Our Heritage

 

The story of Audio Note starts 30 years ago in Japan when Hiruyasu Kondo, son of a Buddhist priest, resigns from Sony/CBS, where he worked as a engineer, as he felt he couldn’t achieve his dream of building a better sound system.

 

Kondo San was in search of a particular sound that he was dreaming of. As a starting point, he arrived at the most simply circuit available, the Single Ended Triode (SET) amplifier. The same type of circuit first used in 1907 by Lee De Forest, inventor of the first Audio Amplifier.

 

However, Instead of improving the sound by making the circuit more complex, he started improving the sound by changing the materials of which the circuit was made.

 

Only when he started using Italian silver, as used in frets and strings of the famous Italian violins from Cremona (like the Stradivarius), all pieces fell together, and Kondo San finally achieved the sound he had been dreaming of.

 

 

Audio Note Today

 

Today Audio Note holds on to this heritage. Simple, elegant and time-proven designs combined with the best component quality and materials available on the planet. And when the right material or component is not available, then its crafted by hand at Audio Note.

 

We not only design and craft all equipment needed for ultimate music reproduction, like turntables, CD-players, amplifiers and loudspeakers. In our higher level products you’ll find the finest silver in wire, capacitors, resistors, transformers and other components, all hand crafted in-house in accordance with our heritage. We even make our own recordings, published under our own label; Audio Note Music. This all in order to achieve our ultimate goal; Musical Ecstasy.

 

Audio Note today is without competition. Its not without reason that Audio Note was featured in Rolls Royce’s Book - 'A Legacy Of Luxury’, as one of few companies who strive for perfection, regardless of cost or difficulty.  

 

However our company is not about snobbery, but about quality. Offering value instead of vapour. Not only for the richest, but also for the common audiophile, as Audio Note components can be obtained at both worldly and unworldly prices.

 

 

Not only a Brandname

 

Audio Note is a cult, not only a brandname. You will not find us when looking for us in regular shops. We will find you… when your path has deviated from the noise of the market to a truth that speaks for itself. Once the proud owner of even a single Audio Note component, the journey starts and a partnership of a lifetime commences. Not many investments will give such a high return in terms of pure pleasure, relaxation, pride of ownership and sheer immersion into the fine arts.

 

An Audio Note system is not only a talking piece. Its a personal and private asset for every critical connoisseur. A quintessential tool to escape from the challenges of every day life. Close your eyes and allow yourself to be transported to another time and another place. Only to come back as a better version of yourself.

 

 

Musical Ecstasy

 

A good music system is like a time/space machine, able to transport a musical event from a different time and location, and place it in the listening room. To do this convincingly, the recording needs to take on a lifelike persona. Not only the recreation of the musical message is required, but also the composers reading, the sheer emotion and sense of “being”.  

 

To achieve this is hard, as many correlations between technology and experience are not well understood. 

 

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Technology transforms into Art

 

We know that two pieces of equipment, roughly measuring the same, can sound vastly different. What does that say about measuring? Do we measure the wrong thing? Aren’t we measuring accurate enough? 

 

How is what we measure with instruments related to what we experience with our senses? Can we recreate an emotional event, just by putting our minds to work? You can’t measure sound quality with an instrument. Try measuring the taste of a Chateau Petrus. It is not possible.

 

At Audio Note we are not against mathematics, modelling, or measurement in any way. We routinely use all three to create Audio Note products. We have to, otherwise nothing would work. 

 

However, there are too many papers written purporting to hold the formula to creating the Philosopher’s Stone of audio. And, too often, they are written by people who haven’t created a single good sounding product in their entire career as an audio engineer. 

 

We feel this failure comes about due to a lack of understanding of the problem, which is to recreate a musical event, one which has meaning to a human listener, in the home.

 

The bounds set by mathematical and engineering rigour, artificially set due to thoughts taking place solely within the logical or Platonic world, limit the available dimensions of freedom, and therefore, acceptance that another could create something which works but which does not fit within those bounds. 

 

We guess here we could contemplate the work of Kurt Gödel, in our case, to say ‘not everything that sounds good is provable as to why it does’. And, conversely, ‘using logic and rigour will not reveal all that is available to us to create good sound’ - at some point we reach a level of blurred uncertainty, and the human element is required.

 

 

Our Mission

 

As home-theatre systems are designed to create special effects, and lifestyle systems to provide aural wall-paper, Audio Note systems are designed to create Musical Ecstasy. They seamlessly blend audio into music with vivid and lively power.

 

Our products are designed for the music loving connoisseur. Those who want to own the best money can buy, to enjoy an ecstatic experience at home. No amount of words will convince, we invite you to experience.

 

Every day we straddle the border between science and art. You don’t know where one finishes and other begins. For the love of music. That universal language capable of creating a shared visceral, emotional experience, regardless of what language you speak.

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For an In-Depth analysis the Audio Note products, please watch the video below by Real Hifi.