Chris Bennett has long nurtured an obsession for Boston Acoustics speakers. He has spent countless weekends in the speaker and amplifier repair shops around his hometown of Portland, Oregon, watching skilled artisans recone and refoam his beloved gear. He loves the workshops brimming with vintage objects, strewn parts, and analog equipment lovingly restored by dedicated audiophiles. But it never occurred to Bennett that his pastime would make a good photography project, even though the shops are as visually rich as they are sonically inviting.

Then his academic advisors encouraged him to shoot his passion and work locally.

He had spent his formative years as a landscape photographer, doing what landscape photographers do – making road trips seeking the unfamiliar. For his series Along the Way, Bennett crossed six states retracing the Lewis and Clark expedition along the Missouri River. He so enjoyed traversing and documenting huge swaths of terrain that when he began his MFA graduate studies he proposed photographing the Columbia River. His advisers were not interested in Lewis and Clark redux.

"They wanted me to do something closer to home, something personal," he says. "They told me to photograph something my wife thought was weird."

A year on, Bennett's exploration of the world of analog music enthusiasts in Portland and Seattle, WA, House of Sound, is his master's thesis project for the Hartford Limited Residency MFA in Photography.

"It was a challenge to photograph something so near and dear," he says. "I've never been a portraitist. I'm not comfortable with it. I'm shy. It was a big challenge to walk into shops and pitch the project. But most people were super receptive."

The fact he was a friend, a customer and a fellow audiophile forged connections that allowed him to take intimate photos in workshops, homes, record stores and storefronts. Many of Bennett's subjects appreciated his passion, which mirrors their own commitment to an aesthetic pursuit with rich personal rewards but scant financial ones.

"They've obsessively dedicated their lives to types of listening," says Bennett, who founded and sits on the board of the nonprofit Newspace Center for Photography. "But, you know, do you love what you do? They do. They'll say, 'I don't make any money but I have the best job in the world.'"

Financial frustrations are but one way the music and photography worlds parallel one another. The two art forms have been completely upended by the embrace of digital technology. Just as we no longer need film, photographic paper and chemicals to share photographs, neither do we need an elaborate sound system and a stack of records to share music. That said, Bennett still loves film – and vinyl. His first vinyl record was Alive II by Kiss. It wasn't just the bombastic music that drew him in; his young mind was blown by the panoramic photo of Gene, Paul and the boys on stage that appeared inside the double gatefold.

"That picture in my hands was so visceral I felt like I was at the concert," he says with a grin.

Bennett will take a first listen to albums on iTunes, but makes a point to buy music he truly loves on vinyl.

"I love flipping through records. I want to own the disc, the artwork, the sleeve, the color, the whole package," he says. And besides, now most vinyl purchases include also a digital download – a development Bennett calls "genius" and has likely contributed to the surprising rise in vinyl recent sales. While total sale of all physical music formats (mostly CDs) fell by more than 12 percent in 2012, the sale of vinyl increased by 18 percent. While the 4.6 million vinyl records sold account for just 1.4 percent of the 316 million full-lengths sold last year, the figures are a sign that more and more fans think of smell and touch as important parts of the listening experience.

Bennett thinks of record collections and mix tapes as a person's calling card and wants to step into friends' living rooms and see their music collection. Swishing ones way through a digital music library on a touchscreen doesn't compare to running your fingertips down the spines of vinyl record sleeves.

But it's not just all about romance or indulging of the senses. For Bennett, there are practical concerns associated with the digital storage of both music and photographic files. Many decades into the future, the chances of finding someone who can fix the enduring technology of a record player will probably (almost counterintuitively) be much higher than the chances of finding someone who can retrieve files from a crashed hard drive manufactured according to short-lived digital specs.

House Of Sound recognizes the daily heroics of people who refuse to let the glorious sound of vintage audio gear and vinyl vanish. They, like Bennett, want to preserve that history for future generations born into an increasingly digital world.

"I'm thinking about my son," Bennett says. "Passing on my record collection will be much more satisfying than giving him a hard-drive of music."

Photos: Chris Bennett.