rendered the energy of the voice and not just faithfully reproducing a recording. This system reminded me of Campfire Audio Trifecta, and if you want a taste of OMA you can take with you, the Trifecta is the closest one can experience it even if Trifecta lacks the magic horn sound.
As we got halfway through the vinyl record, Jonathan lifted the tone arm and asked for my thoughts. Well, of course I told him I loved it. He responded that it’s not surprising, given the entire chain was close to 1 million dollars. Despite OMA not releasing price lists, some online sleuthing reveals the cost of admission for the Imperia is well over US$300,000 and a similar price for the K3 Turntable alone. He knows this system is simply out of reach for all but a few of those who demo these speakers. The real talent he says, is to bring this magic down a magnitude in price, as this is where the skill lies. Ultimately, his firms success depends on expanding his customer base beyond the well heeled veterans of Wall Street or those with generational wealth. In this vain, we switched to a modest system, the Fleetwood Sound Deville’s. This chain had the fewest amount of components I’ve seen for such a system in its class. Not including the speakers, it was simply two components. The Technics SU-G700M2, an amplifier with "a DAC that isn’t a DAC" as Jonathan remarks, and an Innuos streamer. Most of our audition was on this Deville system alone, as it impressed us on every song we threw at it. From violin caprices to jazz ensembles and sultry vocalists like Yao Si Ting, the Deville speaker executed on delivering the signature OMA effortless house sound, lifelike energy, transforming recordings to something almost living. Granted, the shape of the voice, sound stage, wall of sound or voluminous bass was not even close to the flagship Imperia but this is to be expected when comparing an entry product to a flagship. Jonathan remarked you could use any streamer such as Bluesound Node as a source to keep costs down, with a full Deville system coming in just over US$18,000. Listening to this system was addicting and frequently I would get up and walk around the studio to see if imaging would break, however it did not. Recordings were cohesive, with the signature horns bringing life to the vocals and brass instruments especially. For my tastes, I would add a sub as I loved the dominating bass notes of the Imperia subwoofers.
As the clock struck 4PM, it was our time to leave as we needed to pack up and depart New York. Before we left, had a conversation about the medicinal effect of music, spirituality and reincarnation. Throughout my experience at Oswalds Mills Audio I came to realize that to be an artist requires a tad dose of insanity and stubborn vision. I am reminded of Ken Ball from Campfire Audio, and their flagship Trifecta, an IEM which continues to split much of the Headfi community. Regardless of how one feels about such creations, it mustn’t be forgotten, some of the worlds greatest inventions were created off the beaten paths of the familiar. Jonathan Weiss and Ken Ball seem to share a similar vision of defiance against the status quo, kindred spirits forging paths in different realms. I am curious to see what Jonathan Weiss comes up with next. In the meantime, encourage anyone local to the OMA studio in Dumbo Brooklyn to experience Jonathans take on Hifi. It will be an experience you won’t soon forget.
Interesting videos from Jonathan:
(apologies if I missed anyone, and I am sure I have...)
which will be highly appreciated by minimal electronic music lovers because of his collaborations with Marc Houle from yesteryear.
I'm just trying to repay my debt for all the tours 
