A budding hi-fi enthusiast travels from Michigan to Arkansas on her first Klipsch Pilgrimage to hear the newest Dope from Hope

I joined the Klipsch family in July 2022 with very little audio knowledge. I had a pretty great Reference system circa 2014 – and my dad’s gifted vintage 1970s McIntosh amps, but that was it. I couldn’t tell you anything about frequency response or horn-loaded nothin’. As a new Project Coordinator on the marketing team, it was my job to organize and communicate internally - not understand the physics of sound or comprehend the math behind how our products worked.

A few months into the job, I visited our award-winning crew in-person at Indianapolis, Indiana HQ. I dove deep into the PWK history and culture, soaking up all the technical details and copper iconography this epic brand has to offer. I’ll never forget that trip, starting with the anechoic chamber. For the uninitiated, it’s essentially a room that eats sound and allows engineers to measure very precise data as we develop and build speakers. If silence had teeth, those chompers would look like the triangular foam spikes that line the chamber walls to absorb soundwaves.

That same trip I heard my first ever Heritage speakers, including a listening session with the Klipschorn AK6s. I really try to stay somewhat stoic in public, and it took everything in my power not to get teary-eyed during that first Klipschorn demo. I requested David Gilmour’s “A Boat Lies Waiting (Live at Pompeii)” and…wow. Just wow. It was next-level. Sound reproduction and my own emotional response only surpassed by hearing the song live at United Center in Chicago, 2016.  

It would be a long time until I got to experience music like that again.

VISITING HOPE FOR THE PAUL W. KLIPSCH BIRTHDAY BASH

In March 2025, I got to visit the place that started it all: Hope, Arkansas. I wanted my first Hope visit to be special – not all business – so I flew down to attend the PWK Birthday Bash.

And you know, it’s funny. My house is packed with Klipsch speakers. A full Reference Premiere theater system in the basement powered by an Onkyo TX-RZ50. Heritage Forte IVs powered by my dad’s McIntosh in the living room, where we’re also beta testing a not-yet-publicly-released system. The Nines are our backup stereo for the basement. I carry the Klipsch Nashville around while I clean because my husband claimed our Klipsch Detroit. As I write this article, I’m listening to T5 II True Wireless ANC headphones. There’s more than that in my house now, I promise you.

I used to complain to anyone that would listen: I can’t fit another speaker under this roof!

And then I spoke to the Klipsch fanatics at the PWK Birthday Bash.

And oh – my – goodness. My husband and I are amateurs.

There were people at the Bash who use Fortes as surround speakers. One guy had a pair of Jubilees in a house less than 1,000 square feet. I mean, talk about dedication. Another man with a house in Texas – which must’ve been the size of Texas itself – had Jubes and Khorns and Fortes and Cornwalls, and more. He also rocked quite a few antique pieces of Klipsch history that he’d won at museum auctions.

I will never complain about the size of my speaker collection again. Guess I had to travel 1,000 miles south to get that perspective.

STARTING OUT STRONG - HEARING THE JUBILEES

When I made my trip itinerary, I knew I’d be hearing some big, beautiful speakers. What I didn’t know was that a small group of Klipsch Pilgrims would get an intimate Jubilee listening session early on Saturday morning. After getting myself lost-and-found wandering the factory (sorry Jerry!), I met up with Roy and company in a little room separate from the production floor.

Roy Delgado, Jr., Klipsch Principal Engineer and self-styled “Chief Bonehead,” is the G.O.A.T. of Klipsch. Well, that’s how I think of him, anyway. He worked alongside Paul W. Klipsch himself and has spent his career building legendary speakers with the same four principles that started it all: high efficiency / low distortion, controlled directivity, wide dynamic range, and flat frequency response. Roy doesn’t listen to the Jubilees too much because, “you know, I still gotta build all the other stuff.”

After listening to a pair of Jubilees at considerable volume, let me tell you – I believe it.

Before the music started, we learned that the room requires additional structural reinforcement to withstand the kind of sustained, powerful speaker output standard during development testing. Building materials, ceiling slope, wall proportions, and more had to be taken into consideration to ensure the listening experience is as accurate as possible outside of an anechoic chamber setting…and that the walls wouldn’t vibrate apart.

The Jubilees produce a deep, physical impact on the room they’re playing in. Back at home, my Fortes are great…but they’re not shaking my photos off the wall!

MEETING THE NEW KLIPSCHORN AK7

It’s hard to go from a Klipsch Jubilee to any other speaker, but I gotta say…I prefer the Khorns. Call it nostalgia from my first trip to Indy HQ, but the AK7 sounded even better to me than the Jubes. I don’t just hear music when I listen to those speakers, I feel it. Of course I do.

Because PWK started this company, and built the original Klipschorn, to bring all the detail, clarity, and emotion of a live concert into the listener’s room. 

There must have been 25 to 30 devoted Klipsch Pilgrims packed into that listening room. To kick things off, Roy explained why the new AK7 was developed to begin with. And it’s pretty simple: our 40+ year old tooling for the midrange horn had reached the end of its lifespan. We either needed to spend the money to re-create what had always worked extremely well…or spend money to play around with a few new ideas.

