PSNE March 2018 digital edition

March 2018

www.psneurope.com

Inside the studio with

Catherine Marks Your mixes Our consoles

NEW

Live depends on us www.yamahaproaudio.com

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Welcome

PSNEUROPE Editor Daniel Gumble dgumble@nbmedia.com

Production Executive James Marinos jmarinos@nbmedia.com

Staff Writer Tara Lepore tlepore@nbmedia.com

Group Commercial Manager, Music Ryan O’Donnell rodonnell@nbmedia.com

Content Director James McKeown jmckeown@nbmedia.com

Senior Account Manager Rian Zoll-Khan rzoll-khan@nbmedia.com

Designer Mandie Johnson mjohnson@nbmedia.com

Sales Executive Mark Walsh mwalsh@nbmedia.com

P3 MARCH 2018

TARA LEPORE Staff writer

@PSNEurope

Contributors: Phil Ward, Kevin Hilton, Marc Maes, Mike Clark, Simon Duff PRINT SUBSCRIPTIONS To subscribe to PSNEurope please go to www.psneurope.com/subscribe-tonewsletters-digital-editions should you have any questions please email subs@psneurope.com Please note that this is a controlled circulation title and subscription criteria will be strictly adhered to.

NewBay subscriptions: The Emerson Building 4-8 Emerson Street London SE1 9DU Email: subs@psneurope.com 2018 subscription rates for nonindustry/non-European readers are: UK: £39/€62 Europe: £54/€86 Other countries: £106/$170

is published 12 times a year by NewBay Media Europe Ltd, The Emerson Building, 4th Floor, 4-8 Emerson Street, London SE1 9DU www.psneurope.com

NewBay Media Europe Ltd is a member of the Periodical Publishers Association Copyright NewBay Media Europe Ltd 2018 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or any information storage or retrieval system without the express prior written consent of the publisher. The contents of PSNEurope are subject to reproduction in information storage and retrieval systems.

Printed by Pensord Press Ltd, NP12 2YA ISSN number 0269-4735 (print) 2052-238X (digital) Accreditations to memberships of industry associations and media partnerships

When you have finished reading this magazine please, why not give it to someone else to read, too? Or recycle it properly. Don’t just sling it in the bin.

I mean, come on!

T

here was a video that circulated around the internet in the days after the late David Bowie’s death, in which he implied – in 1999, no less – that the internet would create a platform that would be more about an audience’s reactions to news, rather than news itself. In an age of likes, retweets, and viral videos, he seemed to be on the money (but then, he was known for setting trends).

While I could easily and cynically list numerous negative impacts the internet has made, when used to enact change, online communities are making history every day. The Music Venue Trust’s stellar campaign work to implement Agent of Change was backed by thousands of online supporters to enshrine policy change in January (read more about what this means for grassroots venues on p46).

The conversations online following our coverage of AIM’s Women in Music event in the same month, which featured an all-female panel discussing working in the studio sector, proved that the next generation of studio talent is breaking through in a big way, and is keen to offer support and share best practice.

As a business magazine, it is our duty to give a platform to important issues in the industry. With that in mind, we are launching a brand new podcast series.

Rolling out this month, PSNEurope’s Women in Audio podcast celebrates women working in audio across the industry, including in broadcast, education and studio sectors. This month’s cover feature is with the award-winning producer Catherine Marks, who shares her career highlights from shadowing acclaimed producer Flood to jetting to LA to mix for St. Vincent’s latest record. Marks is the first guest that has joined us on the podcast, joining an impressive line-up including Bjork mixer Marta Salogni, mastering engineer Katie Tavini (read our interview with her on p36), radio engineer Ann Charles and producer Lauren Deakin Davies.

Keep an eye out on the website for how to listen – and as always, let us know your thoughts. n

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P4 MARCH 2018

In this issue...

People P6

L-Acoustics We hear exclusively from the loudspeaker giant’s brand new UK team

Live P13 ON YOUR MARKS AN IN-DEPTH CHAT WITH REVERED PRODUCER CATHERINE MARKS

P22 Second Warehouse Former live sound engineer and industry veteran Stuart Kerrison tells PSNEurope all about his game changing new cross-rental platform

Report P25 DAB developments Kevin Hilton reports on the UK Government’s consultation on smallscale DAB services P29 Immersive installations A wide-ranging look at what’s going on in the world of immersive audio in the integrated systems sector

Studio

P32 Education ACM Guildford teams up with Metropolis on a new state of the art studio. Tara Lepore takes a look around

P18 IMMERSIVE AUDIO

Interview

THE RISE AND RISE OF 3D SOUND IN THE LIVE SECTOR

P36 Master plans Acclaimed mastering engineer Katie Tavini talks to Daniel Gumble about studio techniques and her stellar career to date P34 Run of the Mill Danni Brownsill, head promoter at Stoke-on-Trent venue The Sugarmill, on why the Agent Of Change bill is so vital to the survival of the UK’s live music industry

P34 SHURE THING CEO CHRIS SCHYVINCK ON SHURE’S PUSH INTO THE INSTALL MARKET

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P6 MARCH 2018

Fab four (L-R): Sergey Becker, Paul McMullan, Alex Linn and Jeff Woodford

Channel crossing

L-Acoustics has just assembled a brand new, purpose-built team with the sole purpose of taking on the ‘seismic UK market’.

In a PSNEurope exclusive, we find out what its goals are for the year ahead and why now was the right time to launch…

L

ast month, French loudspeaker specialist L-Acoustics announced the assembly of a purpose-built sales and application team to focus specifically on the UK market. The new unit is comprised of sales manager Paul McMullan, who has been with the company since 2016, as well as new team members Sergey Becker, application engineer, touring, and Jeff Woodford, application engineer, install.

The team will also receive support from L-Acoustics’ Marcoussis HQ, with Nathalie Prade in sales support

and Alex Linn in customer service.

Commenting at the time of launch on the creation of the team, Jochen Frohn, LAcoustics director of business development, said: “The UK is a seismic centre for both the touring and installation markets and is recognised for its cutting edge performing arts centres.

It is also home to many of the globe’s most important consultancies. As such, it is a key territory for us, which is why we made the decision to strengthen the UK team with the addition of Sergey and Jeff, both experienced

application engineers whose extensive knowledge will help to expand the brand in the robust UK touring and install markets.”

Becker has spent almost 20 years designing and implementing PA systems and their control infrastructure, and is also an experienced FOH and monitor engineer. He joins the company from Delta Sound, where he worked on high profile events such as the Olympics and Commonwealth Games.

Woodford, who joins from RG Jones Sound

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L-ISA’s UK HQ

venues with our systems.

As such, it is a key territory for us, which is growing year-on-year, so we have strengthened the UK team with experienced application engineers whose extensive knowledge will help to support our current users, expand the brand into growing sectors and introduce the innovative technologies we are bringing to the market in the form of L-ISA immersive and the P1 networked audio processor.

Engineering, will be supporting the installation side of the company’s business, where he will put to use his skills as a system designer, project manager and installation engineer. ”Having two talented engineers with extensive real-world experience on the team will allow L-Acoustics to give consummate support to our dynamic UK partners,” added Tony Szabo, head of application, touring at L-Acoustics. “I’m confident that adding Jeff and Sergey to our UK-dedicated team will be a strong factor in the continued growth of the L-Acoustics brand.”

PSNEurope caught up with McMullan to find out more about the L-Acoustics UK team and what its aims are for 2018 and beyond…

Why was now the right time to create this UK team?

L-Acoustics is a highly represented brand in the touring and installation markets, with many of the UK’s largest rental companies stocking vast quantities of our products and installation contractors specifying more and more

What will be its primary objectives?

The primary role of the application engineers is to support clients who are using and specifying our products in the rental and installation markets. This support includes assistance with system design and implementation, on and off-site support, system calibration and training.

The application engineers present regular training courses in partnership with our certified providers. The training includes the fundamentals of system design, using our Soundvision acoustic simulation software, LA Network Manager Control and Monitoring Software and how to use our rigging systems.

The application engineers alongside the sales and customer service personnel provides our UK and Ireland customers with the one to one support they need for all aspects of L-Acoustics related business. It’s our job to build strong, long-lasting relationships in the UK and Ireland.

What are the biggest areas of opportunity for L-Acoustics in the UK? The implementation of our L-ISA immersive sound

systems for Live, Creative and Private applications is opening up a whole new way of experiencing music and sound and providing the opportunity for us to promote our brand’s current products and this new technology.

Both Sergey and Jeff join from prestigious UK companies. How valuable will their experience in the field be to the team?

Having dedicated touring and installation engineers, both with solid record of supporting prestigious projects, means we can provide the best support where needed and build relationships with our valued clients.

Are there any specific sectors that you’ll be looking to target?

Our Syva colinear source loudspeaker system will provide us with an opportunity to increase traction in the high end corporate AV rental market.

The installation market is a growing sector for L-Acoustics in the UK; we are seeing year on year increase in this area, which is a key reason for the addition of a dedicated application engineer for installation.

On the touring and special events side, we are introducing L-ISA Live to as many engineers as possible and showing that this innovative technology is driving a fundamental change in the way we experience shows.

What do you consider to be the biggest challenges facing the UK market?

Educating enough engineers to meet the growing demands for our products is possibly the biggest challenge we face. ■

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Pro audio movers and shakers Stay in the loop with the latest job appointments and movements in the professional audio business over the past month…

‘It’s a new start with many good years to follow’: Yamaha CA expands UK sales team

Y

amaha Commercial Audio has expanded its UK sales team to ensure its pre- and postsales service and support is ‘better than it has ever been’.

Under the direction of sales and marketing director Robert Webster, existing and new members of the team will serve Yamaha’s UK customers, headed up by sales manager Alex Warren, who was promoted to his new role in September 2017.

“We have invested in a bigger team and have worked very hard to locate individuals that possess the drive, enthusiasm and technical skills needed to excel in this demanding business environment,” Warren said.

New staff include south-west UK sales manager Hans Metger, who has experience of running an AV consultancy in his native Costa Rica. In technical sales, Tom Rundle has come from an AV company, specialising in conferences and corporate events.

“The proactive mentality within the team fills me with confidence,” added Warren. “We have some great products on the way and equally exciting events in place for our partners in 2018. It’s a new start with, we hope, many good years to follow.”

AV specialist Midwich appoints James Parker to head up European operations

Astro Spatial Audio recruits Graham Murray as global development manager

Cable specialist VDC Trading promotes Cain Cookson to head of sales in the UK

AV specialist Midwich has appointed James Parker as its new head of European operations, as it bids to ramp up its activities across the continent.

With 17 years’ distribution experience, Parker has previously held a variety of managerial positions.

His role as head of European operations will see him focus predominantly on pre-acquisition due diligence, post-acquisition company integrations, and group-wide infrastructure projects. He will report to the Group’s European director Tom Sumner.

Parker told PSNEurope: “I am excited to have joined Midwich at this key stage in the Group’s growth journey. I am very much looking forward to working with the European subsidiary teams to support their growth aspirations and help deliver synergies across the Group.”

Astro Spatial has appointed industry veteran Graham Murray to the position of global business development manager.

Murray brings 35 years of industry experience to his new role, as he bids to “raise Astro Spatial Audio’s profile on a worldwide level and cultivate the success that this astonishing technology deserves”.

Most recently he held the position of sales director, EMEA for the Harman Pro brand Studer, while in the past he has served in senior positions for the likes of Calrec, Fairlight and AMS Neve.

“Having watched Astro Spatial Audio’s progress over the last two years, it is now a great pleasure to finally join the team and become part of the company’s amazing journey into the 3D, immersive audio arena,” said Murray.

VDC Trading has promoted Cain Cookson to the position of UK head of sales.

Formerly senior relationship manager, Cookson has been with the cable specialist for two years.

In this new role, he will take on responsibility for the commercial aspect of the business for the whole of the UK, heading up the sales team in the country.

Cookson said: “It’s great to be able to expand my role in this way. I’m excited to be able to drive the commercial side of the business and look forward to continuing to work with clients to ensure they get the service they expect from VDC.” Niall Holden, founder and CEO of VDC Trading, said: “Cain’s knowledge, enthusiasm and commitment to the VDC brand is invaluable and he always goes above and beyond for clients.”

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By design, Digital 6000 has no intermodulation artifacts.

Our superior RF technology results in more channels and more flexibility for any production and any stage — with no trade-off in transmission power or quality. Smarter, leaner, more efficient — this is the built-in principle from user interface up to spectrum efficiency. Redundant Dante™ sockets and the command function are just two components of the recent update.

