About

Finding a real vintage audio console with proven history is getting more and more difficult these days, firstly because they are getting extremely rear and there are less people who can service and repair them. It’s still possibilities to find original replacement parts, but these are also getting rarer and expensive.

If you are reading this you are lucky to get in touch with one of such of rare peace of equipment – audio mixing console CORONADO of long time non-existing American manufacturer QUAD-EIGHT. You can find his glorious and sad history HERE (Link to Page 1).

In the 1978 to 1983 according to BILLBOARD Quad-Eight had about of 3% of the American studio console market, which means that they produced about a 20 consoles per year.

The Quad-Eight company finished his production in the late eighties after unsuccessful fusion with Mitsubishi, but the Pacifica and Coronado are used in USA and Europe over two decades after the company’s disappearance. 

One of the main features of the Quad-Eight consoles was their superb sound quality, which combined clarity, warmth and punch. The preamps and equalizers of the Pacifica and Coronado models are highly sought after by audio engineers and producers who appreciate their vintage tone and character. The Quad-Eight sound can be heard on countless records from various genres, such as rock, pop, jazz, soul, funk, disco and hip hop.

Many successful music productions are tracked and mixed on QE consoles, including the final mix of THE WALL of PINK FLOYD.

We don’t know how many QE consoles were situated in Western Europe, but behind the Iron Curtain there were four – two in the Slovak National radio in Bratislava, former Czechoslovakia and two in the National Palace of Culture in Sofia, Bulgaria, as referred from Billboard issue from 1980.

In USA and Europe the consoles were used even in the 90-ties, mainly in Nashville for country music productions as you can see below.

In Bulgaria, QE consoles have to serve much longer – due the lack of financing the one was replaced in year 2004 with YAMAHA PM 4000 and the second one was put out of service in year 2019. The console was sold to a private company with idea to bring it back to life.

The latter was used not only for the Sound reinforcement of the biggest concert hall in Bulgaria, but also as heart of a recording studio which was very active till year 2004.

Many of the significant Bulgarian audio recordings was produced and recorded there. Some of the most famous artists who worked with Quad-Eight consoles in Bulgaria were international artists like Herbert von Karajan, Ennio Morricone, Placido Domingo, James Brown, Chick Chorea, Weather Report, Allan Parker and many others. Local artists who recorded on QE was Lily Ivanova, Georgi Hristov, Sylvia Katzarova, various pop, rock and country artists and bands. They created timeless classics that are still popular and influential in Bulgarian music archive. The Quad-Eight sound was also used for various symphonic and folk music recordings, as well as film and TV scores. The console was a versatile and reliable tool that could handle any kind of music with ease and grace. The engineers who worked with it were proud of its performance and quality. They maintained it with care and skill, and preserved its original condition as much as possible. You can hear some samples here.

Nowadays the console is passing process of general restoration and will be for sale soon.

Technical description of the console you can find here.

Some revues all around the world you can find here (Link to Page 4).

If you have interest in the process of the restoration you can click here (Link to Page 5).

If you want to contact us please follow the link here (Link to Page 6)