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Pro Audio Network Wars: Will It Take
A Guitar Maker to Get It Right?
ThE NEws MagazinE For LivE Sound
December 2005 Vol. 4 No. 3
Jackson Honored With
Parnelli Innovator Award
AUSTIN, TX—Either the FOH crew is
prescient or we got lucky. Last month,
we covered the plethora of competing
formats in the pro audio world for the
delivery and control of digital sound, and
while we were busy kvetching, the leading
company in the network world and one
of the most important MI manufacturers
were working out a deal that may have implications in the live event audio world.
Gibson Guitar Corp. and chipmaker
Cirrus Logic, Inc. have entered into an
agreement to develop and deliver a new
generation of digital audio networking
products beginning in 2006. Building
upon Cirrus Logic’s CobraNet technology
and Gibson’s MaGIC technology, the
new products will provide high-channel
count-media transport solutions for professional markets while enabling secure
multiroom distribution of media content
in consumer markets.
Gibson and Cirrus Logic will focus on
the development of next-generation gigabit Ethernet-based products designed to
continued on page 35
Counterfeiters Caught in Southeast Asia
NILES, IL—Shure Incorporated has
conducted a series of raids in cooperation
with Thai authorities, which has dealt a
significant blow to those involved with the
importation and distribution of counterfeit Shure products in Thailand.
Initiatives by the Thai Customs authorities earlier this year have resulted in
the seizure of a container of counterfeit
audio goods that were imported through
Klongtoey Port, Bangkok. Among the
products in this shipment was a large
quantity of counterfeit SM58 microphones
destined for retail outlets around Thailand.
In addition to the seizure of these goods,
the importer was subsequently arrested
and charged with trafficking counterfeit
products into Thailand.
“These successful and decisive actions
in Thailand go a long way to show our
commitment in ensuring that Shure customers receive a genuine Shure product
every time they purchase a product that
bears our name,” said Rob Ascough,
managing director of Shure Asia Ltd.
New President for AKG
VIENNA, AUSTRIA—Stefan Gubi has
assumed responsibility as president of AKG
Acoustics. Gubi succeeds Dr. Hugo Lenhard
Backhaus, who left AKG at the end of June.
"As a music enthusiast, it is fascinating to
me to lead an organization which is preeminent in the international world of music
and audio technology,” Gubi said recently.
The term “music enthusiast” is key.
In its 58 years AKG has registered more
than 1,500 worldwide patents and most
of its leaders came from backgrounds
In This
Issue:
Sound Sanctuary
Architecture versus Inteligibility,
who wins?
Bleeding Edge
You thought line arrays were the end
of all steering sound? Think again.
ORLANDO, FL —With clients ranging from Springsteen to Streisand, technology
breakthroughs that include pragmatic consoles and cutting-edge processors—as well as
the first flown speaker systems—and, lest we forget, mixing The King, Bruce Jackson is a
hard guy to miss. He was among the honorees at the 5th Annual Parnelli Awards. See pg. 14
for full coverage.
Stefan Gubi
Ad info: www.fohonline.com/rsc
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Table of Contents
December 2005, Vol. 4.03
What’s
What’s
Hot
What’s
Hot
What’s
HotHot
29. The Biz
Features
14. Parnelli Awards 2005
The industry gathers once again to honor its
finest audio practitioners. Along with a bunch
of squints and production slackers that we
pretended to care about for the night.
16
Parnelli winner Dave Rat goes to Lampyland and lives to tell the tale. He even took pictures!
24. Installations
What do a bunch of churches and a bunch
of “gentlemen’s clubs” have in common?
Could it be their audio installers?
32. Sound Sanctuary
EV Zx4 speakers and a passel of mics from
audio legend Bob Heil.
We go waaaay off the Great White Way to
look at Stomp!, a show that is still running
a dozen years after it first opened.
22. The Anklebiters
How much does technology matter? What
is the price (and the value) of keeping
current?
28. On The Bleeding Edge
A peek behind the U2 LED curtain with Dave Skaff and Joe O’Herlihy.
36. FOH-at-Large
Departments
19. On Broadway
20
How can we get architects to understand
that no matter how beautiful it is, if you
can’t understand what the pastor is saying,
then the building sucks?
Baker gets his hands on a nonlethal audio
weapon. Not necessarily a great idea…
Columns
FOH Interview
31. Theory & Practice
Okay, we have avoided the math thing for
a while, but when it comes to figuring out
SPL and power and coverage, there is no
avoiding it.
26. Road Tests
LDI/ETS Coverage
Product placement has come to the world
of pro audio. Can a new reality show called
The A-1 be far behind?
Sure, line arrays improve pattern control,
but put audio, a bunch of DSP and some
really smart guys together, and you can
really steer sound.
4. Editor’s Note
6. News
10. On the Move
12. Showtime
30. In the Trenches
30. Welcome to
My Nightmare
Feedback
Okay, I Give!
We received some letters last month in regard to a Road
Test on the dbx DriveRack 260. The letters were not about the
review or the gear, but about an offhanded and—OK, I admit
it—derogatory comment I made about drummers at the end
of the piece. These two letters kind of sum up the general feelings I hurt. (And, no, I don’t even know what a factorial is…)
—Ed.
I must tell you that I take personal offense to the
“conclusion” section of your article about the dbx DriveRack 260. I use a DriveRack P.A. myself (I don’t need most of
the extra features of the 260), work with a soundman who
I trained and I am very comfortable with using all sorts
of signal-processing gear. I agree that the unit is intuitive
enough that most guys with some KNOWLEDGE (not the
same as experience) can use it fairly easily.
I am curious as to your technical background and
200.0512.TOC.rg.indd 2
qualifications to judge others. Perhaps you could include
this information and disseminate it to the masses in one of
your future articles.
Still, I am a fan and find most of your (and other writers’) information useful. Perhaps you will print this for
others, some of whom might be less “aware”.
Don’t judge anyone by their “cover”!
Here’s a “simple” little test for you (I know its math, but
so is the entire electronics field):
Why is the factorial of the number 0 = 1?
It really is a simple question, do you know the answer?
Best Regards,
Tom Blazek,
B.S.E.E., B.S. Physics, MBA…
DRUMMER!!!
I read with much interest your review of the DriveRack
260, mainly because we have the DriveRack P.A. and have
been very happy, and if this version had been available
when we purchased ours, the 260 is what we’d have right
now. The difference the DriveRack makes and the time it
saves me in sound checks has been a lifesaver. When you
are in a different place every weekend, it is very reassuring
that you can pink the room and be even more confident in
your mix. But I take exception with you on one statement
in your review’s conclusion.
You see, here in the wilds of West Virginia and Ohio,
most (and I mean ALL) bars that have bands on the
weekends do not have their own P.A. or sound girl (wink,
wink). My husband is originally from Roanoke, Va., and then
Detroit, so this was very strange for him to contend with.
He is used to clubs that provide the bands with sound and
an engineer.
My husband joined a band here, and the P.A. that was
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Editor’s Note
What’s It
All About?
D
on’t you just hate it when I use this
limited amount of space to wax
philosophical instead of writing
about something cool like gear or new tech?
I can hear the groans already. “Oh crap, here
he goes again. Can he please just get to the
f’ing point? Forget it, maybe I’ll just turn to
the FOH Interview or the Road Tests.”
Sorry, but this is what happens when I
actually have a little time to think. A bunch
of stuff has gone down in the past couple of
months that may seem unrelated, but—at
least in my twisted mind—adds up to an
important point.
Item #1—A good friend of mine who
does some writing for FOH told me about a
gig he did with an act aimed at the preteen
set. It was, as you might expect, a track act.
We all get to do these, and everyone I have
ever done came with a manager or someone who cued the tracks, telling me when
to start and stop the prerecorded backing
tracks. But on this gig, our intrepid FOH writer
reports that he was handed a CD and, when
he asked who would be giving cues, was told
to just hit “play” and let it go. He did, and it
went off flawlessly. The talent had the act so
down that even the timing of stage patter
was consistent so they could say their little
bit and start the next tune.
Item #2—Another friend, touring with a
major pop act, told me that he was playing
every night, but had no idea if the audience
ever heard him because “there were eight DA88s in the rack.” That would be eight Tascam
eight-track digital recorders for a potential
total of 64 playback tracks. Another big pop
singer’s tour relied so much on backing tracks
that, while the band was “playing” every night,
they had to rehearse for two full days to get
one song down when a TV talk show refused
to let them use their prerecorded tracks as
“doubling” (wink, wink). At least, that is what I
hear on the lowdown. In these days of nondisclosure agreements on most tours, no one will
actually go on record about this stuff.
Item #3—I saw an alleged live performance of another preteen act on TV. Three
girls, two with guitars that they appeared to
be able to play, and a third with a mic. But
the guitars were not plugged into anything,
and the girls playing them were singing big
backup harmonies, but there were no mics
onstage except the handheld being used
by the lead singer. And the crowd of kiddies
cheered and no one seemed to notice anything amiss in this “live” performance.
Item #4—Yet another friend called after
seeing the Stones to report that Mick Jagger
must have “gone down to the crossroads”
because it was the only explanation for a
man of his age having that kind of energy
and charisma. He raved about how Ron
Wood and Keith Richards were so tuned in to
each other that they finished one another’s
musical sentences.
