Waves Meet Waves

Welcome to Brooklyn!

I first had the pleasure of meeting Ran Ortner at the bunker-like metal door into his studio in DUMBO, NYC. It was April 2023, and this man whom I only knew via brief internet search and a short time on YouTube offered me the warmest, generous embrace, and a beaming greeting as if we had been friends since childhood.

I mention this only because it paints the clearest possible initial picture of the celebrated NYC artist to those unfamiliar with him or his work. Linn’s CEO, Gilad Tiefenbrun, was in Brooklyn alongside me to meet Ran in person at his cavernous studio, and to survey his brand-new Linn Klimax System, featuring 360 loudspeakers adorned with a very special finish.

The Studio
Ran conducted a brief tour of his living/working space, pointing to objects, motorbikes, installation pieces and canvasses, recounting their history and meaningfulness like a seasoned raconteur.

Ran radiates warmth while speaking in soft yet rich tones about the arts, life, humanity, and the universe. I was rapt, and that was even before I’d had a chance to truly absorb his work with my own eyes.

We ended up, the three of us, stood in front of Ran’s new Linn system. The 360 speakers were already unpacked and hooked up to his new Klimax DSM digital music player.

I had a job to do – to fine-tune this setup so that it would perform at its absolute best within this huge studio space. But first, I had to take (more than) a moment to admire the bespoke satin-like finish which Ran had designed with us for his own speakers. Linn generally offers custom finishes – any colour of the rainbow – but this was something utterly unique. In Ran’s own words, “a rich tritone”, comprising elements of all the primary colours in a smooth, 8-layer lacquered coat. They looked quite stunning.

The Work Begins
Any set of hi-fi loudspeakers has an ideal placement in any room – a location where the sound opens up sweetly and completely – with speed, accuracy, dynamism and depth. And let me tell you, when you’ve nailed it, you can really tell. I had this in mind as I surveyed the vast, minimalist, concrete space – well over 200㎡. This would take some time, but it would be oh-so-very worth it.

I unpacked some tools and set to work. Using careful, active listening and small, measured movements to establish the golden point in space where each speaker performed at its optimum. All the while, I kept one ear on the conversation between Ran and Gilad; picking up fragments ranging from philosophy, to molecular biology, to quantum physics, to music, to food, to travel. Through myriad subjects Ran revealed his own profound wonder at the world, his prioritisation of intellectual curiosity, and a desire to share what he’d gleaned from all these sources with his compadres. It was like attending some kind of humanistic church. Though Ran wasn’t preaching – he shared his soul and his heart, his guiding principles and motivations without pomposity, self-indulgence or pretentiousness – and that’s a real skill.

I felt that we would fast become friends – as soon as I’d finished moving these beautiful, deceptively heavy speakers another 5mm, and checking again for improvement.

Space Optimisation
Some time later, once I’d established the golden positioning for this pair of dramatic monoliths, I began to measure the entire space using a laser measure (there’s no way a tape measure would have reached the ceiling, so I was glad to have packed it), and sketched the room in plan.

The reason for this is that, in order to mitigate the negative sonic effects imposed on a music system by the environment in which it sits – standing waves, room modes, excessive ‘boominess’, etc. – we have a clever piece of proprietary software called ‘Space Optimisation’. I fed the software the dimensions of the room, including the height, and any features such as doors and windows; I entered the building materials of all surfaces; I even input the humidity and temperature of the space, as these factors affect the speed of sound. This would be the cherry on the cake – the final piece of fine-tuning – ensuring that Ran’s system was totally optimised for his studio-home with an ultimately natural and un-distorted sound.

It’s worth noting that this configuration isn’t a task that Linn owners are required to perform themselves; it’s part of the installation service carried out by our global network of trained Linn specialists.

But enough about cherries on cakes, and on to the proof of the pudding… The first listen.

The Dance
A couple of chairs were placed reverentially in front of the Klimax System, and Ran took to his iPhone to begin the difficult task of selecting the first track to play – with a mixture of deep concentration and barely contained excitement. It was at this moment, as I waited, that I realised I had been so fixated on the task at hand that I had barely noticed the overall scene at this end of the studio.

The 360 speakers stood like totems, guarding either side of a huge canvas – some 10m across – depicting a pulsing oceanic swell. It was a moment frozen in time, yet eerily fluid and three-dimensional. The luminosity and weight of liquid transformed when viewed from different angles. Forget the eyes of a portrait following you around the room, this dramatic and imposing work was in constant metamorphosis – hung between two states. Tumultuous, restive, and epic; yet serene and fundamentally beautiful.

Zooming out a little, I was intrigued to see elements of the palette used in the painting were clearly also present in the finish Ran had designed for the speakers.

Ran then explained what had brought us to this place and this moment – his desire to own a beautiful, bespoke Linn system. He is captivated by the symphonic nature of the oceanic, and the “exquisite sonic integrity” of Linn would open up worlds of possibilities in his own exploration of both sonic and oceanic rhythms.

“With the awareness that life itself is the stuff of cadence, I am exploring both the tender and tragic provocations of rhythm. I now have intimate and immediate access to the entire catalog of recorded music, as well as a way to bring new sonic compositions to my installations.”

Sound waves, ocean waves, the pulse of life, the rhythms of our planet, the possibilities of art! I understood – and the first few notes of Leonard Cohen’s “Nevermind” filled the studio.

It sounded exceptional. All three of us sat in captivated silence, as our eyes and ears drank in the scene before us. As we took turns choosing tracks, from Punk to Neo-classical to Americana, I was lost in both the music and the painting. Before we knew it, four hours had passed.

“My lust for life, my greed and curiosity as an artist is a question at the center of my being. This is my life guided by desire: intellectual desire, aesthetic desire, sensual desire – all of it – and the underlying insistence that animates it. What is this everything my greed is reaching for? What is the consolidating image, and how is this tangible in color?”

Hark, Triton!
Since we published our first video and blog with Ran Ortner, his bespoke speaker finish has garnered much admiration.

So, in partnership with Ran, we decided to make it available as an optional finish for both 360 speakers and LP12 plinths (with potentially more in future). However, the finish would need an evocative name…

“In the pageantry and boundless exuberance of the oceanic, I see the dance of life. In the color of waters, I see beautifully engaging, mercurial complexity. I see Tritones; rich, shifting grays composed of all three primary colors.

We were considering these ideas in the development of the finish for my Linn speakers. We wanted an alchemic, rich ground; a complexity – densely sensual – that moves. In one moment cool, in the next warm; a hovering liminal finish, unfastened. In the process of becoming.

Here in my Brooklyn studio, the stunning musicality of my Linn Klimax System is wonderfully supported by the speakers’ finish. As I work and listen, I am beautifully untethered from any fixed notions of what music is!”

Incorporating both its description as a tritone, and in homage to Ran’s deep connection with the oceanic, we have named his signature finish ‘Triton’, after the Greek demigod of the sea. It will be the first in our Signature Collection, joining the established Glasgow and Classic Collections in our range.

Across the Ocean
I always leave our transatlantic catch-up calls filled with renewed vigour, curiosity and inspiration. Ran is one of those rare individuals who has their own gravitational field of creativity that can’t help but suck those around him in. Linn and Ran have big plans for future work together and we are looking forward to unveiling them when they are fully formed, and when the time is right. Watch this space…

Learn more about Linn’s flagship loudspeakers and the ingenious proprietary technology that underpins them.