A Chat With Peter Henriksen Co-founder of Henriksen, Inc.

In your opinion, what is it in particular that sets Henriksen Amplifiers apart?

Recently, Mixdown was given the wonderful opportunity to chat with Peter Henriksen, the son with whom the late Bud Henriksen started the company in 2006, about everything from the brand’s genesis and evolution, to his personal product stand-outs in their compelling range.

Tell us a little bit about your background in the audio world - where did you get your start? Do you have any formal training/qualifications under your belt?

Bud started playing guitar at a young age, and he discovered jazz while in the US Army in the 1960’s. He was stationed in Colorado Springs where the legendary Johnny Smith lived, and stumbled upon him at a gig and his life was forever changed. Bud mis-spent much of his 20’s playing music, being a booking agent, sales rep for Kustom amps, “record producer” and at one point in time was a music store manager in Berkeley, California in the late 60's (Oh, the stories! He didn’t remember much of it, honestly. Who does?) He eventually got his act together and used his training in radio equipment from his time in the military to create a telecommunications manufacturing company in the 1980’s, Henriksen Data Systems, which was very successful and at its peak was a multimillion dollar enterprise with over 100 employees.

Is there a particular experience, or person, who inspired you to specialise in amplifiers? What is it about the tech that makes you tick?

I always tell people that Henriksen Amplifiers is really all Roger Sadowsky’s fault. When Bud retired, he wanted to play a lot more guitar, and after focusing on this for a few years started looking for a better archtop, finally settling on the newly available Jim Hall model from Roger Sadowsky. Jim Hall was a hero of Bud’s and he ordered it sight-unseen telling me, “hey, good enough for Jim Hall is good enough for me”. He ordered the guitar, and instantly fell in love with it the moment he picked it up (as is a common experience with Roger’s instruments). The problem was, now that he had a guitar he loved playing, he had to plug it into something for gigs. The state of amplification was in a bad place at the time; Polytone wasn’t in business anymore, and you couldn’t find a working one if you wanted to (Bud had to buy one from Canada to ship to the US, and it was broken and unfixable when it finally arrived). There were a couple of other options, such as Phil Jones and Acoustic Image, but neither of them had the tone that Bud wanted to hear from his Sadowsky guitar, so he finally just had to build one himself. He sent a prototype amp to Jim Hall, who loved the sound, and so Bud called me and asked if I wanted to quit my software engineering job and build guitar amplifiers with him. How was I going to say no to that?

From a tech perspective, it’s all about the unmolested signal; we don’t use shunt circuits or traditional tone controls, and always choose the highest quality audio components in our signal chain. Our philosophy is that tone is in your hands and your instrument, and the amplifier’s only job is to make that louder. This approach is not universal, it’s fairly specific to jazz and acoustic instruments because the predominant styles of rock and blues utilise the amplifier as part of their sound, but our niche in the marketplace is clean, warm, high headroom amplification for artists who just want the sound of their instrument, but louder. This makes us the amplifier of choice for players using modelling devices and elaborate pedal boards as well, because as an FRFR, ours is designed with instrument amplification in mind and doesn't have the cold, sterile feel of a PA system or powered monitor speaker.

Could you talk us through the process behind the creation of your amplifiers, from prototyping and design to construction?

When we prototype something, it’s fairly ugly. I mean, REALLY ugly. We just do proof of concept here. After that, we try to stick to Bud’s original philosophy of “let’s build 100 of them, and if we can’t sell those, well, it was a dumb idea.” We create a short production batch to make sure we can build them economically, and to test the market waters. After that, it gets pretty boring; we are a mostly solderless operation here in Denver, Colorado, almost all of what we do is mechanical assembly and testing, packaging and shipping, warranty service and repairs. Our PCB assemblies are done locally but not in our shop, as is our sheet metal, and our speakers and cabinets come from Eminence. We put it all together and play test every single amplifier before they ship.

What would you consider to be your hero, or stand-out products within the Henriksen range - are there certain models that certain types of performers/audio creatives have responded particularly well to?

The Bud, named after Bud Henriksen, is clearly our stand-out product. It’s become the amplifier of choice for gigging musicians around the world, we’ve seen them everywhere from coffee shops to amphitheatres, with jazz legends, singer-songwriters, bluegrass and classical musicians alike. They're small, but with 120 watts of power and all the features you need to professionally gig with and true to the tone of your hands and your guitar. It’s everything Bud ever wanted in an amplifier and, clearly, he wasn’t alone.

What’s next for the company? Do you have a strong vision for the future, or does the team like to work more intuitively?

We have quite a few designs already through the R&D process that we were going to launch… in 2020. As supply chains become more reliable, we intend on putting them out over the next couple of years, including an updated version of our 12AX7 Preamp Hybrid and a bass amp. For local enquiries regarding the Henriksen range, visit guitarfactory.net.

