PSNE July 2015 Digital

July 2015

www.psneurope.com

Prima performance The Strokes headline Barcelona’s première pop festival P38 P28

P42

P54

EUROVISION DAZZLES

NEXT IN LINE

APOLLO LANDING

MORE THAN A WALTZ AT THE VIENNA SHOW

ITALIAN COMPANY THINKS BIG WITH NEW MONITOR

SSE BRINGS L-ACOUSTICS AND KNOW-HOW TO REVAMP

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07/05/20152:52:25 14:28:01 6/5/2015 PM

Welcome

PSNEUROPE Editor Dave Robinson drobinson@nbmedia.com

Account manager Rian Zoll-Khan rzoll-khan@nbmedia.com

Deputy editor Jon Chapple jchapple@nbmedia.com

Commercial director Darrell Carter dcarter@nbmedia.com

Managing editor Jo Ruddock jruddock@nbmedia.com

Head of design Jat Garcha jgarcha@nbmedia.com

Advertising manager Ryan O’Donnell rodonnell@nbmedia.com

Production executive Jason Dowie jdowie@nbmedia.com

Contributors: Kevin Hilton, David Davies, Erica Basnicki, Phil Ward, Dave Wiggins, Angela Buenger, Guillaume Schouker, James Manley, David Mathew

PSNEurope NewBay Media, 1st Floor, Suncourt House, 18–26 Essex Road, London N1 8LN Editorial: +44 20 7354 6002 Sales: +44 20 7354 6000 Press releases to: ukpressreleases@nbmedia.com Circulation and subscription: Refunds on cancelled subscriptions will only be provided at the publisher’s discretion, unless specifically guaranteed within the terms of the subscription offer. NewBay Media may pass suitable reader addresses to other relevant suppliers. If you do not wish to receive sales information from other companies, please write to Circulations and Subscriptions, NewBay Media, Curwood CMS Ltd, The Barn, Abbey Mews, Robertsbridge TN32 5AD

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by NewBay Media, 1st Floor, Suncourt House, 18–26 Essex Road, London N1 8LN, United Kingdom ISSN: 0269-4735 (print) 2052-238X (digital)

Cover image: Julian Casablancas at Primavera Sound 2015 (pic: Louis Austin)

P03 JULY 2015

DAVE ROBINSON Editor

@PSNEurope

C

onsolidation in the commercial world has become, more or less, an everyday event, be it Kraft buying Cadbury, Volkswagen acquiring Porsche, Coca-Cola grabbing Innocent or Google snaffling up… well, nearly everything. Should we surprised it appears to be an accelerating phenomenon in our pro-audio world?

While HHB’s Ian Jones suggests that we are witnessing a logical event, and that consolidation is “inevitable” within a group of businesses that began as small independents, AV consultant Roland Hemming puts it down, partially, to a lack of “succession strategies” for certain companies. David Davies looks in depth at the bigger picture starting on page 34, while trying to gauge whether or not we will benefit in the longer term.

An aside at this point: despite numerous requests for interviews, David has so far failed to gain any insight from the actual VC and private equity firms dancing around at the peripheries of our business. Just once, I reckon, it would be nice to hear from some of these ‘other’ directors, to find out what they really think, and whether they have any expectations than simply making 20% growth a year. But I won’t hold my breath on that one.

Dave Wiggins has a take on the consolidation story (though he calls it ‘Big Brother’) in his column on p10. Wiggy’s column last month about Uli Behringer’s take-over of TC Group certainly raised a few reactions last month – but, you know, that’s what columnists are supposed to do, aren’t they?! It’s online at www.psneurope.com/the-empire-strikes-again if you missed it...

There’s lots of other great stuff for you this month: A round-up on the compact console trend from Phil Ward (p48); NEXT-proaudio in the spotlight (p42); and the annual Eurovision tech rundown, of course (p28). PLUS! You saw the shortlists for the Pro Sound Awards already, right (p8)? Have you bought your tickets yet? n

1 Color - 0 Cyan / 100 Magenta / 99 Yellow / 4 Black

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Contents

P04 JULY 2015

In this issue...

P38 SPRING HAS SPRUNG L-ACOUSTICS EVERYWHERE AT THE 15th PRIMAVERA SOUND

P20 OFF THE AIR? SIR GEORGE’S STUDIO TAKES ON THE NEIGHBOURS

P44 SAX APPEAL IN THE FRONT ROW AT JAZZ SOUS LES POMMIERS

Studio 20 24

P28 OLD DOG, NEW TRICKS EUROPE (AND AUSTRALIA) SINGS ITS HEART OUT FOR THE 60th TIME

Business 6 7 8 10 12 14 18 34

21 million Britons see live music in 2014 A&H dLive-rs with new digital desk Pro Sound Awards 2015 finalists Vocal channel: Erica Basnicki and David Wiggins Movers and shakers PSNTraining The strategic position: Gary Stuebing, AVnu Alliance Feature: Consolidation in pro audio

Broadcast 26 28

16 48

New products: InfoComm round-up Feature: Digital consoles

Full Sound: Now and Next wrap-up Eurovision welcomes Australia and AoIP

Live 38 42 44 46

Twin Cam rides solo at Primavera NEXT-proaudio: Rio Tinto revolutionaries Pro audio under the apple trees in Normandy Usher FOH Horace Ward says Yeah! to RedNet rig

Installation 54

Technology

Bumpy ride ahead for AIR Studios Crowdfunding Q&A with jubilant Flare Audio

Contract rental for SSE at the Apollo

Back pages 57 58

Hither & dither Backtalk: Rick Clarke

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Business

P06 JULY 2015

Glasgow’s Arches in happier times (Photo: Bart Photography)

United Kingdom

Live music generates £1bn for UK since 2011

Some good news for Britain’s beleaguered live venues as a UK Music study also reveals a 23pc increase in gig attendance

T

otal attendance at live music in direct and indirect spending for the events in the UK topped 21 British economy. million in 2014 – a 23 per cent The figures were released exclusively increase in three years, newly to PSNEurope stablemate Music Week released figures have revealed. by campaigning and lobbying group UK Concerts attracted 17.5m fans during Music following the release of its latest the 12-month period, with a further report, dedicated to music tourism’s 3.5m to festivals, generating £1bn contribution to the PSNgoing 98x145.qxp_Layout 1 06/05/2015 10:14 Page 2 UK’s public purse.

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Manchester Arena general manager James Allen says business at the venue reflected the national trend, continuing into 2015, with first quarter ticket sales of more than 410,000 being the highest in its 20-year history.

The 2013 arrival of new UK arenas The SSE Hydro in Glasgow and the First Direct Arena in Leeds also boosted the market.

“In our case we’ve seen a gamechanging increase in attendance, which is directly attributable to our new arena, which fills a very necessary gap in the Glasgow event landscape,” says John Langford, director of entertainment for the Hydro’s owner and operator, SEC. “From a national perspective, I believe that the increase in demand is fuelled by the quantity and quality of touring talent and an improvement in the general economy.”

The Wish You Were Here 2015 study, carried out by Oxford Economics on behalf of UK Music, states that music tourism numbers increased by 34 per cent between 2011 and 2014, with 9.5m people travelling to UK music events in 2014 – 546,000 from overseas – and contributing £3.1bn to the economy.

The report counts both overseas visitors and domestic music fans that travelled at least three times the average commuting distance to attend an event, as “music tourists”.

It will be welcomed by Britain’s live venue operators – especially those of smaller, ‘toilet-circuit’ clubs – who have seen their numbers dwindle in the past few years as they fight against encroaching residential property development and unsympathetic local

authorities.

Last month, following the city’s decision to curtail its licensed hours, The Arches in Glasgow became the latest casualty, joining the 12 Bar Club, Madame Jojo’s, the Astoria, Sin, Metro and the Bath House in the UK’s growing venue graveyard.

The Music Venue Trust, an advocacy group and charity set up in January 2014 to “protect, secure and develop the future of grassroots live music venues in the UK”, shared on its Facebook page the following message from Jeff Horton of the 100 Club, another venue that was, at one time, facing closure: “How can [artists and arts organisations] possibly [look beyond subsidy and be more entrepreneurial] when our hands are constantly tied by Dickensian and vindictive conditions on our licences that have no chance under current legislation of ever being taken off, regardless of laws that that get passed – such as the smoking ban – that should affect us positively? A lot of them are there simply to restrict trade, in my opinion. I strongly sense that there is a resentment within licensing when it comes to venues actually making money.

“It’s 2015. I still have conditions I have to adhere to that have been on my licence since we first applied for a liquor licence in 1964! Perhaps this world we live in – [one] that has changed dramatically in every conceivable way since then – is different to the one in which licensing authorities exist, and they’ve been living in a parallel universe all along…” n www.musicvenuetrust.com (With thanks to MW’s James Hanley)

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P07 JULY 2015

United Kingdom

A&H to ‘dLiver’ next-gen digital mixer dLive S7000 Control Surface with DM64 MixRack

Major update to current mixing portfolio from Allen & Heath

C

ornwall-based Allen & Heath has announced its latest digital mixer offering, dLive.

The “next-generation” digital mixing system features FPGA processing at the core, with an array of control, expansion and networking options, starting from a base price of $22,500/ €20,000 (“a small venue solution”) to $33,500/€30,000 (“a large touring system”).

Like the iLive system launched 10 years ago, dLive has a distributed system design with separate MixRack and Surface. The dLive processing brain is housed in the MixRack, available in three sizes (DM32, DM48 and DM64), and there are three accompanying control surfaces (S3000, S5000 and S7000). All MixRacks and Surfaces are mix-andmatch compatible, with common configuration, set-up and show files.

The 96k/96-bit XCVI Core (“designed from the ground up,” according to R&D director, Rob Clark) provides capacity for 128 inputs with full processing and 16 dedicated stereo FX returns, offering 160 inputs to mix, plus a fully configurable 64 mix-bus architecture, with full processing on all 64 mix channels. dLive incorporates the DEEP processing portfolio of embedded plugins, including graphic EQs, compressors, multiband compressors and dynamic EQs, alongside its 16 slot FX racks, featuring Allen & Heath’s proprietary FX emulations.

When asked to highlight three key advantages of the new system over iLive, senior product manager Nicola Beretta suggested: • It’s twice the speed and power (of iLive Mach2): “We doubled the input count, buses, FX racks, sample rate, and number of screens.”

• The networkability: “Now up to five I/O Ports, 128-channels at 96kHz each, independently assigned, for all major networking protocols including Dante, MADI, Waves SG.” • It’s built for the road: “Rock-solid construction, daylight visibility, dual redundant hot swappable PSUs common across the range, and dual redundancy on every audio connection.”

“It really is the ultimate mixing system, with all the processing tools and power that the most demanding engineers would expect, and the flexibility and networkability to cater for any application. This is coupled with an extremely intuitive user interface and what we believe is the fastest workflow in the industry,” says Beretta, senior product manager. “dLive is equally at home in fixed installations, such as a HOW or theatre, as it is at festivals and out touring.” dLive will ship in September and will not “intentionally” replace iLive: price-wise, it sits “between fixed format and modular iLive systems”, according to Beretta. dLive has been in development for two years, some time before the company became part of the recently dubbed ‘Audiotonix’ group alongside fellow console makers (and FPGA enthusiasts) DiGiCo and Calrec. n www.allen-heath.com

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P08 JULY 2015

Pro Sound Awards

Over to the judges…

Darryn de la Soul and SSR London’s Michael Grieg, PSA 2014

The Pro Sound Awards team has chosen the four finalists in each category for this year’s event

C

an you believe it’s already that time of year again? After much umm-ing and ahh-ing, the PSNEurope team has chosen the finalists for the third Pro Sound Awards, whittling down the deluge of entries to what we consider the four most worthy in each category.

Recognising outstanding achievement in professional audio, PSNEurope’s Pro Sound Awards return to the Ministry of Sound nightclub in London for the third time on Thursday 24 September.

The shortlist of finalists for each category will now be presented to a 50-strong panel of judges from across the spectrum of the pro-audio industry, who will ultimately choose the winners of each Pro Sound Award (with the exception of the grand prix and lifetime achievement gongs, chosen by the Pro Sound Awards team, and the rising star award, chosen by our sister title, Audio Media International).

A range of sponsorship opportunities – from headline sponsor to category, photobooth, red-carpet and afterparty sponsorship – are available; contact PSNEurope ad manager Ryan O’Donnell (rodonnell@nbmedia.com) or account manager Rian Zoll-Khan (rzoll-khan@nbmedia.com) for more details.

For ticket information, email Georgia Blake at gblake@nbmedia.com. n www.prosoundawards.com www.focusrite.com Tickets are available now for £49, which includes drinks reception, food, the awards and the afterparty.

And a splendid social occasion!

