Mid-Level Delight

Wattson + Merason + Sugden + Luna

Yesterday I took a picture of the electronics I used, along with Sonner Audio’s Legato Duo speakers, to entertain folks coming through our weekly open house. I then posted it on Instagram with the heading ‘Elevate your Listening.’ Since IG doesn’t lend itself to long form exposition, I though I’d expand on it here.

First, let’s move beyond the brand names and identify the individual components:

  • Wattson Audio Emerson Digital streamer
  • Merason Frérot DAC + Pow1 LPS
  • Sugden Audio A21SE integrated amplifier
  • Luna Cables’ AC, Ethernet, digital and analog ICs & speaker cables
Wattson Audio Digital streamer (output side)

Wattson Audio, as a brand name, is only a few year’s old but the Swiss company behind it has been doing R&D and manufacturing custom circuit boards for high end brands for 20 years. They currently have three products: Emerson Digital, (used here), which is a streamer only, Emerson Analog, which is a streamer/DAC and Madison, a streamer/DAC adding a headphone amplifier and volume control. All three use the manufacturer’s proprietary streaming approach and their patented LEEDH digital signal attenuation. They are ROON-ready, but can also be controlled via Wattson’s own app or the recently released Play, an Apple IOS-only UpNp control app.

All three have been widely reviewed and have garnered very high marks for great detail without brightness or hardness, a marvelous sense of space—a wide, deep soundstage with specific placement as well as a relaxed organic feel and compelling sense of musical flow. Wattson maintains a page of reviews here: https://en.wattson.audio/reviews

This will be expanded very shortly. I’m only publishing at this pint to create a link to reference in the brief Instagram and FB posts.

Published by David Cope

After 15 years doing audio shows and marketing for Audio Note, UK, I took a year off, intending to establish a recording studio dedicated to making natural, minimally processed recordings of acoustic instruments playing jazz, folk, blues, bluegrass and classical music. Somewhere along the way I borrowed a pair of Auditorium 755 speakers and a Shindo pre-amp and power amp from Jonathan Halpern of Tone Imports. Quick as you can say, "Bob's your uncle!", I had become an audio retailer, using Old Forge Studio as a dual purpose space. It's all very exciting and more than a bit crazy . . .

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