Item #5—Took my daughter to see
one of those Big Screen Concert shows at a
movie theatre that featured film of a Bruce
Springsteen show from 1975. (Just to brag
about my kid’s taste for a second: At 15, she
was the youngest person in attendance by
a good 20 years.) Watching this show with
minimal lighting and primitive sound (the
monitors appeared to be a couple of Bose
cabs leaned back against a box or crate) and
Publisher
Terry Lowe
[email protected]
Editor
Bill Evans
[email protected]
Technical Editor
Mark Amundson
[email protected]
Associate Editor
Allison Rost
[email protected]
By BillEvans
being blown away by the power and presence and sheer talent of this band made me
really think about items 1 through 3 above.
You know, we are service providers. We
don’t control who gets onstage or what they
do while they are there. But the accelerating move toward packaged, prerecorded
acts aimed at kids does not bode well for
the future of live event audio. If these kids
are raised to think that Ashlee Simpson or
anyone else dancing around and pretending to sing and/or play is a live performance,
why are they going to bother going out
to a show? We need to educate the next
generation on what real music is really all
about. FOH publisher Terry Lowe has often
called concerts the modern equivalent of
the ancient tribal gathering, and I think he is
right. But if there is nothing really live about
a live show, then why not just stay home and
watch it on that 60-inch plasma display in
pristine 7.1 surround sound?
What can we do about it? Probably not
a lot, but keep it in mind, and the next time
you get a chance to provide sound for a “real”
band—real people playing real music—take
it and cherish it as the gift it is. And I am not
naive enough—as sucky as it is to be part of
The Big Lie—to suggest that any of us turn
down work, but if the time comes when you
really have to make a choice between that
real talent and a canned act that pays better,
and there is no way to pull off doing both
gigs, well, let’s just say that I trust that you will
do the right thing.
Contributing Writers
Jerry Cobb, Dan Daley,
Steve La Cerra,
David John Farinella,
Nort Johnson, Paul H. Overson,
Baker Lee, Tony Mah,
Bryan Reesman, Jamie Rio,
Richard Rutherford,
Photographers
Steve Jennings, Bree Kristel
Production Manager
Shawnee Schneider
[email protected]
Senior Graphic Designer
Robert A. Gonzalez
[email protected]
Graphic Designers
Ezra Padua
[email protected]
Josh Harris
[email protected]
National Sales Manager
Peggy Blaze
[email protected]
National Advertising Director
Gregory Gallardo
[email protected]
General Manager
William Hamilton Vanyo
[email protected]
Business and
Advertising Office
18425 Burbank Blvd.
Suite 613
Tarzana, CA 91356
Ph: 818.654.2474
Fax: 818.654.2485
Circulation
Stark Services
P.O. Box 16147
North Hollywood, CA 91615
Front Of House (ISSN 1549-831X) Volume 4 Number
3 is published monthly by Timeless Communications
Inc., 18425 Burbank Blvd., Suite 613, Tarzana, CA 913566902. Periodicals Postage Paid at Tarzana, CA and
additional mailing offices. Postmaster: Send address
changes to Front Of House, PO Box 16147, North
Hollywood, CA 91615-6147. Front Of House is distributed free to qualified individuals in the live sound
industry in the United States and Canada. Mailed in
Canada under Publications Mail Agreement Number
40033037, 1415 Janette Ave., Windsor, ON N8X 1Z1
Overseas subscriptions are available and can be obtained by calling 1-818-654-2474. Editorial submissions
are encouraged but will not be returned. All Rights
Reserved. Duplication, transmission by any method
of this publication is strictly prohibited without the
permission of Front Of House.
ES TA
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TECHNOLOGY ASSOC IATION
Publishers of...
December 2005
200.0512.EdNote.rg.indd 4
www.fohonline.com
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12/1/05 5:04:32 PM
News
D A V Productions Makes
First Use of Yamaha
M7CL in North America
LAS VEGAS, NV—In a move that can
only be described as “gutsy,” D A V Productions recently picked up a Yamaha M7CL
desk at midnight, spent an hour learning
the ins and outs of the new digital board
and put it on the truck for load-in of a
large corporate event that same afternoon. The digital console was purchased
through T.C. Furlong of Lake Forest, Ill.,
expedited via air freight for a midnight
pickup in Las Vegas and was immediately
pressed into service for the Pepsi Big Air
show at Mandalay Bay.
“This latest addition to Yamaha’s lineup
of digital mixing consoles is a perfect fit for
much of what we do,” says part-owner and
chief operating officer Ben Brownback. “After about an hour of learning the console,”
Brownback adds, “the guys had it down. We
made the decision to load it into the Pepsi
show that afternoon, where it has performed
flawlessly. Based on the fact that it’s part of
the first 20 shipped out, and the fact that we
fast-tracked it onto our show site, this is probably the first production use of the new M7CL
in North America.”
Why See the Movie
When Rent is Still
Rocking on Broadway?
NEW
YORK, NY—“In theatre,
unintelligibility is not an option.” With
that, award-winning Broadway sound
designer Brian Ronan sums up his attitude
toward vocal reinforcement and explains
the chief hurdle he faced in designing
an all-new sound system for the musical
Rent, which he characterizes as a “rock
opera.” Achieving the required clarity is
fairly straightforward on the orchestra
level of the 1,200-seat house, but not
as easy in the steeply-raked 500-seat
balcony. “The Nederlander is a room with
two very different sounds upstairs and
down,” Ronan explains.
Despite the differing needs of the
upper and lower parts of the hall, Ronan
had little time to experiment on the
long-running show, currently in its 10th
year at New York’s Nederlander Theatre.
“It’s very unusual to replace the system
on a running show,” Ronan explains.
“However, they had always felt they
could improve the sound, so when the
musical director brought up the subject
they decided, to their credit, to take the
hit.” Ronan was allotted one week to
strip the old system, install the new one,
rehearse with the band and cast twice
and then reopen.
“I had taken a class this past summer
on Meyer’s MAPP Online Pro acoustical
prediction program,” Ronan says. “I contacted design services manager Todd
Meier at Meyer Sound on a Friday, and by
Sunday evening, Meyer’s technical support representative Mike Maxson had
visited the theater to hear what would
be expected of the system. Monday, we
‘MAPPed.’ We knocked it right out, and
by Tuesday, I had a rental order together.”
Design in hand, Ronan turned to the
Mt. Vernon, N.Y., office of Production
Resource Group (PRG) to provide the
equipment he needed.
continued on page 8
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December 2005
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12/1/05 5:28:18 PM
12/1/05 5:06:14 PM
News
America West Arena
Installs Flexible
Sound System
PHOENIX, AZ—Since installing a Martin Audio loudspeaker system as part of
multimillion dollar audio and video upgrade last year, America West Arena has
found new uses for the sound system.
Recently, they were able to reconfigure the
speaker clusters for the University of Phoenix
Online’s graduation ceremonies. As described
by AWA audio manager Carson Price, the process was quick and relatively painless.
“When we set up for normal concerts or
this type of event, instead of our usual setup
in the round, the stage goes at the north end,
so we took our northwest and northeast clusters of the 12 Martin Audio W8LCs, moved
them around and faced them in the proper
direction, south,” Price explains
“Then, we took those two clusters of 12
and moved them to the edge of the stage, like
a normal concert, and we have extension cables that live on our catwalk and drop down.
So, we didn’t have to do any reprogramming;
we just muted the clusters we weren’t using
and we were off to the races.” Price says.
“Putting the system together didn’t
take much time at all and saved on labor as well. We actually have an extra
Crest 48-input console on the floor and
we mix the event just like a concert.”
AWA hosted three graduation ceremonies
over two successive days, each with approximately 1,200 graduates. The results? As Price
puts it, “The clients couldn’t have been any
happier. You could hear every word of every
speech. We had two podiums and video playback, and also recorded it on DVD for sale.”
The overall system consists of eight clusters, with each cluster having different speaker combinations. The four main clusters have
W8LC Compacts, and there are two clusters
with four WLX Subs and eight W8LM Minis;
and two clusters with eight W8LX Subs and
two W8LM Minis.
To further accommodate concert work,
the installer, Genesis Audio Systems, installed
a wireless network, Crown IQ, with a graphic
interface for the arena to allow for control of
the P.A. for the floor.
Why See the Movie When Rent is Still Rocking on Broadway?
continued from page 6
The system settled on was based around
a center cluster design with a main array of
eight M2D compact curvilinear array loudspeakers. “I knew I wanted a single array in
the balcony to cut down on reflections, and I
chose M2Ds for their power and size. The 90º
spread took care of the whole balcony.”
The cluster was augmented with two
600-HP compact high-power subwoofers,
one on either side of the array, with another four 600-HP cabinets used for floor subs.
“The new 600-HPs tucked under an overhang in the stage for a perfect fit,” Ronan
says. “They gave much-needed bottom to
the balcony, and added punch to the orchestra level.”
Ronan also used four CQ-1 wide coverage main loudspeakers for some of the
stereo effects and to act as mains on the
orchestra floor. The cabinets were hung on
the proscenium, two at about the height
of the actors’ heads and two higher up
for the balcony. “The CQ-1’s 80º horizontal
spread filled in the orchestra level with nice
smooth coverage,” he says,“and I know and
love that horn.”