More information at www.prosoundawards.com

2014 lifetime achievement winner John Pellowe

The oyster man! PSA 2014

THE FINALISTS Live/touring sound

Engineer of the year • Davide Lombardi (Kate Bush Before the Dawn) • Michael Brennan (Faith No More, Primal Scream) • Tom McShane (The Defiled’s Ice Cold Gig) • Martin Walker (Judas Priest) Best tour/production sound • SSE/L-Acoustics for Clapham Calling Festival 2014 • Powersoft for Caparezza’s 2015 tour • Flare Audio for Node live at the RCM • Meyer Sound for Ed Sheeran’s x Tour (2014–15) Best theatre sound • Mick Potter for Miss Saigon • Laurence Owen for Golem • Gareth Owen for Memphis • Guido Olischlager for 14–18

studio sound (sponsored by

Team of the year • Polar Audio/Renkus-Heinz for Reading University • Sports Technology/d&b audiotechnik for the 2014 Commonwealth Games, Glasgow • NoiseBoys/JBL/VDC Trading for Leicester Cathedral • Genelec/Jutel for Restaurant Nallikari

broadcast sound )

Engineer of the year • Wes Maebe • Alexis Smith • Matt Wiggins • Dan Cox

Best studio • Parr Street Studios • Strongroom • The Church • The Pool Best sound in post-production • The Eichmann Show • Poldark • Sherlock • Whiplash

installed sound

Best temporary installation project • Tannoy for The Wind Tunnel Project • Two Big Ears for Björk’s Songlines at the Museum of Modern Art New York • Merging Technologies for the Imperial War Museum London’s WWI galleries • SNK Studios for Talking Statues

Best permanent installation project • Marquee AV/Bose for The Forum, Kentish Town • SSE/L-Acoustics for the Hammersmith Apollo • NoiseBoys for Leicester Cathedral • Autograph Sales & Installations for the Barbican Centre

Best facility • Technicolor Sound Services • Warner Bros De Lane Lea • CTV OB11 • Jungle Studios Broadcast event of the year • EastEnders Live Week (BBC S&PP) • Winston Churchill’s State Funeral – 50 Years On (BBC S&PP) • Volvo Ocean Race (Sunset+Vine) • FIFA World Cup (HBS) Team of the year • ENO Screen for Pirates of Penzance • Salzbrenner Stagetec Mediagroup POLARIS evolution development team • BBC S&PP for Strictly Come Dancing • BBC for the Scottish independence referendum

marketing initiative of the year • • • •

Roland OHRCA launch Sennheiser for D1 and Only Martin Audio CDD launch Powersoft’s 20th anniversary

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P10 JULY 2015

Vocal channel

How to not save a studio

A ERICA BASNICKI

is a writer and sound designer

home renovation project in west London has caused mass hysteria in the UK. This is, of course, the famous basement that would cause a worrisome excavation to take place right next door to AIR Studios (see p20 for the full story).

Studio owners say the disruption will force them to close, possibly for several months.

The reaction to this has been nothing short of ridiculous, totally useless, and – frankly – laughable.

“Only in this country would any council contemplate bringing music-making to a halt in the interests of private profit and needless aggrandisement,” said playwright and director Sir David Hare in a report in the Camden New Journal.

Hang on a second – I didn’t realise that’s how this all happened. Camden Council called a meeting in order to figure out how to bring music-making to a halt? This is awful.

Deplorable! What kind of country is this?!

Hans Zimmer added his objections in a report in the Ham & High newspaper: “My

movies have grossed more than $22 billion dollars worldwide, and in no small part have the musicians and AIR Studios been a contributing force in this.”

Congratulations. You’re a wildly successful composer who has used AIR’s facilities. And? The only remotely rational response so far has come from lawyer Jessica LearmondCriqui who started a petition in an effort to put a halt to the project. Rational, but given the fact that Ms Learmond-Criqui is herself a lawyer, it’s a bit short-sighted.

Fact: no one sat around plotting the demise of the UK’s film industry. Fact: you can have the brightest, most creative, most celebrated artists from around the globe voice object to anything, or tens of thousands of signatures on a petition, but they are no real competition for the fact that people don’t just decide to add a basement (at considerable cost) to their property unless they really want to.

What might change their minds? Having a lawyer to deal with. One with the intention of railroading their plans and who will cost

a pretty penny to fight. Maybe Mr Zimmer can contribute some of his portion of the royalties from that $22 billion to hire one?

Maybe instead of signing a petition people can put their money where their mouth via a crowdfunding campaign. Maybe Ms Learmond-Criqui knows someone?

With respect to everyone’s good intentions, and Ms Learmond-Criqui’s efforts, if saving AIR Studios is truly important then it will take a lot more than writing a strongly worded letter to Camden Council. Objections are just words. Redesigns, expensive provisions for a sensitive site, compensation… surely that would make anyone pause and rethink how badly they need a subterranean sauna.

That is assuming, of course, the Hampstead couple aren’t sensible people and decide to push on with no regard for the uproar their plans have caused.

Would you look at that: mass hysteria might be the appropriate reaction after all.

Don’t forget to sign the petition. n you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/ save-air-studios

End of the beginning II: Big Brother awaits

A

DAVE WIGGINS

is a freelance marketeer and pro-audio pundit

pologies to those who have been waiting breathlessly for the follow-up to part one, in the May PSNEurope, as a certain acquisition snaffled these precious column inches in June…

Pursuing my somewhat Orwellian vision of a future live sound industry leads me into uncharted waters, where things could look very different to today. The structural, commercial and operational differences would be profound, perhaps most notably in the people who would lead these operations.

If (say) 80 per cent plus of international concert touring was handled by just four or five operations globally, each of them would likely be a sizeable venture in general industrial terms. Turnover, profit, personnel, assets, corporate taxation, legislation, capital funding requirements and even flotation opportunities would be very different from

career opportunities for ‘professional’ business people (by whom I mean those who have trained and qualified for a career in commerce, as opposed to starting out in hands-on roles within live sound) could be attractive. In this future the strategic direction of the biggest players in pro audio could very well be determined by bankers, lawyers, MBAs and accountants who couldn’t tell a DI box from a hole in the ground.

The business would also become much less gear-centric; in fact, it is already becoming so. Any of the major players could deliver the equipment of choice to engineers and production managers from enormous inventories that pay no historical allegiance to particular manufacturers. The composition of hire inventories would be based solely on demand and ROI – this is a very good thing, because it means that ‘premiership’ providers would compete on level terms, with

This obviously changes things for some pro-audio manufacturers too, especially those who specialise in premium concert touring products, as they would be dealing with a customer base that is small in numbers but large in spending power and market control. The working relationships between these manufacturers and the major players would become much closer and the latter would have a much greater input to product development. The market would become polarised, too, as manufacturers would be divided into those who supply the majors and those who do not – the latter would have to make a living selling kit to everyone else.

The good news, though, is that ‘everyone else’ would actually be better off, because if the big players own all the major work they will not need or want to dabble in anything much below a certain level. That would create a healthy and potentially more profitable

almost anyone we know today. Added to the fact that the first generation of proaudio entrepreneurs are leaving us, the

their success based on performance and relationship management rather than on the kit they own.

‘first division’, able to focus on tailoring their businesses to specific markets.

Scared? Me too. n

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P12 JULY 2015

Movers and shakers

RCF boosts British business Miles Brooke joins Dean Davoile and Phil Price (L–R) at the former Radio Cine Forniture

R

CF has announced a significant expansion of its UK operation.

Miles Brooke, who brings 20 years’ experience with the D&M Group (Denon, Marantz), will take up the newly created position of regional sales manager (south), with Mick Butler continuing to represent the Italian manufacturer in Scotland and northern England.

Dean Davoile will become director of sales for RCF’s

Audio Precision (AP) has announced the appointment of Jayant Datta as chief technology officer. Datta was formerly assistant vice-president of audio R&D at THX. www.ap.com

The AVnu Alliance elected a new board of directors in April. Gary Steubing (interviewed on p18) joins as president and the Intel Corporation’s Kevin Stanton (pictured) as chairman. www.avnu.org

UK office, while Phil Price – who originally set up the RCF UK operation 25 years ago – takes up a new role in international sales (voice evacuation systems).

“We are delighted to have secured the services of Miles as part of this carefully considered restructure,” says Davoile, “which will not only enable us to give closer support to our customers and sales network, but consolidate in all our core markets.” n www.rcf.it

Andy Copeland has joined HHB Communications as technical sales support engineer. A graduate of the University of Huddersfield, Copeland qualified as an Avid certified support representative. www.hhb.co.uk

Marquee AV has expanded its sales team with the appointment of Paul Day as business development manager. Day (right) has spent the last seven years as a regional sales consultant at Bose. www.marqueeav.com

Mic manufacturer Mojave Audio has named Kevin Parker as director of sales. Parker’s background is in pro-audio/MI “sales, marketing [and] strategic […] development,” says Mojave. www.mojaveaudio.com

Renkus-Heinz has appointed David Schuster as production manager. A manufacturing veteran, Schuster previously held high-level positions at General Dynamics and Pacific Scientific. www.renkus-heinz.com

DEALER NETWORK Canford has been appointed sole UK and Republic of Ireland distribution partner for the new Green-Go range of digital intercom-over-Ethernet products. Unlike other digital intercom designs, Green-Go, by Dutch company ELC Lighting, does not employ an expensive central matrix: All interconnection routing data, system set-up and user preferences are stored locally within each user station, including beltpacks, which eliminates the possibility of a disastrous central failure. www.greengodigital.com www.canford.co.uk K-array has named Appel Electronique Industrie (AEI) as its exclusive distributor for France. “AEI has a good understanding of the pro-audio market in France and is really enthusiastic about our systems,” says K-array president Alessandro Tatini. “I am happy to welcome them to our team of international distributors so that we can continue to grow the K-array brand globally.” www.k-array.com plus.google.com/110919579165715242769 Preco has been announced as exclusive UK distributor for French broadcast equipment manufacturer Rami Audio. Preco’s James Thomas says: “Rami really does have an extensive range, and the product design and build quality is right up there with the best. It’s our job to get the word out about this great brand here in the UK.” www.ramiaudio.com www.preco.co.uk

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P14 JULY 2015

A-T, A&H pitch a tent at Wigwam

BY JON CHAPPLE

Audio-Technica, Allen & Heath’s UK distributor, held a free training event for A&H’s Qu-, GLD- and iLiveseries digital mixers (pictured) on 29 May. Held at Wigwam Acoustics, in Heywood, Lancashire, the training was delivered by Rodrigo Thomaz, an Audio-Technica Allen & Heath product specialist (and the star of May 2015’s back page

interview), and also included a brief history of the British console manufacturer.

All attendees left with a working knowledge of Allen & Heath’s digital consoles, and received a certificate to confirm completion of the training. n eu.audio-technica.com www.allen-heath.com

1 July

Shure Academy: Wireless Mastered Dublin, Republic of Ireland www.shure-academy.co.uk/events/wireless-mastered

2 July

Meyer Sound: The Mixing Workshop session 15 Webinar www.meyersound.com

15 July

Adlib: Soundcraft Vi training Liverpool, United Kingdom www.adlib.co.uk

18 July

Orbital Sound brings training to ABTT

Sound Technology: HoW demo Letchworth Garden City, United Kingdom www.soundtech.co.uk

BY JON CHAPPLE

Orbital Sound showcased its comprehensive proaudio portfolio, including products from Nexo, ClearCom, CSC, Flare Audio, Nemesis and Yamaha, at the ABTT Theatre Show at the Alexandra Palace, north London, on 24 and 25 June.

The UK dealer/distributor also presented a product demonstration workshop on Thursday (25 June) as part of ABTT’s seminar series and was on hand to advise on theatre sound training, including on its popular Mixing Musicals and Sound Fundamentals for Theatre courses, the latter of which started again in April.

As Nexo’s UK main dealer, service centre and approved rental partner, Orbital spotlighted the French manufacturer’s theatre solutions, including the brand-new ID series of super-compact loudspeaker systems. Other systems on show included the GEO M6 small-format line array system, which had its first install in Europe – in Bled Festival Hall, Slovenia – in January. n

THE ESSENTIALS:

TESTING AUDIO ADCS AND DACS

Pictured is Nexo’s Gareth Collyer and Orbital Sound’s Andy Simmons at Prolight + Sound in April. www.orbitalsound.com www.abtttheatreshow.co.uk

STO launches subscription service

BY JON CHAPPLE

Sound Training Online (STO), the online arm of Dublin’s Sound Training College, has launched a subscription service for its web-based audio training courses.

For an introductory fee of €19.99 (£14.99/$19.99) per month, €54.99 for three months or €199.99 for a year, students can learn at their own pace on one or more of STO’s Logic Pro X, Ableton Live, Native Instruments Maschine and Pro Tools 11 courses, with more – in FL Studio, digital DJing, songwriting and “advanced Pro Tools” – on the way soon.

In conjunction with the new subscription service

the organisation has also drastically reduced the price its instructor-led premium courses, which offer private, one-to-one tuition with a music/audio industry professional. n www.soundtraining.com/online

Along with the transducers, these two links in the digital chain are key in determining the overall quality of the sound, writes Audio Precision’s David Mathew In 2015, there’s not much question about audio storage, transmission or streaming: it’s digital.

Apart from rare sightings of vinyl or open-reel tape in boutique sales or creative enclaves, audio is digital. Done right, digital audio is flexible, robust and of very high quality. PCM recording, lossless surround formats and even lossy compression (at least at high bitrates) provide the soundtrack for our lives.

But, of course, sound in air is not digital. n Read the full article at www.psneurope.com/testing-audio-adcs-dacs

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www.dbaudio.com

Reflect on the future: today‘s D20.

The D20 amplifier is the forward thinking choice for realizing mid size solutions. All controlled via the intuitive user interfaces and remote network. Incorporating four truly independent channels, DSP capabilities for comprehensive loudspeaker management, switchable filter functions, two 16-band equalizers and up to 10 seconds of delay.

Future ready. Available now.

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New products: InfoComm 15

P16 JULY 2015

ALTO PROFESSIONAL TSL115

What is it?

An evolution of Alto’s 15”, 800W TS115A active loudspeaker which includes built-in interactive LED lighting.

Details: Designed for small- to medium-sized events where both quality sound and celebratory lighting are needed, the TSL115 incorporates a circular LED array with five customisable lighting modes.

And another thing…

The TSL115 also features 800W of class-D power, 15” low-frequency transducer with a 1” neodymium driver, counter switch for EQ control and XLR output. www.altoprofessional.com

AUDIX

AVIOM

BEYERDYNAMIC

What is it?

A single-ear, headworn miniaturised condenser microphone for vocal applications.

What is it?

A distributor of power and digital audio data for Aviom personal mixing systems.

What is it?

The latest incarnation of the Revoluto conference microphone system.

Details: The modular, omnidirectional mic features an earpiece that can be worn around either the left or right ear, with an adjustable boom for easy positioning.

Details: Two versions of the D400 are available: the standard D400, with an A-Net input, and the D400Dante, with Dante I/O.

