Looking for Speaker Recommendations

Wot!   No Vandersteen?

And then there's the Gershman Avant-Garde.

You're right to stay away from B&W and Focal.  I also think you can do better than Wilson.

As for auditioning, it depends on where you live, but brands you should listen to with deeper market penetration (more stores carry them) are Vandersteen and Sonus Faber.

Another way of going about this would be to consider the home trial/free return route.  Take a look at the offerings of Crutchfield, Music Direct and Audio Advisor.

If the OP considers Vandersteen "possibly too wide" (see his post above) then a lot of these recommendations are not going to work.