BRICASTI DESIGN HISTORY
BRICASTI DESIGN - HISTORY - NEWS - REVIEWS - TECHNOLOGIES - PRODUCTS - CLASSIC SERIES - SOURCES - PREAMPLIFIERS - AMPLIFIERS - PLATINUM SERIES
Bricasti Design is a Massachusetts-based high-end audio company specialising in digital and amplification components for studio and home use. Founded in 2004, it is still a relatively young and less well-known company, but the individuals behind it have significant experience in audio, having worked for years with companies like Lexicon, Madrigal and Mark Levinson.
The co-founders of Bricasti are two American legends of the pro audio industry, Brian Zolner and Casey Dowdell, and the name of the company comes directly from their Christian names. Both come from Harman International Industries, where Brian spent 20 years as Lexicon's vice president of international sales and where Casey worked as a DSP software engineer.
BRIAN ZOLNER
Passionate about music, Brian realised a dream in the 80s by working closely with music and musicians, thus arriving at Lexicon, a leading company in the professional market for reverb units. He is now CEO of Bricasti Design and chief designer for all the brand’s product ranges.
CASEY DOWDELL
Casey is the specialist DSP software engineer and writes all of Bricasti’s signal-processing software in-house. His outstanding talents and skills are recognised worldwide.
DAMON GRAMOND
At the end of 2010, Damon Gramont joined Bricasti Design as the new sales director. He previously served eight years with Summit Audio as vice president of sales. Damon is often seen taking part at various HiFi Shows around the US and Europe.
PRO AUDIO ROOTS
Following this transition, several former Madrigal employees left Harman to establish Aevee Laboratories, a company specialising in advanced circuit board design for electronic devices. These engineers, who had played a crucial role in Mark Levinson’s development at Madrigal, now collaborate with Bricasti Design, bringing their deep expertise in high-end audio product development. Aevee Labs also integrates components from renowned suppliers like Analog Devices, further enhancing the performance of their designs.
Brian and Casey followed a similar path by establishing Bricasti Design. In the early years, the company focused on the pro-audio market, releasing its first professional audio product in 2007: the stereo reverb processor M7. This product quickly became a highly regarded reference design adopted by many recording engineers worldwide. Following the M7's success, Bricasti Design introduced additional products that, over time, were embraced by professionals and audio enthusiasts, leading Brian and Casey to offer audiophile products for private home systems.
M7 GOLD STANDARD
Released in 2007, the M7 stereo reverberation processor was Bricasti Design’s inaugural product, created specifically for the professional recording and mastering markets. The M7, a ground-up design that utilises reverberation synthesis rather than convolution from recorded impulse samples, has earned a reputation as the "gold standard" of reverb generators due to its exceptional digital conversion performance.
This success allowed Bricasti Design to leverage its technology and expertise in subsequent products, starting with the M1 DAC, the company’s first consumer-facing product, which was met with high acclaim. Moreover, the growing demand for high-quality amplification in studio environments prompted Bricasti to identify and address a new gap in the market.
As a result, Bricasti designed amplifiers that met the high standards required for accurate studio reproduction. This effort led to various electronics that have since been refined for the consumer market. Notably, Bricasti Design is one of the respected manufacturers offering both Delta-Sigma and R-2R Ladder technologies within their product line, using these for their digital-to-analogue conversion to provide a versatile approach to high-end audio reproduction.
With their deep involvement in studio recording and mastering, Bricasti Design precisely understands how signals are captured and how they should be reproduced. This unique perspective gives Bricasti a 'standard' rarely found in the audiophile market, as their expertise spans both studio and private settings.
Internal view of the Bricasti M7 reverb processor.
Marrying understated aesthetics with exceptional design and build quality, Bricasti Design’s consumer products stand out as some of the most advanced high-end audio electronics available today. With an expanding product range that now includes top-tier digital-to-analogue converters (DACs), preamplifiers, power amplifiers and the state-of-the-art M19 SACD/CD Digital Transport, Bricasti continues to push the boundaries of audio technology. Lately, the M11 Classic and M11 Series II R-2R Ladder DACs joined the lineup alongside Bricasti’s Delta-Sigma DAC technology, offering audiophiles unparalleled performance options—each providing its distinct, high-precision approach to digital-to-analogue conversion.
Each product in the Bricasti lineup is a masterpiece in its own right, meticulously engineered to deliver pristine audio performance. While each component is designed to function independently with outstanding clarity and precision, the true magic happens when paired together. Tuned to work seamlessly as a complete system, these products create a unified listening experience that provides a transparent window into the recorded performance—a sought-after quality often referred to as the ‘Holy Grail’ by audio professionals, enthusiasts, and reviewers alike. This integrated design approach ensures that every detail is captured and reproduced with unmatched accuracy, making Bricasti’s offerings a true benchmark in the high-end audio world.