Nagra is a brand of portable audio recorders manufactured since 1951 in Switzerland. Starting in 1997, it also offers high-end equipment for the audiophile community (...). The Kudelski Group's original product, Nagra recorders are now developed, manufactured and sold by an independent company, Audio Technology Switzerland S.A., based in Romanel-sur-Lausanne. en.wikipedia.org, accessed: 3.01.2024. The founder and chief engineer of the company was a Pole, Stefan Kudelski.
I look at a photo of Stefan Kudeski, featured in the monograph of the Nagra brand by Roland Schellin, and I see a young, friendly, good-looking boy from Warsaw with a characteristic, still pre-war hairstyle, shy smile, but also confidence emanating from his posture—in his worth, or rather the worth of what he is holding in his hand: a reporter's reel-to-reel tape recorder of his own make.
Nagra has a laminated back with an aluminum front.
Today, more than seventy years later, it's hard to find someone more recognizable in professional audio circles than Kudelski. When his first portable tape recorder, the aforementioned Nagra I model, was created in 1951, he had no idea that his devices would travel on K2 climbers' backs to the Himalayas, be launched (with the Apollo mission) into space, become part of the French Navy's combat torpedo tests, be used by the intelligence services of many countries in the world, or that sound recorded by them would be heard by hundreds of millions of people watching movies, and he would receive an Academy Award in 1978 and 1991.
All of this was thanks to the enthusiasm, talent and diligence of a refugee from war-torn Poland, an immigrant—first in France and then in Switzerland, and also due to the people around him, who believed in the vision he presented to them. Not very proficient in business games, devoted entirely to ways of recording sound with portable tape recorders, he accomplished the impossible—a Polish gained fame worldwide, becoming a synonym for perfection. This is what the book summarizing seven decades of the company's existence, Nagra by Roland Schellin, is about.
Publisher & author
The publisher of the monograph is Ernst Hrabalek. As he writes about himself on a website dedicated to the book, he is an "Austrian entrepreneur and showman" who is "particularly well-known" for his work for Bohemian Prater in Vienna. Born on September 29, 1945, he grew up in the Per-Albin-Hansson settlement and spent a lot of time in Laaer Berg 12.
Hrabalek began his career as a toolmaker and engineer and managed a foundry company in Mödling. Later, he decided to revitalize the Bohemian Prater and acquired the oldest carousel in Europe, built in 1892. He has added many attractions to the Prater, including a duck carousel and a laser labyrinth.
For his services to the Bohemian Prater, Hrabalek received the Golden Medal of Honour of the City of Vienna. He also opened the "Hutschn Bräu," a pub in the old Viennese style that serves home-brewed beer.
Author & Publisher Blog, nagrabook.com, accessed: 2.01.2025.
So, one could say that the author of the book is some kind of a patron for Roland Schellin. And the support was necessary. Nagra is perfectly documented, both in terms of facts and photos, and required a lot of time to collect all the details included in it.
A comparison of three audio book format types on the QUAD, Nagra and Thorens brands.
It is evident that the author has a lot of experience in this field. In 2001, he published his first book on Minifon tape recorders, which were once used by spies and intelligence services. By April 2022, Schellin had prepared its updated version with lots of new information, stories, booklets, circuit diagrams and new photos, all in full color. This hardcover book is 260 pages long and contains hundreds of photos, all really high-quality.
A little earlier, in 2008, Funk Verlag published his next book Stellavox - voice of the stars: Die Geschichte der legendären Miniatur-Tonbandgeräte aus der Schweiz, devoted to Nagra's direct competitor, also based in Switzerland. Already a year later, Schellin had written another book which had, in a way, made him ready him to write Nagra: Federwerk-Tonbandgeräte – History of clock-work-driven tape recorders (Funk Verlag again).
He had already gained knowledge of spring-driven reporters' tape recorders, and the Nagra I and Nagra II models used this type of design, information on miniature spy tape recorders, and Kudelski's company was successful in this field as well, as well as small top-of-the-line reel-to-reel tape recorders, used by reporters and the film industry. As you can see, he knows what he writes about.
Yet even in such favorable natural circumstances, considerable help from Nagra's family, both relatives and friends, was needed. In his search, Schellin was aided by Marguerite Kudelski, the engineer's daughter, long-time company employees, company documents (both unclassified and those so far secret), as well as the largest collection of the company's products located in Vienna, which was made available to him. As a result, we get a lot of first-hand information, available to a wider audience for the first time.
