Generously Serving Musicians Nya, singer / chanteur - Switzerland - 16 October 2009

Over ten years ago I participated in the recording of an album by a pretty well known French trumpet player. It turned out that the designers at Focal JM Lab liked the album a lot, to the point that they would listen to it as a reference when testing new speakers. Said trumpet player was endorsed and each of the band members was offered a pair of JM Lab speakers. This little anecdote is what Focal is about. The designers actually love real life music made by real life musicians and mixing engineers who earn a real life salary. Their products sound stellar with lots of musicality and the prices are reasonable. I still cherish those speakers to this day and do all my mixing and critical listening on them. I know that when the time comes to step up my monitoring chain it will definitely be Focals. There’s simply no other option. Thank you all at Focal for your dedication.

At the heart of the sound material and the music Gérard Chrétien, Vice President - France - 5 October 2009

In September 77, I met Jacques Mahul; Focal wasn’t born yet… It was the beginning of “L’Audiophile”, a magazine of the new Audio wave. It was about to arouse passions and catalyse a very simple urge: the improvement of sound reproduction, at the risk of shaking up many received ideas… and turning the manufacturers against us!

In September 90, I joined Focal, which was approaching its 11th anniversary, ready for new adventures… manufacturing adventures. Jacques was looking for a number 2 to help him in the development of the structure. The goal was to get a good industrial tool, to find the best skills in each field to build a very well-integrated company in order to have total control on our products. That was more than ten exciting years to learn, to build and to make the company grow up to maturity.

In January 2003, the industrial structure was then solid, the skills were there… Jacques asked me to relieve him and to take over the Home division’s destiny. Back to the products, with the intact urge to open up new territories. If technology was still deeply anchored in Focal’s genes, it wasn’t any more the only way that needed exploring. Design, use value, the new music listening modes… as many new dimensions to integrate to live new experiences!

In September 2009, we are celebrating Focal’s 30th anniversary, these new dimensions have now been integrated into the products, such as the Grande Utopia EM, Dôme and XS. One more forward step thanks to the genius of the new talents who came and enriched our teams.

Luckily, there are still limits to overstep. The music dematerialization is not anymore the devil it once used to be; it’s rather a new way towards progress for Focal. Our part is to reproduce and preserve all the subtleties and the integrity of the source, isn’t it?

With the new audio formats, truly in high-definition that will replace the CD, we will be able to cross new frontiers and then find back the lost pleasures of the analog sound without its limitations… All the more so as we’re now getting closer to the artists with our latest developments for the studios (thank you Jacques-Hubert!). As many opportunities for Focal to transcend itself, to increase even more the tremendous pleasure it is to penetrate at the heart of the sound material and the music.
Gérard Chrétien
Vice President
Focal JMlab

Sharing my passion Guy Bonneville - Directeur Division Car Audio - France - 2 October 2009

Passion is only worth when it’s shared. It’s the idea of sharing that made my passion grow. In my first car, I had made a nice installation and my great pleasure was to drive with my “buddies” while listening to my favorite cassettes. Everybody used to have his own “best of” and each joyriding was a chance to discover new songs and of course on Saturday nights, our discoveries were rather trendy… I used to be a DJ at the weekends, so I wanted to find back the sound I had at the disco in my car. As I studied electronics, I was always fiddling my installations trying to find the “perfect sound”. I’ve tried the best high-fidelity speakers at the time. Then in 1983 I bought my first Focal speakers and that was the beginning of a great adventure. I had the chance to meet Jacques Mahul and I quickly understood what was “the Spirit of Sound”. Since then, my system not only had to play at high sound level, but it also had to be as faithful and detailed as a JM-Lab speaker. In 1990, I officially integrated the Focal company. Twenty years later, I still feel the same pleasure to share my favorite music in my car… So I can say that Focal is not only a great brand but it also has the ability to feed the passion.

Guy Bonneville
Division Car Audio
Focal-JMlab

CK06, an architect house, designed by Pablo Katz, equipped with Focal products Hélène et Laurent - CK06 - France - 22 September 2009

Who could say that they don’t like listening to music, either relaxed in their living-room, or lying on the bed, or at work, under the shower or even dancing in a house at a party?!!

Not us, that’s for sure… We could even say that listening to music is a pleasure in our everyday life and a house without music would be like a car without a radio! For us at least, it was the same problem and the solution was obvious as well. We wanted to have sound in every room of the house, terraces and gardens included, with an invisible system, perfectly integrated and with a high-quality sound. In a project of a modern house, this idea is perfectly sensible, especially when everything is forecast, when the wiring is designed beforehand with the architect and when the choice of the products is relevant. As far as we’re concerned, we designed the system with the architect and we chose Focal products. The speakers are integrated in the walls and the ceilings (shower included), almost invisible, and the sound is of very high-quality. In the living-room, combined with the Home Theatre, we installed a 5.1 system with loudspeakers from the Electra line, fixed on the wall on a white lacquered, tailor-made box. Added to that, a subwoofer also tailor-made by Focal that goes under the fireplace…

After a few months in this house, the pleasure’s still the same and definitely we couldn’t live without such an integrated sound system. You can see our pictures on the website dedicated to our project: www.ck06.com

Hello my friends Marcello Giuliani, Bass Player - Switzerland - 22 September 2009

Hello my friends!! I’ve been working for 3 months with the CMS 50 in my home studio, where I make all my demonstration recordings and arrangements that generally end up in the studio, on the mixing console. I can find back my balance everywhere!
Today is my first day in studio with Françoise Hardy…
See you!

Cello

www.myspace.com/lecello