Any Young Audiophiles Out There?

I am 35, and for me it started at 6 when I got my first yellow transistor am radio for 5 cents at a garage sale. Since then music has been playing non-stop throughout my life, and it has been one upgrade after the next. I started working at a Hi-fi store when I was 19, which really opened my ears. High end audio is far from mainstream and not everybody is lucky enough to be exposed to it at an early age. When I was 19, none of my friends were interested, now at 35, none of my friends are interested. You either get it, or you don't, and I don't think age really has much to do with it. Finances yes.

Hey Hens,

My son is 4 1/2, he knows the difference between the super tweeter, tweeter and mid-range driver. He loves dancing, and he loves tubes, they make really cool designs in playdough.

Cool Hanaleimike!! My son still has so much to learn!:-) It's so great seeing just how much my son loves music. I feel sad for kids that don't get this exposure to music and good sound at an early age - I think it really does start this early!

I'm 32 and bought my first system when I was 21, shortly after my friends and I dropped in on the one and only hi-fi store in our little college town. We happened to have some favorite CDs with us--I remember the first thing we cued up was SRV's In the Beginning, through some electronics I don't remember and a big pair of bi-polar Definitive speakers--and it was a revelation. Despite the fact that I played guitar and owned a tube amp, it also marked the first time I'd seen a tube amp for audio--I wanted one.

By the time I'd saved my pennies, unfortunately that store had had to move out of its prime downtown storefront and into a tiny space in a strip mall miles away. Still, for $1000 I bought an NAD/KEF setup that kept me happy all through my low-paying post-college years and grad school. It's only in the past few years that I've gotten more into hi-fi as a hobby and caught upgradeitis--and gotten friends into it, too, as they've heard my system.

Part of my point here is that I wonder if as more brick and mortar stores close the kind of chance encounter I had is disappearing and with it some of the potential to grow the high-end. I am encouraged, though, because I teach on a college campus now and after a few years of Bose everywhere I see lots of students walking around with Grados and Sennheisers hooked up to their iPods. And when I use the Stereophile article on mp3 compression as an example in my tech-writing classes, a good number of students are already wise to lossless and uncompressed audio. I think the iPod via good headphones and uncompressed files is already leading more and more young people into the high end. And the current hipness of vinyl doesn't hurt either. Here's to it!

Hens, Hanaleimike,

I had no idea about high end audio until my dad brought me to Quintessence Audio in Morton Grove IL. I was 15 at the time and as soon as I saw the amazing tubes and wonderful speakers I was hooked for life. 10 years later my wife Ania and I started Nawrocka Distribution. Yes I am 26 and my wife is 25. We represent some of the finest Audio products in North American and I can honestly say I would have never started my own business in audio if it wasn't for my dad bring me to a high end audio store. My wife and I relax most weekends and through in our favorite CD and just listen for hours with the lights out. I think the key is not having a TV in our front room. All you have is the stereo.

Cole & Ania Hatfield
Nawrocka Distribution