I agree with @sudnh and others who have referenced the 50’s and early 60’s as the golden age of sound recording, especially in classical music. Tube equipment and mini miking led to the warmth and incredible sound staging that is only beginning to be matched digitally in the past few years.
When Was The Audio Golden Age?
I looked at the Vintage section here for the first time. It made me speculate on what other forum users would view as the best era in Audio. For me it is the present. The level of quality is just so high, and the choice is there. Tube fanciers, for example, are able to indulge in a way that was impossible 3 decades ago, and analog lovers are very well set. And even my mid Fi secondary systems probably outshine most high end systems from decades agoHowever when one hears a well restored tube based system, play one speaker from the mid to late 1940s it can dazzle and seduce. So what do others think? Are we at the summit now, or did we hit the top in past and have we taken a few steps down?