December 2005
www.fohonline.com
12/1/05 5:29:00 PM
News
PRG in Jeopardy! and Behind the Wheel
LOS ANGELES, CA—When Sony Pictures
Television’s Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy!
leave their respective studios to tape shows,
PRG is there, providing substantial gear and
support for both productions. During November, both Jeopardy! and Wheel of Fortune
aired shows that took place on the road late
this summer. Jeopardy! taped a college tournament at RBC Center in Raleigh, N.C., while
Wheel of Fortune taped their shows in New
Orleans, La.
“Typically, when people think of a show
like this coming to their town, I doubt they
have any idea how much is involved. We travel with more than 100 staff and crewmembers, and there are usually 14 to 17 trucks of
equipment and set,” explains FOH mixer and
system designer Bill Daly from PRG Audio.
Daly takes a significant quantity of PRG’s audio gear out on the road with both shows.
“Our equipment packages rival any large
scale touring show,” Daly contends. For both
game shows, Daly uses a line array P.A. that
includes cabinets from JBL, L-ACOUSTICS and
NEXO. “Having a variety of gear options really
does help. Due to the depth of PRG’s inventory, I have the luxury of great equipment availability and choosing how it will all fit together
in a cohesive package,” he explains.
PRG also provides an experienced audio
crew that knows how to deal with the intricacies of doing TV shows out of the studio. The
PRG Audio crew consists of crew chief/system
engineer Alan Henig and system engineer/
floor A2 Larry Borgarding. David Hoover manages the account in PRG’s Orlando office.
Hot New
Nightclub Calls
Queens Home
QUEENS, NY—One of the newest
nightclubs in New York bears a name
that implies sleepiness. But Soma, a
high-end nightspot in the Astoria
area of Queens, is hardly a sleepinducing place. On the contrary,
Soma is playing host to some of the
hottest acts in the New York metro
area with a new sound system built
around Turbosound.
Frank Garcia, owner of Mainline Pro
Lighting, Sound and Video, the Flushing,
N.Y., company that installed the sound
system, says a complement of four Turbosound models, each with distinct
capabilities, work together to deliver
the kind of sound splash the club’s new
owners were looking to make.
“We needed near-field capabilities
with even distribution,” Garcia says. “All
of the speakers work together, and the
result is what the client wanted—do
the sound system install once and do it
right.” In all, Garcia used 28 Turbosound
speakers to cover four main areas of the
club, which is spread over two floors.
In the club’s two VIP lounges, Garcia selected Turbosound TCS-59s. Four were
deployed in the larger of the two, and
two were installed in the other. In the
30- by 30-foot room, the four were installed catty-corner to each other, all
facing toward the center of the room.
In the 30- by 20-foot room, two TCS-59s
are deployed in two corners, one across
from the other.
Additionally, four TCS-59s were
used to provide coverage for the bar,
while four TQ-315s provide sound to
the dance floor area. In the entrance
area, Garcia opted for TCS-35 speakers, installing six. And the TCS-35s also
are deployed in the larger VIP lounge;
eight of them complement the TCS-59s.
In addition to their sound capabilities,
the Turbosound products also addressed
the owner’s aesthetic concerns.
With their low profile, the speakers
fit well into the ceiling areas. Their availability in white also helped Garcia blend
the speakers into the club’s environment
in the downstairs area.
www.fohonline.com
December 2005
12/2/05 2:08:51 PM
On The Move
BC Sound and Lighting of Battle Creek,
Mich., a longtime dealer and contractor of
ISP Technologies products, has expanded
their operations. BC Sound and Lighting has
recently moved into a 12,000-square-foot
building in Battle Creek. In addition, Jason A.
Hinz has joined ISP as vice president of sales.
Cadac Electronics Plc has
appointed Bob
Thomas as its
managing director.
Formerly MD of
TEAC (UK), Thomas
takes up this new
post as Clive Green
formally retires
after more than 37
years at the helm.
Bob Thomas
Community Professional
Loudspeakers has named
Benchmark Audio
Sales as their
new Northeastern sales representatives. Based in Norwalk, Conn., Benchmark will represent the
company in the states of Connecticut, Rhode
Island, Massachusetts, Maine, Vermont and
New Hampshire.
Eventide has
named Dino Virella
Pro Sales & Marketing
as its representative
for professional audio
products for Northern California and
northern Nevada.
Dino Virella
Inter-M
Americas, Inc. has
named Metro Tek
as its new rep for
the New York City
metro area and
northern New JerBarry Seiden
sey. The firm is led
by Barry Seiden
with the assistance of Amy Weinstock.
JBL
Professional has
made three new appointments. Simon
Jones has been
named director of
portable P.A. marketSimon Jones
ing, Phil Sanchez
has been appointed
product manager for commercial sound prod-
Phil Sanchez
Harald Kanz
ucts and Harald Kanz is JBL Professional’s new
product manager for portable P.A. products.
Mills James Productions recently broke
ground on a 3,000-square-foot addition to
its new warehouse complex in Columbus,
Ohio. The additional space, expected to be
completed by April 1, 2006, will feature an
enclosed loading docks, scene shop and set
storage area.
Bryan Dowd has
joined ProSonic Solutions as a sales representative for several
live and retail audio
product lines.
Bryan Dowd
Shure Incorporated has appointed
Jim Schanz as a regional
sales manager. He will
be responsible for managing the company’s regional sales in a variety
of Midwestern and East Coast regions.
Jim Schanz
Solid State Logic has made three new
appointments at its UK headquarters in
Oxford. Jim Motley has been appointed as
partnership manager for the XLogic range
of products, Filip Saelen has been appointed
software product manager and Jon Jannaway is a new marketing manager.
New President
for AKG
continued from front cover
compatible with developing technology
for the music industry. Gubi is described
as “an industry veteran with a 20-yearplus track record of achievement in sales,
marketing and general management.”
His resumé includes positions on the
executive committee of Austrian IT firm
Kapsch Business Com AG, as managing
director of the Upper Austrian National
Publishing House and in senior management with Ericsson Austria. In what may
be seen as an extension of the industry’s
move toward “adult supervision” in its
executive ranks, experience in anything
related to audio on Gubi's CV is notable
in its absence.
We have seen others struggle as
talented execs from other fields try to
adapt to or change the culture of the
pro audio world to line up with traditional business templates. Stay tuned.
Thanks for a
Great Year!
2005 has been a banner year for FOH
and we have seen significant increases
in both reader awareness and industry
acceptance. From the staff and management of Timeless Communications, we
would like to say thank you to our readers, contributors and advertisers for their
continuing support.
Here’s to a great 2006.
10
December 2005
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www.fohonline.com
12/2/05 10:18:24 AM
Everything you need literally at your fingertips with a touch screen panel
display. Access and control console parameters, name and configure
input and output channels, set up built-in effects, dynamic processors,
noise gates, mix assignments and much more...
No layers...everything is on the surface.
In/out channel section configured in
blocks of 8 for easy access.
Easier and more efficient that analog! CentralogicTM
operation allows the mix engineer to remain at the
center of the console, where all channels and mixes
can be controlled.
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200.0512.Ads.ss.indt 11
©2005 Yamaha Corporation of America
12/1/05 5:22:51 PM
Showtime
Gothicfest 2005
Venue
Odeum Sports and Expo Center, Villa Park, IL
Crew
Sound Co/Provider: Tantra Tour Sound, Inc.
FOH Engineer: Dave Lowum
Monitor Engineers: Ed Marzano, Rich Koc, Jeff Evans
Systems Engineer: Mike “Bo” Topousis, Chris Bowie
System Techs: Tedd Lupella, Alex Lupella, Jim Griffith
Crew
Sound Company : Rat Sound Systems Inc.