Details: The new vertical-array Revoluto features greater freedom of movement to the left and right, allowing two participants to share one microphone.

And another thing…

Up to eight personal mixers can be connected to each D400 or D400-Dante’s A-Net outputs, and an unlimited number of distributors can be used when creating larger systems with more than eight performers. www.aviom.com

And another thing…

Due to its vertical lobar polar pattern, the Classis RM 30/31 Revoluto’s gain before feedback is optimised for ceiling systems. www.beyerdynamic.com

HT7

And another thing…

Designed to blend with the skin tone of the wearer, the HT7 is available in three colours: beige, black and coffee. www.audixusa.com

D400

CLASSIS RM 30/31

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P17 JULY 2015

D&B AUDIOTECHNIK 10D AND 30D

What are they?

Two four-channel, 2RU amplifiers tailored for permanent installation applications.

Details: The 10D and 30D share the same DSP platform and capabilities as d&’s D20 and flagship D80 amplifiers.

And another thing…

The 10D is intended for small applications with lower SPL requirements, while the powerful 30D is designed for medium-to-large applications with demanding SPL requirements. www.dbaudio.com

DENON PROFESSIONAL

LAB.GRUPPEN

What are they?

Three new models of ceiling speaker designed to combine accurate sound with commercial fireresistance and suitability standards.

What are they?

The LUCIA 120/1-70 and LUCIA 240/1-70, two dedicated 70V-output amplifiers.

DN-105S, DN-106S AND DN-108S

Details: The 105S, 106S and 108S feature a metal ‘can’ rear enclosure which provides a fire barrier behind the speaker to meet commercial fire codes.

LUCIA

Details: With power ratings of 120W and 240W, respectively, into a single output, the amps offer installers the option of driving 70V distributed loudspeaker systems while retaining the input flexibility offered by low-impedance LUCIA models.

And another thing…

70/100V transformers facilitate multiple unit installations without the level-matching concerns of parallelled transformerless speakers. www.denonpro.com

And another thing…

Both amplifiers are Energy Star approved for green building certification. www.labgruppen.com

TANNOY

VUE AUDIOTECHNIK

WAVES AUDIO

What is it?

A surface-mount loudspeaker series incorporating Tannoy’s new Dual Concentric (DC) technology.

What is it?

An update which adds Dante networking support for VUE’s h-Class UHD speaker systems and V Series DPS/amplifiers.

What’s the news?

Waves’ plug-ins and SoundGrid technology will be integrated into Lawo’s mc²-series consoles (mc²66 pictured).

Details: The update, set to officially ship in September, will be incorporated in all future products, and upgrades will be available for owners of existing systems.

Details: Running the Waves MultiRack plug-in host application on Lawo consoles will offer users Waves processing for live broadcasts, postproduction, live mixing and theatre sound.

AMS

Details: Comprising a range of seven models, the AMS series is designed for entertainment and hospitality venues, as well as “areas where true sonic clarity and reliability is required”, says Tannoy.

And another thing…

The AMS range is engineered to perfectly match Tannoy’s CMS 3.0 ceiling loudspeaker, launched last summer and shown at ISE earlier this year. www.tannoypro.com

H-CLASS AND V SERIES

And another thing…

“We’d been waiting for a cost-effective solution for audio over Ethernet, and Dante has clearly become the industry standard for audio networking,” says VUE Audiotechnik CEO Ken Berger. www.vueaudio.com

SOUNDGRID

And another thing…

Waves’ Mick Olesh says the partnership realises a “commitment to provid[ing] our customers with the freedom to use Waves plug-ins in all settings”. www.waves.com

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22/06/2015 14:33

P18 JULY 2015

The strategic position

A new dawn for AVnu?

Despite some enduring perception problems, AVB still has an exciting potential future in pro-audio networking, incoming AVnu Alliance president Gary Stuebing tells David Davies

R

eservations about the progress being made

by Audio/Video Bridging (AVB) networking technology in pro audio are nothing new – but they were certainly given additional weight when RH Consulting published The Death of Analogue and the Rise of Audio Networking earlier this year. Among other findings, the report documented the availability of only 61 AVB pro-audio products as of December 2014 – compared to a whopping 296 for Audinate’s increasingly ubiquitous Dante media networking technology.

It is within this somewhat challenging context that Gary Stuebing has assumed the role of president of AVB-promoting organisation the AVnu Alliance. Now four decades into a distinguished career, Stuebing’s background is rich in IT management experience.

His current ‘day job’ is manager of engineering, IoT standards/architecture, at Cisco, while he has also fulfilled roles at several other alliances and standards groups such as IEEE, Wi-Sun and HomePlug.

Speaking to PSNEurope a few days after his appointment was made public, Stuebing was candid about the current pro-audio industry status of AVB and AVnu. “I am a little concerned, and would like to see AVnu take off more from the perspective of what it is doing [for the future of audio networking],” he says. “It does not seem there is a general sense of cohesiveness in the pro-AV community about using open standards

AVnu has held steadfast to the open standards principle, but there is little doubt that the limited quantities of AVB-supporting product – and in particular, the small number of currently available dedicated switches, which are needed to make AVB networks operate – has inhibited adoption. But Stuebing, who is more than familiar with the “extended timescales” involved in getting standards-based technologies to achieve market traction, believes that, aided by the forthcoming TSN (Time Sensitive Networking) standard, AVB could be on the verge of a productive new phase.

Billed as an evolution of AVB, TSN has been developed to provide users, not least those in the industrial community, with the ability to use standard Ethernet “to support highly reliable and precise synchronised networking appropriate for industrial control”. Completion of the related standards is predicted for July, says Stuebing, after which development of an interoperability certification programme and the relevant chipsets will mean we should anticipate ratified TSN product “about a year from now”.

Once introduced into the market, Stuebing expects the technological and businesses cases behind the technology to become increasingly apparent. “AVB/ TSN will constitute a really powerful open standard for networking, with capacity for fast and effective time-sensitive operation over a real-time network. There will be scope for very tight synchronisation of an entire

and trying to form some kind of compatibility and interoperability scenario. And I think that is to the detriment of customers.”

network,” he explains.

Stuebing also thinks AVB/TSN will add momentum to the development of new products: “Experience tells

Experience tells me that when you start to have commoditisation [around an open standard] a lot of things start to happen quite quickly, and that includes price points being driven down Gary Stuebing

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Attendees to April’s Conference on Time Sensitive Networking and Applications (TSNA) in Santa Clara, California, US

Meyer Sound’s AVnu-certified CAL column-array loudspeakers

me that when you start to have commoditisation [around an open standard] a lot of things start to happen quite quickly, and that includes price points being driven down.

With regard to switches, the Extreme Networks [family of AVB-compliant switches] is performing well, and I would suggest that we will start to see other manufacturers jumping into that with TSN standards.”

Pro audio remains an “integral” part of the future vision for pro-audio, confirms Stuebing, although AVB/TSN is also expected to resonate strongly with automotive, among other industrial sectors. “I do think it will help to awaken a large segment of the market,” he says “It is true that we are seeing a great deal of activity in automotive in Germany, and it seems a lot of [automotive networking] in Korea and Japan is basically going to be AVB/TSN-based as well.”

The perception of drift around the AVB/AVnu project over the last few years will take some time to dissipate in even the most favourable conditions, but Stuebing is refreshingly frank about the challenges that lie ahead and clearly determined to reassert the value of an open standards-based, fully-certified approach to audio connectivity. “I am convinced this technology has a great future in pro audio,” he concludes. n www.avnu.org

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22/06/2015 15:44

Studio

P20 JULY 2015

AIR Studios’ Lyndhurst Hall, a former congregational church

United Kingdom

Hampstead studios’ future up in the AIR Neighbours’ super-basement plans may force AIR Studios’ temporary closure, writes Jon Chapple

A

IR Studios could be facing up to six months of disruption from building work after its neighbours applied for planning permission for an underground extension to their property.

Alison Burton, manager of the Hampstead recording studios, says the facility would not be able to operate for around six months due to “severe noise pollution and underground vibration” and has asked the membership of the Music Producers Guild (MPG) for its support. If the application is successful, the MPG says the closure could “directly affect MPG members […] and have wider implications, with loss of income across the music recording community”.

Speaking to PSNEurope, studio owners Richard Boote and Paul Woolf confirmed that AIR is obliged to follow the planning process but added: “If we were not successful in stopping the application we could then sue for nuisance, perhaps.”

In addition to the MPG, the studios have won support from local preservation group The Heath & Hampstead Society, which has expressed opposition to the extension

planning application as the “[e]rection of single storey extension with single storey plus basement link to proposed basement and sub-basement extension, demolition of single storey self-contained studio and erection of single storey pavilion as ancillary accommodation to main house, demolition of 2x single storey outbuildings and additional basement extension to west of property.” The owners’ names are given as Mr and Mrs Andrew Jeffreys.

AIR (Associated Independent Recording) was founded in 1969 by Sir George Martin and moved to its present location, Lyndhurst Hall in Hampstead, north London, in 1991, and was acquired from Sir George by Strongroom MD Richard Boote in 2006. It also had a studio in the tiny Caribbean island of Montserrat until it was destroyed by Hurricane Hugo in 1989.

The last five years have seen an increasing number of ‘mega-basements’ or ‘iceberg homes’ built under the houses of London’s super-rich, increasing the size of the properties many times over (a 2012 Guardian article described their “making Swiss cheese of London’s poshest streets”). They were, however,

Degrees campaign website (you.38degrees.org.uk) had collected over 7,000 email signatures by mid-June, the date the petition was due to be forwarded to the case officer at Camden London Borough Council.

At the time of writing, Boote and Woolf were both confident the local authority would refuse the Jeffreys’ planning application. But do they have a contingency plan, just in case?

of a grade II-listed house it says is “relatively untouched by the vulgar excesses of the 21st century”.

The proposed refurbishment is described in the

outlawed by the affluent Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea in May. A ‘Save Air Studios’ petition created on the 38

“We will be successful!” n www.airstudios.com www.mpg.org.uk

Associated Independent Recording founder Sir George Martin

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22/06/2015 16:40

When you need to discreetly deliver the true story

ESD5 ďšş NEW ADDITION TO ESD FAMILY This tiny enclosure produces true and accurate reproduction in a cleverly designed cabinet.

Ideally angled for ceiling or under balcony mounting, installation is quick and easy with the integral mounting bracket.

Suitable for all applications where a robust, high quality compact speaker is required.

Like all KV2 speakers, the ESD5 delivers sound performance beyond expectation!

The ESD Range Time Aligned Passive Speakers

www.kv2audio.com

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6/12/2015 2:02:03 PM

Studio

P22 JULY 2015

United Kingdom

Flare’s a crowd

Following a Kickstarter campaign that raised over £177,000 for its new consumer headphones, Flare Audio’s Naomi Roberts reveals the secret to its success and tells Jon Chapple how other manufacturers can get in on the act

I

f you’re a reader of our daily and weekly newsletters or a regular visitor to PSNEurope.com, you’ll no doubt have heard about the Kickstarter campaign for Flare Audio’s Reference R2 in-ear headphones.

Launched on 5 May, it closed 28 days later, having raised £177,277 (€241,125) with 1260 backers – over 177 per cent of its initial goal of £100,000 – and established West Sussex-based Flare as a major player in the consumer headphone market.

So, how did a pro-audio manufacturer best known for sound reinforcement so successfully crowdfund its way into the booming headphone market (a phenomenon we’re officially dubbing ‘the Canaissance’) – and how can other companies learn from its experience? Flare’s customer relationship manager, Naomi Roberts, spills the beans…

Naomi Roberts (far left) with the Flare Audio team on Lancing beach in West Sussex

PSNEurope: Congratulations!

Naomi Roberts: Thank you!

Were you always confident you’d pull it off?

I knew we had a great product, and we had some heavyweight endorsers on our Kickstarter video, so I was very confident in our offerings, but Kickstarter was new territory for us – we were entering a new marketplace with the consumer products, so in that respect it was a bit of an unknown.

I hoped that people would embrace what we were doing and see the zest and belief we have in what we do. When all the positive reviews started coming in there was a rush of backers; the video reviews were particularly helpful. I wasn’t content until I saw that we had reached the £100k mark, though – don’t count your chickens and all that!

Why £100,000? It seems a lot...

How did you get the word out there?

We thought we’d set our sights high! We had some really good advice and, having researched other Kickstarter campaigns, we found that if the target is set too low your project might not be valued quite as much. Kickstarter backers like to see a strong product and creativity or a new way of doing things in order to create real buzz and excitement.

We found that we had to be very proactive from all angles – it was a multipronged mission! Social media was important, as were the endorsements and reviews. I think you need all those facets to appeal to everyone. People are tempted by different things, but I think most Kickstarter backers are very savvy and like to see in-depth technical reviews from people whose opinions they respect and value.

It’s also important that all questions and comments from potential backers are replied to, and that you dedicate time and courtesy to everyone. We are a very small but very enthusiastic team at Flare, and the Kickstarter backers seemed to like and appreciate the personal touch that we gave. We invited anyone who was local to us to come to our warehouse and try out the earphones – from this we ramped up our presence in forums with some really glowing and detailed reviews. We wanted to be very transparent in our approach and I think the backers valued this.

With 11 days to go, the campaign had raised only £35,000 – then there was a big surge in pledges towards the end, and the 100k mark was reached with three days to spare. Was that something you were expecting?

We hoped that it might happen, but we weren’t relying on it. It was a constant push. It seems to be the way that it goes for quite a lot of Kickstarter campaigns: people hold off pledging until they get all the information they are after. The reviews and endorsements helped massively as, after all, we are selling a product visually that people will be using aurally.

How did you get so many celebrity endorsers on board? How important were they to the overall success?

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Studio

Naomi roberts’ crowdfunding secrets •

• • •

• •

Get a good, solid campaign together for something that you are passionate about. It will take up a lot of your time and you need to genuinely believe wholeheartedly in what you are promoting.

