Founder
Sidney N. Shure
1902–1995 · Chicago, Illinois
The man who built the microphone the blues crowd stole from truck dispatchers
He was a radio parts wholesaler from Chicago. He built microphones that lasted 70 years. The harp players found their favourite hidden in another industry entirely.
Sidney Shure started Shure Radio Company in Chicago in 1925 with a catalog of radio replacement parts. When the Depression hit he pivoted to making his own microphones. The Unidyne (1939) — the first true single-element directional dynamic microphone — was revolutionary: you could stand close to the mic without feedback.
The 55SH 'Elvis mic', SM57, SM58 and 520DX 'Green Bullet' all came out of the Shure lab. The Green Bullet was designed for truck dispatchers — two-way radio. Chicago harp players found it by accident in the fifties and sixties. The limited frequency response — a problem for clean speech — was perfect for a cupped harmonica driven straight into a small tube amp.
Anecdotes & moments
- The SM58 has been in continuous production since 1966. It still sells for roughly the same money, in real terms, as it did then.
- Little Walter mostly played an Astatic, but it's the Green Bullet that has become the symbol of amplified blues harp. Both stories are Chicago stories.