Music Manufacturing
Mark Amentt was brought into the music products industry to help direct the then, newly established AIMM group, to better serve its members. The group soon grew as did its noted annual meetings, which take place the day before the Anaheim and Summer NAMM Shows begin. In recent years, Mark joined...
Fred Buch has always been interested in combining electronic technology with pipe organs. When he entered the pipe organ business in the 1957, electronic organs were not sufficiently advanced to provide a high quality pipe sound. Fred added pianos and home organs in 1960 resulting in a three...
Guy Ward was the president of the Ward Piano Company, located in Canton, North Carolina, from the 1940s until his retirement. After his daughter and son took over the company, he continued to go into the shop every day even at the time of his 2013 NAMM Oral History interview when he was 89! As...
Ken Kantor is the president of ZT Amplifiers and the inventor of the compact amp technology used in such products as The Lunchbox and The Club. His long career in music began when he was about ten years old and built his own tube amplifier. Ken wrote, played and recorded his own music and along...
Scott Emmerman began taking guitar lessons in his hometown of Chicago when he was five years old. As a musician he toured and recorded with different bands and landed some great gigs, including, ironically enough, as a Boss demo artist at the 1979 NAMM show! He later was hired by Roland as a sales...
Karl Leong participated in the International Coalition during the NAMM Show beginning in 2012 to discuss collaborative efforts in creating more active music makers. As CEO of KHS, Karl has been active in these and other music education efforts both in Taiwan and around the world. As CEO, Karl has...
Scott Peterson is the President of Peterson Electro-Musical Products, which his father, Richard, established in the pursuit of his passion for audio electronics and pipe organs. Among Richard’s many innovations was the Peterson Tuner in 1952 (beginning with Model 70), the world’s first transistor...
Clemens Von Arnim is the CEO of Louis Renner & Co., producer of the Renner Action and Hammerheads for pianos, the company his great-grandfather was involved with from the very beginning. Over the generations, Clemens family was always a part of the company and worked hard to expand the company...
Lars Wern is the Vice President of Em Nordic AB in Stockholm, Sweden, working alongside the company’s founder, Benny Englund. In fact, during the 2013 NAMM Show in Anaheim, Lars and Benny were interviewed together and shared their love for the industry and spoke about some of the changes they...
Siwei Zou is the founder and president of sE Electronics International Inc. He was born in Shanghai, China and began playing at an early age. Siwei was focused on western classical music and composed both classical and popular music during the early part of his career. He played at the famed...