Make sure you have a variety of reviews lined up.

Work out your rewards and have a diverse range of price options.

Dedicate yourself to it. It needs constant attention and encouragement: you can’t leave it to run itself.

Give up on all social engagements for the length of the campaign!

Coffee. Plenty of coffee.

Well, I think if the whole approach was likened to a cake, the tech reviews were the sponge and the celebrity endorsers were the icing and cherry on top!

It’s difficult to quantify just how important they were

to the overall success, but they definitely bolstered the campaign and gave us an extra dimension.

Personally, I found I had to lose all self-effacement and just go for it. For example, we messaged Huey Morgan on Twitter and he was happy to try out the R2s and let us know his thoughts. He has since been showing them to his friends and colleagues because he likes them so much. Everyone we approached has been very amiable and, thankfully, all loved the earphones, so getting a quote from them wasn’t as hard a task as we might have thought. Jarvis [Cocker] has been a Flare fan for a few years now and so was keen to try out the earphones.

We were aware that, as individuals, they all have a great deal of integrity and didn’t have to give us quotes, so we were thrilled that they gave us such wonderful words.

Flare is now officially a successful consumer brand too. Are you moving away from pro audio?

No, definitely not! The consumer products are just another string to our bow – we are fortunate that the technology we have developed can be easily scaled,

so consumer products was a natural next step for us and Kickstarter felt like the right platform as a means in attracting a new audience. I think I can speak for all of the team when I say that the whole experience has been very uplifting. The feedback and interaction from Kickstarter backers has been thoroughly heartening, and they embraced our different attitude and mindset. It was wholly refreshing.

Does crowdfunding only work for consumer products, or can you see pro-audio companies being successful on Kickstarter too?

I’m not sure… From our experience I’d say that you need to be able to offer Kickstarter ‘rewards’ at a number of different price brackets, which might be tricky for the pro-audio market. That said, I do think that our backstory in pro audio definitely helped us – I think it gave us some extra authority and standing in the consumer market.

Pro audio is a really exciting world to be involved with, but it’s a tough one. It was really interesting to put our first toe into the consumer market and to be so warmly received. n www.kickstarter.com www.flareaudio.com

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Broadcast

P26 JULY 2015

United Kingdom

The future starts here for BBC Sound

BBC R&D used a new two-day event to put audio technology front and centre at New Broadcasting House in London during May. Kevin Hilton attended and, dodging a lurking Dalek, sends this report from the TARDIS

B

BC’s Sound: Now and Next event was, according to Frank Melchior, lead audio technologist with BBC R&D and the driving force behind the event, designed to get programme makers, researchers and technologists together to look at what was being done today and how that could move on in the near future. (See last month’s issue.)

Now and Next was presented by LJ Rich from BBC News Channel’s Click technology programme, who said the event would show “the nexus between sound and technology”. This was confirmed by the showcasing of what Melchior called “almost four years” of the BBC Audio Research Partnership with the Universities of Surrey, Salford, Southampton, York and Queen Mary University of London, plus displays by DTS, Fairlight, Fraunhofer, Blue Ripple Sound and Dolby.

Spatial sound in its various forms – Ambisonics, object-based and binaural – was a pervading

Wildlife sound recordist Chris Watson addressed this in A Journey South, with his recordings and audio diary from trips to the Antarctic making natural history programmes.

He detailed his work with adapted hydrophones to record inside glaciers and SoundField microphones for surround. While saying that immersive technologies put the viewer/listener “in a sense of space”, Watson bemoaned that his efforts to do this were often obscured by having “orchestral music smeared over it”.

Current broadcast transmission systems constrain new immersive audio production, as do the requirements of event coverage. In a session on live broadcast sound freelance OB sound supervisor Bill Whiston and Olympic Broadcast Services audio manager Nuno Duarte both commented that although tests were being made it, could be some time before spatial technologies were a regular component.

programmes had been made in both 5.1 and binaural in the past. “For a long time we did 5.1 in our trucks but there isn’t a platform for it apart from HDTV,” he said. He added that R1 presenter Rob da Bank had fronted a two-hour binaural special in 2014 and while that was well received “the difficult thing is explaining to listeners that they have to put their headphones on and keep them on”.

In a specific session on immersive sound Isabel Platthaus, commissioning editor and dramaturg with German public broadcaster WDR, outlined the production processes behind 39, which is both

theme, as broadcasters, engineers and producers contemplate the best way to recreate how the world sounds for ultra-HD TV, games and virtual reality.

Andy Rogers, senior producer for live music with BBC Radio 1 and 1Xtra, commented that there was “a problem in doing immersive”, even though

a radio play and an interactive game for mobiles.

Working with sound engineer and game designer Achim Fell, who co-presented the talk, Platthaus

3D audio gives more tools to tell stories

Varun Nair, Two Big Ears

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says the production was built up in layers so it could be both listened to and played with. Fell added that the sounds were mixed together, with the interactivity allowing the level of immersion to be increased.

The potential of immersive sound for virtual and augmented reality was discussed by Varun Nair, cofounder of interactive audio specialist Two Big Ears.

Nair said that the three main aspects for 3D sound in VR/AR are panning, elevation (playing with height) and externalisation, for the sense of reality. “But technology is a means to an end,” he concluded. “3D audio gives more tools to tell stories.”

Earlier in the session Martyn Harries, rerecording mixer and senior lecturer in audio and

The tech fair

Jon Tutcher, BBC senior research technologist, at Sound: Now and Next

music technology at the University of the West of England, observed that “object-based surround is way forward”. This was discussed on the second day under the heading of Responsive and Interactive Content. Matthew Brooks, senior engineer with BBC R&D described how object-based technology was used to create a version of radio documentary The Cornish Gardener that allowed listeners to specify its duration (see PSNEurope April for a full report).

While that had been a re-versioning of an existing linear production, BR-Klassik in Germany has created a responsive radio feature about the beginnings of World War I from scratch. Managing editor Werner Bleisteiner explained that, working with the IRT and BBC R&D under an EBU pilot project, he and his colleagues had assembled a series of clips and music tracks as objects to create what he described as “radio beyond radio”.

final session of Now and Next. Musician Tim Exile shook up the venerable Radio Theatre with his Flow Machine, a looping system that combines MIDI, sampling and delay technologies. Mark Boas,

co-founder of Hyperaudio, described the technology behind his company’s name, which is designed to integrate audio into the web in the same way hypertext does for words.

Perhaps most intriguing was the editing and search software conceived by Professor Jörn Loviscach of Bielefeld University of Applied Sciences.

Originally designed so that he could easily search videos of his lectures, the program has potential for general audio production in giving visualisation of selected words and the automatic highlighting of “um”.

The possible future of audio in all its forms was addressed by composer and sound artist Nick Ryan, who said the key elements were immersion, interactivity and sonification. He explained the third component as “transforming information into sound”, be it data or from another sense, as in the case of colour.

As newly appointed controller of BBC R&D Andy Conroy remarked at the start of the event, the intention was to identify techniques and technologies that would “feed the imagination” of audiences.

“Someday all broadcast audio will be made this way,” he said hopefully. n www.bbc.co.uk/rd/events/sound2015

Freelance OB sound supervisor Bill Whiston speaks at Sound: Now and Next

Different production tools that can make the creation of responsive and immersive audio material easier and more efficient were the subjects of the

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Broadcast

P28 JULE 2015

Måns Zelmerlöw performs winning song Heroes at the Eurovision Song Contest Grand Final (All photos: Ralph Larmann)

Austria

IP begins at 60 for Eurovision Audio signals were routed via a RAVENNA/AES67based AoIP infrastructure for the first time in the event’s history, writes Angela Buenger A team from host broadcaster ORF mains the Lawo desks

E

very year, the Eurovision Song Contest (ESC) ranks among the top-rated internationally broadcast TV programmes. On 23 May 2015, almost 200 million viewers from 80 countries watched Sweden’s Måns Zelmerlöw beat Russia and Italy to the Eurovision trophy at the Wiener Stadthalle in Vienna.

For the 60th anniversary of the world’s biggest TV entertainment show, host broadcaster ORF celebrated two world premières: Not only did the contest win the Green Events Austria Sonderpreis award for sustainable cultural and sporting events at the Green Events Austria Gala 2015, Austria’s national broadcaster also led the way when it came to the audio technology used at the Stadthalle.

In the framework of the host broadcaster’s overall technical concept, all audio signals were routed via a RAVENNA/AES67-based IP infrastructure. Both the Lawo Nova 73 audio matrix – including all connected DALLIS I/O systems used by Belgian company VideoHouse, ORF’s broadcast supplier – and the video and audio distribution of the commentary solution were based on IP networking technology, which made its ESC debut at this year’s event.

To distribute all the audio signals to the different suppliers and OB vans while minimising equipment and cabling required and increasing flexibility, the signals were collected by a central audio router. The setup was based on a Lawo Nova 73HD audio routing core, with 10 DALLIS I/O systems connected using RAVENNA audio-over-IP technology.

The installation provided for a decentralised collection and distribution of the signals at the

Not only microphones and monitoring but also intercom systems, wireless cameras, LTE base stations and controlling units for light and effects required spectrum Gerhard Vonwald, Grothusen Audio Video

venue, including 96 Sennheiser Digital 9000 wireless microphone systems, 32 Sennheiser in-ear monitoring systems for the artists and an Avid Pro Tools playback system. In addition, all sync and timecode signals required for the production were also distributed via the infrastructure.

According to Lawo, the Nova audio routing infrastructure routed more than 6,600 audio signals to six OB trucks and to the FOH and monitor consoles inside the venue. All OB vans provided by either ORF itself or VideoHouse were equipped with Lawo m²66 or mc²56 digital mixing consoles. In addition, the VideoHouse trucks were equipped with V__pro8 video processing systems for audio embedding, deembedding and format conversion. To manage and control the whole setup. a VSM system from L-S-B was used.

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Broadcast

Sennheiser wireless systems, managed by Grothusen Audio Video

The most difficult requirement was the height of the arrays: 12m above the floor PA designer Stephan Schloegel In addition to the signal routing, the commentary system used by the host broadcaster was also resting upon IP networking technology. A team of 14 engineers equipped 45 commentator cabins with LCU commentary units, which were networked via RAVENNA/AES67 with the commentary control room and the commentary equipment room. Here, the signals were forwarded to the Prodys ISDN and IP codecs that connected broadcasters around the world with the event location. The video signals for the 90 video screens in the Eurovision commentary boxes which provided additional information to the commentators on site were streamed to the commentary boxes via V__link4 Video-over-IP systems.

The equipment was provided by Audio Broadcast Services (ABS), a rental partner of German manufacturer Lawo; the technical concept as well as its implementation and on-site support was managed by Lawo as a turnkey solution.

Another German company, Riedel, supported the radio, intercom and signal distribution systems.

operated; the intercom matrix comprised nine Artist mainframes which were distributed across the venue. In order to integrate the OB vans into the whole system, around 300 panels and 15 mainframes were used. The signal distribution system included Riedel’s MediorNet solution for video, data and audio communication and comprised

Vienna-based Sound Art Service (SAS) and included a Meyer Sound LYON linear sound reinforcement system, 44 LYON linear line-array loudspeakers and 12 1100-LFC low-frequency control elements, with a Galileo loudspeaker management system with four Galileo 616 and six Galileo Callisto 616 array processors for system drive and optimisation.

In total, around 600 radio sets were used to interconnect the around 2,500 crew members.

For the intercom system, around 140 panels were

45 MediorNet mainframes and a total of 127 HD-SDI inputs, as well as 148 HD-SDI outputs.

The PA system was provided and designed by

Onstage foldback was provided by six MJF-210, two MJF-212A, and 14 UM-1P stage monitors.

The auxiliary fill, delay, and VIP systems included

Meyer Sound M’elodie hang

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Broadcast

Lithuania’s Monika Linkytė and Vaidas Baumila sing the solidly 18th-placed This Time

A flaming piano for Austria, but they still failed to score

24 M’elodie line-array loudspeakers; six JM-1P arrayable loudspeakers; six CQ-1, six UPQ-1P, eight UPM-1P, 18 UPA-1P, eight MSL-2, 18 MSL-4 and four MSL-6 loudspeakers; eight UPJ-1P and six UPJunio VariO loudspeakers and 10 700-HP subwoofers.

Equipment supply for the LYON and 1100-LFC systems came from Senec-based Amex Audio, with coordination by Igor Demčák and Braňo Bèreš.

In addition to the Sennheiser Digital 9000 wireless systems, the front-end system comprised Midas PRO6 and PRO9 digital mixing consoles for main and

Due to the technical requirements on site the support staff had several obstacles to overcome, as Gerhard Vonwald, technical director at Grothusen Audio Video, Sennheiser’s Austrian distribution partner – acting as head of wireless audio at ESC – explains: “As one can imagine, the frequency spectrum in Vienna was quite densely occupied. In the hall, not only microphones and monitoring but also intercom systems, wireless cameras, LTE base stations and controlling units for light and effects required spectrum.”

music mixes. Monitors were mixed on Midas PRO X consoles, while the broadcast feed was mixed on four Lawo mc²66 consoles, as mentioned above.

According Vonwald, the metal pipes of the stage construction also created HF reflections that were difficult to manage and a challenge when it came

to positioning of the 11 transmit/receive antennae.

Furthermore, interference was also created by the large LED walls and the LED floor. “Therefore, it was helpful that Digital 9000 does not create intermodulation products and, hence, is spectrumefficient,” he continues. “We were able to arrange the microphone frequencies in small intervals of 600kHz, which eased the planning and made this high number of channels possible.”

SAS’s Stephan Schloegel, the designer of the PA system, adds: “The most difficult requirement was the height requirement of the arrays: 12 metres above the floor. A uniform coverage in front of the stage was not easy, but the LYON and JM-1Ps provided a seamless solution.”

