Concorde
A phono cartridge from Ortofon, introduced for home hi-fi in 1979 and made for DJs since 1984, now in its second generation.
- Made by
- Ortofon
Pictures © Ortofon, from ortofon.com.
Why it is renowned
The Concorde won the Danish Industrial Design Award in 1979, the year it came out.1 It was meant for home hi-fi, but DJs took it up in the 1980s, and Ortofon made DJ versions from 1984, built to take the high tracking forces of club play, hip-hop and scratching.1 The maker credits the original Concorde with changing vinyl DJing.2
The story
Ortofon designed the Concorde as a low-mass cartridge and headshell in one, to be mounted on the tonearm without screws or wires; its shape was drawn with the Danish industrial designer Møller Jensen.1 The silver Concorde Pro of 1984 was the first DJ model, and the Concorde Nightclub series followed in 1989.1
The second generation, the Concorde MKII, came in 2018.3 It is made in versions for different kinds of DJing: Mix, DJ, Scratch, Digital for timecode vinyl, Club and Elite, most of them also sold as twin sets.4
The Club model uses a special elliptical stylus with more contact in the groove than a spherical diamond, and an output of 8 mV, which needs less preamplifier gain and makes it less prone to feedback in live use.5 Ortofon also recommends it for transferring vinyl to digital.5
Sources
- When a Cartridge Became a Legend, Ortofon. ortofon.com, read 2 October 2026.
- Ortofon History Timeline, Ortofon. ortofon.com, read 2 October 2026.
- Ortofon, Wikipedia. en.wikipedia.org, read 1 October 2026.
- Ortofon Concorde MKII Series, Ortofon. ortofon.com, read 1 October 2026.
- Concorde MKII Club, Ortofon. ortofon.com, read 1 October 2026.
Last checked 2 October 2026, against the maker's own pages.