[Italian version]

For the sake of younger readers, some 20-30 years ago, companies like SAE were the dreams of all us avid audiophiles, then came others. Very few knew, myself fortunately being one of those that did, that behind all these revered names and milestone products, stood one man - James Bongiorno. This gentleman deserves at least a book, but for the time being, you'll have to be satisfied with a small interview. I all but gave up on ever meeting him, but thanks to the omnipotent, ubiquitous Internet, some dreams in life did come true, and this is one of them. It was well worth waiting for.

But enough of me already - Mr Bongiorno, the floor is yours!

TNT-Audio >
Mr Bongiorno, over the decades, you have been associated with many famous names in audio, such as SAE, GAS, Sumo and others. You are quoted in books, magazines and texts dealing in audio. How did you start out and where, and why audio?

JB >
I started when I was very young, about 10 to be exact. I was studying classical and jazz accordion with one of the greatest musicians in the world, Russ Messina, in Buffalo, N.Y. This was in 1953 and at that time the accordion manufacturers were changing the style of the instruments from open grills to closed grills. They also added tone chambers and felt muting under the grills to make the instrument sound more mellow. Unfortunately, This also made the instrument much harder to play inasmuch as one had to pump the bellows harder to get volume. At this point the industry made the jump to amplification which obviously made the instrument much easier to play. Along about this time, our teachers and other great accordionists started making recordings. Being a kid made it difficult as we didn't have any hifi gear. What we did was to obtain say a Bogen turntable with a ceramic (high output voltage) cartridge and plug it directly into our instrument amps. Also, the cartridge didn't need to be equalized either. The instrument amps were also very rugged because they originally had to support guitars and electric basses and could also play LOUD. As I got older, I moved into electronic organs with Leslie speakers, etc. All of these things however, didn't really have that great a sound quality. So this is how I migrated into designing hifi gear.

My first job was working for Wurlitzer however, at that time (1959) I still had the desire to be a great musician and so for many years I vacillated between being a technician and being on the road as a musician. In 1965 I got hired by Dawson Hadley to be his right hand man. He had a problem with Parkinson's disease and was shaking badly and needed me to be his hands. I learned quite a bit from Dawson. I wasn't there very long and I went back on the road. I then saw an ad in the back of Audio magazine from Marantz Co. I then started a communication channel with the great Sid Smith who was Chief engineer. After about six months of talking he hired me. This was my shortest job in history. I (and everyone else) could not get along with the new general manager at Marantz-Flavio Bronco. We called him the South American dictator-he was bad news. Anyway, I kept up my communication with Sid which turned out to be a 35 year span up until his unfortunate recent death. I then spent several months working for Harry Kolbe at Audio Workshop in NY where I really got shafted by this criminal character. I won't go into details. I then got hired by Rectilinear Research (Morris Weiner-another even bigger criminal) to redesign the Rectilinear III loudspeaker (and the VI and the X also). This I did AND NEVER GOT PAID. End of story. I then went back into the music business for another few years and in 1972 was hired by David Hafler to replace himself at Dynaco as Chief engineer. There I designed the Stereo 400, and also made contributions to the AF6 am/fm tuner. (I designed the 10kHz notch filter and the low distortion dectector). After a year there I was hired by Morris Kessler and Ed Miller to be the Director of engineering at SAE. The rest is history.

TNT-Audio >
How did SAE come about, and what did you do there?

JB >
SAE was founded by Morris Kessler and Ted Winchester in around 1969. They were never a happy couple however. After a while, Morris bought out Ted's interest. I was originally hired to replace Ed Miller doing tuner design. But Morris was immediately made to realize (by me of course) that he was NOT an engineer and therefore, I would not stay at SAE unless he removed himself from engineering. He had no choice as I said to him "take it or leave it". Morris acquiesced and for the next couple of years I designed all the products.

TNT-Audio >
Why did you quit SAE and what happened to the company later on?

JB >
Actually, I never intended to quit SAE. The Ampzilla project was originally supposed to be just a construction article for Popular Electronics Magazine and Morris and I would have a little kit company on the side. After the unit had been designed, built, submitted to the magazine and I was paid for the article, Morris suddenly got cold feet about the project. No need to go into details here but he offered me a choice: either quit the project and stay on as Director of Engineering or quit SAE and follow my dreams. Since my neck was already stuck out a country mile I had no choice but to quit. SAE lasted for about another 10 years before going down. Enough said.