More about the next step towards the future of audio: www.sennheiser.com/digital-6000

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P11 MARCH 2018

Voice activation extends on Radioplayer platform The smart speaker was one of the big retail successes over the Christmas period. This must-have technology already accommodates radio, with listeners able to stream progammes at a convenient time for them, and now that capability is being expanded with new features. Kevin Hilton predicts where this fast-growing technology will take the sector next...

R

adioplayer, the streaming and listen-again service provider for UK radio, introduced new applications aimed at the smart speaker market at the end of January.

As well as selecting stations using the Alexa voiceactivated app on the Amazon Echo, listeners are now able to catch up on their favourite programmes and access podcasts.

Amazon made provision for the voice user experience (VUX) selection of radio stations by contacting Radioplayer three months before it introduced the Echo smart speaker in 2014. The initial VUX app for the Echo enables three basic functions: allowing people to select a station by invoking the Alexa artificial intelligence (AI); asking Alexa for a recommendation, which is based on the listener’s previous selections and preferences; and identifying a channel that is already playing.

A major part of Radioplayer on computers and mobile devices is ‘listen again’ and being able to play longerlength podcasts. These are popular and useful features, which have helped maintain radio listenership at a time of extremely wide choice through music streaming services and the ability to access YouTube and other media providers through smartphones and tablets.

Towards the end of January, the catch-up and podcast functionality for the Echo was going through Amazon’s certification process and the managing director of Radioplayer, Michael Hill, was anticipating some fine tuning to be made before the official introduction. “Because it is quite a big change, we expect some technical bug reports and user feedback,” he says. “Up to this point we have been allowing for voice selection of one of approximately 500 live radio stations.

Now we have to give access to around 10,000 items each day. It’s quite a challenge for a screenless system.”

Because of this and the need to get people to the content they want quickly, the app had to be relatively basic and straightforward. Hill continues: “We had to make some brute force decisions. This means the speaker will always default to the latest episode because that is what most listeners will want to hear. Then we make it easy to step back in time, with the person saying ‘previous’ or ‘back’ to get to the programme they want.”

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The new features are set to be similar to smart TV tech

Hill says it should be possible to get to a show on catch-up or a podcast within two to three seconds by using this method. Since introducing radio VUX for Echo, Radioplayer has extended the capability for other smart speakers and AIs, including Google Home and Microsoft Invoke (Cortana). Hill observes that the plan is to do the same with listen again and podcasts: “We are talking to Google about Home. They have a very exacting certification process for Chromecast compatibility before we can update the app. We’re also looking at the Sonos platform, which has great sounding speakers, although that does involve very high bit rates.”

The upgrade process for Echo, and by extension other smart speakers, is pretty straightforward for the user. “It all happens in the background,” Hill explains, “you don’t have to do anything. Once the upgrade has taken place, Alexa will say there are new features - catch-up and podcasts - and ask if you want to install them.”

Hill comments that voice operation and selection lends itself well to radio, which, after all, is about sound voices. Because of this, he says, there is a great deal of potential for other features in the future, although,

again, these will not necessarily be easy to implement.

“We’ve been thinking about how users can use voice activation to get the best out of radio. They give us a lot of suggestions and ideas, one of which is to wake up to their favourite radio station.”

With the popularity of clock alarm radios this feature makes good sense. However, due to reservations on the part of the manufacturers, this only became possible early this year. “Amazon was cautious about waking up the device without someone asking it to do that,” Hill comments. “Alexa coming on without being invoked could be a bit invasive but now the developer community has been given permission to do this.

Amazon agrees with us that being able to set an alarm or a reminder for a specific programme will be the next area looked at.”

Hill says usability is a priority in the development of Radioplayer, both for smart speakers and the already established computer and mobile devices market. This is likely to include features familiar from smart TVs and set-top boxes, including series linking and reminders.

“We’re looking at all platforms,” Hill concludes. n

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All photos: Paul Harries

Marksism

Boasting a sparkling array of production, mixing and engineering credits across her ever-expanding CV, Catherine Marks is currently one of the most exciting and acclaimed studio talents in the business. Daniel Gumble dropped in on her at Londonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Assault & Battery studios to talk gear, Mercury Prize-nominated records and the pursuit of new sonic horizonsâ&#x20AC;Ś

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T

ucked away in an unassuming Willesden side street sits Assault & Battery, one of the UK’s premier studio facilities and the setting for PSNEurope’s interview with producer, mixer, engineer and audio extraordinaire, Catherine Marks. Situated behind a black iron fence emblazoned with the studio’s distinctive logo, the site’s exterior is otherwise unremarkable, yet the music that has been sculpted within the confines of its history-soaked walls tells a very different story. And on this particular occasion, it also provides us with a welcome refuge from a bitterly cold February morning in the capital.

Devised by two of the world’s most revered studio genii in Alan Moulder and Flood, it’s unsurprising that Assault & Battery has spawned some of the finest records in recent British history, drawing a potent stream of artistic and technical talent through its gates.

To list the full extent of outstanding albums produced inside would command greater print real estate than

that offered by a year’s worth of page space. Suffice to say, its most recent client list includes, among a great many others, the likes of Foals, Interpol, Royal Blood, La Roux and Led Zeppelin. Indeed, as PSNEurope awaits its subject in the studio reception, Radiohead guitarist Ed O’Brien can be seen milling around, nodding a polite good morning in passing - presumably in residence to put the finishing touches to his debut solo album, which is being produced with Flood and Marks - as can the aforementioned Moulder.

It is here that Marks is predominantly based, having become Flood’s assistant back in 2005 after departing her native Australia for the UK. She immediately began reading up on engineering techniques and learning the ropes via a process of on-the-job experimentation.

Before long, she had acquired mixer and engineer credits on The Killers’ 2012 single Runaways, before engineering the critical and commercial success that was Foals’ 2013 album Holy Fire. After adding to

her client roster the likes of PJ Harvey, Placebo, MIA, Ride, Kanye West, Mr Hudson and Frank Carter and the Rattlesnakes, she was honoured with the MPG Breakthrough Producer Of The Year Award in 2016, while also earning a Grammy nomination for her work on Wolf Alice’s Moaning Lisa Smile.

But if 2016 was deemed a breakthrough year for Marks, 2017 was the one in which her place as one of the world’s most sought after producers was well and truly cemented. Her production and mixing work on The Big Moon’s debut Love In The 4th Dimension contributed in no small part to the record’s Mercury Prize nomination, while St. Vincent’s Masseduction, which landed in the upper reaches of most critics’ end of year ‘best of’ lists, saw Marks drafted into LA to mix a clutch of its genre-defying tracks. Throughout the year she also put her signature to acclaimed records by such diverse artists as Manchester Orchestra and The Amazons. And while it’s only early in 2018, she has co-produced The

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P15 MARCH 2018

KNOWING HOW TO SET UP MICS AND HOW TO USE SOFTWARE ISN’T WHAT PEOPLE ARE INTERESTED IN. THEY ARE MORE INTERESTED IN WHAT YOU AS A PERSON HAVE TO OFFER TO THEIR PROJECT AND WHAT YOUR PERSONALITY WILL BRING

CATHERINE MARKS

Wombats’ Beautiful People Will Ruin Your Life record and has been shortlisted for the 2018 MPG Award for UK Producer Of The Year alongside Charlie Andrew and Tom Dalgety. All in all, it’s been rather a busy time.

As we take our seats inside the facility’s affectionately nicknamed ‘studio Dave’ – a cosy, softly-lit space sporting a gold record here, a framed portrait of Sesame Street’s Animal there and a small but distinguished smattering of analogue and digital recording equipment – Marks considers not only the range of records she has worked on over the past 12 months, but also the ways in which her multi-faceted skillset has informed her work since her time shadowing Flood.

“I love [engineering, mixing and producing] equally for different reasons,” she enthuses. “I haven’t done as much engineering for a while now, but a few years ago I engineered for John Parish and it was so awesome to be let free to do some interesting sonic stuff without the responsibility of the producer role. But I love production

and being at the beginning stage of a record when you can’t wait to hear how it’s going to sound at the end.

With mixing I just get totally absorbed. It’s like this awesome exploration of someone else’s vision.”

According to Marks, this blending of roles makes not only for a more varied working pattern, but can also bring numerous benefits to the project in hand.

“All the roles are really fluid,” she explains. “For example, I’ve just been working with Sunset Suns and the engineer we were going to use unfortunately had to go to hospital, so I ended up doing that. How things sound is very much part of production for me and I love creating interesting sonic textures.”

Sonic identity Prior to Marks’s employ with Flood, the call of the studio had never previously been heralded by any affinity with particular sounds or producers. For many years, her love of music was invested in melody and performance

as opposed to any kind of sonic underpinning.

“There wasn’t one record or producer that turned me on to sound before I started,” she elaborates. “I remember the week before I moved here I had a little iRiver - like a really early MP3 player - and the only album I could figure out how to put on there was an Interpol record, so I was listening to that over and over again and remember noticing the shit loads of reverb on it! But not much prior to that. I’d loved listening to Bowie records and Led Zeppelin records but I listened to those for enjoyment. Now when I’m in mixing mode I’m breaking it down. If I’m working on a track, someone might say, I really want this to sound like a Queens Of The Stone Age track, and I’ll listen to the song and be like, OK, that’s interesting, it’s not how I thought it sounded. Because when you’re listening to music for enjoyment you’re not breaking down the elements. So no, there wasn’t any particular record that made me decide to do this. Although, Spirit Of Eden by Talk Talk is something that excited me early on when I first started, like, God I hope I can make a record like this!

“More recently, I really liked Everything Everything’s latest record. And I love what James Ford does. He creates something that is really tough but delicate at the same time. I obviously love what Flood does - he’s a mad genius and a sonic wizard. Over the last couple of years, since I’ve kind of got a bit more confidence with what I do, I’m just soaking up other records and feeling really inspired and enjoying listening to music.”

So how does Marks describe her own approach to music production?

“It varies from project to project,” she says. “With Manchester Orchestra the songs and the idea of the record had already been established, there was a real story thread that ran through the songs. What they were interested in was experimenting and seeing how far we could take it sonically. Whereas with The Amazons we loved going into the rehearsal room and ripping the songs to shreds and rebuilding them. Sometimes they had songs that were already written or they had an acoustic idea that we would transform into something else. It’s usually just me sitting on the floor saying to the drummer, OK play a Billie Jean beat, or let’s try this beat from Deus, and everyone just trying out different things with me basically directing a jam.”

Studio Dave Modest in scale but boasting an impressive haul of digital and analogue gear, Marks’s current base at Assault & Battery has served her well of late, with many of the items on display utilised across much of her recent output.

“So this is my little mixing room,” she beams, talking us through her audio arsenal. “I have a Fat Bustard summing mixer - I like equipment that sounds how it looks! This is big, chunky and strong. Basically, I mix in the box but I run everything through analogue, so it runs through the summing mixer then through the Obsidian

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Full Marks: Catherine Marks at London’s Assault & Battery

compressor rack, then through a Massive Passive EQ. “I also have some effects processing. I have a tape echo I bought for The Amazons’ record, which broke on the first day. One of the heads had something sharp on it, which kept cutting the tape so I couldn’t use it as a tape delay, but I thought, Fuck it and decided to use it like a valve distortion and basically everything went through it. It gave it this really nice high-end shimmer. I ran the vocals through it and often when we were doing the live tracking I’d sent the guitars to it and just have it really quietly sitting under the mix. You could hear that little bit of what I call rainbow sparkles - you don’t notice that it’s there, but you do when you take it away.”

She continues: “When I’m recording I use Pro Tools like tape. I’ll usually hit record and let it run for hours.

The fortunate thing with digital recording is that you don’t have to change the reel every 30 minutes. But recently I was in Wales and we were recording to tape.

I’m down for anything.”

Where some have lamented the rise of digital technology and so-called bedroom producers, Marks believes that the wider accessibility to studio software is something to be celebrated.

“It’s cool,” she states. “Studios are expensive. I wish I had had that opportunity. I remember I had a really old Mac and my dad had bought me this computer programme, which allowed me to play MIDI on a piano keyboard and through MIDI it would convert it to musical

notation. I could score these amazing things, but if I’d been able to record all the instruments that would have been even better, rather than trying to get an orchestra to play the songs that I was writing.

“I don’t feel like [technology] has changed anything for me other than it’s really annoying every time Avid comes up with a new Pro Tools and it’s not back compatible. Everything else I will embrace and I love it when one of the bands I work with comes in with something that I don’t know or has a cool piece of kit. I find that really exciting.”