Throughout its history, the company has often had close contact with authorities and secret services, especially because of its surveying equipment. This topic occupies an important place in the book, as the high level of secrecy in this field has repeatedly given rise to legends that still circulate today. Some of these myths are confirmed by OICI, while others are refuted.
Ibidem.
Publication
The editors promote the book with the slogan: "Nagra – a limited edition masterpiece created to last forever," adding right afterwards: "Written by Roland Schellin and published by Ernst Hrabalek, the book offers a deep insight into the fascinating world of NAGRA tape recorders." I think this is not an exaggeration. The book I am holding in my hand (well, okay, I'm holding it in my lap, but so be it) is, I repeat, one of the best prepared and published books related to both professional and perfectionist (audiophile) audio that I know.
And, once again, a comparison of the sizes of the previously mentioned publications
It is important that this is not the history of the Nagra brand, but the history of Nagra tape recorders. So, you won't find information on the brand's contemporary reporter and studio equipment there, or anything about its audio equipment for home systems. Although, presumably, the company would prefer to emphasize the continuity of production in this way and mark its presence in the audiophile world, the author chose a different path. And he did it brilliantly.
However, it should be remembered that quality has its price—in this case, as much as 1 euro per each of the 467 pages. The average price of an item of this type and format is about 180 euros. So, this is one of the most expensive books of this type on the market, a large "brick" measuring 46 x 35 x 6 cm and weighing 3.7 kg, featuring an outer slide-in box. Both are silver and have a distinctive pattern resembling unanodized aluminum.
As it turns out, this is a direct reference to an object Stefan Kudelski never parted with throughout his professional life—an aluminum card pad on which he sketched all his ideas (p. 76). The cover bears no lettering but is embossed with a large company logo. For that, its back is spectacular—it's a thick slab of laminate with a top aluminum layer, with the company's logo laser-cut into it. This is a reference to another obsession of the company's founder, i.e., precision machining. The theme of pursuit of perfection runs through all the years of Nagra's development, as reflected in the relevant entries in the book under review.
However, it is easy to see that Nagra is much larger than the A4 format, and thus also the pads that make it rigid. This is a concession in favor of scale, and the book in question is meant to be unique and "forever." With that, the publisher departs from a kind of usus associated with this type of publications, i.e., the so-called coffee table book, initiated in audio with the QUAD company monograph by Ken Kessler in 2003 (Quad: The Closest Approach).
The format was continued in his subsequent books, until the last one, Making The Music Glow, devoted to the Audio Research brand, published in 2020; more HERE. Finally, two out of three planned The Absolute Sound magazine publications (The Absolute Sound's Illustrated History of High-End Audio) had the same format. So, it was some kind of a "template," which Nagra departs from. Let me remind you that it was Kessler, at least for a moment, who was being fitted for that publication, at least by the Nagra Kudelski Group company.
Ken Kessler talking to Marguerite Kudelski, head of the Kudelski Group, about his new book on Nagra; High End 2012 exhibition in Munich
The photo above features Ken and Stefan Kudelski's daughter in 2012 (!), who seem to be talking about the planned publication. The editor of Hi-Fi News is presenting her his latest title, KEF: 50 Years of Innovation in Sound—incidentally, my copy. The year before, the company had celebrated its 60th anniversary, so the prospect of a 65th anniversary with a book dedicated to the company seemed absolutely feasible. The three of us even wondered if it would be ideal for an all-black cover to feature only an illuminated modulometer that unique for Nagra design.
However, something went wrong, as things went quiet and then dead. So, the book we get is different, but not only in terms of format—more on that later. Let's return for a moment to the physicality of the reviewed item, or, more precisely, to its exclusivity. In addition to the already mentioned elements, it is to be emphasized by a signature of the founder's daughter, Marguerite Kudelski, under her foreword to the book. I am looking at it in my own book, item no. 0718, and I can't tell if it's a copy with an authentic signature or a facsimile of it. But I assume I have the original.
Yes, all the copies are numbered. The "importance" of the publication is also evidenced by its packaging, which in a sense is also collectible. "In a sense", because on the outside it is no different from any other packaging, and only inside, on one of the cardboard elements, there is a sticker informing about the publication. This type of action, i.e., "extending the value" of an artifact, has been known in the book world for a long time
Among the examples that interest us, it is worth mentioning again Kessler's book about the KEF company, whose box has a corresponding sticker on the outside, but especially the monumental monograph J Jazz Book – Free and Modern Jazz Albums From Japan 1954-1988 by Tony Higgins, dedicated to covers of jazz releases from Japan, published by Membran just before the end of last year. It comes in a cardboard box with an imprinted graphic image referring to the cover, together with the title of the book inside it.