TNT-Audio >
Later on, you founded Great American Sound, or GAS. One of your best known models there was a power amp called Ampzilla. Beside demonstrating your sense of humor, what was GAS to you?

JB >
There was no later on. I left SAE to start GAS. Even though I was the principle owner of GAS I made the very bad mistake of giving away too much of the company to partners. This later turned out to be very bad judgement on part. It was a fiasco to say the least and the 4 other partners were totally out of touch with reality and had absolutely no direction. After 3 years of annoying grief from these guys I decided to make them buy me out. I gave them 3 more years before I said they would be out of business. The irony is that 3 years to the month, they went bankrupt. The end of a glorious dream due to ego and monumental stupidity.

TNT-Audio >
What happened to GAS later on?

JB >
GAS went under due to very bad marketing mistakes and absolute fiscal irresponsibility. When I sold out, the grand total of debt of the company was $220,000. When they went bankrupt, the debt total was $1.6 million.

TNT-Audio >
Next you founded Sumo. When it hit the market, it was something of an instant success, and continued to be so for some years. Then it slowly disappered, like it seems every company you establish does after you leave it. What happened there?

JB >
I originally had 2 other partners when I founded Sumo. They were Japanese. I very soon discovered however, that they were trying to use me as a patsy. They expected me to do all the designs and marketing AND fund the whole thing with the products being made in Japan. And I was only going to get 1/3 of the deal? I told them to go fly a kite with that crap. Unfortunately I had already registered the name both here and in Japan and had already designed the two cartridges and printed all the material that goes with the effort so I had to continue with the name. I had Sumo for about 5 years. What shot me down was that a first operation for Liver cancer in 1978 ended up being unsuccessful and the tumor came back with a vengeance around 1982. At that time I was told I would not survive so I sold the company. Fortunately, for some unknown reason, the tumor stopped growing but started up again in 1985. This time I was fortunate enough to find the most competent liver surgeon in the world, Dr. Thomas Starzyl in Pittsburgh. He saved my life. Why do companies go down after I leave? It's very simple. These people failed to realized a couple of old adages. First, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" and second, if there is an ongoing successful business plan, why change it.

TNT-Audio >
Now you have Ampzilla2000. What are you preparing to do now? Go on from where you left off, or do something entirely different?

JB >
I kind of think that everything I've ever done is different. I do not subscribe to the philosophy of "that's the way it's always been done, so that's the way we'll do it. Rarely in audio design have true innovations been made. 99% of all of the products ever made have always been copies or clones of someone else's original work. I made a solemn vow after the Dynaco 400, which was partly Sidney's driver circuit coupled with my new series output stage, that I would never again use someone else's ideas in my designs. I do believe that so far I have kept that promise. As a matter of fact, my dual-differential, full complementary circuit has to be the most copied topology in all of audio circuit design history. There must be something right about it. The new Ampzilla2000 uses some of my previous ideas and some new concepts. The output stage is identical to my previous Sumo designs mainly because it has absolutely NO instability factors whatsoever. In addition, even up to full power, the total distortion products are below .1% all the way to 20kHz OPEN LOOP WITHOUT FEEDBACK. Also, the input stage is virtually identical to the Sumo design with a little twist of a local feedback loop which complements the servos. The real magic is in the second stage which is radically new and I'm not yet going to comment on it.

TNT-Audio >
You have always been something of an "enfant terrible" of the audio industry, forever a non-conformist. For example, in a fad era when everybody is throwing away everything they can in their "KIS" (Keep It Simple) efforts, you are advocating tone controls. How come?

JB >
Tone controls are mandatory. Can anyone show me a flat room? Doesn't exist in nature. And the problems are always at the frequency extremes. I will never make a preamp without tone controls. To do so would be sheer stupidity.

TNT-Audio >
If you had to pick one out of many amplifier design aspects, such as stability, load tolerance, good phase response, no slew rate limiting and so forth, what would be your No.1 factor, beside the obvious noted above?

JB >
There is no one design factor that is above or more important than all the parameters that make up a good philosophy. EVERYTHING is important because it's all in the mix. As far as the final performance of the product, I am more concerned with the character of the distortions rather than just the numbers, per se. This is what really separates the men from the boys, so to speak.