Mercury rising With a 2017 Mercury Prize nomination to its name, The Big Moon’s Love In The 4th Dimension proved to be one of last year’s defining rock records. Bristling with energy and brimming with infectious, stadium-sized choruses, the record received near-universal acclaim. And while the songwriting prowess on show is plain for all to see, Marks’s ability to capture the raucous nature of the band’s live shows provided a sonic dimension all of its own. For Marks, this came about in no small part due to the speed at which the album was recorded, having almost missed out on the project altogether.

“After working with them before on a few tracks, they decided they wanted me to do the record,” she explains. “I said I’d love to but I’m scheduled to fly out to start work with Manchester Orchestra and before

that, because I haven’t had a break, I’m going to go and have a quick seven-day holiday. Then the manager texted me saying, We don’t want anyone else, so can you please, please, please do it. I said I’d think about it and I remember waking up at 7:00 am one morning and I rang her and said, This is the only way we can do it, if you’re up for it. We do it in seven days, we have zero expectations, we achieve what we can and we basically just have the best week of our lives. Are you up for that?

That’s how that happened.

“We rehearsed hard and had everything planned out and they were so easy to work with, and the songs were really fun. Everything felt quick, which allowed us to play around with a lot of stuff. There was a little weird robot microphone thing and we were all just like, Should we just put on it? They were up for anything. We were reminiscing the other day over a bottle of tequila about what went into each song, like finding a tin can guitar and going, this sounds cool, we should put this on the album. There are all these little intricate, awesome sonic treats in there.”

Another major 2017 album on which she left her indelible mark was St. Vincent’s Masseduction – another record that came together at a rate of knots.

“I was going to LA and my manager said, St. Vincent needs to finish some mixes, would you like to have a go at one? I said, Oh my God, yes. I thought I was going out there for a few meetings, catch up with some friends and go on a road trip. I arrived on a Saturday and this request was made on the Monday, so I went in to do this test mix on the Tuesday. They ended up loving it. And she was amazing to work with - she’s so clear about what she wants, and we had really similar ideas. The first song I did was Fear The Future; I said, I want to make it sound like indie Kylie and Nine Inch Nails, and she’s like, Yes I love those things! And there was a part I wanted to make sound like the rave at the end of The Matrix and she knew exactly what I meant. I was mixing literally to the point where I had to get on a plane back to London, where I hopped off, came straight to the studio and did another two mixes for her. I’ve never been so jet lagged, but it was really fun.”

With the clock winding down, conversation turns to the producers and engineers of tomorrow. In the space of just a few years, Marks’s reputation has transformed from up and coming star to contemporary studio icon. Though unable to reveal details as of yet, she currently has requests and projects piling up as her star continues to rise. Her advice to the next generation is simple: be yourself.

“I remember thinking, Why would someone want to work with me over someone else?” she concludes. “If you are unique you could provide something that nobody else has. Knowing how to set up mics and use software isn’t what people are interested in. They are interested in what you are as a person has to offer and what your personality will bring. I can’t be anyone else, I’m just me.

It seems to work.” n

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Chamber music: Acoustic chamber where d&b Soundscape was developed

Ghost riders

Phil Ward prepares for the arrival of ‘360°’ audio techniques in the live sector, as the rise of immersive sound continues…

T

he emerging techniques of ‘object-based’ audio, quite apart from encouraging a swathe of fresh claims about who slept with Fraunhöfer or IRCAM first, are really going to screw up Nipper the dog. He’s the one who sits at the HMV gramophone horn, convinced of the signal’s authenticity. The signal travels through a cable to a transducer, and emerges from some kind of flare right where you and Nipper would expect. But if you introduce a means of separating that source from its aperture, and Nipper will be spinning round just like he does when you pretend to throw the ball without actually letting go.

That’s pretty much what the current explorations into so-called 360° audio are doing, albeit to enrich listeners’ experiences and not to confuse household pets. Just as stereo creates a phantom image somewhere between the two sources, multiples of this effect can be used to create potentially hundreds of audio apparitions in three dimensions – and move them around, too.

Live Aid All of which is just fabulous for VR, AR and other transporting multimedia thrills – as well as the brave new world of headphone-melting audio mixes for the spaced-out connoisseur. It’s also a boon for interactive experiences in art galleries, funfairs and reconstructions of Medieval Winchester. However, milking a live

performance into these buckets is a different truckle of cheese. The phenomenon of the open microphone is enough of a challenge to start with, quite apart from the mood-swings of sensitive talent and neurotic architecture. Somehow the live sound industry is going to have to make all this work.

The good news, according to those at the front line, is that the sound engineer is not going to have to reinvent the wheel. Roger Wood is head of software at Digico, the console pioneer that has just completed a joint project with French loudspeaker powerhouse L-Acoustics to integrate the SD range with L-ISA, L-Acoustics’ groundbreaking speaker processing that introduces ‘immersive hyperrealism’. Taking advantage of SD consoles’ use of OSC for remote control, Digico has found a means to plot a course between OSC and L-ISA; the result is about to be launched as a software upgrade called DeskLink.

“We have provided a customised on-screen panel that displays the main L-ISA controllers and a touch sensitive, graphical representation of the pan position on a per input channel basis,” explains Wood. “The controls are automatically mapped to our console’s under-screen work surface rotaries to provide a simple, intuitive method for control of the sources in the L-ISA eco-system. Communication between the console and L-ISA uses OSC commands and the setup is accessible

from the SD console’s standard External Control panel.”

Users are excited about this prospect. Scott Willsallen is an Emmy Award-winning sound designer for major international events, and a director of Australian consultancy Auditoria Ltd as well as UK-based Remarkable Projects. “DeskLink is very straightforward,” he says. “The L-ISA Processor does all the hard work under the hood, and all the console is doing is providing touchscreen control via the network – they have to be on the same Ethernet network. Audio connectivity is MADI, either ‘in line’ or as an insert: the processor has three MADI cards and the live configuration provides 96 inputs and 32 outputs at 96kHz. Input 1, for example, becomes an object, say on channel strip 1, and you activate L-ISA within that channel strip. You remove the normal Pan function on that strip and the L-ISA one replaces it – a square with a dot in the middle.

“Open up the full screen and you get five controls: Pan; Distance; Width; Elevation; and Auxiliary Send – just as you would, with different parameters, if you selected and opened up the full EQ for that channel. And you do that on a channel-by-channel basis in the normal way.

“The ‘matrixing’ is inside the processor; all you’re thinking about as the engineer is spatial placement. As far as workflow is concerned you don’t have to think about a delay matrix, just physically where should any specific sound come from. You can adjust it in the

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horizontal plane, the vertical plane, how close or far away, how wide or narrow that source is – whether it’s a spot percussion sound or a choir, for example – and the processor does the rest. Really, it’s an extension of the traditional techniques of panning left and right. The difference is that the placement is much more precise, because it’s emerging from a single array rather than having to consider amplitude and time difference, plus you get the added three-dimensional elements of height and depth.”

Willsallen fully expects other console manufacturers to follow suit, not least because of the minimal impact these parameters will have on the engineer’s working day. “It shouldn’t be any different to any other control of external devices, be it a Waves rack or whatever,” he points out. “You treat it like a plug-in, and the key point is that it doesn’t add to the console DSP load as the processing occurs inside the 2U L-ISA box.”

Sound and vision Guillaume Le Nost is a key member of L-Acoustics founder Christian Heil’s L-ISA team based in North London. As head of R&D, he’s been shaping L-ISA into a flexible format for live sound, studio recording, re-mixing and re-mastering, and is convinced that pro audio needs this kind of treatment to keep up with rising production values. “We’ve seen major improvements in video and lighting design,” he says, “and we want sound

back in the forefront of live events. Without sound, there is no show – and we can now achieve a better fusion between what you see and what you hear.”

L-ISA proposes vertical solutions for every point in the sound design chain, from speaker allocation to interface tools and from simulation to show time. It replaces traditional L-R configurations with a minimum of five frontal speaker arrays to cover the ‘Performance Zone’. More can be added to the ‘Extension Zone’ to immerse the audience in a wider soundscape, as with sidefills, with the exact deployment tweaked according to taste and budget. Typically, live sound L-ISA systems – L-ISA Live is the branded product range – will feature fewer arrays than those for fixed installation, which have already reached 24 in some cases to envelop the audience completely.

“It could change the design of consoles and speakers if, in the future, more and more people use object-based mixing for live shows,” reflects Le Nost, “but it’s really achievable right now. At the moment we’ve integrated the control of objects, rather than the mixing of objects, so the workflow has not changed dramatically. It’s what good digital control surfaces are designed to do! You can still use your existing speaker and console inventory to implement a quite revolutionary change. You only need to add the processor, which is just another box in the audio chain.”

The limits to arraying for live sound explain the

doubts surrounding the use of ‘360’ as a label for these applications, but for some this misses the point. Sound designers are already realising the benefits of the way that these processors can ‘point-source’ multiple signals and fix the uneven time arrival of wavefronts inherent in plain stereo, dramatically increasing the percentage of the audience that can enjoy the so-called sweet spots. It also attenuates overall levels, while maintaining coherence and impact. Even with five arrays for a basic rock and roll show, it may not be ‘immersive’ but the sound will certainly be better for more people.

You can use the word ‘soundscape’ when talking about L-ISA, because that’s what it is, provided you pronounce it with a lower case ‘s’. If you capitalise the initial letter you are then talking about Soundscape, the competing immersive audio system made by global rival d&b audiotechnik. The D-100 hardware processor has its own algorithm, and is bolted on to a live rig in much the same way and with an equally minimal impact on workflow. Again, the arrays need to increase by around 30% to begin to achieve the results, but most agree that each array – and each element in the array – can be smaller and lighter almost in inverse proportion to the benefits produced.

“Soundscape is about changing the entire idea of sound reinforcement,” says Ralf Zuleeg, head of sales services and application engineering at d&b audiotechnik. “Things have been done in the same Tony David Cray, head of sound at Sydney Opera House

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21/02/2018 15:48

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DESKLINK IS VERY STRAIGHTFORWARD. THE L-ISA PROCESSOR DOES ALL OF THE HARD WORK UNDER THE HOOD

SCOTT WILLSALLEN

way for decades, and it’s time for something new. The real challenge is not to do with the technology but with education – re-learning. Soundscape allows us to rethink the role sound plays, both in terms of its social and cultural context, but also the relationship between the listener and their environment.”

Something a little spatial The Soundscape interface is via two software modules: d&b En-Scene and d&b En-Space, each of which opens up within d&b’s existing R1 remote control software.

Basic configuration is as normal in d&b’s prediction software ArrayCalc. Now that the processing platform has been released officially, it has also been revealed that two third-party developers in show control and theatre have already integrated it: Canadian specialist Figure 53 had incorporated a link within its ubiquitous show control software QLab; and Norwegian protagonist TTA’s Stagetracker II FX tracking and localisation system is also supporting it.

Tony David Cray, a sound designer for large, outdoor events; a live sound and recording engineer; and currently head of recording and broadcast at Sydney Opera House, has been at d&b’s HQ in Germany recently to examine Soundscape more closely. “Soundscape allows us to create a virtual environment in which we can place close-mic’d sources across a broad space,” he comments, “and more than anything it increases our empathy with the music and enables us to deliver it to the audience in a much richer way. When I first heard it used, on the opera Die Tote Stadt in Sydney Harbour, I

wept. The illusion of spatialisation was overwhelming.”

There is another kid on the block. Bjorn Van Munster, formerly at Salzbrenner Stagetec, is now the prime mover behind Dutch manufacturer Astro Spatial Audio (ASA). “For some,” he says, “it’s getting a little unclear about what 3D live sound is, whether it’s stage localisation, immersive or surround audio, or basically 2D solutions for re-distributing the sweet-spots or some other kind of imaging. For us, it is clear: it’s about using the principles of object-based audio to give sound professionals an entirely new tool, to unlock the creative potential of audio.”

Uniquely among the manufacturers of algorithmfilled boxes for plug-and-play ‘360’ live sound, ASA does not also market loudspeakers and is agnostic in this regard; SARA II is ASA’s ‘premium rendering engine’, a 3U rackmount hardware application of the SpatialSound Wave algorithm optimised for most types of digital sound reinforcement system compatible with MADI, Dante or AES67.

“Everybody’s suddenly talking about ‘object-based audio’, but there’s no clear definition of what an ‘object’ is,” continues Van Munster. “For us it’s a virtual speaker behind the physical speaker, in a vertical and horizontal mesh or dome around the whole area of the system.

Each one can be moved anywhere, automatically re-calculated for specific positions. It has data about spatial positioning, acoustic characteristics, diffusion, reverberation… everything needed to re-scale it convincingly in a different environment, no matter where you are.”

