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It was due to a hot tip from an excited cohort at this year's winter NAMM show that I heard about the Studio Projects line of microphones. PMI Audio, distributors of JoeMeek and Trident-MTA products, was showing in the "other" hall, down the escalator, all the way on the other side of the convention, over the river, and through the woods.

The C1 is a cardioid-only, large diaphagm mic, and one of three Studio Projects microphones available through PMI. Also shown was the C3, identical in nature but with three selectable polar patterns (its specs vary ever-so-slightly), and the T3, which is a dual triode tube version of the C3 with variable polar paterns via its included power supply. Not only was I initially wowed by the responsiveness, sensitivity, and robust quality and construction of these mics, but the prices threw me into a Tazman-like tailspin. The C1 retails for $300, the C3 for $600, and the T3 for $1,000. I talked PMI Audio into letting me review one of their C1s.

Martin Mull coined a phrase that has become rather well known—"Writing about music is like dancing about architecture." Sometimes I feel that writing about audio gear is like dancing about audio gear. Words can be interpreted, but we do the best we can. Enough about me, let's examine the Studio Projects background.

Studio Projects was conceived to offer German-type engineering at a reasonable price, and by partnering with 797 Audio in Beijing China, they have achieved their goal. 797 Audio has been making microphones for 50 years, some of them for German companies. The 797 Audio logo also appears on the Studio Projects mics.

The C1 is a transformerless mic with FET impedance converters, touting good common mode rejection and RF interference prevention. The capacitor element is of the 'center electrode' design, providing an even frequency response over 20Hz to 20kHz. Dynamic feedback at the capacitor element is a technique which eliminates distortion at high sound pressure levels. The capacitor membrane is 6 micron mylar, gold-sputtered, with its voltage polarized by the application of phantom power.

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