Apparently, it was worth the effort: “The final and all 11 shows with audience before were technically perfect and an amazing experience for the 60,000 people in the hall, as well as for the TV and online audience”, says Vonwald. ORF director-general Alexander Wrabetz, Vienesse mayor Michael Haeupel and Vienna town councillor Christian Oxonitsch said in a statement that they were also happy: The costs for the event were below the estimated budget and national and international reactions were more than positive. n www.eurovision.tv www.grothusen.pro www.lawo.com www.meyersound.com www.midasconsoles.com www.riedel.net www.sas.co.at www.sennheiser.com

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X-LINE ADVANCE Forward-thinking line-array design starts here.

The result of rigorous R&D, the introduction of the new X-Line Advance family sees Electro-Voice push the parameters of line-array performance to the next level.

X-Line Advance utilizes state-of-the-art EVengineered components and incorporates a range of innovative new features, all of which work together to surpass the capabilities of other line arrays, and all in a significantly more compact, flexible, and quickerto-set-up package.

KEY FEATURES: An unprecedented performance-to-size ratio for installed and concert sound applications.

Advanced audio quality and control via a host of new and exclusive EVengineered technologies, including next-generation Hydra wave-shaping devices, high-output transducers, and proprietary FIR-Drive optimization.

New-look EV industrial design and new Integrated Rigging System combine streamlined appearance with simplified setup.

The first wave of X-Line Advance products includes two full-range elements (X1-212/90 & X2-212/90) and the X12-128 — the most powerful subwoofer EV has ever developed.

Designed, engineered, and tested for ultimate reliability by Electro-Voice in the USA. Learn more at: www.electrovoice.com/X-LineAdvance

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Feature: Consolidation in pro audio

Small world… … getting even smaller? Historically an industry dominated by compact, niche-style operations, professional audio is currently experiencing a wave of consolidation through mergers, acquisitions and venture-capital investment. But why now and what are the long-term implications, wonders David Davies

E

ven if we datestamp the birth of pro audio as we know it today to as recently as the late 1950s and the development of the first studio consoles, it seems reasonable to assert that this industry is hardly in the first throes of youth. But in fact, a current trend towards greater consolidation of businesses is leading an increasing number of people to wonder whether it is only now that pro audio is truly reaching maturity.

Of course, mergers and acquisitions in this industry are certainly not unheard-of, and there have been plenty of landmark deals during the past decade – think of Sun Capital/LOUD Technology’s buyout of Martin Audio in 2007, or Music Group’s purchase of Midas and Klark Teknik in 2009, to name just a few.

It is clear, however, that the pace of change has accelerated somewhat over the last few years. In the last 24 months alone, we have seen Yamaha acquire modelling amplifier and recording software specialist Line 6; Harman purchase audio directivity pioneer Duran Audio (hot on the heels, it should be noted, of acquiring entertainment lighting giant Martin Professional too); Gibson add music recording software specialist Cakewalk to its stable; console brands Calrec, DiGiCo and Allen & Heath being brought into the same group; and, most recently of all, Uli Behringer’s Music Group further

Harman VP Blake Augsburger

HHB Communications’ Ian Jones

So, the principal question is not ‘if’ – instead it is ‘why now’ and, more problematically, ‘what are the long-term implications?’.

Pro audio in transition Whilst there is a general feeling of economic uplift at present, the sense of uncertainty prevalent since the 2008 crash hasn’t completely dissipated, and at press time the possibility of a Greek exit from the Euro remains a forbiddingly dark cloud on the

strengthening its presence in pro audio through the acquisition of TC Group, parent of Tannoy, Lab.gruppen, Lake and TC Electronic.

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horizon. Opinions vary on the extent to which the broader financial landscape has contributed to the wave of mergers and acquisitions, but it certainly seems to be an element in the mix.

Blake Augsburger, executive vice-president and president, professional division, at Harman International, comments: “The rate of mergers and acquisitions taking place within the audio industry is contingent on variables within the industry such as maturity, technology and competition, but also on macro-economic issues as well. This includes but is not limited to the cost of capital, globalisation and compliance. There is also a cyclical filter determined by high-profile successes and failures, market sentiment and even trends.”

James Gordon, MD of DiGiCo and now also CEO of the combined DiGiCo/Allen & Heath/Calrec group christened Audiotonix in April 2015, similarly thinks the broader economic situation has had an impact, but highlights too the increased appeal of the sector as a reason for the influx of venture-capital (VC) money now enabling many of the changes.

“Post a recession, this kind of new investment cycle is very common and is occurring in lots of industries at this time,” says Gordon. “I guess as the dust starts to clear companies look at new opportunities and that generates new investment. We have certainly seen this trend in our industry before.

I do think, though, that as our industry becomes more professional with a worldwide footprint it becomes a more attractive proposition for external investment.”

For RH Consulting founder and keen industry observer Roland Hemming, the explanation resides more in a cyclical change slowly taking place. “Our industry has been regarded as very young with many companies that are still owner-managed, but it is now transitioning,” he says. “However, as an increasing number approach retirement, if they have no succession strategy, then this makes them look to sell. Secondly, you have companies wanting to diversify or supply a more complete package, so again M&As [mergers and acquisitions] help companies achieve this.”

Ian Jones, managing director of stalwart independent AV technology supplier HHB Communications, also thinks we are witnessing a logical development in the industry. “Pro audio has traditionally comprised a large number of relatively small businesses operating independently, so I’d suggest that consolidation is somewhat inevitable,” he says.

In an increasingly integrated world, it makes sense on multiple levels for larger firms to look to deliver a wider cross-section of complementary technologies.

But it also stands to reason that consolidation isn’t always going to be straightforward, or even immediately beneficial. To put it mildly, ‘growing

pains’ are surely to be expected.

Practicalities of consolidation

“It’s never that cut and dried…”

It would obviously have been preferable to assess the practicalities with the architects of the most prominent deal of recent times: the Music Group purchase of TC. Unfortunately, TC and Music Group declined to be interviewed at this early stage of the process. Meanwhile, private equity firm Electra Partners – which acquired latterday Audiotonix group bands Allen & Heath in 2013 and DiGiCo and Calrec in 2014 – accepted PSNEurope’s questions but was unable to provide any comments by the time of going to press.

Fortunately, there are plenty of others to whom

As our industry becomes more professional with a worldwide footprint it becomes a more attractive proposition for external investment

James Gordon, DiGiCo/Audiotonix Group we can turn to analyse consolidation mechanics.

Surveying Harman’s purchase of Martin Pro and Duran Audio (regarding the latter, “we saw an excellent opportunity to acquire great technology and great talent”), Augsburger confirms that “there were many practical/logistical elements in getting onto a shared ERP [enterprise resource planning] system and to a single procurement plan, but the most important aspects were ensuring customers experienced nothing but improvement in choice, service and support, and that the employees of all three groups were culturally engaged in making the acquisitions work. They were and so the acquisitions have worked. It typically takes a year or so to complete the integration.”

For Audiotonix – which features a combination of ownership ranging from Electra and fellow privateequity firm Living Bridge through to the managers and staff of the group – the consolidation of three leading mixing console brands into one group was the result of a period of careful reflection. “We looked at many options and could have taken the more traditional route of investing into a speaker or amplifier company, but in reality the skill of the team is that we know mixing consoles,” says Gordon.

Selecting the companies was not particularly challenging since “all three brands have great reputations and loyal clients. When you look a little deeper into the businesses, although all three design

Andy Huffer, sales director at pro-audio trade sales and distribution company HD Pro Audio, believes that analysis of M&As needs to be undertaken very carefully:“When the word gets out about another much loved independent proaudio brand being merged, acquired or injected with VC money, the kneejerk reaction of the pro-audio community tends towards clutching our pearls to our chest and exclaiming our horror and outrage. Like most things, it’s never that cut and dried. I’ve seen many brands evolve over the years, and there’s enormous potential for it to be a positive thing if managed correctly. Access to enhanced R&D and manufacturing capability, investment in support infrastructure and stock, increased marketing budget and securing a longterm future for the brand… all of these can come from investment by the ‘suits’.

“Having said that, there is also enormous potential for the brand’s original architects to leave, unhappy with the new structure, for assetstripping, for the ‘suits’ to ignore the qualities that established and maintained the brand in the first place that don’t fit neatly on a spreadsheet, and many other classic errors that have left once mighty brands chewed up and spat out by their new owners.” www.hdproaudio.co.uk and manufacture consoles, we address a different market or client base with them. This means the combined mixing console knowledge and experience across the group adds real value and expertise.”

In terms of the practicalities, Gordon was aware from day one that encouraging dialogue between the three R&D firms was going to be instrumental

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Feature: Consolidation in pro audio

If you want to buy another company or merge you have to think about what the overall benefit will be […]

Will the result be greater than the sum of all the parts?

Roland Hemming, RH Consulting in making the new group function effectively. “Three strong R&D teams with a long history of developing groundbreaking products all working together sounded an impossible task,” he admits. “Looking back I am not sure now why we viewed this as the biggest challenge, because from their first meeting they were talking the same language and were keen to learn from each other. The level of respect between the teams has meant they willingly share ideas and want to contribute and share with the other teams in the group.”

Long-term benefits One pleasant upside of the recent wave of M&As is that they seem to have involved relatively few losses in terms of personnel – something that can only be good news in an industry where job opportunities aren’t always in plentiful supply. But if the current phase of consolidation has been fairly painless in the short-term, what are its long-term benefits likely to be?

Over at Line 6 – which is still run as an independent company following the Yamaha acquisition – the benefits have included joint product development with its new owner (for example, on the Variax Standard guitar) and the back-up of a “financially powerful yet music industry-internal partner” that allows the company to pursue new products and markets.

“The instant benefit is a much larger internal customer base allowing sales either through under own-brand or under one [of] the other brands in the Yamaha group,” says Nils-Peter Keller, director Yamaha Music Europe’s pro audio division. “A medium-term benefit is the know-how transfer of production and design quality methodology, as well as the development of the businesses processes’ quality – which is also a bidirectional benefit. Last but not least, the addition of Yamaha’s power has made it easier for Line 6 to develop new products and enter more or other business fields.”

For Michael Hoover – president of Cakewalk, which was officially acquired by Gibson in December 2013 – the primary benefits of the acquisition reside in enhanced capacity for product development

and increased access to possible new customer groups. “To start with, we get to focus on what we do best: designing, developing, testing and delivering innovative software products for musicians and producers,” says Hoover. “Our dedicated marketing team allows us to talk directly to our customers through online properties we manage on our own.

Our expert staff provide a first-line support while keeping our development team constantly informed of any issues. What has really changed is our ability to reach more customers. Through Gibson’s extensive sales and distribution network and marketing and entertainment relations teams we have a much bigger and stronger voice.”

Continuing consolidation?

But while the recent wave of deals has evidently brought tangible benefits for many of the brands involved, concerns persist that increased dominance by a smaller number of very large players may ultimately inhibit the entrepreneurial spirit that has traditionally underpinned pro-audio’s greatest leaps forward.

Gibson CEO Henry Juszkiewicz, however, thinks that smaller firms will continue to be viable and influential players.

“Smaller companies can address very specific needs that would distract larger companies from their more ambitious goals,” he says. “Gibson can’t imagine a future where niche companies don’t exist; if anything, we feel they strengthen the industry, introduce innovations, and keep raising the bar. We want the bar to keep rising, because ultimately it benefits all of us.”

But not everyone is optimistic. Although he believes that some smaller firms will remain independent due to “emotional attachment or [being] a lifestyle choice”, Hemming expects that “small integration companies will find life increasingly tough as barriers to market increase. Many small manufacturers will either die or be bought, primarily for their IP or for a particular market segment where they excel.”

It is also important to remember that consolidation doesn’t always pan out creatively or commercially. “Many mergers and buyouts don’t succeed,” says Hemming. “If you want to buy another company or merge you have to think about what the overall benefit will be. It’s a cliche, but will the result be greater than the sum of all the parts? If your business isn’t efficient and focused then an M&A probably isn’t going to help. If it is, and you see another business that can benefit from your streamlined operation, then that might be worth consideration.”

So there are no shortage of potential pay-offs, and pitfalls, from taking the path towards merger or acquisition. But in an industry which appears to

Gibson Brands CEO Henry Juszkiewicz

be nearing the end of a significant cycle – whereby an increasing number of the figures who have shaped the modern business will be contemplating retirement and ultimately passing the baton to a new generation that will have to find fresh methods of financing costly R&D – more consolidation seems to be a certainty. n www.audiotonix.com europe.yamaha.com www.gibson.com www.harmanpro.com www.hhb.co.uk www.music-group.com www.rhconsulting.eu

KEY POINTS: • Creation of tri-console manufacturer group Audiotonix and acquisition of TC by Music Group are the most prominent recent examples of pro-audio consolidation • The latest economic cycle is generally regarded to be an important agent of change • The desire to diversify and enhance R&D capacity are also contributing to consolidation • Some observers fear that it will become increasingly difficult for very niche brands to operate independently

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Fucked Up (the band, not the KARAs) (All photos: Louis Austin)

Spain

Strummage to Catalonia Twin Cam reflects on the 15th Primavera Sound festival at Barcelona’s Parc del Fòrum, where the Catalan audio provider went it alone for the first time with an L-Acoustics-based set-up. Jon Chapple reports

Ride are back on the festival circuit

S

ince its inception in 2001, Primavera Sound has drawn some of the biggest names in indie pop, rock and dance music to Barcelona, outgrown its original venue, been named “artists’ favourite festival” at the European Festival Awards and spawned a spin-off event, NOS Primavera Sound, in Oporto in neighbouring Portugal.

The 2015 festival, featuring a guitar-heavy line-up that included The Black Keys, Patti Smith, The Strokes, Sleater-Kinney, Antony and the Johnsons, Alt-J and Interpol, marked 15 years of the festival – and, with it, 15 years of a long and fruitful partnership with Barcelonabased audio provider Twin Cam and its L-Acoustics PA inventory.

