Mapleshade Studio & Upgrades

When people first hear about Mapleshade, there’s always a barrage of questions. “Why do you record on analog tape?” “Can wires really make my stereo sound better?” “Why are Clearview wires so thin?” We’ve tried to address the common questions about our CDs and products on other pages. But there's a good question we've missed, one delicatly posed by one of our musicians on his first call to our Studio: “What’s this Mapleshade shit?” It's a reasonable question, considering our not-quite-conventional approach to recording and good sound. Here’s a brief sketch of how the pieces of the Mapleshade puzzle happened to fall together by Pierre: 

"Mapleshade is actually my third career. I’m proud of my previous defense and statistical consulting careers, but recording music and improving sound is the most satisfying thing I’ve ever done. Born in France in 1937, I grew up in New York, graduated from Yale in aeronautical engineering and French Lit, then went on to a Cornell M.E. in mathematical statistics and operations research. Coming back to New York, I worked as a consulting statistician for Grumman Aircraft and immersed myself in the city’s fertile jazz scene.

In 1986 I started Mapleshade Studio, immediately after my old friend Shirley Horn asked me to record her Softly album, my first pro gig. By 1988, I was recording people like Clifford Jordan, Walter Davis, Jr., Gary Bartz, and Leon Thomas, making my own microphones, and manufacturing my first thin solid core interconnects and speaker cables. 

In 1990, I launched the Mapleshade label to produce unusually creative jazz, blues and gospel music recorded with the purest, closest-to-live sound in the industry. We achieved national distribution in 1993. A year later, I started Wildchild! to record, in the same way, other traditional genres like R&B, Irish, country, bluegrass and world musics. In 1999, we added Mapleshade Classical to bring unprecedented spontaneity and “liveness” to the classical repertoire. 

Also In 1990, I met my design partner Ron Bauman. A graduate EE from Lehigh University and president of inSound Inc., Ron is a world class authority on RF communications as well as a brilliant audio circuit designer. We hit it off instantly, formed our Mapleshade/inSound wire manufacturing partnership, and began our ongoing 25 year research program to develop, from a blank slate, the world’s least compromised, best-sounding audio wires. By 1991, we had launched the cost-is-no-object Omega Mikro line encompassing the world’s thinnest, least dielectric-laden cables and interconnects—and pioneering the voltage-biased shield system now being widely emulated by other manufacturers. 

In 1998, we debuted our Clearview line with the design goal of offering excellent sounding cables with a modest price tag that surpass wires costing 10 times as much. Also in 1998, I launched the first generation of Mapleshade’s Vibration Control System and CD treatments."

Pierre passed away in 2021, we miss him every day.