BY ISABELLA VENUTTI

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in focus: Cranborne Audio

Cranborne Audio have been making waves for some time now, and not just because of their sleek looks; their sonic footprint makes for really easy work when recording and mixing.

Cranborne Audio’s motivation for this is to take a “modern approach to vintage sound”, melding the best analogue components for saturation, grit, weight and clarity, with the most practical digital routing options for the best in modern recording technology. Analogue summing is an increasingly popular option for mixing, allowing mixers to mix in-the-box before sending sub groups out through analogue channels to impart a little uniformity to the vast array of plugins we have available in our DAWs.

While their affordable and practical preamps are becoming more popular, the 500-series versions are often being housed in Cranborne’s own 500 series power supplies. The 500ADAT and 500R8 power supplies offer more comprehensive options than most– particularly useful is the option to sum your sounds together to a final mix output, while you can always use the power supplies as a more standard rack via the channel’s direct outputs. The 500ADAT offers more streamlined, digital connections, while the 500R8 features MIDI in and out as well as XLR speaker outputs if needed. The 500R8 itself serves as a USB audio interface, complete with ADAT expansion, headphone outputs and a monitor controller section to toggle between multiple speakers, talkback and a monitor level control.

Cranborne’s sound is clean if you need it to be, but helpful options for extra saturation are always at your disposal. Their 500-series Camden preamps offer simple enough Gain controls, but the additional ‘Mojo’ knob allows you to blend in some extra vibe, and toggle between Thump and Cream. The 500-series Camden preamp is transformerless, making for a faster transient on the output, whereas the Mojo control is based on transformer grit and warmth. It’s important to state that the Mojo control is not achieved with a transformer, but instead is the result of a research project at Cranborne to discover what makes transformers sound the way they do. The result is a switchable transformer sound that can be removed from the signal entirely if need be.

More pragmatic options are also available with the N-22H Headphone Mixer, as well as full rack (dual mono) and half rack (mono) variants of the Camden with headphone mixers integrated. The N-22H is Cranborne’s headphone amp, designed to be small enough to be placed near a musician and simple enough for them to to use. The N-22 Stand alone C.A.S.T. breakout box accepts C.A.S.T. signal, and distributes it for headphone use. All this is to say that Cranborne has the end user in mind, and their products can serve as either the heart of your studio, or just a set of extra tools at your disposal.

Single preamps are always helpful to have, but a channel strip from Cranborne could do one better; their new Carnaby 500 Harmonic EQ being a great pairing with any of the aforementioned preamps. What makes the Carnaby so special? It’s a harmonic EQ, which effectively speaks to adding harmonics to a sound rather than a more conventional boost and cut. Saturation warms up sound, making it more present and ‘big’ sounding without becoming overbearing. While a conventional EQ might add the selected frequencies, a harmonic EQ adds frequencies progressively at different octaves of the selected frequency for a more tasteful effect. The Carnaby is a 3-band parametric EQ with input and output controls to tame or overload the module, and has Hi, Mid and Lo bands with +/- 10dB available. The Lo band is selectable from 20-420Hz, while the Mid offers 200Hz-6.2kHz. The Hi band allows you to push 25kHz for ‘air’ and headroom above our hearing, but you can affect anything from 5K and up. What’s more, the boost/cut is stepped for optimum recallability. It’s the little things that make up a piece as amazing as the Carnaby.

As a channel strip, the Camden into the Carnaby is a formidable signal chain. The Camden allows you to push and shape a signal, while the Carnaby offers the option to shape and cut what the Camden has built. Even with little to no EQ, the Carnaby just adds a little sweetness, the harmonic, saturated nature of the circuit doing its part. The ‘In’ switch toggles between engaging the Carnaby and taking it out of the circuit entirely; the module is set up to be true-bypass.

Cranborne Audio are a company melding the best of analogue and digital: digital routing options to send and receive signal, sum and eventually print elsewhere, with the best analogue components to add whatever saturation, heft and clarity you might need. Harmonic EQs add a particular colour to sound because of their design, adding saturation progressively at different octaves, and a little saturation never did anyone any harm. Whether you’re looking into their single 500-series modules like the Camden or Carnaby, or the standalone versions of the Camden of N-22H headphone amplifier, Cranborne build quality equipment to get the best out of your signal. Their 500-series racks incorporate the best of the digital world so you can maximise the best of analogue for a truly hybrid experience. Sending and receiving audio from multiple sources can become complex, so you’re best letting Cranborne handle it all for you.

For more info visit https://www. mixmastersproaudio.com.au/

BY LEWIS NOKE EDWARDS