Band’s FOH Engineer: Greg Nelson
Band Monitor Engineer: Karrie Keyes
Crew Chief: Tommy LBC
System Technician: Brian Teed
Assistant Technician: Jamie Harris, Taka Nakai,
Peter Baigent
Tour Manager: Mark Smith
Production Manager: Lyle Centola
Gear
FOH
Console: Soundcraft MH4-48, Allen & Heath
ML5000-48
Speakers: NEXO Alpha
Amps: Crest Pro9200
Processing: Roland SRV2000; Yamaha SPX990,
SPX2000, REV-500; TC M2000 and D-Two, Drawmer
DS501, DS201, DS404, dbx 160A, KT DN360
Mics: Shure, Audix, Sennheiser, AKG, Countryman
Power Distro: TTS custom/Motion Labs
Rigging: CM 1-Ton
MON
Console: Allen & Heath, Yamaha
Speakers: Yorkville TX5M, TX4, EV MTL2
Amps: QSC PL218 and PL236
Pearl Jam Winter Tour 2005
Gear
FOH
Console: Yamaha PM5D
Speakers: L-ACOUSTICS V-DOSC, dV-DOSC, Arcs, Kudo,
MTD 108a
Amps: Crown MA5000VZ, L-ACOUSTICS LA48
Processing: BSS DPR901, Empirical Labs Distressor,
XTA DP226
Mics: Shure, Audix OM6
MON
Console: Midas Heritage 3000
Speakers: Rat L Wedge, Microwedge 12
Amps: Crest, Chevin
Processing: BSS FCS-960, Aphex 720, Klark Teknik
DN410
PEM: Sennheiser IEM300G2
34th International Steel Guitar Convention
Venue
Millennium Hotel, St. Louis, MO
Crew
Sound Co/Provider: Pearl Productions
FOH Engineer: Don Lanier
Monitor Engineer: Earl Parrish
Systems Engineer: Steven Lanier
Production Manager: Mike Brown of Peavey
Electronics
Tour Manager: Bill Ferguson
System Tech: Lou Watson
Speakers: Peavey Q wave and DTH S5
Amps: Peavey CS4080HZ, CS3000, CS800S
Processing: Peavey Kosmos Pro, TC Electronic M-One
XL, D-Two, dbx, Lexicon
Mics: Peavey Diamond 46, 520I, 535I PVM Drum Series
Power Distro: PearlPro 200-amp 3-phase custom
Rigging: Genie
MON
Console: Peavey 2410M
Speakers: 10 x Peavey DTH M L/R
Amps: Peavey CS800S
Processing: Peavey, Lexicon, dbx
Mics: Peavey
Gear
FOH
Console: Crest Audio HP-8/32
200.0512.showtime.rg.indd 12
12/1/05 5:28:57 PM
Jon Secada/Joey Daniels
Venue
Gear
Windjammer, Guantanamo Bay, Cuba
FOH
Console: AudioArts Wheatstone
Speakers: Proprietary LRC
Amps: Carver
Processing: Ashly, Martin
Mics: Shure, Sennheiser, A-T
Power Distro: Proprietary
Crew
Sound Co/Provider: Clearwing Productions, Inc.
FOH Engineer: Gary J. Brunclik
Monitor Engineer: Adam Webb
Systems Engineer: Chris Balke
Production Manager: Gary J. Brunclik
Tour Manager: Will Byrd
System Techs: Shorty, Reed and Robo
Viento de Agua
Latin Tour
Venue
Woodrow Wilson Auditorium, Beckley, WV
Crew
Sound Co/Provider: Welsh Sound LLC
FOH Engineer: James Welsh
Monitor Engineer: Chris Kourtsis
Systems Engineer: Michael Monseur
Production Manager: Hector “Tito” Matos
Tour Manager: Dawn Welsh
System Techs: Michael Monseur, Albert
Felicio III
Gear
MON
Console: Soundcraft Spirit Monitor 2 32 x 12
Speakers: 10 x Wharfedale EVP-M12s and
4 x Twin 12 Coaxial Bi-Amp Wedges
Amps: Wharfedale SE1200, 970, QSC
MX700
Processing: TDM Crossovers, dbx and
Behringer Graphic EQs
Power Distro: WSLP 100 AMP Single Phase
Rigging: CM Loadstar 1-Tons
The Roots w/ Jill
Scott & Friends
Venue
Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts,
Philadelphia, PA
Crew
Sound Co/Provider: Clear Sound Inc.
FOH Engineer: Artless Poole, Jim Roach
Monitor Engineer: Ephrem Jenkins, Foster
Systems Engineer: Jim Roach
Production Manager: Dave Theile
Tour Manager: Keith McPhee
System Techs: Foster
Gear
Crew
FOH
Console: Yamaha PM5D
Speakers: 12 x Meyer MSL-4, 4 x Meyer CQ1, 4 x Meyer UPA-1P, 8 x EAW SB-1000
Amps: Crown MA-3600
Processing: 2 x Summit TLA-100, BSS DPR901ii, FDS-355, Yamaha SPX990, Lexicon
PCM-42, TC Electronic M2000, D-Two
Mics: Shure SM58, Beta58, SM57, Beta57,
Beta98, Beta91, Beta52, SM 81, AKG C451,
Neumann KMi-84, Yamaha Sub Kick,
Sennheiser 421, Countryman Type 85 DI
Power Distro: Motion Labs
Rigging: House System
Sound Co/Provider: Third Ear Sound
FOH Engineer: Raul Suarez
Monitor Engineer: Michael Grass
Systems Engineer: Paul Cain
MON
Console: Yamaha PM5D-RH
Speakers: EAW SM200, SM500, Shure
PSM700, PSM600 Sensaphonics Earphones
Amps: Crown MA3600
Processing: Ashly Protea 4.24C
Mics: Shure, AKG, Sennheiser, Neumann
Power Distro: Motion Labs
Rigging: House System
Breakout Systems: Whirlwind
Snake Systems: Whirlwind
KSOL Festival del
Sol w/ Intocable
Gear
FOH
Console: Yamaha PM4000
Speakers: JBL VerTec VT-4888
Amps: QSC PL6.0
Processing: XTA DPR226, BSS 960,
dbx160X, 166A, Roland SDE3000, Yamaha
SPX1000, Lexicon PCM80
Mics: Shure, AKG, Sennheiser, Countryman
Power Distro: Third Ear Custom and
Motion Labs
Rigging: CM Loadstar
MON
Console: Yamaha PM4000M and Ramsa
WR-840
Speakers: Third Ear PowerPoint, JBL 4894,
Radian TES-218
Amps: QSC PL236 and PL6.0
Processing: dbx DriveRack 480, JBL
DSC260
Mics: Shure, AKG, Sennheiser, Countryman
Power Distro: Third Ear Custom and
Motion Labs
Venue
Santa Clara County Fairgrounds, San
Jose, CA
FOH
Console: Soundcraft Series Two 40 x 8
Speakers: 6 x Wharfedale Lix-15, 4 x EV
2x18 Subs
Amps: QSC EX and RMX Series
Processing: dbx Drive Rack, 2231, 166XL,
166A, Samson S-Gates, Alesis, Lexicon and
TC Electronic Effects, Smaart Live
Mics: Shure Beta 58, SM52, SM57, A-T
MBK4, Pro 37R, Samson CO3, MXL 990,
Whirlwind DIs
Power Distro: WSLP 100 AMP Single Phase
Rigging: CM Loadstar 1-Tons
Breakout Assemblies: Whirlwind and
Horizon Sub snakes
Snake Assemblies: Whirlwind Concert 52 2-way splitter
MON
Console: AudioArts Wheatstone
Speakers: PSM600, PSM700
Processing: Aphex, dbx IEM
Mics: Shure, Sennheiser, A-T
Power Distro: Proprietary
www.fohonline.com
200.0512.showtime.rg.indd 13
December 2005
13
12/1/05 5:29:54 PM
Parnelli Innovator Award Wimmer Bruce Jackson
Star-Studded Parnelli
Honors Industry’s B
Bruce Jackson Receives Innovator Award, Dave Rat honored as FOH Mixer of the Year
FOH Mixer of the Year Award Winner Dave Rat
By Kevin M.Mitchell
“W
“I spent my career making sure I’m not in front of
the mic when the audience is in the house, and
here you go and do this to me.” – Dave Rat
Presenter Dave Shadoan
Rergional Sound Company of the Year Award
Winner Kerry Darenkamp of Mid-America
14
December 2005
200.0512.Parnelli.ep.indd 14
elcome to the 5th Annual
Parnelli Awards,” said PLSN and
FOH publisher and Parnelli
Award dinner host Terry Lowe. And thus
began LDI/ETS convention’s most anticipated
event. Held this year at the beautiful Rosen
Centre, the industry’s legends, stars, up-andcomers and likely a few ne’er-do-wells came
to honor this year’s top performers in 18
categories. Additionally, highlights included
bestowing achievement awards on Patrick
Stansfield and Bruce Jackson.
“Tonight, the production community
comes together to honor its own,” Lowe
said in his introduction. He pointed out that
the industry’s influence could be found in
the way we worship, how we present our
political leaders, at tradeshows and “all the
way to retail. Many of those pioneers who
developed the technology and methodology
of our industry are here with us tonight.”
Indeed. The night featured a star-studded
crowd that was mostly on its best behavior
(save for a hilariously obscene phone call
from Keith Kevan) and mostly looking classier than usual (save for the always Hawaiian
shirt-attired Dave Shadoan).
Brian Croft and Mike Brown, both
also Lifetime Achievement Award winners,
took the podium next. They handed the
Set/Scenic Designer of the Year award to
Mark Fisher for his work with the Rolling
Stones; Set Construction Company of the
Year was a surprise tie, going to both All
Access Staging and Production and Tait
Towers; Staging Company of the Year to
Mountain Productions; and the Rigging
Company of the Year honor going to
Atlanta Rigging Systems.
Appropriately, Roy Clair of Clair Bros was
on hand to present Bruce Jackson with the
2005 Parnelli Innovator Award. Clair was an
influential player in Jackson’s extraordinary
and prolific life. As the documentary Lowe
produced to highlight just a few of his remarkable achievements said:“Any part of the career
of Bruce Jackson is enviable, any part worthy of
honor. Anyone who has worked the knobs of a
mixing board would love to have the names of
Bruce Springsteen, Barbra Streisand, Fleetwood
Mac, Johnny Cash and Elvis on their resume.
But from his development of parametric EQ
for live mixing boards to his groundbreaking
work in digital sound, he has and continues to
drastically improve the live event experience.”
Jackson had flown all the way from his native
Australia to receive the award.
FOH editor Bill Evans, with sound engineer Buford Jones, came next, presenting
the Sound Company of the Year award to
Clair Brothers.
