BUILDER PROFILE > EPIFANI
For example, at the time, nobody was really
making a 1x10 or 1x12 cab. People needed
a cabinet to take on the subway and taxis,
and that’s where the idea for the UL (Ultra
Light) lines was born.
NYC obviously influenced your product
development. Could you have done this
in another town?
Chicago comes to mind, but I design my
cabs and amps around the players. So being
in touch with them throughout the years
has helped, and New York has a lot of
great players in a relatively small space. In
visiting all the underground clubs over the
years, I would bring a cabinet or two by
the club and get input from the best play-
ers anywhere, while spreading my name
throughout the community of musicians.
The biggest stars would frequent the tiny
clubs to pick touring musicians, and it
would end up being this crazy jam session
of historic proportions. It was good to be a
part of that.
Redefining Quality Carefully crafted construction with details like scalloped bracing are augmented by a deep list of features that include Fishman® electronics and a solid Sitka spruce top to deliver a level of quality that you can hear and see. MR710F • Solid Sitka Spruce Top • Mahogany Back & Sides • Fishman® Electronics • Scalloped Bracing • Genuine Bone Nut & Saddle
When did you start feeling less
like a boutique company and more
mainstream?
When we started selling more gear
[laughs]! Seriously, we had the NYC
line of cabinets, which was the 115,
215, 112, 110, 210, 310, 410, and
610. Working with Eminence yet
again, over the course of two years we
developed an efficient neodymium
speaker. This put the speaker weight
down to 4. 6 pounds each, and we used
Italian poplar rather than plywood,
which cut cabinet weight in half. The
UL series was the result, with the UL
410 cab weighing 56 pounds. This
was the next big step in our company’s
growth. Once the UL was reviewed in a
national publication, it took on a new
meaning for our company. Our innovations—bracing, 80-ounce magnets, and
speaker designs—were being noticed by
the big boys, and they started having to
redesign and play catch-up. At NAMM,
the other builders would visit and talk
about my innovations—which was a
big compliment. As we have grown
through the years, I have noticed more
and more backline companies coming
to me with requests for gear. That is a
huge step forward as the word spreads
around the globe.
Speaking of innovation, you have a new
development in your D.I.S. T. cabinets.
Yes! The Dual Impedance Speaker
Technology is something we are very
proud of. Every speaker in the world has a
single voice coil. We are the first to develop a dual voice coil, with a user-selectable
8Ω or 4Ω impedance, which allows single
or multiple cabinet use. We can put them
in series or in parallel. Nobody else has
been able to perfect this feature.
See, feel and hear one today
at a Cort dealer near you.
cortguitars.com
Cort USA 847.498.6491
since 1960
Let’s talk amps.
I had three tube preamps early on
that never made it to production. The
cabinets were selling well, and we were
quite busy with those. And, honestly,
lack of manpower and capital kept
amps out of our lines—but not off
our radar. This was in 1999. We had
a design for a digital amplifier at the
time, years before bass amps started
shrinking. We could have made very
small, powerful amps, but listened to
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