Speaker audition: a novice’s journey

I am no expert at audio. But I like to listen to music, primarily classical and then a little bit of everything else such as jazz and soft/alternate rock, both at home and concerts. I am looking for speakers that can play classical well, can represent the ‘body’ of a full scale orchestra. That can soundstage and image well. And that can isolate different instruments. Oh yes, my budget is 10-15K.

On this forum I got tremendous help from several folks. Now I have a list of speakers that I need to check out.

So, sooner the better and I decided to take a plunge. Along the way I’ll also learn how to really audition speakers. It’s a little dummy’s guide to myself. I wouldn’t get into technicalities, my head rings when a dealer tries to explain first order network and phase-time coherence. After all it ain’t matters how sophisticated the science is. The speakers need to sound good. Period. My evaluation is purely by how it sounds, caveat being on untrained ears. I am planning to use the same set of music so that I can get a fair comparison.

I decided to write down my experience (coming in the response links below); hopefully someone, someday will be benefited by it. I welcome your inputs/suggestions.