As a lifelong classical musician, I am painfully aware of the limitations of almost all speaker systems. A debilitating illness removed the possibility of a performing career, so I turned to composing and recording—and being married to a professional cellist and music scholar—as ways to stay involved with live music.
A few years ago I met Lyle Porter, a fellow audio traveller who is also a skilled cabinet maker and experienced speaker designer. Bernhagen-Porter was born. We both wanted to build speakers that could close the huge gulf between live acoustic music and reproduced. If there had been a product that was satisfyingly close, then we would have bought it and been happy, but we both realized that no one makes what we desire, so we needed to make such a product ourselves.
We think our years of development have yielded something unique and special. We hope, having heard the fruits of our labour, that you agree.
—David Bernhagen
"The Bernhagen-Porter 10/12s conveyed piano with a combination of articulation AND dynamic power that is very rarely encountered in music reproduction. They put the grand piano right in the room."
-CB, former Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab employee
"The star, though, was the debut offering from Bernhagen-Porter. The Model 10/12 Loudspeakers, featuring horn loaded treble, a 10" midrange driver, and a powered 12" driver for the bass, seemed to play everything significantly better than merely well. They're clearly a labor of love (an obsessively detailed kind of love, judging by the results). It was, to my thinking, among the best executed systems of the weekend—with a voice that grabbed on to every one of my weaknesses and shook. Given that there seemed to be twenty people shoehorned into this tiny room at any given time, I can't be the only person who thought that way. "
-Malachi Kenney, Positive Feedback