Algorithm and blues Ah, there’s the rub: the system does it for you. The L-ISA Processor does all the number crunching and the summing, as do the D-100 and the SARA II, but for Robin Whittaker – co-founder of Out Board, home of the TiMax2 SoundHub delay-matrix, audio show controller and spatial audio processor – there are levels of subtlety only achievable if you are willing and able to roll up your delay matrix sleeves and do the math.

“There’s more to this than a plug-in,” he states.

“When we used TiMax on Alan Ayckbourn’s ‘narrative for voices’ called The Divide at The Old Vic in London, it also had a very thick underscore from an upstage band and choir. We radar-tracked the actors, time-aligning and localising every voice, and left a clear space in the middle of the mix for these to come through. We did this by timing the band and choir back to where they were, but massaging the levels so they were kept out of that middle space, and timing the music into the surround speakers according to the cues. It created a really immersive soundtrack while keeping crystal-clear voices from the stage. The point is: if you throw your mix entirely into the hands of the algorithm, you’d be hard pressed to achieve those two ends simultaneously.”

So time will tell, in more ways than one. But however granular we get, few can argue that if we can implement any greater 3D control of the live mix we are – sorry, Nipper – at least barking up the right tree. Last word to Guillaume Le Nost: “The audio industry needs to move forward with this, so that sound remains creative and does not become just a commodity.” n

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Second to none

Last month, touring engineer and industry veteran Stuart Kerrison launched Second Warehouse, a new web-based platform aimed at revolutionising the AV cross-rental sector by allowing companies to find what they want in a matter of seconds and trade in a safe and cost-effective way. PSNEurope sat down with him to find out more about his game-changing creation…

F

or decades, live engineering was Stuart Kerrison’s bread and butter. Having traversed the globe with some of the world’s biggest rock and pop acts, among them Sparks, INXS, OMD and many, many more, his knowledge of the touring sector is extensive to say the least. Unsurprisingly, his years spent on the road have also imbued him with a keen sense of the value of a smooth and efficient rental and cross-rental system. His understanding of things on both sides of the desk was developed further still after spending several years working for a clutch of high-profile manufacturers.

All of which brings us to Second Warehouse. Officially announced back in February, Second Warehouse is a new, web-based service essentially designed to speed up and tidy up the cross-rental process. In a nutshell, it will enable companies of all shapes and sizes to trade in a safe, fast and cost-effective fashion. So, a rental company searching Second Warehouse for AV equipment will be able to find what they need in a matter of seconds, with every found item coming from a fellow rental firm. Both companies can negotiate the equipment sub-hire and arrange transport via direct messaging within the platform.

Commenting on the launch of Second Warehouse, Kerrison said that the platform has “the potential to fundamentally change how the rental sector functions, ensuring that companies of all size are able to trade with one another in absolute confidence, so everyone does better business - no one got into this business to spend tedious hours on the phone or writing emails.

Second Warehouse gets rid of all that so you can get back to doing what you really love – putting on great shows and making money while you do it”.

Here, PSNEurope sits down with Kerrison to drill down into the detail and find out exactly what his plans for Second Warehouse are and to see what he views as the biggest obstacles in revolutionising the way the live market does business…

Tell us about the origins of Second Warehouse. What made you decide to quit life on the road?

It’s like everything in life; I just fell into the next thing.

I made a big change in my life and went from being constantly living on tour buses and in hotels to actually being at home for a while. So that was the first time I ever had a regular job. It was a bit of a shock to the system. That was when I started getting into rental companies and I worked at rental companies for about

Stuart Kerrison

10 years, from 1998 to 2008.

I first worked with a company in Oslo called AVAB. They were probably the number one rental company in Norway. I was always the project manager and audio manager on these big festivals and big shows, like the Nobel Peace Prize concert every year. This is where this whole Second Warehouse thing started, because I was always in charge of putting the audio together at these huge festivals, and of course we never had enough gear.

So I was finding myself making phone calls, and there wasn’t even much in the way of emails then, to try and find this gear. It sometimes took days and weeks to put things together. I always thought there has got to be a

better way. But technology hadn’t matured to the point where it is today.

So, after working with other rental companies, what inspired you to launch your own business?

I’ve seen the business from a lot of different sides. And this cross rental thing has stuck with me all the time.

When I was working as a representative for a speaker manufacturer the issue that was raised regularly by people looking to buy a system was budgets and limited monies - they needed to be able to maximise the return on their investment. So they would say to us, Can you help us find work for this gear? To be honest, as a

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manufacturer, it’s pretty hard to do that because you’re focused on your own R&D and marketing and thinking about what to make next. You don’t have time to start finding work for rental companies. That’s their job! So it was obvious that there was a need [for this]. These guys are still facing the same problem I was having years ago. It struck me that with the right approach there could be the possibility of fixing it. That was about two years ago. I actually went to these guys who had created an audio localisation system based in Trondheim and said, I’ve got this idea, what do you think? They said, That’s a great idea and that I should go and see Innovation Norway, a government department that helps fund startup companies. They did the initial funding and got us going.

So how does it work?

For a start, it’s all cloud-based, so it will work on any platform. We need to have a critical mass of equipment in the inventory so that people can find things so it starts to grow. We won’t have everything to start with, but we’re talking to companies and getting equipment into the inventory.

After you register, you enter the name of what you’re looking for and we have a reference database of over 12,500 items that is growing and growing as people tell us what they need. You put in the dates that you need it - the day it will arrive in your warehouse and they day you will ship it back.

We have a centralised database of all the companies and the real-time availability of their equipment.

Primarily you get the results in your own country, but if you don’t find what you’re looking for and you want alternatives you can search other countries as well.

ULTIMATELY, THIS HAS TO BE GLOBAL BECAUSE EVERY RENTAL COMPANY IN THE WORLD HAS THE SAME PROBLEMS. YOU HAVE TO WALK BEFORE YOU CAN RUN, BUT YOU’VE GOT TO GET THERE QUICK STUART KERRISON

How do you coax people in?

It’s a commission-based service, so there are no fees, no membership. You don’t pay anything to rent anything.

As a supplier, we find you £10,000 worth of work then we take a small commission on that. But we also have, like any loyalty scheme, a process where you start at a low commission, and then the more you use it, that commission will drop to the point where if you are a high volume user you won’t pay anything after a certain period. So the service becomes free. This is important because we cap how much commission we will ever take from any company; there are some companies out there who are massive and do a scary amount of crossrental business.

Are you concerned that people will be cautious about adopting a new approach to such a traditional working method?

This must be one of the most conservative businesses in the world. To get audio people to change their ways of working is like dragging a whale across the beach, and I know that becasue I’m a sound guy and I know how resistant to it I was. And you don’t get much of a second chance in this business; things have to be there on time.

It’s extremely competitive, this business, and there is very little room for failure.

Once you’ve got something working in a way you know is OK you stick to it, but what we can do is make that routine a hell of a lot quicker. In many cases we have the ability to integrate with a company’s rental software system, so we know in near real-time their availability.

That’s optional, of course.

We are very aware that everyone likes to work in different ways. Almost everything we do is optional; we understand it will take time. People are always sceptical about new things.

Where would you like to see the company go in its first year?

Ultimately, this has to be global because every rental company in the world has the same problems. You have to walk before you can run, but at the same time you’ve got to get there quick. The first people we’re talking to about this are in Europe - we are using people for testing and finding bugs and getting fantastic feedback.

We have a team of developers that are really fast and responsive. We’re very agile and nimble as a company; we can add features and change things very quickly.

We are already looking at how we bring this to North America, South America, Asia, Australia, and I would like to see, by the end of 2018, a Second Warehouse presence in all those places.

What are the biggest challenges in getting Second Warehouse to market?

The biggest challenge will be that people will need to stick with it for a little bit. Companies need to see the potential with this and they need to see that it’s something we’re making for them. It’s important to me that Second Warehouse becomes something that is useful to my peers in the business. For that to happen it needs the support of the companies. They need to put the equipment in and be patient.

I would say very possibly when this thing launches that the first thing people search for they won’t find.

So instead of just saying, Oh that’s useless, what they need to do is say, I didn’t find it today but maybe in a month’s time I’ll search again. And one day they will find it because it will grow and grow. Then, when they do find it and get the chance to use it, that’s when they’ll start seeing how it can be a benefit for them. www.secondwarehouse.com

The cloud-based platform matches companies with rental products

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P25 MARCH 2018

UK government consults on small-scale DAB services After a successful trial period, local digital radio stations could soon be rolled out across the country. Kevin Hilton looks at the recent consultation period from the government’s Department of Media, Culture and Sport, which is working with broadcast regulator Ofcom to bring regional radio stations currently using analogue up to date with DAB and DAB+ technology...

T

he UK is moving closer to the formal introduction of small-scale digital radio services. A consultation period ran until the end of February, inviting existing and potential local and community broadcasters to contribute comments and requirements prior to the advertisement of full licences.

The consultation has been published by the Department of Media, Culture and Sport (DCMS), the government department with responsibility for broadcast-related legislation. The introduction of smallscale DAB is already enshrined in law following the passing of the Broadcasting (Radio Multiplex Services) Act 2017, which started life as a Private Member’s Bill, introduced into the UK Parliament by Kevin Foster MP. The DCMS is working with Ofcom, which allocates frequency spectrum, as well as licensing and regulating broadcast services. Ofcom awarded licences for 10 test multiplexes in April 2015, with trials using lower-cost, open source processing equipment taking place in Aldershot, Birmingham, Brighton and Hove, Bristol, Cambridge, Glasgow, Greater London, Norwich, Manchester and Portsmouth.

The aim is to expand the reach of the approximately 400 commercial local and community radio services that broadcast to small, defined regions using analogue frequency bands, either MF or medium wave (MW).

By using DAB or enhanced DAB+ technology, the government and Ofcom hope more broadcasters will have the opportunity to build wider audiences.

Both the DCMS and Ofcom intend that any new licensing should create a network of small radio stations, particularly in country areas.

Commenting on the consultation process, secretary of state for digital, culture, media and sport Matt Hancock, said: “Local radio is much loved and vitally important as a source of objective and in-touch local news. As more power is delivered locally, and as local newspapers struggle, local radio’s role in the community is becoming more and more critical. We are working hard with stations and listeners to make sure the rules are up to date, and give local radio the chance to use new digital technology to reach audiences, new and longstanding, old and young.”

Ford Ennals, chief executive of Digital Radio UK, which

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WE ARE WORKING WITH STATIONS TO GIVE LOCAL RADIO THE CHANCE TO USE NEW DIGITAL TECHNOLOGY TO REACH NEW AUDIENCES

MATT HANCOCK

Matt Hancock, secretary of state for culture

promotes and supports DAB in Britain, described smallscale digital radio as an important enabling technology with the potential to help hundreds of local and community stations. “This consultation is particularly important as there is much work still to be done to fully consider the best use of the limited spectrum available and how small-scale can work most efficiently alongside existing local and national DAB multiples to help maximise the benefits to listeners,” he said.

Among the services that took part in the test programme was Angel Radio, operator of the smallscale multiplex in Portsmouth. Its digital development manager, Ash Elford, commented: “After more than two years of successfully broadcasting local DAB to Portsmouth, it is good to see a process for the full-time licensing of many more local multiplexes for cities and towns starting to take shape.

“We hope that the success we have achieved so far with technical innovations and broadcasting smaller commercial, niche and community services can be replicated across the UK as soon as possible.”

With digital radio ownership estimated at more than 60% of UK households, DAB/DAB+ is regarded as the best platform to create a third tier of smaller multiplexes across the UK, slotting in below the existing national and regional digital multiplex networks.

These use transmitters operating in VHF Band III, with blocks of frequencies in the range 211MHz to 229MHz (also known as blocks 10 to 13). In its report on the small-scale trials, Ofcom concluded that additional spectrum would be needed for any new services. Lower frequencies below 211MHz were used for the test project and this is now being considered as the longterm host for future open source stations.

Up to now this has been used primarily for business radio. Although many operators of such services have moved to other frequencies, some are still using this VHF sub-band II, covering blocks 7, 8 and 9. This required what the Ofcom report described as careful planning to prevent interference during the test, with some frequencies avoided altogether. It was concluded that the six sub-band II blocks identified would be able to support small-scale DAB across much of the UK. Some of the test services used DAB+, which provides additional multimedia capabilities. Among these was an electronic programme guide (EPG) used by one multiplex to offer details of shows coming up on the station. According to both reception reports and anecdotal evidence, DAB+ provided satisfactory reception in “fringe” areas where it was not possible to decode DAB signals in the same multiplex. www.gov.uk

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P26 MARCH 2018

VivaLux Studio, Libramont

VivaCité: TV on the radio

With new headquarters planned in 2022, the Belgian French language public broadcaster RTBF has stopped its investments in its current studio landscape in Brussels and concentrated on studios in its regional centres in Wallony, reports Marc Maes…

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ivaCité is the RTBF’s full service radio channel, serving the Belgian French community with regional broadcasts. The channel has studios in Brussels and five regional centres, and airs on 20 FM frequencies in the south of Belgium. Vivacité holds, with an audience share of 16%, the lead position in Wallony.

