Custom Altec A7 Voice of the Theater

September 2026

For Sale!

Altec. A name almost synonymous with high-fidelity, and a brand I’ve followed from the beginning of my vintage hifi obsession. With drivers like the 755A, a legend of full range performance, the horn coaxial 601C, and even Altec’s muscular 1569A power amps all rotating through my room over the past 20 years, I’ve spent a lot of hours enjoying Altec gear. And now one of the most iconic Altec designs of all time, the mighty Voice of the Theater A7 speakers are here, and what a presence they have. Perhaps one of the most revered speakers of all time, the sound from the A7 is both graceful and majestic (and sometimes unbelievably real and present), and in the re-imagined form mine have taken, they stand in as both fine furniture as well as high-pedigree living room horns.

I’ve had a long fascination with big horns, but knew in my heart that the good ones are just too big for my rooms. In the past I’ve owned a few horns, but with mixed results. A pair of corner placed SpeakerLab Klipschorn knockoffs absolutely overwhelmed my small room many years ago and they never did sound right to me. And of course they are not real Klipsch, so I can’t make statements about the real deal yet, but I do have my suspicions. Klipsch’s own Heresy, Forte 3 and Chorus have all had their chance, but as you see none of those are featured anywhere on my page. One big success, the incredible ElectroVoice Georgian, still does mono duty from the corner of my small room and it is a delightful speaker to listen to. But the Voice of the Theater certainly has been at the top of my target list.

Altec’s A7 “Voice of the Theater” speaker first appeared in 1947 and were designed for full range sound in small theaters, often hidden behind the screen. The big horns were durable and road-worthy, and plenty of A7 boxes were used for public address, out on tour at small venues, and as studio monitors, etc. And of course plenty of them ended up in homes across the US, and later Japan, being used as audiophile speakers. And rightfully so. Given the space to breathe, a horn like the A7 has an ability to wake up and pull the curtain back on a good recording in a way that can be starling and maybe even shocking to those new to the sound of horns. They can have a scale and a live and living feeling that is hard to convey in words, but easy to appreciate in real space. They play pretty much every type of music well, and without compromise. And with fairly high efficiency, the A7 allows even a small amplifier to unfurl its charms and show what it has to offer.

The pair featured here are a one-of-a-kind re-imagined design of the A7, made to be far more living room friendly, and were expertly built by a cabinet maker in New York. They look luxurious and very high end, with deep wood tones and grain, and overall have a very calming presence; like something from Tannoy or Lowther meant to be shown off in the finest of living spaces. The Altec 515b bass drivers and 802d/511 compression drivers and horns are all vintage. The speaker’s previous owner had collected them over time and sent the woofers to Great Plains Audio for restoration. A JBL super tweeter was added to the design, and crossovers were built by Werner Jagusch in Germany to allow flexibility in the loading of both the horn and tweeter. Wheels were added to allow ease of movement, and the whole package is top shelf in every way. At 66 inches tall, 30 inches wide and 24 inches deep, they weigh in somewhere around 200 lbs. each. When I purchased them, I needed to rent quite a large panel van and drive 16 hours roundtrip to collect them, but the time and effort were well worth it. Arriving home with the goods, it took some considerable help to get these huge cabinets inside and setup without a scratch, but powering them up for the first time with McIntosh and AC/DC was a fun experience, and I stood there in a kind of awe at the speed and presence from Back in Black. This is how that music should sound! But of course the enormity of the large speaker’s physical presence was also quite stunning. These are BIG speakers and they certainly make a statement in the room, immediately transforming my living space into some kind of audiofool version of paradise and eliciting surprised and unbelieving reaction from all visitors. I love it.

So how do they sound? Incredible of course. On the “right material” the sound can be absolutely riveting with the Altec A7 and a quality tube amp of almost any kind. And these speakers are flexible! Powering right up with just the one and a half watt from my Yamamoto 45, the A7 also sounds grand and inviting (and even more powerful that I had imagined) with a 30 or 40 watt push pull amp like the McIntosh MC240 or Luxman’s LX-38U. There is detail and presence and an ease infused into the spread out performances in almost all acoustic music, jazz of any stripe seems ideal and even heavy metal like Slayer or Kreator sound about right. Bass is not over present by any means, these are not bassy speakers, but nor is the bass absent. I find that in my room the A7’s bass response is adequate for most musical reproduction. Home theater might want that subwoofer for explosions and so forth, but that’s not my application. And the midrange of the A7 is quite special, with an upfront and in the room presence. For music of all kinds these are good speakers that don’t need to apologize for any shortcomings.

But still, they are not the “be-all-do-all” that I might have hoped for. These big horns need some space, but they take up a lot of it too. You need a big room for them. Ideal listening distance for the A7 seems to be somewhere around 12 to 15 or more feet away, and in our bigger combined kitchen/dining/living room space that can work. But most of the actual seating is closer to the speakers than that, and those positions are close enough to feel the gap in the response. The horn simply needs some space to open up. So in our room, standing in the kitchen making dinner, sitting at the dining table, or wandering around the house doing things is actually more rewarding listening than sitting down directly in front to of the speakers on our couches at 8 or 10 feet away. At those closer distances the A7 can have more of a “two separate driver” sound rather than feeling like a completely integrated and coherent source. But from a farther distance the sound is involving and realistically sized, and in some cases supersized. It can be invigorating, and feels like a real performance maybe more convincingly than any speaker I’ve owned to date. But again it needs some room to make that magic happen.

I’ve had a wonderful experience with the big Altec A7, and I’ve enjoyed firing them up a few times a week with so many amplifiers that I could never use before in my big living room. Bozaks just don’t light up with 2 watts. The A7 sure do! But ultimately, they are just too big for my room and things have become too crowded. What a treat they’ve been to own though. If I had a castle, or ran a wedding hall or ballroom, or lived in some humongous McMansion with a 1500 sqft living room, these would be my go-to for easy room filling fidelity, even with a small SET amplifier. If you have the space, I think these are end game speakers that are sure to satisfy. I’ve had a ball with them!

I feel that these are about the finest looking loudspeakers of any kind that I’ve ever seen, certainly in person. And they sound as good as the look; super fast with big images and a sense of ease to their presentation, but still very present and incisive. This is the horn high water mark for me.

Beautiful wood tones and Altec Green work so well together.

Werner Jagusch crossovers allow a lot of flexibility to tune the horn and super tweeter up and down. Crossovers are critical for a horn speaker, and these are some of the best ever designed for Altec. I’ve only experimented a small amount with these settings.

The JBL Super tweeter is an upscale departure from the original A7 design, a modern update. I must admit that I’m not sure if I can even hear them.

The recess-able wheels are a huge plus for these speakers, making it easy for one person to reposition or even put away the speakers.

Here soon after arrival, powered by 60 watt per channel Psvane 845 monos. In the beginning I experimented with a lot of placement options, pushing the speakers all over the place seeing what worked best. In the end I often just kept them next to each other. Most of my listening is from quite a distance, and I found that my room just isn’t wide enough to place the speakers far enough apart. But the speakers throw a huge enough soundstage that even placed close together it still sounds like a stereo image rather than a big mono picture.

John Hogan 300B.

SE EL84 is plenty of juice for the Altec A7! Its so funny seeing this tiny amp drive the huge speakers.

Here with the magical Alpa 300B monos.

Here with SE 6C33C amps. Meaty sounding even on the Altecs.

Here with a fabulous 6LR8 SPUD amp by Radu Tarta.

Our beloved Toby passed in July 2026 at almost 12 years old. I really miss my listening partner.