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In 1989 two music loving friends from a/d/s, Michael Kelly and David Marshall commenced a journey to build high value loudspeakers from state of the art, custom designed drivers, crossovers, and cabinets.
At a/d/s Michael oversaw the production of 10,000 drivers a year at the height of production and knew in his heart he could do higher quality, high value drivers that would give accuracy to music reproduction. David Marshall’s expertise in electrical engineering provided a perfect match to design top quality, phase correct crossovers.
For two solid years meticulous and exacting full-time work were invested into the dream. Drivers were custom designed and fabricated including 1″ titanium-dome tweeter, 5.3″ dual Kevlar/epoxy-laminated-cone
midrange unit, and 10.7″ bi-laminate composite-cone woofer. The two then worked together to design a cabinet beyond reproach. For example, the head unit could either be very large and made of 4 inches of MDF (overwhelming a reasonable listening space) or it could draw on the expertise of Michael and David’s materials and manufacturing expertise forming a cast material specifically designed for the task. That material is trademarked as Novalith. However, keeping in mind the idea of a value priced high performance product they only employed this special material where necessary. The result was a speaker true to their vision of high value. To further the vision David Marshall designed a phase accurate crossover. He focused on a 24 dB per octave design that allowed each drive
unit to function in its optimal range. The result is the Aerial Acoustics 10T a speaker that is still treasured for its tonal accuracy and dynamic range.
The accolades came but Aerial Acoustics remained true to its business vision to not grow too quickly so each customer receives undivided attention, each speaker lovingly built and each employee receives support. But grew it did, a testament to the value of clear vision and solid technology backed by patience and kindness. If you call today Michael still picks up the phone and David still designs the crossovers and makes sure every speaker is perfect before it ships
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Michael Kelly is the President and Designer of Aerial Acoustics, which he started in 1989 and incorporated in 1991 near Boston. He attended high school in Raleigh, NC, later earning his undergraduate degree in Physics from NC State University.
He moved to Boston in 1974 to pursue audio design and engineering at Analog and Digital Systems where he eventually became Executive Vice President. At ADS he managed extensive loudspeaker and electronic design, engineering, and production on two continents. Wanting to start his own company, Michael went back to school and graduated with a Master’s Degree from MIT’s Sloan School before founding Aerial Acoustics.
Aerial’s first product was the very successful Model 10T with its unique cast-in-house Novalith stone head and Kevlar midrange. The 10T was Stereophile magazine’s Speaker of the Year in 1996. Aerial developed a full line of high performance models culminating with the award winning Model 20T V2, and more recently the well-reviewed Models 6T and 7T. This fall Aerial introduced 3 new models, the 5T, 7CC and on-wall 7LCR. Aerial looks forward to an exciting new high-end Model 12T coming in 2016.
Michael is very passionate and involved in daily business. Under his leadership, Aerial continues to innovate, guided by intelligent engineering, good design, and enduring commitment to the accurate reproduction of music.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][vc_column width=”1/6″]