Last year saw the opening of two brand new radio studios for VivaCité, in Libramont and Charleroi, after the public broadcaster teamed up with local media to enhance proximity with the audience. All of the new studios are DHD-based and are equipped for both radio and TV. The technical integration of the two new radio studios and one television studio was carried out by Amptec who took on the design, system integration, custom-made furniture and cabling of the studios, as well as the supply of the technical equipment.

In Libramont, the RTBF found a new location for its regional studio, which had been relocated from Arlon.

In a new building, both the public broadcaster’s VivaLux (the VivaCité radio channel for the Luxembourg region), as well as local TV station TV Lux, have on-air and production studios.

“The idea is to team up more and more with local broadcasters,” says Laurent Finet, head of production and digital radio innovation at RTBF. “We share editorial content and news, resulting in a positive synergy.”

The new on-air studio, used by VivaLux for its regional broadcasts on radio, is also streaming on RTBF’s Auvio platform and broadcasted on TV Lux. In Charleroi, VivaCité and local TV station Télésambre relocated to the brand new MédiaSambre building: an audiovisual activity hub in the very centre of the city.

For the new radio studios for VivaCité Charleroi, sharing with a local TV station went a step further: Finet opted for a ‘hybrid’ studio that is used for the radio and webstreamed Charleroi Matin morning show at VivaCité, and for the TV news bulletins of TéléSambre, the local TV channel in Charleroi.

“We don’t design pure radio studios anymore,” Finet explained. “Today we build studios for visual radio, for the production and broadcast of radio and TV. It’s also more cost-effective in the construction of the studio – instead of adding TV, social media and podcasts afterwards, we decided to give them a spot right in the new studio. It really adds to the dynamics of radio and allows us to deliver high quality broadcasts, both on radio and TV.” VivaCité’s morning programmes (between 5:30-8:30am) are produced in the radio studio, including visual radio and internet streaming. During TéléSambre’s TV programmes, the studio’s imaging is adapted for the station’s news bulletins on the hour and some 15 locally produced programmes on sports

and culture. Amptec also designed specific microphone stands for the on-air studio: the large diaphragm microphones (Neumann TLM 102) are quickly changed to more discreet ones during TV broadcasts.

“Both the Libramont and Charleroi radio studios are quite identical in terms of technical equipment,” explains Bart Lamberigts, project manager with Amptec. “The compactness and organisation of the workflow on DHD consoles has become the standard where DJs can switch studios, or even regional stations, easily – and remote support becomes more effective.”

The main on-air studios are self-operated with the presenter taking on the technical workflow of the broadcast. A DHD XC2-core with a DHD 12 fader MX console for the self-op studio and two DHD TX touch consoles for the journalists’ workstations make up the technical basis for the broadcast set-up. “In Charleroi, where radio and TV work closely together, the XC2 is interconnected with the TéléSambre DHD XD2 core with higher DSP capacity,” adds Lamberigts. “We also installed TéléSambre’s new TV studios with a DHD MX 12-fader console for the smaller ‘daily news’ studio and a DHD MX 20-fader console for the larger production studio. An RTS Intercom system, connecting these studios with the floors and all of Télésambre’s video edit booths, completes the set-up.” n www.rtbf.be

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21/02/2018 13:10

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P29 MARCH 2018 TiMax used on Europe’s largest natural stage

A tipping point for immersive audio?

From an initial base in cinema, object-based audio and other Next Generation Audio technologies are increasingly crossing over into broadcast, post-production and other fixed installation applications. David Davies immerses himself in some of these new sound experiences and hears from some of the most influential figures shaping this ever-expanding sector…

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he emergence of Dolby Atmos in the cinema environment was the first indication that what we might term ‘more than stereo’ audio was set to experience a resurgence after 5.1 and 9.1 rather failed to lead everyone into a brave new world. In 2018 the concept of immersive audio is both established and respected in the cinema world, but what of its migration into broadcast, post-production and fixed installation applications such as theatre productions and museum exhibits?

The concise answer is that it’s early days, but the signs are certainly promising. In particular, broadcast

appears to be particularly enthusiastic to embrace the opportunities heralded by Next Generation Audio (NGA) technologies such as immersive and object-based audio – not least because there is an industry-wide feeling that a more compelling audio experience is required to complement ultra-high-resolution 4K images. There is also interest in exploring the potential of immersive audio experiences to be tied into personal audio, whereby bespoke interfaces could be offered, allowing users to tailor mixes to their personal preferences.

Timeline Television is a leading outside broadcast company that has recently played a pioneering role

in bringing UHD-capable trucks to the market. David Harnett, Timeline’s head of sound, outside broadcast, confirms that all of the company’s UHD trucks are now “ready for Dolby Atmos as we expect increasing demand for clients” – particularly those involved in broadcasting high-profile sports such as football and rugby.

Harnett explains that “a very large reason for the use of Dolby Atmos immersive audio in live sports is so that the audio side of the production can catch up with the live video side. There has been a significant amount of progress from HD to 3G and now 4K/UHD content, and realistically very few changes in the audio since

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P30 MARCH 2018

Dave Harnett

THERE HAS BEEN SIGNIFICANT PROGRESS FROM HD TO 3G AND NOW 4K/UHD, BUT VERY FEW CHANGES IN AUDIO SINCE 5.1

DAVE HARNETT

5.1 audio. We currently produce almost every show we do in 5.1 and have done for many years, but now are looking to make that leap forward in the form of Dolby Atmos audio to ensure the audience at home hears the audio with the same experience now offered from such amazing pictures.”

Unsurprisingly, the advent of immersive audio has had an impact on both audio capture and subsequent mixing in the truck. Harnett would like to see more options in terms of surround-capable microphones, noting that “the only microphone I have found that will produce the height elements alongside the normal 5.1 audio is [made by SoundField] and this has a proprietary cable that connects to two rack units of equipment.

There is no doubt that this mic is great, but I would also be keen to see some competitors in this field running on different connections like a dedicated fibre”.

Inside the truck, immersive audio production requires the Timeline team to put its Calrec Audio mixing consoles into immersive monitoring mode “which gangs up two 5.1 main output busses to create the height simultaneously as the 5.1 mix, and then we use a Dolby monitoring tool to create a local render to re-insert into

the gallery monitors. I am really looking forward to a time when this could be achieved within the desk in the same way and a downmix created to other formats created as we currently do in 5.1”.

The ability to output mixes in multiple formats with a minimum of repurposing and remixing will be a determining factor as to how widely immersive audio crosses over from sports into other areas of broadcast.

At the same time, manufacturers appear to be working hard to fill in crucial spaces in the signal chain both for day-to-day TV production, and in post-production too.

Nugen Audio is one such vendor to have registered a significant uptake in interest in immersive audio in some of its primary segments, including post-production and gaming. The last six months have witnessed a number of new launches into this space, including an update for its Loudness Toolkit (version 2.7) and a further update to its Halo Upmix 3D Immersive Extension that enables second and third order Ambisonic output and support for the AmbiX and FuMa formats. The update also includes both 7.1.4 and 5.1.4 channel configurations to facilitate production in Auro-3D, which is a threedimensional audio standard used across industries

including cinema, gaming and automotive applications.

Nugen Audio technical director Paul Tapper confirms that immersive audio is an increasing contributor to its overall business as service providers in different sectors “look to establish further points of differentiation”.

But while broadcast and post appear to be particularly receptive to the potential of immersive audio, the same can be said of certain elements of fixed installation – especially theatres, museums and other large-scale visitor attractions that are seeking to enhance the sensorial impact of their offers. Astro Spatial Audio – which employs an object-based audio technology for the generation of spatial audio experiences – is one beneficiary of this trend, having recently seen its technology deployed at venues including the State Opera in Berlin, the Maly Theatre in Moscow, Ankara’s Presidential Theatre, Germany’s Folkwang University, Cologne’s Hightide mixing and post-production studio, and the hit Broadway musical The Band’s Visit.

“2017 was a great year for bringing immersive audio to a wider audience,” says ASA founder Bjorn van Munster. The ASA system continues to evolve, which will certainly stand it in good stead as the overall outlook for immersive audio remains somewhat uncertain, but in terms of achieving the broadest possible take-up for these kind of solutions “education is paramount, but so is the reliability of the product and the fact that it truly adds something special to the user’s toolbox. The added value of object-based immersive audio has been proven again and again, but it’s no good to introduce a technology such as this as just another way to sell boxes – it needs to be understood and nurtured in its own right. To that end, we participate in every single Astro Spatial Audio project because we want every customer to feel great about the new, remarkable possibilities at their fingertips.”

Another company that has been instrumental in developing the theatre and live entertainment space is OutBoard, whose flagship solution is the TiMax 3D Spatial Audio system. 2017 was another successful year with numerous Broadway and London theatre productions to the company’s credit. And OutBoard’s

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P31 MARCH 2018

Astro Spatial Audio tech deployed at St. Gallen’s production of Loreley

WE BELIEVE THAT 2017 WAS A GREAT YEAR FOR BRINGING IMMERSIVE AUDIO TO THE ATTENTION OF A WIDER AUDIENCE

BJORN VAN MUNSTER

Bjorn Van Munster

Dave Haydon indicates that the increased availability of immersive-capable products hasn’t done any harm in boosting overall market receptiveness.

“The most significant milestones in the technology marketplace has been the emergence of some interesting multi-channel line-array panoramic audio plus surround propositions from a couple of the major speaker manufacturers, which helps to stimulate the immersive audio conversation that we’ve been engaged in and successfully promoted for many years,” he says.

The TiMax system’s capacity to deliver targeted vocal localisation is among its primary selling points. “Our

experience with TiMax spatial reinforcement doing vocal localisation is that once producers have heard it they can’t go back to the ‘old’ way,” says Haydon. “And when we add the immersive audio possibilities in terms of fully spatialised and aligned multichannel reverb, plus 3D layered animated immersive soundscape rendering, we usually get asked back. Vocals reinforced without the immersivity of spatial amplification sound flat and lacking realism – we’ve proved this at the flick of a switch to the likes of Disney Theatrical Group management as well as seasoned sound designers. Once they accept amplification is required for voices and acoustic instruments, directors don’t really want to hear the PA – therefore panning across multiple speaker channels is not the answer.”

Although the long-term viability of immersive audio as a technology with mainstream appeal remains unclear, it is evident that ‘more than stereo’ audio is experiencing its most sustained resurgence since the early 2000s.

Leading and specialist vendors are working hard to fill in the remaining elements of production and mixing workflows, so however the market does develop those wishing to embrace immersive audio will have the tools they need at their disposal. n

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P32 MARCH 2018

Raising the standard Four years after Metropolis Studios and the Academy of Contemporary Music joined forces, a flagship studio has been built at the Guildford campus to create an environment for students that mirrors the size and scale of the world-class recording studio in London. Tara Lepore was invited along to hear the first live recording of an ACM choir from the control room…

ACM choir Electron recorded the first track in the academy’s brand new flagship studio

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hen former railway engineer Kainne Clements took ownership of London’s Metropolis Studios in 2012, it was – in his own words – “struggling”.

Clements was asked to get a studio that has hosted a plethora of world-class acts, but was then “losing a lot of money”, back on its feet, and having just sold his railway technology company, he was in a position to do so.

The next year, Clements became chief executive at the Academy of Contemporary Music (ACM), a music education college in his hometown of Guildford. In this double acquisition of sorts, he saw an opportunity for the two to work together: for Metropolis to provide training opportunities and futureproof its recruitment strategy; and for ACM to get its students working with Metropolis’ world-class engineers, who among them have credits for the likes of Queen, U2 and Adele.

Almost four years in the making, a flagship studio mirroring the quality at Metropolis – both technically and aesthetically – is now open, giving students a

taste of what it’s like to work in a state-of-the-art recording studio. Designed by ACM’s Neil Martin, with input from Metropolis’ head of technical Nick Wrate, “it was essential that the studio was designed in a way that would create an environment where students would have the confidence to learn about working in a recording studio,” says Martin.

The control room has rows of tiered benches so students can look over the shoulder of the tutor, who teaches from a 24-channel SSL Duality console.

The desk has Dynaudio monitoring and a suite of digital audio workstations, such as Pro Tools, Ableton and Logic, and plugins including Fab Filter, Native Instruments, Plugin Alliance and Steven Slate.

