Bill Putnam Jr essentially grew up in the music business. Bill’s father, Bill Putnam Sr., started Universal Audio in 1958 and was basically the inventor of the modern day recording consol...
Bob Rissi was the founder of Risson Amplifier Company, which produces Made-in-America products based on Bob’s own designs. He began designing amplifiers in 1960 when he was hired by Leo ...
Clive Roberts has wonderful memories of his parent’s passion for music. His mother played piano and his father performed his own songs on the ukulele-banjo for the troops during World Wa...
Bud Ross made his first amplifier for his own band in 1958 to save a little money. Within 5 years he had established Kustom Amps, a leader in product design and innovations. The powerful ...
Bob Rufkahr's long career in the music business began in retail in 1962! He later moved into wholesale and manufacturing before he formed his own company, Image Marketing in 1980. Along...
Mark Sampson and his friend, Rick Perrotta, formed Matchless Amplifiers in Mark’s kitchen back in 1989. Two years later they pulled all of their resources to exhibit at the NAMM Show in ...
DeWitt Scott knew about as much as a person can know about steel guitars! As a retailer he sold them, as a performer he played them, as a composer and author he wrote about them and as a ...
Verne Searer began working part-time for Crown International in 1963. He left to earn his engineering degree at Purdue and returned to Crown in 1970. He stayed nearly twenty more years wi...
Larry Shank joined Crown International in 1985 with a computer background. He had the goal of bringing computer technology to the product line. With the help of Dick Hyser, the inventor o...
Al Simpkins spent his career selling musical products. One of his former dealers was convinced Al could sell a block of ice to residents of the North Pole. His knowledge of the products a...
Kenny Smith serves as the Managing Director of the Peavey Hollywood store on Sunset Boulevard. However, this is only part of what he does in the shop. Kenny is a born salesman and enjoys...
Steve Soest played in several local rock bands and studied hard on the makes of electric guitars and amps, an expertise that came in handy around 1972 when he began repairing musical inst...
Mike Soldano says he was late to game, picking up the guitar when he was 20, but soon made up for lost time by jumping in with both feet! He studied the instrument and listened to live an...
Cassandra Sotos is the owner of AmpRx, which creates products, such as the BrownBox, to provide a safe range of optimized voltage reduction levels to improve sound and help protect ears a...
Gerald Stanley is without question one of the pioneers in pro audio, working as product engineer for Crown International for several decades. Over 45 patents have been issued to him over...
Wade Stewart entered the pro audio industry in the late 1960s when he worked alongside Bob Crooks, the founder of Standel Amplifiers. In the early 1970s he formed Wade Electronics and foc...
Mal Stich worked for the BC Rich Guitar Company from 1975 until 1985, which was an important time of growth for the guitar maker. Mal helped the company's founder, Bernard Rico, expand th...
Peter Stroud is probably best known for his work as guitarist with Sheryl Crow. While that gig may have helped Peter come to greater recognition, he first developed his love of gear while...
Dave Stuber was just out of high school in 1968 when he was hired to work as a technician in the tape recorder production of Crown International. The Elkhart, Indiana based audio company ...
Gary Sunda began building guitar amplifiers under the name Sunda in the 1960s before he was hired by Don Randall to create a new line of amplifiers, Randall Amps. Gary began designing pr...
Conrad Sundholm is the founder of Sunn Amplifiers and Biamp Systems, which revolutionized the music industry with several key design innovations, designs, and products. Although Conrad w...
Norm Sundholm was playing bass for the rock band The Kingsmen when he had a few ideas to improve his amplifier. As the band rose to fame, thanks to the recording of “Louie Louie,” Norm an...
Tom Szerencse worked his way up to an Engineering Group Manager overseeing Crown International’s design prototyping efforts. In the mid 80’s his team worked with the Marketing department ...
Mark Wentling is the CEO and President of Ashly Audio in upstate New York. As an engineer Mark established himself within the industry as a creative and passionate contributor to such co...
H. P. Wilfer inherited the passion and drive of his father who formed the Framus Guitar Company. After hard times and his father’s retirement, H. P. bought back the company to bring the m...
Florence Wilfer was born in France and was working for a musical distribution company when she met HP Wilfer, her future husband. The two have been working together at HP's Warwick Compa...
Trev Wilkinson began painting cars as a teenager and soon there after painted his own guitar, which started him on the road to guitar restoration and building. His long and fascinating in...
Tom Wittrock remembers the very moment he decided to dedicate his career to the guitar: when he purchased his first Les Paul sunburst in the mid-1970s. Many of his friends thought he was...
Ken Woodcox was an early adopter of computer technology when he proudly joined Crown International in the 1970s. Bringing his skill set to Crown and having the company embrace computers r...
Jim Wordinger was hired by the founder of Crown International, Clarence Moore, in 1972. While he started as a technician, Jim’s career developed over the years and expanded to engineer an...
Bruce Zinky loves playing guitar, but even at a young age he realized he enjoyed modifying instruments for himself and his friends. The Fender custom shop hired him in the early 1990s to...