Roy chose the latter, and the world sounds a lot better because he did. Here are the highlights:

• The new cinema-grade midrange K1133 compression driver adds an extra inch to the horns throat which increases sound pressure for fuller volume
• Patented Tractrix® and Mumps tech, along with the new K-406M horn we tooled, improves coverage, precision, and maintains frequency response
• The K-771 compression driver was paired with a patented extended phase plug to prevent cancellations and equalize wavelengths for greater coverage and clarity on the high frequencies

But the biggest change was allowing the passive Klipschorn to go “active.” The Chief Bonehead meticulously engineered the AK7 to play nice with a custom – though totally optional – Heritage Active Crossover. Using the foundations laid on his favorite Klipsch Jubilees, Roy tweaked that same tech exclusively for the Klipschorn, aligning time and phase while boosting frequencies and balancing EQ.

The conversation turned to non-linear equations, manifold pressure, air compression and a lot of other mathematical or physics-type engineering content that bounces right off my brain cells and into the ether of non-understanding. But as Roy says, “you can learn to critically listen.”

And so we did.

HEARING IT. FEELING IT.

I tried to stay rational and think like an engineer, like an audiophile. But I couldn’t do it. It’s not me. I’ll leave the technical review and precision commentary to the pros. I want to talk about how these Klipschorn AK7s made me feel. Because I kept drifting away from the music and the math, and into emotion. Memory.

I thought of the night before, sitting outside the Klipsch Museum of Audio History. We listened to music, and I watched a young mom play with her baby. I missed my girlie back home. The smoke of Marlboro reds hung in the air. The potluck dinner was heavy on comfort and portion sizes.

Roy played a funky banjo song. The mids and lows especially, even to my green ears, sounded well-rounded and big. Each driver is coupled to a precisely measured horn, with LF/MF/HF frequencies driven by their own amplifier. (Yes, you’ll need three.) Three-way, horn-loaded efficiency and precision. Realism. Impact. If even my ears could hear it, I can’t imagine what you’ll experience.

Roy said we couldn’t take pictures of the engineering lab. Masking tape with handwritten measurements, carpet-covered workstations, general debris of wires and bolts. It reminded me of my Grandpa Carter’s basement. Magic happens here. People put metal and wood and wires together and BAM – the world sounds a whole helluva lot better.

New song. Snares and high hats trembled. Listen to any piece with distinct, well-produced drums and you will not be disappointed. I thought someone could have been tapping high hats in the room with us. Incredible precision. The emotion in the room was palpable, broken only by Roy’s comment between songs: “I need a beer, bro.”

I’m not a beer gal, but I knew what he meant. Crisp, cold, bubbly, and smooth. Just like the iconic sound were being blessed by. I’m not sure any of us have truly heard music until we’ve experienced it the PWK way. And how the hell are we getting such bass without a subwoofer?!

The tinkling, classical orchestra music that came next. Talk about dynamic. The ding-a-ling of bells and chimes sparkled until – WHAM – the rest of the ensemble kicked into high gear. Then smooth, silky R&B slid through the air next. I decided the Khorns have the alchemical ability to turn air particles into velvet. I’m convinced of it. They delivered massive, rolling waves of bass and the gentle tap-pp-pp of the high hat in a way that goes through you.

I thought of the drive from Little Rock into Hope. About two hours, with exponentially more cattle as you go. Spotted brown and white and black. Unconcerned with the humans and their metal hides and rolling rubber feet. Grazing on grass as the sun set. The grey clouds threatening rain and the two-way road with little traffic. Americana, as seen in a polaroid picture…or out of the windshield of a rental Kia Seltos.

And I’m pulled back into the room as Roy reminisces about fishing. He mentions a recent catch of his before the next song, something poppy and in Spanish. I didn’t understand a word, but I did see two Mexican restaurants on the way to the Bonehead class. I want to dance, and I want queso.

The vibe – laid back, unpretentious, normal. Under bright fluorescent lights and bare demo room walls. Acoustic genius with no need for flash. Built by engineers that scatter their tools across wood slab desks. Driving past those cattle ranches and gas stations and knowing I’d get to where I was going when I got there. No rush.

And this kept happening. A new song would come on and my brain would drift off somewhere else. It’s why I’ll never be “a real audiophile,” whatever that means. I clearly lack the critical musical ear and attention span.

But the feelings. Those I got. Perhaps too much of. And the musicality and emotion brought out of these speakers?

I’VE ONLY EVER FELT THIS WAY AT A CONCERT

Someone asked Roy: what’s the headline? Describe the new Klipschorn in a sentence. The Bonehead paused, thoughtful.

“The iconic speaker that started Klipsch keeps up, and is never irrelevant.” 

The sound reproduction was incredible. It’s full, well-rounded, big. Dynamic and impactful. It didn’t beat you up – it wrapped you in a fuzzy blanket and blasted your brain with serotonin. I was just as moved by the music today as I was back when I heard Khorns for the first time.

Maybe this new Klipschorn will upset some purists. The AK6 was phenomenal and I can hear the arguments: the AK6 – such a legendary speaker, just keep it as-is.

But in that demo room…all I saw were feet tapping. Heads nodding. Moving air particles entered our ears and minds and made magic. In a word, it was dope.

The Dope from Hope.