The History of Fried

The story of FRIED begins with the story of Irving "Bud" Fried.

Born in 1920, Bud fell in love with the art and science of sound reproduction when he heard the sound of Stokowski and the Philadelphia Orchestra emerging from the large theatre horns of his father's movie theaters. This was in 1928, the year movies began to talk!

Bud attended Harvard University (1938) where he fell under the sway of Professors Hunt and Pierce, who, under a Western Electric research grant, were conducting their monumental researches into high fidelity phono reproduction.

War came, and Bud served in the South Pacific, where even in Banika in the Russell Islands (ninety miles from Guadalcanal) he found music lovers listening to Mozart on the primitive playback equipment in the missionary churches of the English. Later he was transferred to the Free French Naval Air Force in Morocco, where he used the Armed Forces discs of Toscanini, Koussevitzky and Stokowski to convince the French officers that Americans, too, could be "Cultive": (cultivated). At war's end, he returned to Cambridge, Mass. and Law School, to "Koussy" and the incredible Boston Symphony, to Lenny Bernstein, and all those who love music.

In 1957, Victor Brociner, co-founder of Fisher Radio, was leaving the business and suggested to Bud that he become the official importer of the Lowther corner horns, the creations of P.G.A.H. Voight. In 1958, Bud became the importer of the revolutionary Quad electrostatic.

At the suggest ionof Saul Marantz, the IMF trademark was registered in 1961, a trademark that was in succeeding years applied to all kinds of advanced developments for music reproduction: cartridges (IMF - London, IMF - Goldring), tone arms (SME, Gould, Audio and Design), amplifiers (Quad, Custom Series), loudspeakers (Lowther, Quad, Celestion, Bowers and Wilkins, Barker, etc.)

In 1968 a British branch of IMF was opened. It was this combined Anglo-American company which produced the now legendary IMF Monitor, the first truly wide band loudspeaker the world had seen, examples of which are still being used today.

In 1975, by court arrangement, the English and American divisions of IMF were split, and the trademark FRIED was thenceforth used on all of Bud's designs. The new designs were based upon the same inexorable laws of acoustics that had created the IMF Monitor and made use of new technology as it became available. To enumerate a few FRIED benchmarks; the Model H System, the first modern satellite subwoofer system, the Model M (1977), the first satellite transmission line subwoofer in one unit, the SUPER Monitor (1978) which many still consider to be one of the premier speakers of our day, and the B satellite series (1976 to 1979).

All of FRIED's current models represent the company's dedication to the principle of evolutionary design development. Avoiding the tendency of many companies to give the latest design fad a whirl while tossing out well proven methods, FRIED builds upon its past and the immutable laws of acoustics while incorporating thoroughly tested new technologies. No other company or group of companies can lay claim to such distinction in the past, to the universal admiration for its designs, which are rooted in fundamental acoustic design principles. It has been said that the reason why only FRIED can create designs that it has is the input from learned sources all over the world, authorities on music and its reproduction. Their input is organized and incorporated into FRIED designs of the past and present.

Such devices as Series Networks, Satellite Subwoofers, Transmission lines, Line Tunnels, and Distributed Loading are used today in various FRIED models and by no other manufacturer in such advanced sophisticated ways. These are methods of sound reproduction which others have hardly thought of, or thought of ten years too late. One can begin to understand how this wealth of historic knowledge and its continuous redevelopment produces loudspeakers which in all ways far exceed more primitive designs in their ability to reproduce accurately the timbres, clarity, and dynamics of live music.

Fried Products Corporation is a Pennsylvania Corporation formed by a group of audiophiles, which included Mr. Fried. The Corporation's top management and design team, in aggregate, represents over 5 decades of collaboration with Mr. Fried on all aspects of loudspeaker design. Fried Products is a continuation of that knowledge and expertise; members of the team designed many of the legacy products and continuously advanced the designs.

Fried Products line of advanced loudspeakers uses state-of-the-art materials, driver designs and acoustic materials whenever appropriate to enhance the technology originally developed by Bud Fried. The design breakthroughs add to years of cumulative know-how--a craft and art not unlike that of the Renaissance Guilds--combined with state-of-the-art multidisciplinary breakthroughs.

Fried Products mission is to preserve, protect and advance the art and science of loudspeaker design pioneered by Bud Fried and implemented by our team. We are confident of continued, and continuing, success.

If you would like any additional information concerning FRIED loudspeakers, please call us at (610) 649-8774 or reach us via e-mail at info@friedproducts.com.