The Experts team wondered what we thought people would want to find behind the windows of a dream studio advent calendar. Some of the things we own, some we wish we did. Owned or not, we think any of the things we name in the next 10 days would be a gift to a professional studio owner
Day 15 - Meyer Bluehorn System
In keeping with the spirit of these articles, I am going for a six (6) digits price tag. It is a Dream Studio fantasy, and I had the privilege to hear them for a whole week.
I heard them while taking a masterclass in the south of France (you know the one), with a select few, we had the privilege to have score mixer Shawn Murphy (Jurassic Park, Star Wars, West Side Story, and so many more) as our Mix with the Master mentor. Mr. Murphy (Shawn) didn’t travel light for this class; he had arranged to have Meyer’s Bluehorn System delivered and calibrated for our immense pleasure.
I emphasize immense because these guys are huge, four inches shy of six feet tall, one speaker weighs in at 162 lb (73.5 kg), and you need three for a LCR configuration.
If you have ever been in contact with Meyer loudspeakers, you know the magic is in the speaker design, and its processor. Not being a fan of horn-based design for studio monitoring, my scepticism was blown away after two notes (it helps when you listen to Star Wars raw tracks). The nasal narrow beam associated with horn-based design was replaced by smooth mid-high frequencies. It felt like a dome, but with power, better and more accurate dispersion. The Bluehorn system has some interesting design approaches: what they call Low Frequency Transducer, driven by a 12-inch cone driver (nominal impedance of 2 Ω), and in a different enclosure, another Low Frequency Transducer, driven by an 18-inch cone driver with its nominal impedance set at 4 Ω. And yes, you would need a separate subwoofer to take care of the LFE, but rest assured you won’t be doing bass management with this system.
You can imagine that these guys can dish out a lot of SPLs. Unlike other loudspeakers, you don’t have to push them to get “that” sound, with all that muscle on hand it gives you dynamic range or what I call available power. Having all that available power alleviates the listening stress caused by pushing a loudspeaker to its design limits, and it replaces it by excitement! It’s like driving an unfamiliar car with way too much horsepower. You must have heard it before, listening to a set of loudspeakers, you turn to your friend to express your appreciation, but you find yourself screaming because you didn’t notice how loud it was. But it’s not just because it’s loud, it’s the evenness of the frequency response, the accessible power, and Meyer’s secret sauce “the phase-correction algorithm,” written by their son, Perrin Meyer, some things just run in the family.
As you can imagine, it’s not an off-the-shelf proposition! You have to be all-in: the speakers, the subs and the processor, in return you will have years of enjoyment just in time to finish paying for them.