SHOW REPORT MONTREAL AUDIOFEST 2025

Lemay Audio

Montreal AudioFest, 2025

Robert Schryer, APRIL 16 2025

Lemay Audio: Dayton Wright, Tenor Audio, Baetis Audio, iFi Audio, Inakustik, Silversmith, Modulum Audio

As always, manufacturer and retailer Lemay Audio brought its A game to the show, with a system anchored around a pair of the company’s latest time‑aligned, open‑baffle electrostatic Dayton‑Wright Hommage 9.4 speakers ($68,000/pair), fortified with a cryogenically treated 500W audio transformer and an optional Cryo Biphase power supply ($14,000), and finished in genuine California Walnut (+$20,000). Driving them was a Tenor Audio 175S amplifier ($160,000) and a Qobuz‑streaming Grimm Audio MU2 DAC/preamplifier ($22,000), while cabling was by Silversmith, Inakustik, and stands by Modulum.

This demo delivered some of the most intricately layered soundstaging I encountered at the show, marked by exceptional image focus and depth. The soundfield was expansive and dimensional, offering a palpable sense of space between instruments. Transparency was excellent, with a clarity and sense of organization that seemed to bring every sonic element into sharp relief. The system also impressed with its dynamic range, natural tonal balance, detailed decays, and rare tonal complexity.

During a choral track recorded in a church, I listened with my eyes closed—which I never do during show demos—but the sound was just so divine

Lemay Audio has been a multiple winner of Best Rooms awards and it was a strong contender again this year. At this early hour on Saturday, the room had yet to fill up with attendees so I had a good listen.

Francois Lemay, who was also a principal in the Tenor Audio brand, is fanatical about maximizing the sound quality of his products as well as the complete system. He was eager to tell me about his use of the XACT Phantom LAN cable ($4500) from Poland which he had optimized by hard-wiring directly to the board of the Grimm Audio MU2 preamplifier ($24k) integrated with Roon server, Qobuz, and DAC, achieving what he felt was a 15% improvement. He completely eliminated the use of an Ethernet switch in doing so. (I've had a similar breakthrough hard-wiring an Audio Sensibility power cord to a vintage Sony FM tuner that was equipped with a zip-cord power cable.)

He was so impressed with the cable he used a coupler to create the required length, as it is only available in a short length. The new Polish XACT is not to be confused with XACT-USA, an offshoot of XACT Engineered Manufacturing Solutions, a privately owned manufacturing company founded in 1999 in Calgary, Alberta. Both of those companies are major players in industrial and military cables.

The "monoblocks" used here are the innovative creations of Jocelyn Jeanson, who is instrumental in the development of the speaker. On top are three transformers that develop a 6000 Volt DC supply" for the electrostatic speaker.

Each "monoblock" comes in two pieces as seen here where Francois revealed a massive transformer necessary to raise the voltage for the audio signal by 100x for the electrostatic speaker. I believe Francois said the large transformer was designed by Mr. Hammond (of Hammond Transformer fame) 50 years ago. The loudspeaker power supply alone is $14k. The audio signal for this large transformer comes directly from the Tenor Audio 175S stereo amplifier ($160k) with the wood faceplate seen in the rack. The copper and aluminum footers used between the layers here, like the audio rack, were from Modulum.

Francois also showed me this diagram revealing the construction of the speaker chassis. Other items of interest in the rig included Silversmith Fidelium RCA interconnect ($1600) and ribbon speaker cable ($1600) which were also seen in other rooms at the show. Synergistic Research supplied the UEF Router ($4k) and Master fuse ($800). Power cables were from Inakustik (AC-4005, $5k). An Inakustik AC-4500 120V line filter ($8k) was also used.

As often happens, when I stopped by on my sweep at the end of the show on Sunday, the room was sounding even better.