Aesthetically, it has a similar vibe to a standard Metropolis set-up: big industrial windows in a spacious room create the ‘real’ environment that Clements was keen to create. At the launch event, Clements commented on the importance of training students on kit used in professional environments to give them the

skills they’d need to be employable in an “extremely competitive industry”.

Metropolis engineer Liam Nolan was brought in for the first live recording in the studio last month, where a 20-piece choir and band recorded a track penned by an ACM student for invited members of the industry and trade press. Nolan, who sat behind the desk for three takes of the recording, said: “I’d be pretty happy working out of these rooms, they are genuinely brilliant.”

It’s now the largest studio at the Guildford campus, where students enrol on a fixed BA in Music Industry Practice with a choice of five different pathways, including a producer route and technical services route.

The SSL flagship joins a smaller studio sponsored by PRS Foundation, and a mid-size studio complete with Audient desk.

Simba Mlambo, ACM applicant experience, events and outreach coordinator, commented: “It’s great to now have all these different spaces around the campus for students to develop in and progress on to.” n

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21/02/2018 13:15

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P34 MARCH 2018

Shure to shore Over the past decade or so, Shure has evolved from accomplished microphone manufacturer to all-encompassing audio solutions provider. Daniel Gumble caught up with company CEO Chris Schyvinck at last month’s ISE show in Amsterdam to find out about its ongoing international expansion and how things have changed during her 29 years with the brand…

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e find Shure CEO Chris Schyvinck and senior conferencing market communications manager Chris Lyons in the meeting area behind the company’s expansive booth space in Hall 3 of the Amsterdam Rai. It’s mid-afternoon on day one of a bustling ISE 2018 and the firm’s exhibition space is positively heaving with visitors keen to get to grips with the array of wares on display. Classic models from its historical mic portfolio sit alongside conferencing systems and wireless solutions, highlighting its evergrowing presence in this most lucrative of markets. And while the Shure name will always be synonymous with the trusty SM58 and its iconic siblings, it is a name that today represents so much more.

Carving out Shure’s evolutionary path from the top is CEO Schyvinck, whose 29-year tenure with the company has seen her pass through its various divisions, garnering a keen understanding of the business and, most importantly, the needs of its customers and partners, along the way. Having started her career with Shure in its engineering department, she progressed to senior roles in manufacturing, sales and marketing before being appointed CEO around 15 months ago. As one would imagine, the industry has changed beyond recognition over the past 29 years.

“I would say the biggest change to the business I’ve seen during that time is market penetration into different segments,” she observes. “Back when I started we were predominantly a pro audio company and were dealing a lot with wired microphones, so our technology has proliferated so much through the years.

So we’ve gone from having the strong foundation of knowing everything about acoustics and transducers to then adding the wireless components of that and getting more involved in DSP and software over the past decade. Now the concerns that we have are around networking and security and seeing these technologies layer on top of each other.

“As that’s been happening, the company’s global footprint has increased so much since I started when all of our locations were in North America. Everything else was the rest of the world in terms of where we sold, but now we have around 25 different locations around the world. Some are for operations but more are for getting closer to the customers and understanding their needs, especially for [the install] market where it changes so quickly. Every business is different. What are their

Chris Schyvinck

processes? What are their workflows? What are their problems and pain points? We can’t understand that if we are just listening from Chicago.”

According to Schyvinck, this expansion into new markets and the bolstering of its presence in territories outside of the US has always been part of the plan – a point highlighted at the show by the announcement of a new Shure office in Switzerland.

“In the last decade we have opened up 15 different subsidiaries and it’s not always just about operational things,” she explains. “It’s about trying to understand

customers, being shoulder-to-shoulder with them in their working environments. As it turns out, in both Switzerland and Austria we can utilise the fact that we have a distribution hub in Germany and we can get products to people faster and more efficiently. It applies to all of our verticals.”

So, with a liberal peppering of Shure offices across the globe, are there any specific areas for which the brand is preparing to break further into? Not in the immediate future, it seems.

“Right now, because we have done so much ground

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Shure’s ISE expo space

breaking in the past two to three years, I don’t think we can add any more locations right now,” she offers. “Now we need to exercise what we have and make sure we’re getting closer to those customers.”

Another key announcement during ISE came in the cessation of Shure’s distribution partnership with QSC in the UK and Germany. Schyvinck says the decision was borne out of the company’s growth in Europe over the past 10 years.

“We are at a transition curve right now, so for the past decade we were trying to build on those nonUS markets,” she comments. “When we had a more regional focus and we had direct distribution entities, like we have in Germany and the UK to break into new markets - especially systems markets - we had to have a more comprehensive portfolio. Back then we didn’t have the breadth we have right now; we had to have partners like QSC to really sell a systems solution. Now that our portfolio is so much broader we decided we don’t need that relationship anymore. It was very mutual in terms of how it all concluded.”

As is the case for so many audio-rooted companies exhibiting at ISE, the integrated systems market is one of burgeoning importance. The growth of the annual show since the turn of the decade has been unprecedented, with attendance figures and exhibitor numbers escalating year-on-year. And, says Schyvinck, its growth shows no sign of slowing.

“My first one was in 2011 and it was about half the number of exhibitors at that point compared to today,” she notes. “It speaks to the converging worlds of AV and IT, so the way the show worked five or 10 years ago is very different. For some IT decision makers they see audio as a bit of a mystery, so companies like ours can

help demystify what’s out there. We believe a lot in the education process and events like this give us the opportunity to hold training events and demos. People have to hear it to believe it and see that it’s easy to use and it marries well with the other components in their meeting rooms.

“This show has another decade [of growth] at least. The need for good audio and communication… I can’t see that ending in the next 10 years.”

One of the key areas of growth for the brand is in the sports arena, with its wireless systems an increasing fixture in stadia across the globe.

“It’s been a big market for us traditionally, but even more so now because so many sports are really trying to up the spectacle, whether it’s soccer, football or baseball, they are trying to maximise the audio experience,” Lyons elaborates. “Microphones are put on the net, on the grass, behind this, behind that. It seems like overkill but that’s what brings the drama.”

Schyvinck adds: “In Europe we’ve been outfitting soccer stadiums and there is a trend, in the US at least, for people not attending games as much but watching the event after the fact, and the production is really important.”

“We’re in so many differnet types of installation now that it’s hard to keep track of,” Lyons picks up. “The thing that’s surprising to me is that, when I started at

Shure years ago, a contractor would say, We’re doing a school, we’re going to need six mics over six rooms. Now they say, I have 120 rooms around the world, I want to put the same solution in every one.”

With so many possibilities opening up in the field of integrated systems, what does Schyvinck consider the biggest challenges on the horizon?

“We have been adding a lot more people to help us monitor technology trends” she says. “From what I can tell we are moving at a faster pace than we have before and we need to keep on doing that.”

“And there are additional factors involved now,” Lyons interjects. “It used to be that you had audio capture, then you had some mixing and processing, then you had amplification and reproduction.

“Now you have the added variable of networking, whether it’s something that’s part of a corporate network or tied in with a telephone system, Everything has to work together more seamlessly than ever before.”

With NAMM and ISE now out of the way, Shure is devoting the rest of the year to expanding its global activities and pushing its existing and recently launched lines: “All of the big things are out of the bag,” Schyvinck concludes. “We are in the throes of launching our Axient Digital product, and there are still some other form factors to come out so, that’ll happen at a later time.” n

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P36 MARCH 2018

Master strokes

All photos: Rhianna Tamara

Mastering engineer Katie Tavini is currently cultivating a reputation as one of the finest exponents of her craft in the industry.

Daniel Gumble caught up with her in London for a chat about mastering techniques and her incredible career to date…

Katie Tavini at Red Bull Studios London

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he year may still be young, but 2018 has already been a significant one in the life of Katie Tavini. On January 1 she boarded a train from Manchester to London where she was to relocate and begin work on a substantial project - which, at the time of going to print, must remain under wraps - in addition to a series of other projects set to see the light of day in the not too distant future.

But while the past three months have arguably provided the most significant personal and professional shifts in her burgeoning career thus far, Tavini has been diligently honing and refining her studio skills for the best part of the last 10 years in and around the Manchester punk scene; her work with Sonic Boom Six quickly catching the collective ear of local contemporaries. On the rare occasions she would chance upon any spare time, she would fill

it by engineering and producing her own electronic compositions, adding further still to her ever-growing studio skillset.

It is this ferocious ambition and thirst for knowledge that has led Tavini to where she is today. As we settle into our seats over a cup of tea in a cramped London coffee shop sequestered in one of King’s Cross station’s many nooks and crannies, her enthusiasm for all things audio becomes immediately evident. Indeed, her enthusiasm for all manner of topics reveals itself before our interview begins in earnest: we are informed early on that she is currently cat-sitting for her flatmate by way of various pictures of said feline, while the accidental origins of the teabags are explained upon arrival of our beverages. But these are subjects for another time.

As we fix our attention to the subject of Tavini’s career

so far, specifically her formative years, she is quick to highlight a couple of key moments that she believes set her on the path for a career in audio.

“The first was when I was about five,” she says. “I spent a lot of time in Italy as a child, and though there wasn’t a lot to do my dad had a record player, so I would listen to a lot of records. There was one by James called Seven and there was a track that had this brass panning on it, which I remember finding really amazing. Also, at a similar age, I was in school and I saw these girls playing violin, and I just thought, That’s the worst sound in the world, I want to make that! I want to make people feel as uncomfortable as they are making me feel right now!

I then begged my mum for a violin and had lessons, so my background is in classical music.”

Displaying a precocious level of musicianship, her studies led to a performance-based university course,

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P37 MARCH 2018

although it quickly became clear that Tavini’s calling was emanating not from the stage but the studio, with a small yet path-altering recording module providing a much-needed outlet for her sonic pursuits.

“I spent pretty much all my time in the studio on this recording module thinking, This is what I want to do,” Tavini explains. “And I had a little home set up where I was producing my own tracks. With all my course mates wanting to be performers, I got the benefit of recording them and they had they benefit of being recorded, so it worked out really well. One day my teacher said, Katie, you’re always here – I’ve been offered a job in a studio but I can’t take it, do you want it? I was like, Hell yeah!

Even if it was just making tea, I was up for it. Then I worked my arse off to make myself invaluable.”

Mastering the mix: Katie Tavini

Master plan Having served in an assistant role across numerous sessions, the obvious next step may have been to continue on down the engineering and production route. However, while seeking advice on how to take her mixing skills to the next level, her attention was diverted to the art of mastering.

“I was in a forum and I asked if anyone had any tips for improving mixing techniques,” Tavini elaborates.

“Then this guy says, If you want to learn how to mix, learn how to master. I used to sneak finished tracks home from the studio and then try to master them.

Then, once we got the finished masters back, I’d compare them and see what I could do to make mine more like theirs, so I was teaching myself how to master thinking it would help me become a better engineer.

“Around that time, this producer messaged me on Facebook asking for some mastering, so I said I’d master his EP but asked, If it’s shit please don’t release it, because I’m just starting out! But when he got it back from me he thought it was great.

“He was not only a producer but also had his own band, Sonic Boom Six, and they had a really big album and PR campaign in around 2011, so I got to master that album, the singles from it and a load of remixes. That was quite a lot of work, and they have a large fanbase, so I kind of spread throughout the punk scene just through that one project. I was still doing sessions on the side, and mastering was just this thing I was doing occasionally. But it started spreading in Manchester and people were saying, There aren’t many people that do mastering round here, can you do it for us? It just snowballed due to demand, plus people didn’t want to pay London rates. And I enjoyed it! I get a big buzz out of finishing things.”

For those who aren’t fully conversant with the art of mastering, the process can appear somewhat daunting.

This, Tavini offers, should not be the case, arguing that it could be off-putting to potential mastering practitioners of the future.

“The word ‘master’ sound quite intimidating, I think that’s why some people are so terrified of it,” she says.

“And there’s also the whole stereotype of, You’re not really a mastering engineer unless you’re a 60-year-old guy with ruined hearing! And if the 60-year-old guy with ruined hearing is mastering, anyone can do it.

“The mistake I made at first was thinking it’s this incredibly scary thing, like a lot of people do, and as a result ended up doing too much to the track. It’s often a case of less is more. The most important element of mastering is letting people know what could be better about the mix, not creatively, but the functionality and balance of it before it gets mastered. That’s one thing you don’t get with online mastering. There’s no feedback. If the track is too bass-heavy it’s not going to tell you that. Once the mix is solid, the mastering should happen naturally. A lot of mastering is like admin – labelling, filing stuff, frequency analysis, checking a mix for corruption, that kind of stuff.”

