A History of High-End Audio Design by Gideon Schwartz

Too few books are devoted to hi-fi seen as an art of living and design. There is indeed the Sound Design by the Englishman David Attwood published by Mitchell Beazley, but it has not been translated and it is far from claiming the same iconographic richness as this new publication. Other works, still in English, have taken the angle of the representation of this hobby in advertising (Audio EroticaFuel éditions, April 2024), while most of those published in French rather approach the subject from a purely technical angle, with strong diagrams and electronic theory.

Gideon Schwartz traces a history of hi-fi, from the invention of the phonograph by Thomas Edison in 1877 to the last section entitled “2000s, the renaissance of analog in the post-digital era », putting into perspective, decade after decade, the underlying trends that mobilized the most prominent companies. It does this by focusing on the high end, the one that makes the audiophile dream of the absolute – it is therefore not, far from it, an encyclopedic approach.

Heroic times

A former lawyer and founder of the ultra-high-end audio equipment company Audioarts in New York, Schwartz is a hi-fi consultant for figures such as Rick Rubin (Def Jam, American Recordings) and James Jebbia, CEO of the house of Supreme sewing. He is also the author of Revolution : The History of Turntable Designstill at Phaidon. The introduction to his new opus offers an interesting look back at heroic times, where we learn in particular that Clément Ader, the pioneer of aviation, was also the inventor in 1880 of the Théâtrophone, the first telephone network connected to the Paris Opera allowing live and stereo listening at home. Connected music before its time… The 1950s were those of the rise of the tape recorder, the following ten were those of pop where stereo took over homes. Then come the seventies and the birth of high-end audio, which the 1980s enhanced by introducing the CD, passing the baton to nineties and what Schwartz brings together under the term “the return of the vacuum tube”.

The author has made choices: American and English brands are in the spotlight, as well as certain Japanese manufacturers such as Kondo Audio Note, Stax, Sony, Nakamichi or Marantz, and a smaller panel of European brands – for example, it ignores Nagra, but not Studer-Revox nor Thorens or EMT. Jadis (many) and Totaldac (very few) defend the French flag. An author’s book therefore, to be appreciated as such, and a beautiful journey facilitated by texts as accessible as documented served by an iconography quality.

A History of High-End Audio Design par Gideon Schwartz. Phaidon, 272 p., 69,95 €.