“Although our company was significantly smaller than [it is] now, we were already the largest company in […] Catalonia, known for our high standards of personal and equipment,” explains Twin Cam owner and director Rafael Campos, reflecting on the inaugural festival – headlined by Armand Van Helden – in April 2001. “At the time of Primavera’s conception, Twin Cam was in the process of a huge leap forward. We were still using Meyer Sound, and we actually did the first edition using our MSL-5 system, even though we were already starting the transition to V-DOSC and L-Acoustics.

“The first festival was only one stage, in a far smaller and less demanding location than now. Then, Twin Cam had only a fraction of the capacity that we have today.

We could say that the festival and us grew in parallel since then.

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L-Acoustics K1 hang on the Primavera stage

“This year the festival comprised seven stages – of far greater scope than that single stage 15 years ago – and we were able to supply […] first-generation L-Acoustics sound systems for the entire festival.” (Twin Cam supplied five of seven stages in 2014.)

With Twin Cam newly responsible for sound for the entire festival, the 15th outing of Primavera, held from 28 to 30 May with an attendance over 190,000, was no ordinary event for Campos and his team. “Not only was this a significant increase – because it included the addition of the second principal stage [the Heineken stage], which last year was done by PRG with Adamson – even more important for us was the fact that they deposited their faith 100 per cent in us and stopped looking elsewhere,” says Campos.

Twin Cam’s relationship with L-Acoustics dates back to 1999, when it purchased its first V-DOSC system.

As in 2014, system designer Juan Cid – also a certified level-1 L-Acoustics trainer – specified for the main Primavera stage a combination of L-Acoustics K1, K2 and KARA, with an identical set-up on the Heineken stage. The core system comprised left/right arrays of 12 K1s and four K1-SBs per side, with two hangs of eight K1s and two K1-SBs providing outfill, four KARAs for frontfill, two stacks of eight K2s on L/R delays and 24 SB28s subs for low-end reinforcement.

Four ARCS II with a pair of SB28s were used for stage sidefill, and the entire system was powered using LA8 amplifiers. “I believe that we presented [the festival organisers] with a solid, reliable coherent package

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for the whole festival, maintaining the L-Acoustics sonic signature throughout the seven stages,” Campos comments.

Twin Cam is also providing sound for four other major Spanish festivals this summer (Sonar, Barcelona Beach Festival, Hard Rock Rising Barcelona and Cap Roig), as well as “12–15 large gigs” in the same period (“Murphy’s law never fails when it comes to dates,” laughs Campos.

“We had Andrea Bocelli at the Sagrada Familia the second night of Primavera!”) It is also “constantly re-renting gear” to and from the rest of L-Acoustics’ network in Spain – “There is a fantastic relationship between all […] L-Acoustics users,” says Campos – and is involved in two Spanish-language TV programmes.

How does Primavera compare to, say, Sonar? “Unlike many other Spanish festivals, where volume is the

Tori Amos channels her inner Wakeman

Sleater-Kinney’s Corin Tucker

[primary] requirement, [at Primavera] we have a very strict 102dB limit,” explains Campos. “This said, our client demands this level – no more and no less. Everywhere there [are] spectators – on each and every one of the stages – they expect a very similar sonic experience as well…”

This consistency in sound was helped, says Campos, by Twin Cam being the only audio provider on site, “as opposed to other years where, for better or for worse, there were significant differences where different companies were working. I believe Primavera came out ahead by having one technical standard controlled by one design and production team.

“Additionally I must add that this year we came much closer to having all our technical needs satisfied – ie tower heights, choice of materials to cover PAs, etc. – which helps the end result tremendously…”

But enough audio geekery – with 15 years of Primavera experience under his belt, Campos must have some tales of debauchery from festivals past? “Sorry to say that every day there are less juicy stories: The kit works better than ever before, trucks show up on time and our venues are modern and very well built. The crew rest, eat well and don’t have the same [bad] habits as before.

“So, things sound great, the team works well, the shows finish flawlessly day after day… there just aren’t any surprises – or disasters – any more!” n www.twincamaudio.com www.l-acoustics.com www.primaverasound.com

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Antonio Correia (left) with assistant manager André Correia

Portugal

NEXT appeal Jon Chapple meets the man behind Portugal’s leading loudspeakers, NEXT-proaudio CEO Antonio Correia

W

hy aren’t there more 14” stage monitors?

While the above question may sound like the set-up for the least exciting joke you’ve ever heard, it’s a conundrum Portuguese loudspeaker and amp manufacturer NEXT-proaudio saw fit to tackle head on with the launch at Prolight + Sound of its active LAm114xA monitor – reportedly the very first of its kind.

“We wanted to develop a stage monitor combining perfectly the voice reproduction clarity associated with 12” speakers with the bass extension typically reproduced by 15” speakers,” explains NEXT-proaudio CEO Antonio Correia, speaking to PSNEurope from the company’s headquarters in Rio Tinto, near Oporto. “A 14” monitor was perfect for our demands.”

“We have had a very close relationship with B&C Speakers for almost 25 years, which allows us to test all its new products. Thanks to that, we are using a new model from them, a 14” coaxial. At the moment we don’t know of any company doing the same. So far, saleswise, it’s been a huge success.”

While the LAm114xA may not be as flashy as, say, the latest digital desks or designer nightclub speakers, it is something new – no mean feat for a company owned by a man who’s been designing loudspeakers for 29 years.

Founded in its current iteration in 2004, NEXT-

I was studying at university,” he explains. “I had the opportunity to work with some of the most important Portuguese artists and bands for seven years, until 1986.”

Like many manufacturers, the company that became NEXT-proaudio started life as a one-man operation, with Correia building his own PA system after graduating with a degree in electronic engineering. “The system proved to be a very successful solution even among other sound engineers,” he says. “Buoyed by its unexpected success, I started building other PA systems for other rental companies, as well as for some artists.

That was the beginning of my career in professional audio manufacturing.”

Soon after, Correia founded NEXT-proaudio parent group the CVA Electronic Company, producing amplifiers and loudspeakers for 18 years under the CVA brand name. “We were the market leader [in Portugal],” he says, “with almost 85 per cent of rental companies and artists using our systems. By the mid-90s we were exporting to Spain, China, Germany, France…

“Based on our knowledge and on market changes, in early 2004 we decided to develop a new technical philosophy, together with new facilities […], under a new brand name. NEXT-proaudio was born.”

NEXT’s sound reinforcement systems are used in both live and installed sound, with Correia estimating

proaudio is the brainchild of Correia, a former live sound engineer. “I started my involvement in the pro-audio business in 1979 as a sound engineer while

a rough breakdown of 40 per cent marketshare for touring, 25 per cent portable and 35 per cent installation. Recent major installs include the Les Vôutes

James with Technosound’s NEXT PX System

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nightclub in France (X-Line, MA series, LMS series and DP series) and Word of Life church in Russia (LA212x line array), while its touring systems have been used

by Joe Cocker, Macy Gray, The Prodigy, Pendulum and, most recently, James, with NEXT’s stackable PX System and LA12 line array supplied by Technosound for two shows in Oporto.

For new product development, Correia says NEXT’s focus now is on “small lines, such as small line arrays, as well as small portable and installation systems” and on expanding its existing HFA-series, X-Line and LA-series lines. He also reveals that it is developing “specific solutions” for the Chinese, Brazilian and Dutch markets “in order to fulfil the special requirements of our customers”.

NEXT-proaudio has a presence in 26 countries worldwide, but hopes to make it 30 “in the next three months”, Correia says, and is continually investing in staff, resources and infrastructure – a new factory is planned for the end of 2015 – despite trading conditions only just beginning to improve at home in Portugal.

Still, as a small-ish fish in a very big pond, NEXTproaudio must be keenly aware of the competition?

“It’s always a challenge,” comments Correia, “but,

Les Vôutes nightclub, Paris

internationally, the competition is not a problem.

“We have good relations with all the professional brands, and even a friendship with some of the big brands, [which] is healthy because we share distributors and we need to be present on the same physical space,

5 0 0

such as exhibitions, where we must support [the distributors] together.

“The market is huge and there is space for everybody.” n www.next-proaudio.com

S E R I E S

Neve - No Question w w w .a ms-nev e.c o m

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Manu Katche (drums), Richard Bona (bass), Stefano Di Battista (saxophone) and Eric Legnini (piano) on stage in the Salle Marcel Hélie (Photo: Pierre-Yves Le Meur)

France

And all that jazz

Guillaume Schouker reports from Jazz Under the Apple Trees 2015, the 34th annual Norman pomme-fest

C

reated in 1982 by Thierry Giard and Gérard Houssin, the Jazz Sous Les Pommiers (‘Jazz Under the Apple Trees’) festival takes place every year in the city of Coutances in southern Normandy.

An audience of 75,000 attended the 34th festival, from 8–16 May, which comprised no less than nine different concert venues of various sizes throughout the city. Performers included new talents and jazz greats such as Manu Katché, Richard Bona, Stefano Di Battista, Eric Legnini, Pharoah Sanders, Didier Lockwood, Jacky Terrasson, Kenny Garrett, Lizz Wright, Kyle Eastwood and Ester Rada.

Denis Le Bas, who has been managing director of Coutances Municipal Theatre since 1985 and director of Jazz Sous Les Pommiers (JSLP) for the past 30 years, explains the festival’s choice of audio equipment: “The [programme of music] can not stand vague approximation. “[Our audio providers enter into a] partnership with the festival […] and not [just] a simple financial [one]: “We have a trustworthy relationship with JeanMarie Roussel, sound and technical manager, hightech, at Atech, and Gérard Marie, technical director of the festival, for the [choice of] equipment and crew…”

Roussel reveals: “The audio equipment is provided by Atech SARL, based in Verson, near the

console and DBR-series powered loudspeakers, Coda Audio three-way active ultra-low-profile stage monitors, a Roland M-5000 console, Nexo STM S118 sub-bass modules, Freevox Audio preamps…”

During this year’s nine-day event, concerts unfolded in three main concert venues: Salle Marcel Hélie, a gymnasium converted into a 1,350-seat

square around Coutances Cathedral.

Audio constraints consist mostly of “respecting legislation regarding sound levels”, says Le Bas, and the scalability and configuration of the three different set-ups. He also stresses the importance of “offering state-of-the art equipment where and when it’s imperative. Work on sound and on the technical

city of Caen. [Our] partners help us to discover new products by supplying us throughout the festival: Sennheiser digital microphones, a Yamaha QL-series

concert hall; the 600-seat Théâtre Municipal de Coutances; and Magic Mirrors, a 1920s-styled marquee-like circus tent with a capacity of 350 in the

environment in general is a big component of the success of a festival.”

The Salle Marcel Hélie was equipped with a

The Soundcraft Vi6 at front of house

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Soundcraft Vi6 64/24 FOH console with a Yamaha PM5D-RH console for monitoring, while the Municipal Theatre was serviced by a 48-channel Soundcraft Vi4 at FOH and Soundcraft Vi3000 for monitoring.

Magic Mirrors deployed a 40-channel Yamaha CL5 board and Rio3224-D rack at FOH and Yamaha M7CL on monitoring.

Roussel says: “The choice of which console mostly depends on the specification sheets from artists.

Vi series are the most in-demand, considering the countries from where the productions come: The UK, USA, Netherlands, Brazil, Asia…

“The PM5D [still] offers great versatility for controlling live sound monitoring on large stages, and it’s more ergonomic than the Vi. The Soundcraft Vi3000 handled the stage monitoring in Coutances Municipal Theater. “This control surface is a compromise between the number of inputs and buses, its size, its ergonomics and the remote-control iPad app.”

Sound reinforcement in the Salle Marcel Hélie comprised two line-array clusters consisting of 14 Nexo GEO D10s and six GEO D SUBs with Nexo NXAMP4x4 amplification, plus six Nexo PS10-R2

A seven-GEO D10-module array hangs in the Salle Marcel Hélie

for frontfill and sidefill and five Meyer Sound UPM as nearfield. At Coutances Municipal Theatre, the usual sound system was replaced for the festival

by two clusters with six Nexo GEO S1210s, two GEO S1230s and two sub-bass STM118s, four Nexo GEO S830 frontfills and four PS8 nearfields, while Magic Mirrors’ d&b audiotechnik system consisted of 12 T10 speakers, six Q-SUBs with four D12 amplifiers, four E6s and a D6 amplifier for side diffusion.

Regarding microphones, “the demand is steady”, says Roussel. Most are Shure, Sennheiser, Neumann, Audio-Technica, AKG, DPA and Schoeps. “The references are more or less the same ones,” he continues, “except Audix, which is more and more requested. We also noticed that certain productions provide a Yamahiko piano pickup system.”

Jean-Marie Roussel expresses his satisfaction with the work accomplished by the “tight-knit” sound crew behind the 34th JSPL: “Yes, the tech team has got the hang [of it]!” n www.jazzsouslespommiers.com www.atech-atl.com www.audixusa.com www.dbaudio.com www.nexo-sa.com www.soundcraft.com www.yamahiko.info

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Live

P46 JULY 2015

World

Red-y for anything FOH engineer Horace Ward does it his way on the first leg of Usher’s The UR Experience tour with Clair Global’s 96-channel Focusrite RedNet rig

Y

ou might not know Horace Ward, but chances are you’ve heard him in action.

Ward has been a front-of-house sound engineer for the best part of four decades, and his wealth of experience and talent has made him the top choice for some of the world’s premier R&B artists, including Mary J. Blige, Beyoncé, Prince and Busta Rhymes. In 1998 he started working with Usher, during the heady days of the Atlanta artist’s breakthrough, six times platinum-selling album My Way. To stay ahead of the game, each of Ward’s tours has to be bigger and better than the last in every respect, from sound and visuals to stage performance, so a constant updating of his touring technology is necessary to wow the audience – and with Usher’s latest tour, The UR Experience, he did exactly that.