An evening highlight came next when
well-respected Dave “Rat” Levine of Rat
Sound received the FOH Mixer of the Year
honor for his work with the Red Hot Chili
Peppers. A noticeably humbled Rat got one
of the biggest laughs of the night when
he said in accepting the award, “I spent my
career making sure I’m not in front of the mic
when the audience is in the house, and here
you go and do this to me.”
Monitor Mixer of the Year went to Dave
Skaff for his work with U2, and Evans and
Jones presented the Parnelli to Mid-America
Sound for Regional Sound Company of
the Year.
The audience gasped, laughed and then
applauded wildly when a special video tribute to Patrick Stansfield from the current
Neil Diamond crew, including Neil himself,
was presented prior to Michael Chugg taking the stage. Chugg, yet another Aussie who
made the trek to be part of the evening, is a
long time friend and associate of Stansfield.
In presenting the lifetime achievement
award to Stansfield, Chugg shared many
www.fohonline.com
12/1/05 5:31:06 PM
All photos by Bree Kristel Clarke
Parnelli Lifetime Achievement Award Winner Patrick Stansfield
s Best
Sound Company of the Year Award Winner
Roy Claire of Claire B rothers
Presenter Buford Jones
www.fohonline.com
200.0512.Parnelli.ep.indd 15
Production Manager of the Year Award Winner Jake Berry
funny personal stories before saying of the
respected production and tour manager that
he “exemplifies all that is great about our industry—he has always had time for the little
people and people not as lucky as us with an
open heart, a big grin and plenty of advice.”
An eloquent and humbled Stansfield
received a standing ovation, and graciously
thanked the many who worked with him
over his long, successful career, which
included a quarter century with Diamond in
addition to working with Barbra Streisand,
Bob Dylan and many more.
“The fashion plate of the audio industry,”
Shadoan presented the Coach Company of
the Year award to Ziggy’s Custom Coaches
and the Trucking Company of the Year
to Upstaging.
PLSN editor Richard Cadena was joined
by Niel Diamon LD Marilyn Lowey, and the
two presented the Video Rental Company
of the Year to XL Video. Then, Rock-It Cargo
received the Freight Forwarding Company
of the Year honor and Pryotek Special Effects the Pyro
Company of the Year honor.
Publisher Lowe was then joined by
LD great Peter Morse, and presented
a pair of the most highly anticipated awards
of the show. Jake Berry received the Production Manager of the Year honor for
his work with U2, while David Milam
of Toby Keith received Tour Manager
of the Year.
Lowe thanked all the Parnelli sponsors,
without whom the evening and the contributions to the Parnelli Education Fund for
Rick “Parnelli” O’Brien’s three children would
not be possible: All Access, Apollo, ASI, Brown
United, Littlite, Paradise, Martin, PRG, Robe,
Rock-It Cargo and Techni-Lux.
The multimedia award dinner was produced by Kent Black.
December 2005
15
12/1/05 5:31:48 PM
THE
RATS
By DaveRat
I feel it prudent to be very
thorough in the search and
listen to everything possible.
Go to “Mouse Town”
to Explore LAMPYLAND
by Dave Rat
W
hy in the heck would Soundies go to LDI? Hellooooo? “Lighting Dimension International,” oh boy! Come on, sound people, let’s go listen to the lights! You must be joking. After the fifth person
asked me, I began to wonder a bit and decided to do some research. Well, actually, I just walked over and asked Jon Rat what the deal was. Turns out that unlike the “real” audio trade shows,
these Lampies came up with the idea of setting up a round robin of full-blown sound systems on actual stages all pointed to a central area. Over the course of three hours, you can hear each
of the six stages do a 30-minute presentation showing why they are the magic solution to all that is sound.
After some internal deliberation, it was decided; Rat would delegate Daniella Rat and Dave Rat on a journey to ‘Mouse Town East’ to see what the real deal is all about. Unfortunately, due to prior audio
commitments, Jon would stay back and hold down the Rat’s nest. Our mission—seek out the things that make sound and determine if the legend is true.
16
December 2005
200.0512.DaveRat.ep.indd 16
www.fohonline.com
12/1/05 5:17:20 PM
Right away, even with the blanket term “Entertainment”
plastered on the banners, it is immediately evident that we
are entering the depths of Lampyland. Is it safe for t wo
sound humans to enter?
And then, there it is,
off in the distance,
a distinct sound of
something musical,
like a magnet drawing
me nearer—I find a
clue. Yes, something
made by “our” people,
yet still, this empty,
unsatisfied feeling
lingers. Not to make
these little guys feel
bad, but “they are just
a bit small.”
Obviously some sort of weapon. The Lampies clearly have
considerable defenses set up in their lair. I sure hope we are not
wearing out our welcome; this could get messy if we upset the
Lampy natives.
And then I stumble into
what I feared most, a
Lampy trap.
Aaaaaah!
As I had suspected,
it is true—the Lampy
tribes do practice
the dark arts. I have
obviously been spotted
and they are trying to
disintegrate me.
Now, I realize we are clearly on the right path as we come
across a sonic oasis in a desert of lights. At last, something
I truly feel at home with—a fishing hole!
And so, a little R ‘n R is in order.
Aha! There, I see a sign with the names of many tribes
with which I am familiar. Are these possibly directions to
their lost city? Could it be? But this means re-entering
the Dark Chamber of Lights. We must move with haste,
Daniella, let’s hurry!
That was much too dangerous—we must find a way out!
Then, suddenly, we come across some cryptic hieroglyphics.
Could be a guidepost, but what does it mean? And where
are we? The questions just keep building; we need some
answers and we need them fast.
D
Another breakthrough—an artifact from one of the many
sound tribes. We must be getting closer.
Behold! Six magnificent structures, each a
dedication to a particular sound god. The first
to awaken is the structure dedicated to the orange
sound god Harmanicus.
Notice the cluster of sound worshippers gathering.
Not to be outdone though, the temple dedicated
to L-GOD is preparing to rise from slumber.
And then I spot—in all their magnificence—the Monoliths of
the Lost City of Sound. Understandably, I am unable to contain my
enthusiasm. Daniella watches as I sprint towards SoundHenge.
www.fohonline.com
December 2005
17
12/1/05 5:18:21 PM
The tension builds as an
ode to the god NEXOicus
releases its rumbling fury.
Note the tribal dances of
the sound followers as they
are moved by the sonic
landscape.
I bask in pools of sound from of one of the pillars of SoundHenge.
The next beast prepares to
blanket us with the unseen
powers of sound.
Hopefully, the sound god
Meyericus
Micarius will be pleased.
I find something about this
shrine particularly
interesting to listen to.
The ‘Sound God of Q’ is paid due respect.
As was the Sound Goddess A-Line.
As I stood in the middle of SoundHenge, I realized that I was in a truly rare and unique
place. Here, each shrine has been designed and constructed to highlight the assets of that
specific sound god, some more successfully than others. Some shrines were flawed in design
while others were out of their element, and yet others were less-than-optimally implemented.
So, without risking bringing the wrath of the sound gods upon myself, I would like to
share some thoughts on the shrines. I will leave it up to you to unravel the mysteries of which
entity I’m referencing.
Subwoofer LF Coverage: The range varied from amazing to pathetic.
Best: One had a truly amazing new idea, and while it may run into implementation issues in
some venues, I see true vision. Another was just as solid and smooth as the subs should have been.
Worst: Holes so deep in coverage that you could fall in them and end up in Japan.
Subwoofer Tone: The range was much tighter; at least two manufacturers have a
well-damped, low-tuned box that lacks that irritating 40 to 60Hz “bonging” that so many
companies love to sell.
Main System High-Frequency Fidelity: I always listen to see if the high hat sounds like
sand blocks or as though there is actually something metal being hit. Before I walked in, I knew
of at least one shrine that would not pass this test. Several shrines did well in this area.
Sonic Implementation: I was stunned when one P.A. came up sounding like a wet
blanket was over it, especially considering I know the system can perform better. One excellent-sounding system came up so loud and hard, it sent the worshippers scrambling, while a
third had such poor quality input signal sent that it was hard to hear its flaws. I felt that all in
all, two shrines did a fine job, and one did a great job with three falling behind. Those gods
will surely be displeased.
Main System Coverage: This was one of my favorites, and it truly points out the beauty of
“robin” forums such as this round one. Though not as drastic as the subs’ diversity, there were
clearly superior and inferior shrines. I was listening for actual coverage width, tonal quality at
the fringes and tonal smoothness within the coverage area. I did my best to factor out system
size. The field faired pretty well here with most falling well within the window of acceptability.
Two of the designs were excellent.
General Look of the Stage: You can figure that one out on your own from
the pictures.
18
December 2005
Thoroughness of Presentation: I was surprised to see gorgeous stages and messy mix
positions, like they don’t count. Oh, hey, I’m going to apply for a job, I will wear a nice suit and
no shoes because they won’t be looking at my feet. I found it interesting to analyze what the
various presenters felt was important. The shrines ranged from sloppy and hodge podge to
three-quarters pristine. Not one was thoroughly flawless to the “car show room” level that we
should expect from some of these manufacturers, though one was closer.
