Audiovector’s striking Trapeze Reimagined loudspeaker—known as the Trapeze Ri to its friends—takes its name and inspiration from the original, designed by company founder Ole Klifoth back in 1979. This latest version may be the spiritual successor to the speaker that put the company on the hi-fi map all those years ago, but it is a brand new design featuring modern drive units and more.

StereoNET recently got a very early listen, with plenty of time to get to know the new speaker at a recent press launch event in the brand's Copenhagen HQ in Denmark. Here, we saw speakers in various stages of being built and were given the opportunity to chat with the people behind them. We got the feeling that we were spending time with a family-run business with a wonderful sense of ‘hygge’ – everyone involved seemed to be connected by family, friends and shared passions. There was also a touching passing on of the torch to Mads, Ole's son.

(L-R) Mads and Ole Klifoth

UP CLOSE

The new Trapeze Ri is quite a departure from Audiovector's current stable of elegant standmounters and slender, gracefully curved towers. It takes a more retro and fulsome approach, measuring 875x435x420mm [HxWxD] with its raked baffle to aid time alignment and toe-in. The speaker’s angled appearance marks it apart from anything else on the market, and it actually feels less obtrusive in a domestic setting than most alternatives. Moreover, the speaker can be placed relatively close to a wall, with Audiovector recommending around 70cm from the front baffle as a good starting point. However, in practice, it’s less fussy and can be placed closer if needed.

The trapezoidal cabinets are made of high-density fibreboard and are available in four standard finishes: Black Ash, Nordic Oak, Italian Walnut and White Silk. Naturally, you can also get your pair painted in a wide range of custom colours should you want them to match your car, interior decor or sports team kit. Build and finish on the early samples we have seen are up to the standards expected from Audiovector and other floorstanders at this level and price point. Even the much overlooked Black Ash finish looks classy enough to grace the swishest city centre penthouse.

The Trapeze Ri is a three-way design with an AMT (Air Motion Transformer) tweeter, a 130mm paper cone midrange driver and a combination of a forward-facing 300mm paper bass driver and an internal 200mm unit working in an isobaric configuration.

The company has long favoured AMT tweeters to cover the high frequencies, citing lower mass and distortion than conventional dome designs. Such a tweeter is also claimed to have good dispersion characteristics, minimising the sweet spot effect.

All four drivers have been specially developed for the new design and are linked by a relatively simple but high-quality crossover that interferes little with the signal path. Audiovector's 'Freedom Grounding' concept seeks to eliminate the movement-induced distortion between the drive units by separating the currents running between the chassis and routing them to the ground terminal of your wall socket or power distribution block. The top half of the Trapeze's front baffle is covered with acoustic foam, which adds visual interest to the design and is said to reduce diffraction effects caused by the enclosure's edges.

At the rear of the cabinet are two ports. The lower one is the expected reflex port for the internal 200mm compound bass driver, and the upper one is the AMT tweeter's rear sound outlet. This is Audiovector's alternative solution to KEF's Metamaterial Absorption Technology (MAT) and Bower & Wilkins' now legendary damped tapered tube. This lets the rearward tweeter acoustic escape into the room, which results in a less congested sound, according to the company.

The Trapeze Ri's midrange and bass drivers are treated paper cones. We were told that from the start of this project, they wanted to use a big 300mm woofer. Ole said: "Ideally, it had to cross over with a very fast 130mm midrange at about 500Hz. With the usual half-roll rubber surround, we found that near that crossover point, the woofer might be unable to keep up with the midrange unit. This resulted in us devising a new corrugated, concertina surround for the long-fibre paper cone to ensure the speed and level of detail of the large bass driver matches and seamlessly integrates with the midrange unit. That one also has a speed-optimised concertina surround to maximise detail. As with most of our current larger speakers, an additional 200mm driver inside works with the 300mm driver in an isobaric arrangement. This achieves a low-frequency response that manages to combine speed and weight.”

Trapeze Ri (left) and the OG Trapeze (right)

You also find a single pair of terminals on the rear panel alongside the Freedom Grounding port. Audiovector wanted the Trapeze Ri to offer a plug-and-play solution, so it was not particularly aimed at those looking to bi-wire or bi-amp their speakers. Instead, the company sees the modern music lover having fewer boxes, and instead of a designated listening room, it hopes that the hi-fi finds its place back in the main living area.