Usher performing at The Warfield Theater in San Francisco on the Here I Stand tour (Photo: Seher Sikandar/Rehes Creative)

Pushing the envelope The UR Experience project started in summer 2014 when Ward, members of Usher’s tour production crew and production company Clair Global put together plans for a 96-channel Dante-based digital audio system based around a DiGiCo SD5 console feeding a gargantuan Clair tour PA system. To accompany the pair, the teams assembled “a wall” of Focusrite RedNet devices to interface between the stage, FOH, monitor world and two recording systems.

A total of 12 Focusrite RedNet 4 mic preamps formed the front end of the system, taking 96 inputs from the stage at 96kHz and distributing them to FOH, where three RedNet 6 MADI bridges interfaced to the DiGiCo digital audio infrastructure. RedNet 1 and RedNet 2 A-D/D-A converters provided analogue connectivity for Ward’s array of outboard processors, while the main Pro Tools HD recording system relied on three RedNet 5 HD bridges to provide 96 channels of recording and playback between the Pro Tools HDX cards and the Dante network. A redundant recording rig powered by Reaper running on a MacBook Pro with Thunderbolt Magma Chassis was equipped with a RedNet PCIe Card, providing it with direct access to any and all Dante audio streams.

Going large According to Clair Global system tech Frank Sgambellone, the flexibility of the Dante network coupled with RedNet’s “versatility and reliability” won him over. “We’re moving forward with a different type

of audio transfer technology on this tour: all the audio is transferred over fibre/Ethernet to the FOH console with Dante,” he explains, adding that the system has allowed for a vast audio network that would be impractical to operate on a protocol “less capable” than Dante. “It’s a rock-solid system. We haven’t had any issues and it sounds fantastic. This system is better than what we traditionally have had on a tour like this.”

But it was Ward who pushed for RedNet, having demoed a system at Clair Global’s HQ and following positive experiences using a Focusrite preamp front end on the road with Lady Gaga. “We tried the RedNet 4 mic preamp units and were thrilled with the powerful sound

that we heard coming through the Clair PA during a full system test,” he comments. “The actual sound of the preamp is phenomenal. I was immediately impressed and decided on the spot to incorporate the RedNet system.”

Fast forward/looking back Reflecting on the first leg of The UR Experience – which came to an end some months ago – Ward is happy with his decision to try something new. “If I don’t try [new technologies], somebody else will,” he says. “These are studio preamps that we took on the road. But they’ve given me exactly what I need: a fullness and richness of

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The UR Experience FOH engineer Horace Ward

If I don’t try new technologies, somebody else will. These are studio preamps that we took on the road, but they’ve given me exactly what I need

Horace Ward sound, which is wider and deeper than ever before. When I’m in the mix position, the 3D picture of the concert is right in front of me, and I know that I’m getting exactly the same sound into Pro Tools as I am on stage, with zero signal degradation, and I’m 300 feet from the stage.”

One of Ward’s main reasons for pushing Clair to try something new for The UR Experience was his belief that he would get more definition by running his rig at 96kHz. But his experiences on the first leg of the tour revealed that the jump in sampling rate wasn’t completely necessary – he just needed better preamps. “The saucy end of the stick is the most important, and this means mics and mic preamps,” concludes Ward. “The Focusrite preamps alone solved half the problems I was experiencing, so even before I’ve hit the rest of my rig, I’ve already put the icing on the cake. It’s like being in the studio and using external mic preamps.” n www.focusrite.com www.clairglobal.com

Clair Global’s studio-derived ‘wall of RedNet’

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P48 JULY 2015

Feature: Digital consoles

Subfrantic’s Yamaha CL5 with The Dunwells

Micro management Phil Ward greets the digital console class of ’15 – with a magnifying glass

T

he opposite of networking is NOT working, says a fridge magnet near you, and pro audio’s digital consoles won’t argue. But there’s a lot more going on than AoIP and, it seems, smaller chassis formats are just the tip of the iceberg.

The latest offerings from the market leaders illustrate perfectly the extent to which previous-generation functionality of the highest order is being funnelled into smaller packages for smaller budgets. More than that, in many cases it’s the compact consoles that represent the real cutting edge in terms of user interface, networking flexibility, I/O configurability and all-round grunt-per-square-millimetre – because they have to, in order to fit everything in.

Where there is compromise, it’s in fader acreage. But this, says Cadac brand development manager Richard Ferriday, is a sign of the iOS times. “The new Cadac CDC Six is based around a further evolution of Cadac’s unique ‘high agility’ gesture operating system, developed for the flagship CDC eight, accessed via a widescreen 23.5-inch touch screen,” he explains. “This greatly reduces the fixed physical control count, allowing for a smaller physical interface than usual in a console of this scale and power.”

The CDC six even uses Cadac’s MegaCOMMS digital audio network, a TDM system capable of 128

DiGiCo’s new S21, as stocked by SSE

channels of 24bit, 96kHz audio, control data and clock bi-directionally – up to 150m via a pair of RG6 coaxial cables. “In addition,” points out Ferriday, “MegaCOMMS

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Don’t worry, be IP

Lawo’s mc² platform, which commonly delivers I/O networks measured in the thousands, latterly gained its most compact addition to date, the mc²36.

Nevertheless, this ‘all-in-one’ console for packs all the connectivity of the company’s largest offers, combining MADI and AoIP as if the future depended upon them – which, of course, it does.

“It all depends on your network model,” says Lawo international sales and project manager Tobias Kronenwett (pictured). “We’re now using RAVENNA, a full IP network, which has the advantage of avoiding a lot of the architectural headaches. It’s not a star configuration or anything like that: being IP it can take on any topology. The problem is getting people with classical routingand-patching experience to adopt IP networks! That’s something we try to tackle with the user interface.”

The familiar-looking mc²36 deliberately guides users gently into an IP future, as all serious models will now do, however small. “A RAVENNA I/O system behaves exactly like a classic I/O system connected via MADI,” Kronenwett points out. “There’s no difference in software or management.

Furthermore, it doesn’t matter if the signal is IP or MADI: for us that was a logical way to encourage people to make the step into IP.” www.lawo.com

S3L-X, engineers can share the same VENUE Stage 16 I/O boxes across three S3L-X systems over Ethernet AVB, eliminating the need for a splitter to share source feeds between FOH, monitor and broadcast setups,” continues Hagedorn. “This reduces the I/O and cable requirements, set-up time, and transportation costs, highlighting the true portability and value of using S3L-X in even the most demanding workflows.”

And so it continues at Yamaha and Fairlight. “Yamaha’s CL and QL series digital mixing consoles have gained wide acceptance around the world as well-equipped, high quality live mixers suitable for outside broadcast and production use,” reports Andy Cooper, Yamaha’s manager of PA application engineering. “QL5 is perhaps the most optimised in terms of channel count and size, while the recent release of V3 software brings support for 5.1 surround panning and monitoring, mix-minus buses, frame delays, on-screen RTA and dua oscillator.

“Dante is used to connect with other QL- and CL-series consoles, as well as Yamaha’s range of R-series remote I/O units, computers for live recording and other Danteequipped audio technology. Yamaha has tools to convert Dante to MADI, SDI and other audio formats, with sample-rate conversion if necessary.”

“Fairlight’s Live Family comes in two table-top – TT – formats,” explains Fairlight CTO Tino Fibaek. “The compact QUANTUM.Live TT is the entry level into Fairlight’s ‘Live’ lineup, complemented by the slightly larger EVO.Live TT which offers additional support for a second operator and delivers a greater level of tactile control with a second Intellipad, more switches and more encoders. The QUANTUM.Live TT is ideal for rehearsed and predictable productions while the EVO.Live TT offers faster access to more aspects of

provides for accurate, phase-aligned clock distribution, allowing reliable, ultra-lowjitter synchronisation of all hardware elements within a network. CDC six also ships with Cadac’s unique monitor mode – providing the ability to access any of the 48 user-assignable busses and their respective contribution channels in ‘sends on fader’ mode with a single touch of the screen – and an integrated 64x64 Waves card for direct multitrack recording to a laptop and connection to any Waves MultiRack SoundGrid server.”

The X factor Avid’s latest VENUE incarnation, the S3L-X, is the company’s most compact solution for live sound to date. Derk Hagedorn, senior marketing manager for live systems, emphasises the mobility required by serious users in modern production.

“Whether you’re at the performance venue, on the tour bus or in a studio or hotel room, the VENUE S3L-X system’s full-featured power and ultra-compact size enables users to exercise creativity practically everywhere,” he says. “It’s the most portable, professional live sound system, offering the sound quality and features of Avid’s high-end VENUE live systems in a networked system architecture – a high-performance HDX-powered processing engine running AAX plug-ins, scalable

SOUND COMPETENCE

remote I/O, award-winning VENUE and Pro Tools software and an ultra-compact control surface.”

Its modular, ‘open-networked’ architecture is Gigabit Ethernet-based. “With

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Feature: Digital consoles

your mix.

“Much more than a just a mixer, though, Fairlight Live systems deliver a complete show solution. From the console you can use the faders for different functions, like using some for audio, some for lighting and some for FX machines. The audio processor can playback up to 128 synchronised, pre-recorded audio channels while Fairlight’s optional SMART.Cart delivers full sound FX functionality.”

A&H’s Léon Phillips and his Qu-Pacs

Case study: Left outboard alone

Push the Buttenheim Even the two great German powerhouses of digital mixing are getting in on the comp-act (see box for Lawo). The Salzbrenner Stagetec Mediagroup has the three brands Stagetec, Salzbrenner and Delec, but it’s Salzbrenner that markets the new, diminutive POLARIS Evolution mixer manufactured in Buttenheim. And if multimedia is emerging as a theme running through this generation of versatile compacts, this group has the advantage of Salzbrenner Stagetec AVM – Audio Video Mediensysteme, a dedicated system integration department within the company.

“The Polaris was developed as a live sound console,” points out Bjorn Van Munster, Salzbrenner’s Stagetec Mediagroup’s international product manager, ”but we have additional software modules available: one for theatre, with dynamic automation, cue lists and show control; and, soon, one for broadcast, with mix-minus and other dedicated features.”

Polaris takes the leap into almost fader-less, mostly touch-based territory. This user interface and

‘Sprock’ [That’s soul, pop and rock – Language Ed] princess Anastacia has been on the road with the Avid VENUE S3L-X at FOH, manned by FOH engineer and long-time Avid VENUE user Gerard Albo. Anastacia’s unique mix of styles, with full backing band, was showcased on her 2015 Resurrection European tour and adds to Albo’s expert portfolio of strong female artists – including Amy Winehouse, Patti Smith, Corinne Bailey-Rae and others.

“The main challenge of mixing Anastacia is to conserve the dynamics of the band and to contain

When discussing the advantages of using the S3L-X for production of this particular tour, Albo emphasises the inverse ratio of size to suitability.

“Its compactness means there’s no longer the need to take a huge desk out on the road to achieve a great mix and the perfect sound,” he says. “An easy and simple set up allows me to translate the band in the most natural sound possible. Virtual s-oundcheck is also a great benefit, letting you get into the finer details of the show and make the soundcheck process quick for the artist. The advantages of the S3L-X

workflow emphasises modularity and scalability as never before, providing just 16 faders to access up to 256 channels – as well as defining a new paradigm,

her powerful voice,” explains Albo (pictured). “The S3L-X does such a great job on that; the dynamic range and the sound are superb.”

really are countless.” www.avid.com/S3L-x www.avid.com/anastacia

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according to Van Munster. “It’s a completely different philosophy of fader management and channel allocation,” he continues, “with very quick access to what you actually need. You always get clear visual feedback as to what’s happening. The new DSP takes us to what we call ‘audiomix 3.0’. If audiomix ‘1.0’ is analogue, and audiomix ‘2.0’ is conventional digital mixing with DSP sharing, ‘3.0’ means we can actually split up the DSP: if you have 640 inputs and 256 output busses available and, let’s say, three stages and a lobby in the venue, you can assign any combination of these to each area from the central pool. You can then change the allocation the next day; all you need is the resources. It’s just a matter of re-organising your DSP.” Arguably, in this way, the compacts are ushering

in the post-analogue mix topology with greater vorsprung than the mega-networks and their expansive boards. “Not everybody needs to have their hands on faders,” agrees Allen & Heath product manager Léon Phillips, referring to Qu-Pac, the most portable iteration yet of the manufacturer’s modular Qu platform. “Many mixing applications can be preset and perhaps need a tweak here and there when things are up and running. Qu-Pac does away with the motorised fader bank of its siblings and provides easy navigation via soft keys and a 5.5-inch touchscreen to make any adjustment using the rotary encoder. The rear panel is essentially a Qu-16, but all the processing and capability of the Qu-32 are available in its core.

“It can be set for simple operation with a unique

Salzbrenner’s Pro Sound Award-nominated POLARIS

GUI of icons which can be locked down to specific functions and labelled to suit, or users can have levels of access to the channel processing, levels and routing using the panel controls or the Qu-Pad app over Wi-Fi. A range of I/O expansion options are provided via the dSNAKE port to the maximum 38 inputs and 28 outputs. Personal monitoring using ME-1 is supported, and there’s a dedicated Qu-You app for 1-mix use.”

Qu-Pac is being used in a growing range of applications, according to Phillips. “There’s touring band monitor control, where total recall using scenes can provide consistency on fly-in gigs; freedom to mix anywhere using iPad control of DCA and audio groups armed with GEQ and an RTA; or rackmounting compact PA shout systems,” he says. “The fan-less operation means silent running and very low maintenance – ideal for HOW, venue, and business installed-sound, using custom keys, QuControl and the Ducking feature. Multitrack audio recording and playback via the built-in USB Qu-Drive, or streaming, means it’s great for capture and backing tracks.”

Buddy, can you spare a paradigm The new generation of compact digital consoles is also guiding the industry into changing business models. As rental companies consolidate, they can boost their sales activities with serious propositions that nevertheless fly below the rental radar: here’s SSE Audio Group founder John Penn in a recent promotional statement.

