TESTED: DaVinci Audio Labs Reference Grandezza Phono Cartridge

Making Transparent Musical Sense

You flirted with the butcher,

You flirted with the baker,

Now, you’re flirting with the undertaker.

But you will also hear Redbone or his instrumentalists produce a cracking sound on several tracks that I used to think was mistracking but which turns out, in fact, to be the microphone preamp clipping. You will hear low notes like the plucked doublebasses that announce the rush to the finish of the last movement of Bartók’s Divertimento for String Orchestra [Decca] as if they are in the room with you, but you will also hear the cavernous chamber in which the doublebasses were plucked sound as if it’s in the room with you too, adding volume and reverberation to the pizzicato and shrill brightness to the strings. In short, you may not want a cartridge that is this scrupulous.

On the other hand, if you want to hear a well-recorded piece like Bruno Maderna’s Serenata No. 2 [Hungaroton] make not just transparent sound but transparent musical sense, then the Reference Grandezza is your ticket to bliss. In the first section of the Serenata, Maderna lets the freshly sounded timbre of one instrument (like a flute) harmonize with the decaying overtones of the previously sounded timbre of another instrument (like a violin) making a kind of a gentle, magical, melting sound world in which eleven disparate instruments seemingly “complete” each other’s utterances in almost the same voice. To appreciate this serenade-like effect, you need to be able to hear the partials of the first instrument clearly enough to appreciate that the pitches and intensities of the subsequent instrument have been carefully and deliberately set to harmonize with these overtones. The Reference Grandezza does this—beautifully. BTW, if you think that the DaVinci’s transparency to sources (and musical meanings) makes it more an “analytical” than a “musical” cartridge, let me repeat: The old dichotomies just don’t apply here. The Reference Grandezza sounds voluptuously beautiful on great recordings like the Maderna, and not so hot (albeit a touch forgiving) on poor ones.

Though you can’t go wrong with the somewhat darker and richer Air Tight PC-1 Supreme or the more spacious, electrifying, but somewhat brighter and grainier Goldfinger v2 or the uniformly gemütlich, never-less-than-gorgeous-sounding Koetsu Onyx Platinum, if you prefer to hear what’s actually on your records rather than a more bespoke version of same this may be the cartridge for you. It is for me. The DaVinci Reference Grandezza is my new reference.

SPECS & PRICING

DaVinci Audio Labs Reference Grandezza Phono Cartridge

Type: Low-output moving-coil cartridge
Output: 0.17mV
Coil impedance: 3 ohms
Matching impedance: 3 ohms
Recommended stylus force: 2—2.2 grams
Weight: 20 grams
Price: $7300

DaVinci Audio Labs GmbH
Derrière les Maisons
2716 Sornetan BE
Switzerland
+41 (0) 32 484 01 75
www.da-vinci-audio.com