[PStamler]

And back in the old days, when ribbon mics were most common in studios, there were indeed transformers with step-up ratioa 1:10 -- sometimes 1:20 or 1:30. They showed up in some RCA mic preamps and consoles -- sometimes driving pentode tubes as amplifiers (yeah, really). One RCA circuit used a 1620 pentode, which I believe is really a power tube, for an input tube with a high-ration transformer.

Mind you, I make no claims that these high-ratio transformers actually measured flat or sounded good. I don't know, not having heard them, but I suspect they didn't.

Peace,
Paul