The book
Nagra is a very well-written book, let me say that here already. It is read as a good crime story, as long as you like this kind of atmosphere and value good journalism. However, you need to know that, in fact, it is not a monograph of the Nagra brand, but a monograph or reel-to-reel tape recorders by Nagra (with some excepts, however to small to change it). The author is not interested in digital recorders created after the D tape recorder, much less in the company's HiFi devices offered since 1997.
The value of this publication is determined by thorough research. The information in it is supported by many interviews, both from the press and conducted personally by the author, Kudelski's personal notes, which are still waiting to be published, dozens of technical documents from Nagra's archives and access to a seemingly endless collection of equipment, both from the company and its competitors. Clearly, Nagra has given Roland Schellin far-reaching assistance.
Nagra comes in a cardboard box with no printing on the outside; for comparison, two boxes by other publishers.
Such a positive, in my case even enthusiastic, reception is aided by a clear layout, well-chosen typography and excellent photos. These are not too many at all, but the number is just right. The book is divided chronologically into twelve chapters, each of which talks about the most important products and activities of the period, with the already mentioned foreword, as well as an Appendix.
The latter includes an iconographic image showing various "milestones" in the brand's history, as well as a table that lists all of Nagra's products with their production dates, intended use and even serial numbers. This required truly Benedictine archival work. But it also helped solve a few puzzles and straighten out a few myths.
As I say, this wonderful, extremely valuable piece of work starts with a dissonance, i.e., with a chapter entitled How It Began (p. 13). And, according to the author, it all begins with the end of World War II. Yet we know that this is not true. The history of the company is linked to Stefan Kudelski's private life and past, and that suddenly begins in the book when the inventor obtains his high school diploma in Switzerland and enters the Department of Physics and Technical Engineering at the University of Lausanne (EPUL).
However, it is enough to recall what Stefan's daughter says in the introduction. She writes that her father, an avid sailor, always had to have a yacht ready to go. Therefore, as young children they would always carry fuel for her, so that she was always fully tanked up. When we know this, it becomes clear that this is all about an immigrant's fear, a two-time fugitive from Nazi terror – first from Poland, through Romania to France, and then from the part of France collaborating with Hitler under Vichy rule to Switzerland.
In Poland, the Kudelski family would flee both from the Soviets and Germans. The former would undoubtedly have taken the father, Tadeusz Kudelski, a defender of Lviv against the Ukrainians in 1918, to one of the forests near Katyn, Mednoye, Kharkiv, Bykov near Kyiv, Kherson or Kuropaty near Minsk and murdered him—he was, after all, a former line officer in the Polish Army. The Germans, on the other hand, would probably have killed both the father and mother. The father, if not for his military past, would have either been murdered along with hundreds of other representatives of the Polish intelligentsia in some forest near Warsaw, or deported to one of the concentration camps.
One of the pages with detailed photos of Nagra products.
Let me remind you that Stefan Kudelski's father had completed architectural studies at Lviv Polytechnic and worked in the chemical industry, while his mother, Irena (née Ulbrich), was an anthropologist. Thus, they were an ideal target for Nazi Germany. It also didn't help that Stefan's godfather was the last pre-war president of Warsaw, Stefan Starzynski. And even France turned out to be inhospitable—his parents became involved in the resistance movement, their covers were then blown and they had to flee. For their merits, they were both honored after the war with the French War Cross.
So, Kudelski was traumatized. He was a refugee, as we would say today, and then – a fugitive. In addition, he had fled a few times, which should explain his struggle to be noticed and strive for perfection at all costs, to somehow stand out in an alien and not very favorable environment. As recalled by everyone who knew him, he did not get rid of his thick accent until the end of his life. The author of the book under review calls it Slavic accent, which also did not make his life any easier. And here goes my second objection: the fact that Kudelski was Polish is kind of ignored. It's as if his background and identity were completely "transparent."
Information on Poland is only given twice – once in the motto, which is an excerpt from Stefan's memoirs, and then regarding his first wife, Eve Ulbrich (note – the daughter of another refugee from the war-stricken country). He had five children with her, including Marguerite, engineer with a PhD in micro-technology earned at the University of Lausanne, member of the company's board of directors (1991-1999), and president of Audio Technology Switzerland SA since 2012.