Biggest Screw-Up: No beer, no water, no food, nada! Hello? Let’s see, lure all the Soundies
a mile away with lots of P.A., as a carrot of temptation in the hot Florida sun, and then try to
dehydrate and starve them during a three-hour sound marathon. It’s an evil Lampy plot,
I tell ya!
Biggest Wish: That each shrine would have picked a CD track that was then combined into
a medley with the tracks from all other shrines that they would then all approve. This medley
would then have played through all of the systems in succession after each round robin, as a
grand finale, so we would have had a fair and common reference point to compare by.
OK, kidding or seriousness aside, whichever you prefer, I must say that the idea of the
“sound-off” is brilliant. Finally, a way to truly hear and compare large-scale systems and an opportunity for manufacturers to step up and be judged on the products they offer in real time.
Hell, if they can’t set them up to sound good and impress the heck out of us, how can they
expect us from the sound engineer tribe to do so? Is there any excuse for a manufacturer with
total control over every variable to present anything less than a stellar presentation? That
being said, this is a new concept and developing. Manufacturers have shown they are willing,
and we as engineers and vendors must support it with our interaction. I learned a tremendous amount about multiple systems in an extremely short period of time. I only wish the
presentations were more refined. And I hope our Soundy tribe attendance was strong enough
for manufacturers to press the presentations to new levels. Plus, letting so many Lampies
congregate without any Soundies keeping them in check is never a good idea.
And finally, thank you to Daniella Rat for taking all the photos, for her massive patience,
inspiration and changing her holiday plans to investigate the worthy cause of locating
SoundHenge!
Dave Rat is the founder of Rat Sound Systems Inc. He can be reached at www.ratsound.com.
www.fohonline.com
12/1/05 5:19:25 PM
On Broadway
By BryanReesman
What’s That Stomping Sound?
Robert Capellan
O
ne of the most unusual theatre
events you’ll ever experience is
Stomp, a percussion-driven ensemble
piece with a great sense of fun and playfulness that has been delighting audiences in
Manhattan’s East Village for nearly 12 years.
During the various acts, eight performers
play all manner of objects as instruments—
brooms, tubes, lighters, candy boxes, metal
objects, poles, pipes, customized percussion
kits, even their own bodies. They toss in
everything, including four kitchen sinks.
The man now running the boards of this
long-running show is first-time sound man
Robert Capellan, a former DJ who has the
challenge of tackling a non-stop, 90-minute
performance that requires him to maintain
even levels from a constantly mutating
aural tapestry. With 18 microphones, 12
speakers and four amplifiers, there is a lot of
sound to balance.
When did you start
working on Stomp?
Robert Capellan: I started sound in
October. I first started with Stomp as a
crewmember with the props, and then I was
trained as an assistant stage manager.
The show has a lot of
energy!
It’s very creative…just the energy that
they put into instruments that people don’t
even know are instruments. There’s not a
Broadway or off-Broadway show like this.
How many mics are
used in the show?
There are actually 18 mics on the set. We
have four Sennheiser MKH-60 shotguns, including two on the front. We have an AKG at
the front center. We have a couple of SM57s
within the drums in the back. We have four or
five more in the drums at the top of the set.
What mics are in the
drums up top in the
back?
There are two Shure 985-TMs, and we
have five AKG SE300s.
I’m surprised there
are so many mics because the show doesn’t
sound amplified.
The way the show is designed is that you
can’t really tell that the show is being amplified because of the way it blends in during
each and every act. Stomp takes you on a
journey, not knowing what’s going to come
up next.
You have so many different sounds to
juggle—brooms, tubes,
trash can lids, lighters…how much are you
riding the levels from
act to act?
We have 96 cues during the show.
During “brooms,” every time they hit the
handles I move up, and then I move down
for the sweeping, so the level in the equalizer is coming back down and up. Hit the
sticks, take them back down. It runs like that
throughout the show.
So you have a lot of
preset levels?
Yes. Just like during “Poles,” when you
hear the click-click-click-click-boom. You
want to hear the extra couple of steps that
they take after the slamdown. Everything has
its own little sound effect for every little part,
like during “Hands and Feet,” when they start
snapping their fingers. That’s pretty hard to
catch up to, but you have to make sure you
time it so you can actually hear the volume
blend in exactly where it was for the cue before. It’s all about timing and knowing when
to hit the cue.
In terms of the dB and the gain, we have
everything set up at a tone where I try not
to get any type of feedback. I’ll come in two
hours prior to the show to make sure that
the equipment is running well, and that I
don’t get any type of feedback. I run a sound
meter and make sure that the sound in the
theatre is still up to its standards. I do a noise
test to make sure that the people in Row X
are hearing the same thing as the people
in Row C and the same as the people in the
balcony, and it’s not like they’re getting a
delayed effect on it.
What kind of console
are you running?
We have two O1Vs by Yamaha. We have
a graphic equalizer for the main system and
two different equalizers for the monitors.
What kind of amps are
you using?
We use Crown amps—Micro-Tech. We
have two Micro-Tech 2400s, and also two
Crown Micro-Tech 5000 DZs. It’s a small theatre, so we try not to have it too loud and at a
basic level that people are satisfied with.
What are the biggest
challenges for you with
this show?
Sometimes a mic cable will go out
during the show, and I’ll have to find the
problem and learn how to recover and jump
back on it. If nobody knows a mic went dead,
I’ll manually put the faders up on different
microphones so they can get that same tone.
The challenge mentally right now is learning
more. At this moment, I have someone from
the UK show over here showing me everything about the system.
So this is your first
sound gig?
This is my first sound job for theatre. I’ve
been dealing with sound since I was in my
teens, DJing at parties, but I never thought
I’d have the opportunity to work in a theatre.
Now I hunger to learn more. I’m reading
more books and trying to learn more about
sound. Music is my life.
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200.0512.Broadway.rg.indd 19
We’re picking up a whole bunch of sound.
You can probably only see two or three of
them, but they’re there. Some of them are
undercover.
December 2005
19
12/1/05 5:15:24 PM
FOH Interview
Dave Skaff — Two Decades on the U2 Team
By BillEvans
D
ave Skaff won the Parnelli Award for
Monitor Mixer of the Year in 2005
for his work on the current U2 tour,
which is keeping his hands full. In addition to
it being a very high profile gig with a band
that expects a lot, monitor world is under the
stage, so he has to rely on video feeds and a
complex talkback system to communicate
with his clients. All that and he is using a
new console…
FOH: Let’s get the obvious out of the way
first. You are using the
Digidesign Venue…
Dave Skaff: I love it. It’s my favorite so far.
From what they tell me—I haven’t actually
taken it apart and looked at it—the thing
was built from the ground up. The mic pre’s
are real warm-sounding—closest to what
I’ve heard on analog desks that I like.
Prior to the Venue?
I worked on the D5, and I was able to
get around on those pretty easily. It’s laid
out very well. There’s a lot of power in the
package of a D5. But when I got onto the
Venues—when I was with Alicia Keys earlier
this year—I spoke to the guys from Digi, and
I said, “Hey, can I try one?” They said, “Sure,”
and brought one down. I did the last Alicia
show on it. In a day where we start everything from scratch and we mix the show
that night, it sounded good. With all the
associated problems in a day—like, the
local company could not figure out how
to get the patch straight at all. So, line
checks were pushed back and all that.
But even so, it was still easy to get around
on the desk and do a show.
How much of the
Venue thing is being
driven by the ProTools integration?
There seem to be two schools of
thought. One is the Pro Tools people, who
think it’s a control surface. The other ones
are older sound guys who think it’s Pro Tools.
It’s a console. The part that most Pro Tools
users would be familiar with is the plug-ins
availability, which is a whole new world. It’s a
really cool new world as well.
How are plug-ins going
to work for touring?
Are there going to
be timed versions?
A time-out at the end
of the tour?
I think that’s how it’s going to end up.
And for the vendors, it’s going to be something interesting, because it’s all happening a
bit fast, actually. I don’t think that there’s any
solid consensus on how the vendors want to
handle that yet.
I still see a lot of
outboard gear…
That’s our Sennheiser personal monitor
transfer rack. This double rack is for Bono
and Edge, so there is the standard or normal
amount of effects in there. The little Yamaha
mixer just handles the talk-backs, because
the whole talk-back system is set up to
where the back-line guys from the other side
of the stage—the ones that we can’t see over
here—just open a mic, and it comes straight
to my PMs. And I can pick up a mic and talk
straight back to them.
Without the band
hearing it? Without
having to hit a switch
or anything else?
Correct. It saves our life because the band
was pretty solid on things happening immediately in their lifetime. They can’t see us, so
they’ve gotta have the trust that what they
say is gonna happen right away. Sammy the
drum tech sits right there. Larry looks over at
him and says something. Half the time, I can
see it on my screen, but he’s turned his head.
I know something’s going on, but Sammy
will just pick up a mic and talk right to me. I’ll
pick up my talk-back mic and go, “Got it! Acknowledged.” So in the post-mortems later
on, if there was something to discuss about
some request during the show, it was. “Did
From the Beginning—Joe O’Herlihy Front of House
’78. They were doing a college gig in
Cork, Ireland, and I was supplying the
sound company for the college gig.
They were the fifth act on a five-act
bill for the night, and I’ve been there
ever since.