TNT-Audio >
We see today that the so-called high end has done away with headphone jacks altogether. Do you think this is reasonable and do you believe in headphones?

JB >
I have always hated most loudspeakers for many reasons. Mostly because very few loudspeaker designers actually have a clue regarding acoustics. Therefore, I have been a very avid listener and user of headphones.

TNT-Audio >
If you wanted to buy a preamp today, what would you look for?

JB >
To be quite frank, I haven't seen a single preamp in the history of the world that I would ever consider using other than my Thaedra. There has been nothing in the history of audio past or present that is even in the league of this unit. It's amazing that in the 25 years since I conceived of that unit, nothing has ever come close even up to today. This unit, refurbished, will still beat the pants off of ANYTHING that has ever been done. If this sounds like I'm arrogant and beating my chest, so be it. I deal with facts and not fantasy and I can prove what I say.

TNT-Audio >
How do you view loudspeakers? Everybody has their own views - some want efficient, other say efficient is crude, some want big, some demand small, ...

JB >
I think that I already answered this question. Until the loudspeaker designers begin to understand what real world acoustics are, we are not going to see very many decent speakers. I think that all of these so-called designers are truly in la-la land.

TNT-Audio >
Valve (tube) or transistor? Bipolar or MOSFET? IGBT or hybrid? Any views, pros and cons?

JB >
To be honest, it doesn't matter whether a product is made with donkey manure. The only thing that is important is the final performance. The only drawback to tubes of course is the limitations of the output transformer although I have seen at least one unit that is quite astonishing in its low frequency performance. (I will not divulge the identity of this unit). As far as MOSFETS go, I don't like them, never did and never will. They make good devices for power supplies but not for audio. Bipolars are the only way to go. Again, this seems to be true as 98% of all the design engineers favor them.

TNT-Audio >
Mr Richard Fryer of Spectral says that to get the real sound at the end, you need to buy a one-make lineup, so the same philosophy drives the electrons from input to output. What are your views?

JB >
Mr. Fryer is obviously stating a marketing philosophy which has absolutely NOTHING to do with valid scientific principles. Is one to believe that if one bought only his preamp, then the system would not sound very good? And the other way around if one bought only his amp and used some other preamp. This is pure gobbledegook and nonsense and makes absolutely no sense. This is the same guy who has intimated in their advertising that their 300 Watt mono amp has a power bandwidth approaching 5 MHz. He is obviously from la la land with this claim as it is NOT possible in the real world to come even anywhere close to that. While I have great respect for his partner, Keith Johnson, one should take what they claim with a grain of salt. Consumers on the other hand may have a desire to have equipment all from the same manufacturer and they can't be blamed for that.

TNT-Audio >
Over the years, you have met practically everybody who is anybody in audio. Do you have any favorites you would like to mention, anyone whose work you admire for some reason? Company or man?

JB >
Yes I have met virtually all of the important people in audio over the years and have worked for and with a few of them. Without a shadow of a doubt, the greatest of them all was the late Sidney Smith, formerly of Marantz Co. who gave the world all those great tube products and also the fabulous Model 15 solid state amp. In addition, he did most of the work on the Sequerra Model 1 tuner. Secondly of course, is Dick Sequerra, probably the most brilliant of all of the designers in the FM world. Also of mention was the late Ed Miller who was also a very smart FM designer and taught me most of what I know, as well as being one of my partners. Next is the late Dr. Lester Field, who for all purposes was without any doubt, the absolute most brilliant scientist that I have ever met and, also one of the most brilliant men in the scientific world. He taught me how to think straight. Lastly, I would like to mention Bascom King, who has been a friend for over 25 years and he is also a very smart audio engineer. He has also helped greatly over the years.

TNT-Audio >
Any particular advice you would like to give, and after all these years, you certainly deserve to be asked?

JB >
Advice is hard to give when dealing with an industry made up of gigantic egos wherein credentials are in short supply. Not only have we as a society lost sight of true musical culture (just examine the garbage that people listen to today) we have lost sight of the goal of music reproduction. Not until our industry begins to recognize that the primary goal is to capture REALITY, and the secondary goal is quality, shall we get back on the proper track. The right questions are not being asked and therefore the answers are not forthcoming.

Copyright © 2001 Dejan V. Veselinovic - http://www.tnt-audio.com