OR WHY THE SEE IT, HEAR IT, TOUCH IT HIFI SHOW EXPERIENCE SHOULD BE ON YOUR BUCKET LIST

As I write this it is early September 2023, I am looking back on what a busy year it has been, and there is still over a quarter of it left. It seems a while since I had the chance to sit down and write a piece that wasn’t either HiFi News or a HiFi Show Report and that is basically because our feet have barely touched the ground this year.

HIFI SHOWS A GO-GO

This year, 2023, we (Stu and myself) have visited a large HiFi Show every single month, other than in July, and in between that there have been other trips too, visiting the headquarters of HiFi Brands, and there have also been visitors to HiFi PiG Towers. Other members of Team HiFi PiG have also been to shows and events, all around the world…meaning HiFi PiG has, quite literally, been everywhere all at once.

AFTER THE COVID YEARS

After the dark wasteland of social contact that was The Covid Years, we thought that things were starting to get back to normal in 2022. But though major events like High End Munich happened that year, the world still wasn’t fully open, with intercontinental travel still frowned upon and difficult, and many shows that would normally attract visitors and exhibitors from around the world having to work on a more local scale, it wasn’t quite ‘back’.

However, 2023 has been a totally different story. Most of the regular shows are back in full force and there has been some brilliant new additions to the HiFi Diary that look set to become firm favourites too. Some much-loved shows didn’t make it through Covid (RIP RMAF), but where some have fallen, new events are rising up.

2023 – A YEAR IN HIFI SHOWS

This year we have added new shows to those regular ones we have visited, including ISE in Barcelona, because, well, who wouldn’t want to kick off the year with January in one of the most vibrant cities in the world while experiencing Home Cinema on an epic scale? Then of course there was The Bristol HiFi Show in February, a great and super busy event, perfect for catching up with the UK HiFi industry and British readers.

A new show in March was the Audio Show Deluxe which HiFi PiG Editor Stu organised with Kris, who also puts on NWAS….comments from visitors and exhibitors were very much ‘this is what a HiFi Show should be like’, we are very much looking forward to Audio Show Deluxe 2024.

Our first visit to the USA since Covid saw us head to AXPONA in April, which was a great event, this is now the major international show in the States since RMAF is no more.

And then of course, High End Munich 2023 in May, the mother of all HiFi Shows and very much the linchpin of the global HiFi Industry. It was fantastic this year to see the return of everyone from the Asian HiFi Industry and HiFi PiG was very involved in the event, with talks and presentations and our usual full-throttle High End Munich coverage.

The North West Audio Show in June is always a favourite, for us it is a family and friends meet up, though of course, we were sadly missing Grandma HiFi PiG this year. It is also a major launchpad into the UK for many new products, including those revealed at Munich the month before.

We do like to shake it up a bit, so in August this year, for the first time we headed to the Hong Kong Audio Visual Show. We loved this exotic and huge show and will be back again, a fabulous experience and place to visit.

And there is much more still to come, we can’t wait for the Dutch Audio Event at Eindhoven in October, a super enthusiastic show that we love. Then of course we have Warsaw and the Audio Video Show, the second largest European show after Munich, and a fabulous and enjoyable show for all involved.

Eric is stretching his long legs around plenty of events this Autumn in Benelux and Germany. He will also be casting his eyes and ears over the High End treats at Ascot during the UK HiFi Show Live this month, another show that is back with a bang after both Covid and the death of HRH Queen Elizabeth meant there has not been an Ascot show for the last few years.

Gyula has hit the ground running in Asia, with his fantastic report from the Taiwan TAA show last month and upcoming shows in Asia yet to come during the Autumn and Winter.

Oscar covered the fantastic CanJam London 2023 for us this summer and he is set to snoofle more Headfi for us, plus even more when he heads up to the Daventry UK Audio Show.

Just from reading through these events you can see how our year, and that of everyone else involved in the HiFi Industry, is very much measured in HiFi Shows…we know where we are and where we are going depending on the time of year…it’s May, so we must be heading to Munich!

SEE IT, HEAR IT, TOUCH IT

So why, in an age of everything being virtual and online are HiFi Shows so popular? They are the lifeblood of an industry that is very much about ‘real’ experiences.

Watching a video is no substitute for the excitement of sitting down in front of a huge, esoteric, lottery-winner style HiFi System at the show, and picking your favourite track when the exhibitor asks you ‘What would YOU like to hear?’ It’s about that goosebumps moment as the intro kicks in and you don’t just hear, you feel the music around you, playing from a system that you (and I) can only really dream of owning.

Like car shows, we are not going just for the day-to-day, we want the exotica and the ‘platinum-plated Lamborghinis’ that you won’t ever see anywhere else.

HiFi Shows are very much about the experience of ‘see it, hear it, touch it’. Getting hands and ears on with dream systems all in one place, like a kid at Christmas with each room delighting even more than the last.

Very much in the same way that, though we love the accessibility of streaming, vinyl records and CDs are still enormously popular, because we are in love with the formats we can pick up and hold, ‘real’ experiences cannot be beaten.

We try our very best to get this across to you all in our show reports and hope that they help convince you that visiting a fantastic HiFi Show should very much be on the bucket list for every audiophile.

HIFI COMMUNITIES

HiFi Shows, while not about ‘critical listening’, are about thrill, excitement and participation. They are about the buzz of traveling to a familiar, or completely new place, meeting with like-minded people, even if you don’t speak the same language, you share a passion and a love of something tangible…you share the same language of HiFi and music.

Online communities are a big part of HiFi, and the shows are where we can get together and meet for real. They are the COMICON for those who love music and the gear it is played on, though I am yet to see show attendees dressed up as their favourite HiFi brand!

This enthusiasm of the attendees makes the shows so special for the exhibitors, and the places where they can truly connect with the people that use and love their products.

While we were in Hong Kong we met a guy who lives this dream of visiting HiFi Shows around the world, and he does it just for fun! Mazher is a HiFi PiG reader from India, a successful businessman with grown up children (but no grandkids yet), so he spends his leisure time visiting the world’s best HiFi Shows and attending concerts all over the globe. We had to have the obligatory selfies with him…and I am sure we will meet him again somewhere else in the world.

There is also the community of the people in the HiFi Industry itself, whether on the journalism side or the HiFi Brands, distributors, and dealers who along with the show organisers, make the magic happen. It really is a big family and we have formed some wonderful friendships that, without the network of shows that happen every year, just wouldn’t be the same. Zoom meetings and video chats may have got us through the last few difficult years, but they are no substitute for actually getting together, wherever in the world that may be.

So why not check the HiFi Diary, plan your driving route, book your flight or train, get your show tickets sorted and we hope to see you at the next HiFi Show!

Linette Smith

For all the HiFi Shows in one place go to the HiFi Diary page here