“SSE and Wigwam Sales have recently announced Preview Sessions for the new DiGiCo S21 – sign up for one of these,” he encourages. “We are also encouraging customers to look at the whole range of consoles we can offer at very competitive prices in the sub-£5K bracket.”

Production power continues to be handed down the line in this way, extending from the rental network into ownership by a new class of professional user. These are not ‘MI-style’ consumers, points out Sean Karpowicz, product manager at Soundcraft Studer, but they are more or less completely independent of the old music industry paradigms.

“USB functionality comes right out of the box with the Si Impact,” he says, “because multitrack USB audio is crucial to so many applications now. We’re even seeing our live consoles used in studios as recording front ends. So many bands and musicians produce themselves, so one console for rehearsing, recording and live is very cost-effective.”

In other words, more than ever, less console is more functionality. If architect Mies van der Rohe were still with us, he’d be content. n

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Installation

P54 JULY 2015

United Kingdom

Apollo mission and control The Eventim Apollo underwent a major upgrade of its entire house PA system earlier this year. Not only was it a big commitment from AEG Live, it marked a new paradigm for SSE Audio Group as the audio specialist chalked up its first ‘contract rental’. Apollo technical manager Alastair Parley and SSE MD John Penn tell Dave Robinson, in their own words, the story of the installation

A

lastair Parley: Several years ago, the owners of the Eventim Apollo, AEG and Eventim, decided to investigate the feasibility of installing a ‘house system’ at the Hammersmith venue. The main purpose of this installation was to ensure that visitors were given the highest standard of audio reproduction anywhere in auditorium.

John Penn: Eventim owners AEG Live had attended various shows at the Apollo and were concerned that while some shows sounded great, others were not so, and that reflected badly on them.

AP: Exhaustive research was carried out to establish the manufacturer and supplier of all the audio systems used for every event at Eventim Apollo since May 2010, together with in-depth discussions with our clients, leading production managers, engineers and event promoters. At the end of this process it was clear that an installed house system would not only be practical, it was in fact the only way we could ensure consistent provision of the highest possible audio quality with even coverage throughout the venue.

JP: The proposal was that the system would be used by as many visiting acts as possible; also, something that would deliver the spoken word well, given the amount of

be accepted by the majority of visiting productions was manufactured by L-Acoustics.

JP: At this time SSE Audio Group was completing betatesting of the L-Acoustics K2 and it seemed that this would be an obvious choice for a venue the size of the Apollo. Subsequently, SSE Hire were at the venue for two shows, both using K2, so we were able to provide instant demonstrations.

AP: Our next step was to identify the company who could supply, install and operate the system on our behalf. Our choice was driven by a range of factors. We required a company with the stock levels and range of equipment available to support [a] wide variety of events; a knowledgeable and friendly team of technicians to operate and maintain the system; and a dedicated management team who would supervise the operation. Also the firm had to have the skills and resources and proven record in order to assist with the design and installation of the system.

JP: A number of installation companies were invited to bid for the work – I think they obtained six quotes.

AP: We carried out a full auditorium spectrum analysis using our audio consultants, Vanguardia, to obtain data which we could use to show the quality and consistency of coverage was of the highest possible standard.

the existing points, and also new balcony flying points.

AP: The organisation that best fulfilled [our] requirements was SSE Audio Group.

JP: We are not sure how the Vanguardia report influenced the client, but the contract for the installation was subsequently awarded to [us] using L-Acoustics K2.

AP: A finalised design and specification was then drawn up and agreed upon. The manufacture of components for the system began.

JP: The installation would cover the full PA, but not monitors or a front of house desk – although a small house console (DiGiCo SD11) would be provided. It was therefore important that facilities would be provided enabling tours to plug their own mixing console and monitors, whatever protocols they used.

AP: A major factor in choosing SSE Audio Group was that they offered a complete design, manufacture and installation service to us.

This included every aspect of the install, from custom lifting and lifting control gear, the manufacture of many bespoke elements such as the stage box and patch panels, the mounting systems for the infills and delays, as well as finishing of many of the cabinets in the correct colours to match the auditorium deco. SSE even designed transport and storage solutions for the

comedy presented at the venue.

AP: It became clear that the system capable of providing the highest possible standards and likely to

JP: To carry out the tests, existing flying points were used, although SSE recommended that for the final installation new flying points were needed, wider than

system, for the rare occasion when it does have to be removed.

JP: The main PA comprises 12 K2 per side, installed

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P55

All photos: James Cumpsty

JULY 2015

Up the stairs to the balcony…

from new points. By positioning these points further out from the stage, not only could optimum coverage of the stalls be achieved, but sight lines of the stage could be improved. The new points are also clear of any PA brought in for a specific performance.

Six L-Acoustics SB28 subs are installed on each side of the stage. ARCS Wide and Focus (WiFo) and 8XT cabinets supply nearfield coverage.

Five further ARCS WiFo colour matched to the surrounding décor have been installed under the balcony, an area often neglected with normal PA coverage.

ARCS WiFo was chosen both because of its physical profile and its acoustic qualities. Since these deliver sound to seats that include the FOH position, it is important that the mix engineer hears the same tonal quality as from the main PA. ARCS WiFo uses the same 12” driver and HF driver as the K2 and the HF driver is mounted on a DOSC waveguide, the same as K2. Tonally it is as close as it can be to K2.

[Additional] 8XT speakers have been installed in the foyer and bar. Amplifier racks have been strategically positioned in the venue so they are both close to the speakers they drive and interfere with working space as little as possible.

A discreet custom-built drive rack, accommodating everything required to control the system, has been positioned at FOH. The drive rack is equipped with three Lake controller/processors; output is via a Cisco switch with Dante and Focusrite Rednet.

AP: The system installation [took place] during January 2015. There was no flexibility in completion date: it had to be operating for our first event booking of the year.

Thanks to the hard work, knowledge and ingenuity of all the team involved, the installation was completed in time.

JP: Ahead of this] during Autumn 2014, SSE proposed to

L-Acoustics K2 hang, 12 per side

Downstairs bar and foyer

Keeping cabling option flexible Emma Bigg, installations director at SSE, explains the reasons for turning to VDC Trading for the new cabling solutions in place at the venue: “It was really important that a range of options for tying into the installed fibre optic multicores was commensurate with the range of optical connectors in use with digital consoles today and in the future. Though we have the facility to terminate our own fibre looms and multicores in house that only include standard SC and LC connections.”

To achieve the assembly of further looms

terminated with opticalCON-to-opticalCON and opticalCON-to-HMA connectors to the required standard, SSE turned to cable specialist VDC Trading, whose optical lab is fully equipped to assemble the rugged HMA connectors and opticalCON which will allow constant changeovers while maintaining their integrity.

Bigg continues: “In addition to the extra assembles, the time available to produce the looms was quite short so the fact that VDC had the ability to turn them round in the time frame was a major benefit from our point of view.”

the Eventim Apollo the option to finance the installation on a contract hire basis, instead of outright purchase.

As an audio rental company, this is something that often makes sense both to SSE and the client. The venue pays upfront for the costs of the installation, as well as the permanent infrastructure, such as cabling and bespoke cabinets, etc. The client then pays for the equipment over a number of years on a contract rental basis. Not only does this avoid a high capital outlay, but it means that SSE treats the equipment the same as the rest of its rental stock, ensuring it operates at its optimum and if any equipment fails, replacing it at short notice.

AP: When the audio system was first run up it was clear straight away that the quality and coverage far surpassed anything that had previously been heard in the venue.

JP: The Apollo made the decision to specify a small but fully featured DiGiCo SD11 console that can be used to mix voiceonly shows (such as stand-up comedy). This is patched via the drive rack using dedicated ports, so it remains connected when ‘visiting’ consoles are brought in.

AP: Another significant aspect of the installation is the high quality and flexibility of the multicore systems that were designed and installed by SSE Audio. These allow visiting productions to tie into the house systems with the minimum of fuss and without having to run out their own snakes. This saves vital time and crew workload during load in and load out.

JP: There is a full multicore system between stage and FOH with a choice of two fibre systems, each with a full back-up, plus a conventional 2 x 32-pair multicore (see box).

AP: In the first few months of operation the feedback we have received from both customers and visiting production teams has been very positive.

The uptake on usage has risen to a point where there are very few events that will choose not to use t he in-house system.

JP: For each show, SSE provides a PA system tech, who is able to operate from the FOH drive rack position.

AP: There is no point in having the best of systems if visiting productions are not looked after well by the house techs! n

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Hither & leeSA

Please send all contributions for possible publication to drobinson@nbmedia.com

The waiting is over! Who is ‘D1 and Only’? The judges have spoken!

On a bender after a West End Bend It Like Beckham preview: (L–R) Jonathan from KV2, #2 operator Merlin, ASD Ross, #1 operator Roisin and SD Richard

The spectacular United Vibrations played the Ivy House in Peckham in May. Catch them live if you can – you’ll be dazzled

Nigel Bayliss on Qu-16, mixing for the Future band (and the editor!) at a 30th anniversary in Bath last month

Here they are, the ‘one(s) and only’ winners of the inventive Sennheiser D1 competition, whereby contestants had to send in their cover of Chesney Hawkes’ hit. From the top: first place, the “exceptional and outstanding” leeSA from South Korea; second, Polish a cappella group AudioFeels; and third, all-girl group Riggs, from Australia

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P58 JULY 2015

Backtalk

Jerry Hall in panto in Richmond, where Clarke used a Flare Audio PA

Rick Clarke

Dave Robinson talks to the leading West End sound designer

Y

ou can look right through me/ Walk right by me/ And never know I’m there...

So go the lyrics to Mr Cellophane in the musical Chicago. Rick Clarke could call himself the Mr Cellophane of sound design: his designs have been used on 17 productions of the hit musical worldwide, while his ‘trick’ has been to ‘localise’ the sound to the actors, as though the PA system just wasn’t there…

Chicago is only a slice of a portfolio reaching back to the early 80s, when he left London’s National Theatre to go freelance; since that time he’s been a part of 42 West End productions, and around 60 worldwide (mainly ‘traditional’ musicals, if you will, such as West Side Story, Annie, Fiddler on the Roof and many more). Not afraid to speak his mind, Clarke is a big fan of d&b speakers – but he’s recently discovered something new…

How did you earn your stripes?

I started out at art college and failed to make a living as an artist in the early ’70s! With my ‘co-failees’ we formed a band called Medicine Head. I was the roadie and mix engineer. They became quite successful, with hits including One and One is One and Pictures in the Sky, and we toured for four years!

But we were getting up to nine gigs a week, and it was killing me. We did one particular three-gig day – in the afternoon, the evening and the last one late at night – and after that, I just resigned.

I looked at softer options, and did a few cabaret things, like [French crooner] Sacha Distel. I did lots and lots of plays, for people like [leading producer] Michael Codron. I had a studio near the Shaw Theatre in north London, just off the Euston Road – at one point I was doing sound effects by mail!

Then I was offered a job at the National Theatre in 1980, where I worked for four years. .

What was working at the National like back then?

An actor described it as a like working for the civil service but with a chance to dress up! Our production of Guys and Dolls was important for the National Theatre at the time, and important for the West End because it ‘legitimised’ musicals in theatre. Up to that point there really has only been Cats, Evita, you know, Lloyd Webber stuff, but doing Guys and Dolls changed things.

I left there in 1984 with sound design contracts for The Hired Man and Me and My Girl. The latter was very successful: it did nine years at the Adelphi.

How did you get the sound design job on Chicago?

The show started in New York, and when it came to the UK to do a taster [in 1997] I did that design. And they liked that, so I got asked to do it for the UK version.

Now I do sound design for the international and touring versions of the show.

Where did you first encounter Orbital Sound (who supplied the gear for Chicago)?

When I first did Chicago, I’d been talking to Orbital about using d&b as the speaker system. Up until then I’d been a bins and horns person; big industrial systems. .Which didn’t look very theatre! Was there a lot of choice for theatre speakers at the time?

Meyer Sound with their UPA, which everyone was using… but I thought they were overpriced. Plus, I preferred the sound of d&b.

What is your biggest issue, as a sound designer?

I would see shows in the West End – the sound would be mixed perfectly – and I would be watching mouths move but the sound was [obviously] coming from the speakers on the wall. That was annoying! That disconnect I always found to be confusing.

My ambition was to try and return the amplified sound back to the performer. Then I discovered the

Haas effect. [Google it, I suggest – Tech Ed] I used that – whereby the first ‘source’ is the actor on the stage, and the amplified sound comes from the delay speakers.

[Localisation of the source], that was my USP for a bit.

Until everybody realised that’s what you needed to do.

What technology have you been impressed with?

The continued improvement in the quality of sound.

There was a moment when digital didn’t sound all that good compared to analogue, but now, with the latency problems solved, it’s extraordinary. Clarity is improving the whole time. With any system, you improve the front end first and work your way to the back. So better radio mics, better microphones – DPA mics I use all the time.

Also, the absence of noise in systems – now the only noise is from the lighting, and that can be terrible!

And more recently?

We’re forever striving to improve fidelity in systems.

Like, in Richmond at Christmas I used Flare Audio for the first time. Not since the ’40s has speaker design changed. Flare Audio have brought a technology which seems to be unique and a vastly improved system – losing the colouration, making it a lot more ‘open’. At the moment they are very heavy [boxes] but the sound is great! I look forward to their products improving.

What other kit was being used on the show?

A Yamaha CL5 desk – it’s the first time I’ve used one. It’s a good format for that kind of gig; there’s an iPad app which you can use with it, but it’s limited.

What other problems nare there in theatreland 2015?

Dynamic range is the most important thing. In order to have loud, you’ve got to have quiet. I go and see shows these days and it’s so loud. The imaging doesn’t work any more because it’s just loud! n rick@rickclarkesound.co.uk

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