Sigma Sound Studios announces the Sigma Sound Studio Direct Box ($695), which is available for a limited run. It was developed by audio pioneer Joe Tarsia, who remembers when he and several engineers and audio fanatics created Sigma Sound Studios “wire by wire, component by component” around a 12-input console and 8-track tape machine.
Tarsia built the first Sigma Sound Studio Direct Box as a general-purpose unit for keyboards, electric bass and guitar. The results became a part of the signature sound heard on hits from artists as O’Jays, Lou Rawls, Teddy Pendergrass, The Stylistics, The Spinners, MFSB, Grover Washington Jr. and Patti LaBelle.
After Tarsia retired, a musician friend of his asked him to re-create this unit and he considered making a few. However, after several months of exhaustive searching, Tarsia found that the high-quality audio transformer that was at the heart of the box had been out of production for years. He eventually located 50 of these rare transformers, and assembled and signed the units.
“The day Sigma opened its doors, and for the 35 years that followed, it was the only DI I used for recording musicians like Ronnie Baker, Gerald Veasley, Steve Beskrone, Bob Babbitt, Anthony Jackson and many others,” Tarsia says.
For more information, visit Sigma Sound Studios at www.sigmasoundstudios.com and its distributor, Studio Logic Sound, at www.studiologicsound.com.