If I were malicious, I would say that the first of the shortcomings is due to the "obliviousness" typical for many Austrians "forgetting" their role in the tragedy of World War II. Unlike the Germans, Austria has not accounted for it to this day. In addition, Austrians were treated in a remarkably lenient manner by all four victorious occupant armies, compared to Germany. Starting history with 1945 is therefore extremely handy for them. Sociologists refer to this type of process as "symbolic violence."
For the sake of balance, however, let's add that the "accountable" and "re-educated" Germans do very much the same, for in the history of companies such as Bosh, Siemens, Deutsche Bahn, Boss and Beyer, to cite just a few, the war period is a white spot. This kind of "whitewashing" is true even for the Deutsche Grammophon label, whose history is recorded in a very good monograph State Of The Art – The Story Of Deutsche Grammophon published by Verlhac Editions. The war period is not included in it, as if the company hadn't operated at all then. However, it was at the very heart of the Nazi propaganda machine.
But I'm not malicious or at least try not to be. That's why I'd say that the author of Nagra is focused on technical artifacts and his perspective is that everything started with post-German reel-to-reel tape recorders and the technical studies of Nagra's founder. I assume, then, that the second of the "omissions" (blurring Kudelski's origins) is not derived from a colonial understanding of history by "large" European countries, either. Perhaps it is simply the result of a lack of understanding of the importance of ancestry for people like Kudelski, or straightforwardly taking a technical rather than a social perspective. And I'm not talking about simple pop psychology, but about common sense, certified by millions of testimonies of common knowledge.
However, let's return to the main theme of the book under review. As I have already said, its division and rhythm are set by subsequent company designs. The adventure begins with information on the prototypes that young twenty-two-year-old Kudelski was preparing with his friends/colleagues, working in shifts around the clock. It was then, in 1950, that he met Josette, his first love, who had made a significant contribution to the creation of the first Nagra, which came to be known as the Nagra I. The later owner of the company, pilot and sailor, was aware of this, so he paid her a small salary for the rest of her life, although they had split up.
We also learn about the genesis of the second version of the tape recorder, along with the adventures involved in its production. It turns out that as many as 1000 Nagra II recorders were sold, even though the company was completely unknown. And yet I look at another photograph, from Wikipedia, both in its Polish and English versions, this time showing the Pole with his device—the same amiable man, but at least twenty-five years older, holding the cover of a tape recorder that took part in a Swiss expedition to the Himalayas to reach the summit of K2.
In the picture, Kudelski is also holding an SN "spy" recorder and is clearly proud of both products, even though that was the first story when Nagra's official history is not consistent with what the author of the monograph found out— the recorder did not record any material at all during the expedition. While checking the frost resistance of the spring-loaded engine before the expedition set off, Kudelski caused its overloading, which lead to its failure in both devices that made it to the Himalayas.
This is the first, but not the last "divergence" of the two stories, which I see as what I would call Nagra's obstructionism towards the book under review. As we read in the entry Nagra Stories Sound-men won't ever tell published on the Jwsoundgroup blog, the company had tried to delay the publication. If this is true, it could have had something to do with the author's findings on several facts, not very important from the point of view of the devices themselves, but relevant to the Nagra myth.
The second one is the suggestion that the SN tape recorder in question was allegedly involved in the Watergate affair. The device was ordered by the US intelligence services. As Schellin writes, by officers from the United States Army Signal Corps (USACS), an agency that is the backbone of combined US forces. Following President Kennedy's orders, its members had a hand in the installation of secret recording devices in the Oval Office and Cabinet Room back in 1962. However, as we read, there is no evidence that Nagra products were ever used there (p. 229).
Among many photographs, there are also detailed technical drawings.
Another story involved in creating the image of this manufacturer is the link between the brand's tape recorder, the Apollo Program and lunar missions—they had been in preparation since 1961 and were accomplished in 1966-1972. From Nagra we will learn that the Swiss tape recorders had no chance of landing on the moon because they simply weren't ready at the time—at least according to documentation. They were also "too impractical," as one of the book author's interviewees says, unlike the Sony TC-50 cassette recorder, which actually landed on the moon.
But there is a grain of truth in it. As it turns out, a special version of the tape recorder made its own little contribution to the Apollo-Soyuz Test Program (ASTP) in 1975. Two Nagra SN tape recorders flew to space then aboard an Apollo rocket and were used in an experiment on the Doppler effect. And let's not forget that the SN was used by the FBI, CIA, KGB, Stasi and all the major secret services in the world.