The damping feature is as interesting as it is unusual, and offers a choice of three positions on a rotary dial which tailor the speaker to the damping factor of your power amplifier. There’s a normal setting for solid-state amplifiers with a standard damping factor, plus one for high powered, high damping factor transistor behemoths such as the Gryphon Apex power amp used in the larger of Audiovector's demo rooms. And there is also a setting for tube amps with a low damping factor.

The company says that these are not set in stone, and the owner is actively encouraged to experiment to find which setting is best for their system and their ears. Incidentally, the Trapeze Ri has a claimed sensitivity of 88dB/W/m and a nominal impedance of 8 ohms (with a minimum of 6.5 ohms at 20kHz) – which makes this a pretty benign speaker to drive, and thus an easy match for most modern amps.

THE LISTENING

The usual caveats apply in this first-listen situation. Although some of the demonstrations used a Gryphon Diablo 333 and a Commander/Apex system, these are different from the Essence pre/power that I’m used to in my own system. Furthermore, the unfamiliar rooms made it tricky to make any definitive judgement. All this said, the Audiovector Trapeze Ri made an excellent case for itself and elicited many appreciative nods and foot-taps from the assembled members of the hi-fi press. The larger room with the Gryphons utilised a Naim ND555/555 PS DR front end, whereas the smaller demo room put MOON's excellent North series 791/761 streaming pre and power combo into action.

These speakers might share a similar form factor with the original forty-five-year-old design, but the Trapeze Ri is undoubtedly a modern performer that likes to let its hair down and boogie. Very much from the Audiovector stable, the Ri displays the brand's trademark mix of clarity, detail, and dynamics. Thanks to the combination of depth and effortlessness, as experienced with the company's R series, you never get the sense of having detail thrown at you. Instead, the Trapeze Ri imparts it cohesively and musically. 

The big bass unit, fortified by its isobaric partner, sounded fast and punchy when Ghostrider's Make Us Stronger was selected on the Roon-linked iPad. Grins widened as the volume was increased, and the song's bass notes landed with generous chest-thumping power. The compound bass loading system certainly does what it promises while keeping the low-frequencies agile and clear

Audiovector's Freedom Grounding option was demonstrated, and we found that it makes a noticeable improvement in sound thanks to increased dynamic expression, clarity, and refinement. There also appeared to be a quieter background to the overall presentation. This is not an inexpensive option. However, this could fall into someone's upgrade path a year or two into ownership. Some retailers might even offer a special deal when purchasing the speakers.

Next, the adjustable damping factor was switched between settings, slightly changing the sonic character. Depending on where the dial was, it made the Ri sound a little more rounded and richer, or more direct and punchy. This appears very much a taste option, then...

We duly threw everything at this pair of speakers from eighties pop, techno classics, slabs of indie rock and heavy metal. At no point did the Trapeze Ri become hard or edgy. Instead, the AMT tweeter and well-integrated mid supplied ample refinement and composure, allied to speedy high frequencies and a composed and communicative midband. Anyone expecting the sepia-tinged softened edges of classic retro-fi should look elsewhere – as these angular floorstanding loudspeakers proved fun, even-handed, and punchy.

Finally, as we prepared to leave, AC/DC's Hells Bells rang out as a finale from the smaller room, greeted with more smiles from the gathered press and Audiovector family alike.

THE VERDICT

StereoNET’s first experience of Audiovector’s new Trapeze Reimagined loudspeakers was most enjoyable. I got the impression that they combine the expected refinement of the brand's R series designs with some added devilment and cheekiness – thanks in no small part to the larger bass unit. This speaker treats the listener to a degree of sophistication when presented with pastoral orchestral work, but when the bourbon comes out at night along with the devil horns, it becomes a real party animal!

The Audiovector Trapeze Reimagined becomes available this month and will cost around £15,500/ €17,000, with dollar pricing in the region of US$19,000 and AU$28,600. 

Visit Audiovector for more information