How do you like
your D5?
You’ve been with the
band how long?
Twenty-seven years this September. I’m in
the entire spectrum, really, from the Bijou and
the Bayou club in Philadelphia mixing inside
the telephone box to a half-dozen people in
the audience, to Giants Stadium and back—
from clubs and bars, to clubs and theatres, to
gymnasiums, to arenas, to stadiums and back
again. It’s been one hell of a ride so far.
Do you do anybody
else, or do they keep
you busy full-time?
I’m pretty much full-time, but I started
my career with Rory Gallagher from ’72 to
’78, and I met these guys in September of
20
December 2005
200.0512.FOHInterview.ep.indd 20
The D5 is absolutely wonderful.
To be perfectly honest, to genuflect
in front of the technology pacemakers, I have lived my entire life,
through my career, with the concept
of “Wouldn’t it be fantastic to be able
to do this?” When things like the D5 come
along, it’s like an extraordinary experience
because it’s fantastic to see the sound
reinforcement side of the industry catching
up with the studio aspect of the industry.
It’s another life because 90% of what we do
in the context of using a console like the
D5 is preparation. So, you’ll have your band
rehearsals. You’ll have your preproduction
rehearsals where you get the chance to
work on, in my case, 60 or 70 songs.
So, at a moment in time, Bono decides,
“OK, tonight we’re going to play ‘I Will Follow.’” And the next song up in the set list
for everybody might be something else.
For me, it’s a touch of a button now,
whereas before with my three XL4s, two
or three guys would be turning this on and
that off…
Don’t very often find
a guy who’s been
around as long as
you have who’s really
embracing the digital
thing like this.
You have to be futuristic in your thinking. Working for a band like this pushes the
envelope every time in all aspects of technology, from the drawing board of creating
a new song, to a blank canvas, to the studio
element. Then, it transitions from the studio
to the stage, and any technology we can
use to make that transition as good and as
perfect as it needs to be when we’re trying
to replicate what we’re doing on the record
or something like that, and introducing the
adrenaline-based aspect that associates
itself with the performance…all of that—
anything to do technology-wise that will
enhance that—we embrace wholeheartedly.
I’m seeing studio guys
out on the road a lot.
There’ll be a lot more of it, but you will
find out simply because all of the guys like
myself are lagging back and not embracing the concept. Look at this as another
instrument, as in all the instruments that are
on stage. You develop that train of thought,
and that’s another way of looking at it.
So, what’s the best
thing about mixing U2?
The best thing about mixing U2 is that
every show is different. The set list might
remain the same, but there’s an extraordinary energy that develops from the stage to
the audience in that whole communication
and connection thing, and for me, you learn
something new in every show. I wake up
every day and I love my job.
What’s the hardest
thing about mixing U2?
I’m a perfectionist at the end of the day.
When planes fly over the building, or when
the environmental condition in the building
doesn’t adhere to the theatrical sonic value
of the night, that’s the most frustrating thing
for me—making it sit right. There’s a beauty
in looking upstage from my perspective,
and at the end of the night when everybody comes around and walks out and they
pass you by, you see an expression of joy,
enjoyment, delight on peoples’ faces…that
they’ve been to a show that’s been the best
thing ever. Just to get that feeling from it, for
me, is the reason why I do what I do.
www.fohonline.com
12/1/05 5:22:04 PM
m
you get it?”“Yes, I got the messages,” and all
that stuff. That’s something we developed a
few years ago.
Have you been working
this way with them for
a while?
I’ve actually been doing monitors with
this band for 20 years. I started doing five or
six shows on the Unforgettable Fire tour in
1985. I filled in for a couple of shows mixing
just the drum monitors. Then, towards the
end of the tour, mixing everybody else. I
guess the size of my hair and my nose impressed them, because the call was, “We want
the guy with the big nose and the curly hair
to come back and do the tour.” It took a lot of
time, but my nose finally got me in. All right!
A landmark they can sink their teeth into.
Three Front of House
guys. I don’t want to
think about what the
budget is.
to hear it—tend to be a bit different than
the other three guys. He’s always trying new
stuff, and at one point early on, he tried a few
different things. It’s not that he didn’t like
the Future Sonics. He did. He’s done a couple
of tours on them, but there was something
about this tour and those ears that didn’t
work well for him.
How many guitar channels do you guys run?
Twelve. Something in that neighborhood.
Remember the days
when you would just
walk in and you just
plugged an amp in?
I do. There’s a difference in the style of
music, as well. With Alicia’s band, the guy had a
Twin, and that was it. But then again, it wasn’t
the feature of the music. It was just an accent.
This is different. This has been called the “Edge
Orchestra.” So that is quite a bit of guitar stuff.
Are there any
challenges to doing
this band that you
don’t have with other
bands? Or is it basically a rock ‘n’ roll band
with 12 guitar inputs?
In the music, there’s a lot going on with
these guys and it’s trying to stay on top of it.
Like any band, if you can break it down to its
most basic parts, it’s a service kind of thing
with them. You want to make sure that when
you know what they want and you can get
there with them, that you stay as true to that
as you can all the time. And then, some of
them—like Bono—like to be challenged. You
can do effects for him in his ears while he’s
listening to delays, reverbs and effects. He
loves that stuff. It makes it more interesting
for him to be out there doing it that way.
Where do you see
yourself in 10 years?
Hopefully healthy, still married and
somewhere where I’m still making a good living and enjoying what I’m doing. It’s a good
industry and there is a passion about what
we do. You love it. You hate it. It’s all there. I
try to get off the road once every five or six
years. But there’s still nothing like it when
you mix a show, to put this whole thing of
work together, it’s a very vague thing. There’s
a feeling of accomplishment, like I’ve just
taken all of these impossible factors and
pulled it together and made something—
as fleeting as it is—work.
There’s three of us doing monitors.
Robbie Adams mixes Bono and Nile Slevin
mixes Edge, and I do the other guys…the
rest of the team.
So, we talked about
the Pro-Tools integration. My theory is that
it’s becoming part
of just the business
plan for releasing live
recordings, for putting
things out on the
Internet, for…
It’s definitely something that’s in the
realm of what this can do. When we first
started the tour, because I didn’t know how
much time I’d have with the band, I had a
64-track recording. So when the band wasn’t
on stage, I could take the night before or the
sound check, play it back, do my mixing and
work on a few things and a few sounds and
snapshots, or whatever. It was very,
very helpful.
Now with the ability
to record last night’s
show, is the day of the
sound check over?
Oh no. By no means at all. Every building
is different. Every day is different. I used to
say, the warranty’s off. As soon as it rolls out
of the truck, the warranty’s off. The show
that was in the box when you put it in the
truck and it was a good show—that show’s
gone. The next day the truck opens up,
the guarantee’s off. We’ve all gotta start
from scratch.
Now is everybody on
PMs these days?
Everyone, including the bass player
Adam, is on PMs. They went to PMs in
1993. Bass players have always been harder
because they didn’t feel the low-end kind of
thing. But Adam, in fair play to him, decided
that he could do this the right way. He was
going to give it a fair shot, and he did. You
know, he’s totally settled into them. He’s up
there on the ramps playing bass. For the rest
of the guys in the band, it’s like, “Well, look at
him! He used to stay in the little pocket there
on the stage.”
So that’s all Sennheiser
wireless… What about
the actual earpieces?
Three guys in the band are wearing
Future Sonics, and Edge is wearing one of
these pieces made by Etymotic. Edge’s ears—
what he likes to hear and the way he likes
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200.0512.FOHInterview.ep.indd 21
December 2005
21
12/1/05 5:22:27 PM
The Anklebiters
The
Latest and
Greatest
Dear Anklebiters,
I operate a sound company that is
currently healthy and making money. My
concern, however, is that sound reinforcement technology is moving too fast to
keep up with. How can I compete in this
rapidly changing market?
Thanks,
Pete Hampton, Spokane, WA
Jamie: Pete, the first thing to remember
is: You do not need to have every new toy
and gizmo in your arsenal to be competitive.
You already have a clientele, and the fact that
you are making money tells me that you are
satisfying your clients. Right? But is it a good
idea to keep up on tech and equipment
trends, and of course, the latest and greatest innovations out there. Look, dude, you’re
already reading FOH. Need I say more? Paul,
what do you think?
Paul: Thanks, Jamie. I just finished a
festival that lasted more than a week and
involved three stages operating simultaneously. The move that sealed getting the
contract was renting a Yamaha PM5D RH for
the main stage. All of the performers on that
stage had heard what the FOH console was
and how their settings could be recalled at
any time.
Was it expensive to use this new technology? Yes! Was it worth the effort? Yes! Did I
By JamieRio and Paul H.Overson
Was it expensive to use this new
technology? Yes! Was it worth the
effort? Yes! Did I have the skills to
use the 5D at that time? No! I hired
someone with those skills and then
learned from them.
have the skills to use the 5D at that time? No!
I hired someone with those skills and then
learned from them. I saved all of the settings
from this year and will use those settings
again next year when most of the same acts
return. I cannot afford to purchase a 5D and
it was expensive to rent one, but it sealed the
deal for me—and I got next year’s festival. Jamie, have you had experiences like this one?
