You may remember these nice youngsters who introduced their "CUBE" speaker at the show last year, a steel enclosure with a Fostex full range driver, separate woofer, active filtering and integrated class D amps - one of my favourite products then, and still now...
This year, Eden de Vismes and his partner Laure Kasparian are introducing a series of beautiful control and connector panels, building blocks for designing an elegant multiroom system or connecting local sources to an existing system.
Also new, a range of "invisible" speakers fitted into light fittings, the result of a joint venture with Kreon, a famous Belgian lighting company. I was invited to their common showroom Place des Victoires after the show to experience these great sounding wonders. I am not sure the photos will help you figure out where the sound might come from, but it does sound exceptional good, considering that these speakers use primarily 2in drivers (5cm)
A great "coup" for such a young and amiable team!

Vienna acoustics was once more one of the best sounding speakers around. The new KISS model - shown left - was amazingly demonstrated by DJ "extraordinaire" Martial Hernandez, who has spent the last couple of years transferring all his collection of CDs to a Sooloos system, now part of Meridian.
Martial not only has one of the most extensive libraries of
“dematerialised” music, as well as physical records and CDs, but also knows every track in details, down to where the musicians fit in the studio or live venue.  He is like a living encyclopaedia of live jazz recordings and the like and his enthusiasm is  infectious:  it was funny to watch people ready to move to the next stand, and actually staying for hours on hand because Martial promised them to be blown away by the NEXT piece of music he was about to play – and I fell into his trap as well for my own delight! They are distributed in Australia by Audio Active.

These acoustic panels, distributed in France by Axente and very recently in Australia by Radiance, are actually made in Portugal.
Originally a professional product used extensively in recording studios and movie theaters and other similar venues, they are now becoming popular in Home Theater applications due to their performance obviously, but mainly because of their very high WAF index. architects and Interior Designers alike have no problem specifying them as they are 'invisible" enough, but highly effective in taming these reflexions, resonances and other "nasties' which can kill the performance of the best speakers.

I am happy to report that I will be covering the show officially this year for the Australian Hifi Magazine,
I feel very honoured to be the chosen one!

Here are two links to the show's website for those of you that are keen to visit:
http://www.salonhifi.com/
http://www.hautefidelite.com/flash/main.swf

Dates are October 1st & 2nd at the Pullman Rive Gauche Hotel.

One scoop: Ken Kessler will launch his new book on the history of KEF,
who will be celebrating their 50 years of designing beautiful speakers and will introduce the "Blade"

Some of the French brands already registered to exhibit:
Atohm
BC Acoustique
Cabasse
Elipson
JMB Acoustique
Leedh
Micromega
Pierre Riffaud
Soledge
Vismes
Waterfall Audio

See you there!
Or stay tuned for more news on this blog...

I have known and respected Ken for about 30 years now, so I was quite keen to read his review of the Paris Hifi Show.
Unfortunately, I didn't get a chance to reconnect with him at the Show.
But, I was quite chuffed reading his prose in HiFi News February issue(I always enjoy his prose, as he is a real writer, AND he is not afraid to publish his own opinions...), as we have spotted some of the very same products as being relevant: Vimes, Aerosystem by Jarre, Soledge Maestro, Elipson (bien sur...) and Pierre Riffaud's turntables for instance...
Update on 16/04: Well, I have now received the March issue of HiFi News, and here he is again, showing to the world his collection of gear and software.
I cannot recommend you more than rush to your newsagent and buy your own copy now.
This one will be sold out for sure!
And the good news are that my wife realised that I am not that mad after all !!!

I have not visited this exhibition for 15 years, I have been surprised to see a number of new, innovative, successful French Hifi companies, primarily in the realm of speakers and turntables, but also valve and silicon-based electronics.
Obviously some of the most famous and long established brands were there as well from Elipson to Micromega, Davis Acoustics to Focal.
The newcomers of note were from A to W: Atohm, Jarre Technologies - yes, it is Jean-Michel - , JMB Acoustique, KTR Lab,  Leedh, Pierre Riffaud, Soledge, Stenheim,
Stormaudio, Vismes and Waterfall Audio.
Famous absentees: Cabasse, Jean-Marie Raynaud, Triangle to name a few.
Some of the famous Brits were here too: B&W, Chord, Cyrus, KEF, Lowther, Michell, Mission, NAD, Naim, Roksan, and Rotel to name a few.
A few Americans like JBL, Vienna Acoustics, you guessed it from Austria,  Saegan & Shanghlin from China, nobody from Australia though, but the famous Perraux from New Zealand, and the powerfull Japanese Yamaha and Pioneer, giving an extraordinary multichannel musical demo!
Here are some pictures to satisfy your curiosity.
We will review some of these products in more details later, so stay tuned!