A vintage microphone with an Italian flavor

When you look around the internet, or more specifically, Ebay, for vintage microphones, I’d say that about 80%-90% of the results you get are American made. The rest are Japanese, British, or some eastern European or Russian manufacturers that you get to know after a while (Tesla, Oktava, Sennheiser, Neumann, etc.).

Every once in a while you come across manufacturers that you never or rarely heard about. Geloso is one of those I discovered while looking through some online auctions. I had never seen the Piezo Elettrico Nº 1100 microphone before, and I thought it had an interesting design. Since the bids weren’t high, I gave it a try and ended up buying the Geloso mic. When I got it, I was surprised to learn that it was so small (12cm in height). It looked like a toy microphone. It was pretty battered, and the paint, which resembled something like a greenish metallic gold (if that’s possible), was falling apart. So I decided to do something I always thought about when I purchased mics with heavy pitting on the chrome, or ones with an ugly color. I sent it to get it chromed. But I must say, I don’t like to mess around too much with the microphones, in order to avoid the loss of their personality. In this case, the chrome was a good idea. It gave a new life to the Geloso, and now it gets noticed every time somebody looks at my collection.

John Geloso

Geloso was founded in 1931 by John Geloso, an Argentinian born to Italian parents. It was based in Milan, Italy, and produced a wide range of electronic equipment (radios, TVs, amplifiers, amateur receivers, tape recorders, professional lab instruments, etc.). After WWII, Geloso also started making microphones, although they weren’t the focal point of the business. John Geloso died in 1969, but remains today as a reference of innovations in electronics. At the time when electronics training centers and schools were rare, he printed free technical bulletins which contained information on how to repair Geloso equipment, along with tips, instructions, schemes and all the information needed for technicians and enthusiasts. He will also be remembered for creating tv and radio mounting kits, for people to assemble at home. Unfortunately, the company closed its doors three years after his death.

The DS rarity scale: 9.7/10