Normal Not Novelty Back in January of this year, Tavini featured on a Women In The Studio panel at AIM’s (Association Of Independent Musicians) Women In Music conference at London’s City Hall to discuss the sector’s gender imbalance. Joined by a host of preeminent studio engineers and producers (Steph Marziano, Dr Mariana Lopez, Isabel Gracefield Grundy, Marta Salogni, Katia Isakoff and K-Minor), the panel shone a spotlight not only some of the risible attitudes towards women that still permeate certain cobwebbed recesses of the industry, but also the vast strides that have been taken to begin bridging the gap.

In addition to her appearance at City Hall, Tavini has also been closely involved with Red Bull Studios’ Normal Not Novelty initiative – a monthly workshop open to female DJs, sound engineers and producers.

“We made so much progress last year, with Red Bull putting money and publicity behind the fact there are female engineers out there,” she states. “Because there are fewer female engineers and producers we are more easily remembered and have occasionally found it easier to get work once we’ve made that initial step.

However, I think people assume there aren’t as many women working in the studio as there really are. The females who are working in this industry are just happy to get on with it and we don’t necessarily sit behind a computer shouting about the fact that we’re women.

“But Red Bull sticking at it has really been key. Until last year, very few of my mastering credits were with female bands or female producers, but since around June 2017, about half of the people I’ve been working with are female bands, producers or engineers. Red Bull has helped to connect the dots between women in studios, which is great, and it’s also given us a wider network and a bit of media attention.

“That’s not my priority, but it has put women in the spotlight so that men can see we are doing this and doing it well. It’s getting there.”

She concludes: “The AES are also doing this He For She thing at the moment. Mariana Lopez is one of the chairs on the committee, and she’s really behind getting more women involved. She’s personally making sure that there are lots of women speakers at all the AES events. Everyone needs to make a point of doing this.

It’s really important, otherwise the subject will just get forgotten about again.”

With a busy schedule of exciting projects currently inhand, for now it’s back to the studio for Tavini. And if this year continues as it has started, you can certainly expect to be seeing a lot more of her throughout 2018. n

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P38 MARCH 2018

Fast & Furious The Fast & Furious Live European arena tour hit the road in January 2018 - and audio plays a ‘pivotal’ role in the show, with Digico consoles, RF comms and an L-Acoustics PA all featuring on the live rendition of this franchise hit. Simon Duff reports from London’s O2 show, where he got the lowdown from sound designer Colin Pink and his team from Britannia Row...

F

ast & Furious Live is a high tech extravaganza based on the hugely successful eight-film franchise, featuring advanced theatrical technology, sound design by Colin Pink working with Britannia Row, a score by James Brett recorded at Abbey Road, extensive RF Comms, video projection mapping, pyrotechnics and all the famous sports cars from the films. The action is set in a multitude of settings, from underground drag racing in Los Angeles, drifting through car parks in Tokyo, outrunning a submarine in Russia and ripping a bank vault through the streets of Rio. In effect, the show is a stunning ballet with cars, a feast for all the senses – and audio plays a pivotal role.

Rehearsals for the tour took place in Hall 5 of The NEC Birmingham over a month in December 2017, with two preview shows held at the Echo Arena Liverpool in early January, prior to the European arena tour. Lez Dwight, sales director at Britannia Row, explains the initial stages of audio planning: “We were given a brief for sound design, control, PA and RF Comms for the show back in February 2017. Then we developed a few versions of PA design to offer flexibility of scale as the tour visits large and not so large arenas. The control equipment has full redundancy and is packaged in such a way that it can be rapidly deployed. Custom fabricated dollies have been supplied for the stage end control, RF, comms, amplifiers and processing. We have also built

carts for the PA delays to travel in.”

Early on in the show’s development, Pink was appointed as sound designer. He is one of the UK’s leading sound designers, whose credits for 2017 included live sound supervisor on The Brits and MTV for Britannia Row and front of house for Hans Zimmer’s 2017 World tour, supplied by Britannia Row. Pink was tasked by the show’s producer Rowland ‘Rowly’ French with the creative side of the audio and sound FX creation as well as approving all PA. He said: “Audio really drives the show. All music, sound FX and a lot of voiceover dialogue is all on QLab that I have programmed. The timecode from QLab triggers lighting, video and crucially the stunt vehicles’ cues. Plus, in different territories

AUDIO REALLY DRIVES THE SHOW. ALL MUSIC, SOUND FX AND A LOT OF VOICEOVER DIALOGUE IS ALL ON QLAB, WHICH ALSO TRIGGERS STUNT VEHICLE CUES. IT’S AT THE HEART OF THE SHOW

COLIN PINK

we will be working with a translation of main dialogue.

QLab is at the very heart of this show.”

Initial work for Pink involved recording the cars used from the films and now the arena show. “We spent time last autumn recording the show’s cars at Kendrew Barracks, a former RAF base near Rutland, recording high speed car sequences and engine sounds.

I recorded engines, exhausts and drive sequences using Rode NT1As and Zoom location recorders into Pro Tools via my Focusrite Sapphire mic pre amps then edited at my studio in London. The studio includes a full Pro Tools HD, SSL mic pre amps, sound libraries include The Hollywood Edge and I use Martin Logan Hybrid Electrostatic loudspeakers. I think they are the best midrange detail monitors that I have ever heard.”

In his studio Pink created the full soundscape for the show. This included voiceovers recorded at the National Theatre’s voiceover studio, music stems from Abbey Road for James Brett’s score and Pink was given full access to Universal’s Fast & Furious film music, FX and dialogue stems. Mixing, EQ matching, balance and dynamics was all done in QLab, prior to Birmingham for the month of technical rehearsals.

For Pink and his team, including Fergus Mount, who is mixing at FOH, one of the biggest challenges they face is the enormous dynamic range of the show. Pink explains: “One of the most interesting things we found when we came to the technical rehearsals in Birmingham was

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P40 MARCH 2018

FRONT OF HOUSE IS AT A PREMIUM. THE WHOLE ARENA IS THE STAGE, SO WE HAD TO TRY TO MAKE FRONT OF HOUSE AS SMALL AS POSSIBLE. ALTHOUGH THE SHOW IS COMPLICATED, FROM AN INPUT COUNT WE ARE RELATIVELY LOW, SO THE SD11 WAS AN OBVIOUS CHOICE

COLIN PINK

Colin Pink

that all the voices, music and FX had to compete with a varying noise floor from the cars. Sometimes the noise floor was practically nothing at around 40dB, then when there was a full onstage fill of vehicles it would be extreme. For example there is a moment in the show when you have a tank on stage, various sports cars and ice vehicles called skidoos, all shooting at each other, a lot of pyrotechnics and before you switch the PA on the noise floor is 100dB. Then sometimes at a quiet moment of the show it is a normal 40db quiet arena level. So within those massive dynamic differences we have to make the audio journey sit well. When there are lots of cars and action we are swelling music and FX. That has actually been a real challenge to programme.”

Microphones used on the actors are DPA 4088 using Shure Axient Belt Packs. The choice of console used for the show’s mix is a Digico SD 11, running at 96kHz, with a redundant console in mirror backstage. Mix at the O2 was done from the floor at the delay end, but this will vary per venue. The FOH SD11 also serves as the monitor console. Pink told PSNEurope what he likes about the SD11 and it’s suitability for the show: “Front of house space is at a premium on this show. The whole arena floor is the stage so it was requested that we try to make front of house as small as possible across all departments. Although the show is enormously complicated, from an input count we are relatively low.

So the SD11 filled all the criteria. It has got the same

software as the bigger desks, it is flexible and of course it sounds as good as the bigger desks. It seemed to be the obvious choice. And in fact we have got all front of house sound in one custom made rack with the console on top. It makes set up very quick and works very nicely.”

For the entire production the importance of the RF Comms system cannot be overstated, with Britannia Row’s Josh Thomas is in charge, deploying a Riedel Artist Matrix with over a dozen Bolero wireless units.

The stunt drivers use moulded IEMs on Sennheiser 2000 packs. The system interstates the show caller into both wire and wireless loops, stage management, sound, lighting, video, automation, pyro, mechanics and carpenters. Other key RF Comms staff from Britannia Row on the run are Zoltan Pauli and Antoine Bataillard.

PA-wise, Britannia Row are supplying L-Acoustics K2, KS28 for the main LR hang and for the left-centre, right-delay hang L-Acoustics KARA and SB18, driven

by L-Acoustics LA12X amps via BRP Dante Network and Lake Processing. System tech for the Birmingham rehearsals and Liverpool preview shows was Cesar Lopaz, who will hand over to Sergiy Zhytnikov who will serve as system tech for the tour dates. Lopaz comments on the K2/KS28 combination: “It is a fantastic couple regarding the different venue sizes where the tour is going through. The possibility to change the horizontal K2 dispersion is a great feature in general, but even more in this tour, as the space to cover by

the side hang will vary between venues such as The O2 in London, SSE Hydro in Glasgow or Metro Radio in Newcastle. As well as the 10 degrees vertical dispersion and the low weight (56kg) it gives a really flexible choice for all the venues. The KS28 are really tight and deep, giving all the bass needed for some parts of the show, like sound effects or double basses in different music passages. In my personal opinion, KARA and SB18 are my favourite L-Acoustics couple. They are perfect for the clarity and punch required.”

Lopaz, who works with L-Acoustics Soundvison for system design programming, adds: “Soundvision is really accurate these days; you can have quite a close idea with delay times, EQ, low end dispersion, and translate that to your LA manager file, giving you a good starting point in your set-up day. In Birmingham for rehearsals we hung half of the boxes in the side hang that will be used for the show dates. The room didn’t need all of what we used, but we wanted to check that all systems were working. It was great to get to Liverpool to fire up the full rig!”

Pink concluded: “The L-Acoustics system is great because it has got the power and the punch when you need it to get over the volume of the cars. But it has also got the detail for the quieter moments of the show. We need a box that is very good at all dynamic ranges and the L-Acoustics boxes are great at that.” n www.fastandfuriouslive.com

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P42 MARCH 2018

Best of the best The NewBay Best of Show Awards at ISE 2018 recognise truly innovative and pioneering products launched in the year since the 2017 show. With categories across four NewBay magazine brands in the professional audio and professional AV industries, Tara Lepore takes a closer look at the new technology that came out top in the PSNEurope category…

I

t was a record-breaking turnout at Amsterdam’s ISE Show this year, with 80,000 people passing through the doors of the RAI Centre from February 6-9 – 8,000 more attendees than in 2017.

The NewBay Best of Show awards, which happen annually at ISE and IBC each year, recognise the best products launched in the market in the year since the

previous show. Exhibitors can win awards across four of NewBay’s magazine brands: PSNEurope, and its three sister business titles covering the pro audio and pro AV industries, Audio Media International, Installation, and AV Technology Europe.

Exhibitor numbers at the show this year topped 1,200, of which 291 were attending the show for the first

time. According to organisers, floor space confirmed for ISE 2019 currently stands at 103% of the total booked for ISE 2018.

Four of this year’s exhibitors took home a NewBay Best of Show ISE Award, chosen by PSNEurope.

For the full list of winners across the NewBay brands, go to www.nbmevents.uk/newbaybestofshow

Clear-Com, HelixNet Digital Network Partyline System

partyline intercom systems that performance venues know well, but delivers significant improvements in operation and usability expected in modern-day digital communications techology. HelixNet is easy to deploy and use right out of box.”

24 channels of comms can run down a single cable, making it suitable for busy production periods.

Additionally, each beltpack receives all audio channels, programme audio feeds and power over just a single shielded twisted-pair cable.

Programme volume levels are easily adjustable to aid

concentration and communication in noisy areas. It is also unaffected by electromagnetic interference and ground loops, eliminating hum and buzz.

HelixNet is a robust intercom system with many familiar capabilities that live performances and live productions require, yet deploying and operating the entire system is simple and flexible. A set of instruction videos for the system is available to watch on YouTube.

Many contemporary theatres and event production companies today face unexpected production demands. For venues that play host to various visiting productions every year, the ability to accommodate unpredictable requests or show sizes requires technically flexible communications systems.

As an installed system, the concept of a flexible intercom is one that can deliver a smooth service to incoming productions. With HelixNet, there are no huge looms of cable and, with the network of facility panels, it takes the production team around an hour to get the intercoms ready and tested for a show.

Judy Cheng, Clear-Com director of marketing, said: “It is an honour to receive this award from PSNEurope for HelixNet in our 50-year anniversary. This product takes the form of traditional

www.clearcom.com

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21/02/2018 12:24

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d&b audiotechnik, Soundscape The d&b Soundscape is an audio system processor that opens up a whole world of creativity, signaling ‘the beginning of a new era of sound experience, for the sound designer, engineer, artist - and the audience’.

