Jeff Rowland tour fascinates

couple of months ago, while collecting my cadence phono stage that he personally repaired, i also had the pleasure of spending a couple of hours jeff. he personally performs all repairs. jeff's a super human being who loves his work -hard not to. though jeff doesn't build every unit, he probably touches every single one. while repairing my cadence, he hand picked and listened each input amplifier before selecting the quietest and best sounding ones that he then used to replace the faulty channel. so that both channels would match, he also replaced the input amplifier in the working channel.

after some initial break-in, the cadence sounds quieter and smoother than ever. and how much would you expect to pay for such service and attention to detail on a $3k product long out of warranty??? excluding shipping to jrdg, he charged me less than $100. wow! $100 for total refurbishment. great deal to me. plus the bonus of spending two+ hours with jeff talking about and listening audio gear and vinyl.

he has an extensive vinyl collection. he showed me his specially customized turntable that rides on air using a platform from a high powered microscope table -crude description. nice to have talent to build and customize anything you buy to suit one's purpose. also, listened to his squeezebox transporter that he also customized for better sound. in addition to the revel salon's he also has a pair of vienna acoustics die muzick -disconnected at the time.

i'll admit that i'm an unabashed jrdg fan-boy. save my turntable -jrdg don't make one- i run all jrdg equipment. great man. outstanding company. also, the other people that work at jrdg were all super pleasant as well.

I've talked to Jeff on a few occasions, always a very interesting and pleasant conversation.
IMO, he and his company is still at the pinnacle of audio.

In fact Mr. Rowland personally is involved with the assembly of each unit sold. How is this possible? I asked him about his personal involvement etc and time involved and his only regret was that he couldn't get his workload under ten hours a day. I was shocked assuming a declining two channel mkt but the high end Asian mkt keeps him cranking day and night. I have to say that calling cold and meeting Jeff makes me feel very good about his gear and that I own something special and enduring. Funny thing about audio companies if you've been around long enough as I have. A few want to mesh aesthetics and sound as exemplified by JRDG which entails lower margins and higher production costs while others present clearly more austere gear that purportedly "serves the music first" while providing more profit to themselves at the expense of the consumer. It's not hard to know who these companies are. Anyway not to be a cheerleader which is not my intention I got a glimpse of the best of American high end audio that was compelling. As a note to an inquiry Mr Rowland was using Revel Salon 2's in his demo room. The sound was breathtaking.

Thanks for sharing.

"I have owned and greatly admire but is in no way superior to the Rowland gear."

Very interesting assessment, good for you. During the demo what kind of speakers were being used and did you see any other speakers at the facility?

I met him once at a show in NYC. I recognized him, and introduced myself. I was a little flustered, but he was gracious and friendly.
4425,
Are you saying that he assembles every component himself? That would seem impossible.

27 years of building superb amplifiers in Colorado. I enjoy the smallest of his creations Model 102 dreaming about Model 625 in the future. I've also heard that he is a classy guy.