apogee resurrected

http://www.apogeeacoustics.com/

it is true, apogee is coming back but this time, it is a different company.

let me tell you my apogee story.

actually, it is apogee that got me enchanted in the world of planars, not magnepan. my first and only apogee was the magical apogee centour minor, a ribbon hybrid that was sold for only SGD2,500 in 1991. i bought it from raymond of ultralinear in adelphi.

the apogee minor gave me countless hours of good music. i was awed by the delicacy of the ribbons and the sounstaging prowess of the small apogee. i knew i couldn't go back to box speakers since then.

but sadly, jason bloom was sued by magnepan for infringing one of the patents on ribbon design and the company went into all sort of troubles before it went bust somewhere in the mid 90s. jason bloom died in the late 90s but the world over is still worshipping apogees.

someone in brisbane australia by the name of graz was so inspired by apogee that he mastered the art of duplicating the apogee ribbon tweeter and he gave apogee owners a glimmer of hope in resurrecting their old beloved apogees. graz provides ribbon parts to apogee owners all over the world.

i visited graz in 1990 in brisbane and listened to his own creation, called the perigee, a ribbon hyrbid speaker. i wasn't impressed. subsequently graz launched the perigee worldwide but the reception from audiophiles were lukewarm. it was simply way too expensive and the sound wasn't great.

fast forward to today. graz has decided to resurrect the apogee acoustics marque. this is a totally different company from the one that jason bloom started. rumours has it that he is going to launch a new model called synergy 1.5

graz emphasized that what he does is repairing, remanufacture and developing new products; it is not about the corporate growth and high profits, but about advancing planar speaker development, and turning out a small number of products especially for people that like the sort of work. whilst he has absolutely no material ties to the original apogee acoustics company, the goals and enthusiasm of the original team are certainly present in what he does with his team in brisbane.

i can't wait to hear the new syngery 1.5!