Combining d&b loudspeaker systems with large processing power, object-based mixing and sophisticated room emulation, d&b Soundscape is a toolkit to enable the creation of a ‘new’ listening experience.

Almost five years in development and with extensive field testing by some of the world’s leading artists and venues,

the Soundscape allows the creation of sound system designs where acoustic environments can be created and sound sources placed and moved. d&b’s CMO, David Claringbold, said: “We are delighted to have been judged Best of Show by PSNEurope at ISE and wish to extend a big thank you to all the people who came to experience the d&b Soundscape, which we

officially launched at the show.

“In developing the d&b Soundscape we have envisaged a future in which audio technology has the power to not only enhance the quality of experience for artists, audiences and engineers but also extend the creative capabilities of events and venues.

We appreciate being acknowledged by our peers with this award as we envisage the d&b Soundscape as a key contributor to a conversation that opens up a new frontier of possibility. With d&b Soundscape, the senses are aligned: the brain can literally relax and enjoy the show.” www.dbaudio.com

Kramer, Yardent VT-2 speakers Yarden VT-2 is a vibrating transducer speaker that transforms any solid resonant surface into a powerful speaker. The compact Yarden VT-2 can be discreetly attached to the surface or underside of any table, wall or door and utilise vibration to emit sound evenly from that surface. The speaker is safe to use on lots of surfaces and eliminates the hassle of positioning conventional speakers around a room.

Yarden VT-2 also includes a selectable 70V/100V line transformer for Hi- or Lo-Z applications and has a power rating of 10W @8Ω. Yarden VT-2 is

XTA Electronics, DPA/DNA Series Digital Processing Amplification

easy to install and extremely elegant as the speaker is “hidden away” and invisible to the end user. Above all else, Yarden VT-2 is incredibly versatile and opens up new opportunities for audio installations. As you can place the speakers under a dining table, they are completely out of sight. Yarden VT2 can also be

installed in bathrooms as the speaker is not affected by humidity. A spokesperson from Kramer told PSNEurope it is “proud to be the first company to introduce this type of speaker to pro AV installations.”

The DPA and DNA Series from XTA have been designed to combine audio power and performance with flexible connectivity for both remote control and audio.

Accepting analogue, AES3 digital and Dante networked audio, the DPA amplifiers can connect to any source and make it available over the network, processing four amp channels plus four additional channels with local analogue outputs to connect to nonDSP DNA (or any traditional) amplifiers. The auxiliary output channels can also be fed back onto the Dante network.

All input processing channels feature a suite of familiar XTA EQ (including all the esoteric filter types) and all

eight output processing channels can include FIR filter data, and will accept industry standard presets created for XTA’s other processors.

The non-DSP DNA models may include a fourchannel 96kHz Dante input option (switchable back to regular four-channel analogue if needed). A single network cable can then be used to connect the processed audio from a DPA model to any number of DNA amplifiers to achieve the power levels required.

Powers range from 4 x 1400W up to 2 x 6800W, covered

by Ethernet, USB and RS485 with configuration via the industry standard AudioCore software. Additional tuning and monitoring of a DPA amplifier network is handled wirelessly by the dedicated DeltaDirect iPad app, which is available to download for free.

www.kramerav.com

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P46 MARCH 2018

Stoke-on-Trent’s The Sugarmill venue has played a key role in the development of numerous bands and artists over the years

‘Every day is a challenge for grassroots venues’ In January, Government backed the Agent Of Change bill, which says that property developers must consider – and foot the bill for – any necessary soundproofing measures required when setting up next to a venue. Danni Brownsill, head promoter at independent Stoke-on-Trent venue The Sugarmill, tells us why the bill is so essential to the survival of the live music industry...

The Sugarmill has played a key role in developing so many artists over the years. How essential is it that such venues are protected by Agent Of Change?

It’s really important. Our cities and towns are changing and developing all the time, and I don’t think you’ll find that anyone at a grassroots music venue will have any issue with their towns improving. However, we need to make sure that development doesn’t mean the death of small venues due to noise complaints. It’s absurd that a venue could have existed in the same location for 20-plus years, but could face the threat of closure, sometimes just from as little as one new resident making a complaint. That’s the reality some venues are currently facing. The government need to appreciate the cultural and social value of these venues, and the responsibility for adequate soundproofing needs to be with the new developments, not on the venue. If the venue was there first, it should have legal protection.

What have been the biggest challenges the venue has faced over the past few years?

The recession has been tricky for us to navigate, as it was for any small business. Tuition fees rising, and students not having as much disposable income has been a challenge too. However over the past 18 months, we’re starting to see business getting back to where

it was before. Part of that is to do with us diversifying what we offer, but it’s also because people are sick of austerity and want to go out and have a good time again.

What are the biggest challenges ahead?

Every day is a challenge for a small independent venue.

The UK music industry is one of the richest in the world, but the grassroots venues see very little of its profits.

Once we’ve built the artist and they start selling shows out, the bands tend to move on and aren’t playing our rooms anymore and are working with the bigger national promoters. It’s a strange business. The best way I heard it described is that grassroots venues are the research and development stage, and one company pays for that, but then another swoops in and takes the work you’ve done and makes a profit on it. The other company needs you to do the work, but they won’t pay you for it. We provide an essential service to the wider industry, but ultimately it ends up being a labour of love.

How confident are you that Agent of Change will become enshrined in law?

I think common sense must prevail here. Agent of Change isn’t just to protect music venues; it will help things like farms, factories and all manner of existing business. Current planning law is archaic.

What difference would it make to your venue?

We’re lucky to have not had any real problems with new developments, but Stoke is on the rise and developers are looking at the city. We have had to raise issues with proposed new developments in the past, so this law would stop us having to look over our shoulder and allow us to get on with the business of being a venue.

What does the venue bring to the local area?

As a grassroots venue, supporting bands on their way up and serving our community, we really don’t mind a bit of hard work, especially if it means we’ll be here for another 23 years. Most recently, we’ve been instrumental in shaping the music aspect of Stoke-onTrent’s bid for City of Culture 2021, and have used the bidding process as a way of bringing the whole music scene in the city - from other venues, promoters, bands and recording studios - together and strengthening and reinforcing the value of what we’ve got as a city.

And how big an impact would it have on the community if the venue wasn’t there?

A lot of people wouldn’t have access to live music, as they wouldn’t be able to afford to travel to other cities to see shows. The local bands would have nowhere to play, and Stoke would lose a massive cultural asset. n

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Sound and vision

Calling all snap-happy smartphone addicts! In each issue, we publish the best pro audio pics posted on social media in the past month. This month, we’re sharing some of the best pics from ISE 2018, which took place on February 6-9 at the RAI Centre in Amsterdam. Tag photos with @psneurope or email tlepore@nbmedia.com to feature in next month’s issue... @avidtechnology Fantastic news from the ISE show floor in Amsterdam! Avid VENUE S6L receives the 2018 NewBay Media Best of Show Award from AV Technology Europe, recognising and rewarding achievements and innovations in product and service development.

@nexo_official ISE Show 2018. We are waiting for you! #nexo #yamaha #ise

@mclymcly We are ready! ISE 2018 in colour! #ourgenelec #ise2018genelec

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P49 MARCH 2018

Follow us on Twitter Instagram Facebook @psneurope

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@psneurope XTA Electronics won the NewBay ISE Best of Show award in the PSNEurope category. Hereâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Waring Hayes from the company

@psneurope Yuvai Kramer from Kramer Electronics, which won a NewBay ISE Best of Show award for its Yarden VT-2 Speakers

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21/02/2018 13:39

P50 MARCH 2018

Acropolis now Phil Ward talks to Mark Walsh – classical scholar, founder of Marked Events and architect of a new trade show empire…

F

or 10 years, Marked Events organised the BPM trade event best known for its long run at the UK’s National Exhibition Centre in Birmingham, and for its latter-day association with the complementary full entertainment technology show PRO. As its name suggested, BPM had its roots in the nightclub industry and its glitterball-spiked rainbow of supply chains from turntables to trusses. Adding PRO in 2011, the agenda was able to expand into the wider world of pro audio and most of the leading brands in sound reinforcement and fixed installation secured a presence as the combined event mounted a serious challenge to PLASA, its closest rival.

Now Marked Events, led by founder and devout Northerner Mark Walsh, has completely reconfigured its offer to the entertainment technology industry by breaking apart the constituents of BPM | PRO and spreading them across the year and around the country in four new highly targeted events: Gig; Worship; Club & Bar; and Live.

While Gig places a new focus on talent, the other shows concentrate the traditional equipment supply brew on the specific sector that it says on the tin – reflecting the more discrete channels to market of the digital age and the exacting demands of the Smart customer. Provided his company emerges from its hugely promising Craft Drink Festival unscathed, Walsh can look forward to four times the exposure, distillery and consumption than he had before at the hands of pro audio’s thirsty-for-knowledge professionals.

There are some radical changes to the calendar instigated by Marked Events; how does the new lineup of events better reflect current market conditions?

One thing we learnt from running BPM | PRO is that we need to be more focused in our energies. The retail market is changing and we realise that we need to reflect that change. In many ways, the addition of PRO was an attempt to do this, but I soon began to understand that PRO wasn’t right for the market place.

The new events most definitely are. They’re audiencespecific shows with a razor-sharp focus.

Are they all inspired by the foundations of BPM in DJ and club culture?

I have to say, they are absolutely, categorically not!

We did learn a lot from BPM, including the value of community and education, and this is something we’ll carry over into the new shows. But they are exactly that: new shows. As BPM expanded, it became difficult to maintain the sense of community that made it such a successful event in the first place. It makes more sense to separate these differing sectors into four different shows, smaller but more focused. We want to bring the sense of community back, and we want to focus on the needs of that community.

What was your original inspiration for BPM? We really just saw an opening in the market; a gap left

by PLASA when they essentially cast the DJ industry to one side. Our main goal was to bring education and professionalism to the DJ market – and I’m proud to say we did exactly that.

Why did you add PRO when you did?

PRO was created to reflect the market and its changes around that time. The industry wanted it, too. But by splitting the show into two specific areas, PRO was also an attempt to retain the DJ roots of BPM. We started out as a small DJ show and ended up a large sound/lighting event, so we had to address that change.

How does this four-show, more regional structure better suit “the current economic climate”?

Basically, they’re just smaller, lower-investment shows with a specific focus. More importantly, it’s about serving those markets that run vertical to BPM and PRO, like the UK’s growing worship community and the diverse network of gigging entertainers. These shows are more than just the exhibitors; they’re about education, professional development and industry matters too.

How have marketing methods, routes and channels changed so significantly?

I think it’s become an intangible mess. It’s incredibly difficult to market a general message to an audience that, in the age of social media, is all about individuality and self-expression. Your marketing efforts need to appeal directly to their interests and passions, otherwise they fall flat. Because these new shows are structured around specific communities, it’s much easier to be focused in our marketing. It’s significantly easier to target potential visitors (and exhibitors) when you know exactly who the show is designed for.

What are the ingredients of a strong trade show?

It’s about getting people talking, inspiring conversation about business, products and exciting projects. It’s also about closing the distance between companies and their customers, so they can bounce ideas and help drive the industry forward. Through BPM | PRO, we also learned the importance of education and the responsibility of trade shows to provide a platform for professional development within the industry.

What does the ideal wedding DJ bring to the party – as opposed to any other kind of party?

A quality wedding DJ brings an understanding of the emotional connection that runs through the day... deep, I know! Particularly on a wedding host/MC basis, the more you understand the backstory of the couple and the reasons why things are happening, the more connected you’ll be with your audience.

You studied Classical Civilization: are you a Doric, Ionic or Corinthian kind of a guy?

Always a tough one, but it’s got to be Doric! It’s all about ‘heavy simplicity’, something we all need in life: simplicity and stability. This applies to the world of events too. We can spend so much time overcomplicating things, but when it boils down to it, all we need to do is bring the right people together in the right venue. That’s the basic principle of putting on a show – and, much like some of the ancient Doric temples, it still stands today. ■

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The 8" driver with everything in perfect balance We

our FEA

Unique to Celestion, our bespoke Finite Element Analysis visualisation software brings together magnetic, mechanical and acoustical design. It helped us empower our CF0820BMB 8" bass/mid driver with a perfect balance of low frequency extension and sensitivity, making it ideal for use in 2-way cabinet configurations.

CF0820BMB

From a range of small-diameter, high performance Celestion professional drivers

MANUFACTURERS Contact Celestion to request a sample

celestion.com

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