SS Amp for natural vocals

I heard the DALI Helicon 400Mk.2 a few days ago with the Jeff Rowland Design Group 501 monoblocks, driven by the Rowland Capri. This is a truly smooth and revealing combination. I listened to Karrin Allyson, Rebecca Pidgeon, Livingston Taylor, Kenny Rankin, Chicago Symphony, Dallas Wind Symphony and the DALIs really shone well.

Prior to plugging in the 501s were tried a Primare integrated, which did a very poor job of controlling the DALI's woofers, yielding a bloated, bloomy bass. Next, we put in a Rowland stereo 102 and things improved a bunch, but the 501 really took hold of the Helicons and made them sound smooth, deep, detailed and lush, all at once. Those speakers evidently love a bunch of power and high damping.

Dave

Tomcy6, the ARC is a solid state amp. check out the ARC web for more info.

Regarding Pass and Belles, I haven't owned the specific Pass amps you mentioned, but I did own the Pass Aleph 3 for years - while a great amp, I prefered the Belles Reference 150A by a pretty big margin and with several different sets of speakers.

I prefered the Belles Reference 150A by a pretty big margin and with several different sets of speakers.
Fly_fish_nz (Threads | Answers)

The 150A Reference is a darned fine amplifier...underrated and overlooked by many audiophiles.

Disclosure - I have a pair of 150A Reference for sale. They are being replaced by Pass Labs XA-60.5.

I'm new to this hobby, ok habit... but have read many of your opinions stating that the pre amp and speakers play a large role.
I am using a cj met1 6 channel tube preamp with dali 800s and 400s along with an avr ss amp ( denon 5803) and vocals sound outstanding. Granted I may not have the trained ears of yall but the preamp has unveiled the ss amp to where vocals sound great. I am looking into replacing my denon with dedicated power amp because of what i read here, but wonder if the gain will be marginal because the sound is pretty great already. Perhaps he should consider moving up to the 800s or cabling choices?