But in doing so, we have significantly skipped much of the company's history. After all, its most important tape recorder was the one with the number III. Launched in 1957, it cost the incredible sum of 4650 West German marks, while for 4500 marks you could buy a new Volkswagen Garbus car. The device, in its many versions, was produced until 1968, when it was replaced by the Nagra IV.
But it was the Nagra III, which sold in the incredible 15,000 number of copies introduced the company to Hollywood and it is the sounds recorded on it that we hear in most film soundtracks made over several decades around the world. It was thanks to Kudelski's connection with the film industry that he received two Academy Awards and was known not only in radio circles, where he solely reigned, but also in the film industry. Due to this, in cooperation with the Amoex company, the Nagra video tape recorder was created.
And so, the book guides us through subsequent incredible designs, such as the 1968 Nagra IV tape recorder (another bestseller), the 1981 studio TA, the 1983 VPR-5 video recorder developed with Ampex, the 1985 JBR cassette tape recorder and the digital reel-to-reel Nagra D and D II tape recorders, of which the latter (1999) was the last of Kudelski's inventions. Each of the devices has its own history and a superbly documented development process and design. Something like this has never happened before.
Conclusions
Nagra by Roland Schellin is one of the best books related to the world of audio, not just professional audio, but simply audio. It is very well written, and the research work in its case was outstandingly precise and very competent. And it is written differently than most books related to our industry—not on one's knees, but in an upright position, with documents in hand. In that it resembles Swiss Perfection – The Story of the Thorens TD 124 and Other Classic Turntables by Joachim Bung (the English version was released in 2018). But, perhaps even more so, it is similar to my other favorite book about an audiophile company: A Vibration Measuring Machine.
Chapters are designated by the years in which the most important company products entered production – here it is the Nagra III.
Written by the trio: Bill Philpot, Paul Messenger and Roy Gandy, and published in 2016 by Independent Publishing Network, it was commissioned by Rega, headed by one of the co-authors. This obviously ruled out touching upon difficult aspects of the business. However, the book tells us Gandy's full private story. It manages to maintain the credibility of the text and the stories written in it. Nagra is much more inquisitive in this regard, and therefore richer, more complete and incomparably more attractive when it comes to the visual layer.
It touches upon almost all issues related to this company, except for anything preceding Kudelski's work on the Nagra tape recorder, and it doesn't say much about the musical recordings made with the company equipment. It is more of a technocrat's than a music lover's work. And there's nothing wrong with that, it's even better—this kind of "basic research" is the most cumbersome, takes the most time, but without it it's hard to imagine building any other story. In that I would see an opportunity, in the future, for myself,
It's because I see a gap which can be filled with a story about music and the creation of: the first documented recording of Altantis Blues by Else Bianchi Trio (1962) released on 7" EP (Nagra III), First Flight To Tokyo: The Lost 1961 Recordings by Art Blakey produced in Japan (also Nagra III), released only in 2021 (HERE), the audiophile Graal Jazz At The Pawnshop (Nagra IV-S) (HERE), Piano by Leszek Możdżer (Nagra D), Montreux Jazz Festival recordings (the studio TA recorder), or René Laflamme's recordings for his Fidelio record label (Nagra IV-S and TA) – it's all ahead of us.
The book is numbered – a sticker with the subsequent number can be found at the very end of the book.
But we do have Nagra, the company's monograph not only targeted at "Nagraphiles" but also anyone interested in the audio world. The book is a dream come true to me—an absolutely crazy fan of the company. If you don't believe me, please take a look at my reportage on a visit to the firm's headquarters HERE. I'm sure it will be similar in your case.
POST SCRIPTUM
Roland Schellin's book starts with a well-known quote from Kudelski's diaries, in which he explains the meaning of the name Nagra. During my visit to the company's factory, Mathieu Latour, the director of the audio department, asked me about the conjugation of this verb. Since then, at least it seems to me, the manufacturer's website uses the correct translation—it is not about the infinitive "nagrać" = to record, but the fact that a device will record sound ("nagra").
Nagra, by Boland Schellin
Publisher: Ernst Hrabalek Publishing
Year of publication: 2023
Number of pages: 467
ISBN: 978-3-200-09716-2
AUSTRIA
text WOJCIECH PACUŁA
translation Ewa Muszczynko
images High Fidelity