Jamie: Not exactly, but I recently bought
a rather special snake just to accommodate
the needs of a particular artist. The motivation for this investment was the promise of
contracting all of this singer’s California and
Nevada shows. At the time, I was only in for
one show. However, with the use of my new
snake (and my own expertise), I got the gig
for all of this year and next year’s events.
That’s about 15 to 20 shows. Anyway, the
point here is that I bought a snake that is
technologically more advanced than any of
my other snakes because it was on the artist
rider. Of course, I can use it on other shows. In
this case, I wasn’t keeping up with technology as much as attempting to satisfy my
client and secure more work. So, with your
gig, Paul, was the Yamaha a rider request, or
did you just decide to rent it and make your
show easier?
Paul: I decided to rent it because of the
nature of the festival. Each year, the biggest names in this type of music perform.
I thought that it would be best to dial in
each performer and then save those settings. Over the course of the festival, the
same people performed on the main stage
at least three times. In years past, the FOH
engineer had to reset their console and
then dial it in again and again. Because of
the 5D I had rented, the mix was the same
each time, and so sound checks were done
once and then saved. The performances
were saved, so we had a choice of which
one we liked the best. I now have skills that
are more marketable, and the performers
started asking if I would do other shows
with them. The rental was easier for me, but
also helped me keep up with technology.
It cost more money, but in the long run, it
proved to be valuable to my business.
22
December 2005
200.0512.Anklebiters.JH.indd 22
www.fohonline.com
12/1/05 5:11:23 PM
200.0512.Ads.ss.indt 23
12/1/05 5:08:15 PM
Installations
Rick’s
Cabaret
NYC
Patrons Couldn’t
Find the Speakers at This
Upscale Adult Entertainment
Establishment Even If They Were
Looking For Them
By Kevin M.Mitchell
I
t’s September 21, 2005, and Tim Hannum
finds himself among the more than 500
patrons at the opening of one of the most
anticipated adult entertainment spots (or
“gentlemen’s clubs”) in Manhattan. Located
in the former Paradise Club spot, the building
alone cost $7.6 million, plus another $3 million
to make it pole-worthy, and it’s in the desirable spot between Madison Square Garden
and the Empire State Building. It’s the 10th club
opened by Rick’s, a publicly-traded company.
“It was crazy, a zoo,” Hannum says of the
opening. In addition to being project director, Hannum was also the audio designer, and
he was prowling the scene to make sure all
was running well.
Luckily, it was—though owner and
visionary Eric Langan was always on him
about one thing: “He kept coming up to me
going, ‘Can you make it louder? Can you
make it louder?’” Hannum laughs. “And I
could and I did. I kept cranking it up, but only
because it was a remarkable system.”
“The Devil is in
the Details”
When Hannum looks back on his career
so far, he says he feels lucky to be here.
“I started with McFadden Ventures,
where I was lucky enough to work for Lance
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December 2005
200.0512.Installations.ep.indd 24
McFadden,” Hannum says. For most of the
1980s, he traveled, finding lighting and audio
for promotions of the confetti company.
When the company was bought out in
1989, he went out on his own doing lighting
installations for nightclubs and trendy bars.
He ended up living a little too much of the
rock-star life.
“After becoming a sober individual
and responsible adult again, I founded
Diavolo Systems,” he says. The name of his
company comes from his work philosophy—
he was always hearing himself say that
the “devil was in the details.” Founded
in 1996, the company has an impressive
list of clients, so diverse as to include
the seemingly contradictory church
business in addition to his most recent
stripper venture.
“I love old buildings,” Hannum says of
taking on the defunct Paradise. “It’s what
makes a job exciting and challenging. It’s
like this jigsaw puzzle that’s thrown to the
ground, and you have to put it together. You
have the find the nooks and crannies for
installing audio.”
On the first floor of Rick’s is the main
stage and drinking area. The second floor
features an upscale dining room plus
private VIP rooms, and on the third floor,
there are more VIP rooms.
“Rick’s is a Houston-based company, like
we are, and we’ve been working with Langan,
the owner, on his other clubs for years,” Hannum says.“He decided the old Paradise would
be the place for his flagship New York project
about a year and a half ago.” First, the old
building had to be completely redesigned,
and Hannum credits Joe Kleinmann of the
Kleinmann Group for taking the original
concept of Rick’s adult clubs in Houston,
Minneapolis, New Orleans and Charlotte, and
modifying it for the New York market.
Typically, sound is not a top priority for
places like this, but Langan is not typical.
“I went to competing adult clubs only
after I already spec’d out Rick’s, because I do
things a little differently,” he says. “I know
that Langan wanted it to be able to be a
party place, and he wanted every area separately zoned.” Generally preferring Martin
Audio, he would end up using it almost exclusively. He says Martin’s Rob Hofkamp was
particularly key to the success of the sound
installation.
“This was a great opportunity to be one
of the first big installs of their new AQ series,”
he says.
“Rick’s Red”
Introduced just this past summer, the
new integrated AQ Series of installation
loudspeakers were designed to be architecturally unobtrusive. The main stage at
Rick’s features four AQ15 two-way passive
loudspeakers and with its 400-watt AES
(1600-watt peak), 15-inch direct radiator
and high-efficiency HF compression drive.
It’s the most powerful in the six-speaker
series. At the other extreme, the ultracompact version, the AQ5, were installed
in places like the entrance, dressing rooms
and VIP rooms.
AQ10s, featuring wide 90º by 50º dispersion and rotatable HF horns, were placed in
the house and bar areas. A Backline S18 SubBass System, placed under the stage, is used
as the main subwoofer. “The place rumbles,”
Hannum says.
While he uses and sells equipment other
than Martin, and admits that they aren’t “the
cheapest speakers in the world,” the variety of
mounting devices that come with the speakers and the ever-important eye-pleasing nature of the cabinets were factors in his choice.
Mostly, though,“they sound really good—and
Langan likes to be able to crank the music.
Everything is a tight, clean sound with this
system. He’s a hands-on owner, playing with
everything,” Hannum says.
Apparently, the folks at Martin’s London
headquarters got a laugh when Hannum
sent them the paint chip that the speakers
www.fohonline.com
12/1/05 5:25:59 PM
A Growing Trend?
“I love old buildings.
It’s like this jigsaw
puzzle that’s
thrown to the ground,
and you have
to put it together.”
– Tim Hannum
Strip club, gentlemen’s club, adult entertainment venue—call it whatever you want, but what it really should be called
is a money-printing press. Rick’s Cabaret International, Inc., is just one of several prosperous publicly-held companies in the
industry (NASDAQ: RICK). Their new club in Manhattan is projected to increase the company’s revenue by 50% in fiscal 2006,
and while fiscal 2005 figures are still coming in, fiscal 2004 numbers reveal that revenue was $16 million.
“It’s hard to gauge, because it’s essentially a cash industry,” says Christopher Buttner, who writes and edits for adult
entertainment trade magazines in addition to running his own firm, PR That Rocks. “Some think there are 3,000 adult
clubs out there, some think 5,000. And while there are 60,000 nightclubs, this segment is by far the most lucrative.”
He says the strip club cliché still exists: The woman on stage with three teeth gyrates to an old jukebox bellowing
dirty tenor sax riffs while her three kids wait in the car. But now, as “pornography becomes more mainstream,” these
upscale high-tech joints are growing significantly, especially in major markets like New York, southeastern Florida, Las
Vegas and Los Angeles.
“In Vegas, some of these freestanding clubs have property values of $10 million alone, even before you put in any of
the interior decorations,” Buttner says. “Now, typically, the budget for the lights and sound makes up 10% of the venue’s
overall cost, so we’re looking at some pretty impressive sound and lighting systems.”
While Rick’s seems to be an exception to this, the typical approach to sound is different in these clubs: “Conversation is king, as guys want to talk to these beautiful women. So while they can be loud, the speakers need to be smooth,
and most importantly, blend into the architecture. They are designed to be transparent. You don’t want it to look like a
nightclub; you want it to look like a lounge,” Buttner says.
Also, there is a lack of trussing and moving heads, elaborate pieces of lighting technology that get in the way of
the comfort level. “You want a guy to think he’s in his living room with his own sound system, only with four beautiful,
scantily-clad babes there,” he says.
were to match. “The speakers needed to
match the color of the wall exactly, and they
thought it was funny to be painting them
this very specific Ralph Lauren Balmoral Red
color. They took to referring to it as ‘Rick’s
red,’” he laughs. “But everything turned
out beautiful.”
Having the speakers match the walls was
more critical than one would think. “Most
people would have put in ceiling speakers,
but we didn’t want to do that, because the
ceiling couldn’t handle the abuse, and we
couldn’t have gotten speakers up there that
would be loud enough,” Hannum says. The
larger speakers placed in the rooms might
seem bigger than necessary to some engineers, but they really needed the horsepower everywhere, he says, and were interested
in blanketing the room with sound. After
that, they squeezed in the smaller AQs to fill
out the sound.
The DJ booth features a Rane MP24Z
Mixer and two Technics SL-DZ1200 CD/MP3
Players. The monitor is a single AQ10.
Time was an issue:“We never have
enough time!” he laughs.“But that’s another
reason why people are hiring us. If you have to
turn a place around in 60 or 90 days, we tend
to get the call because we can get in there
with a crew and start work immediately.”
Despite the high growth of the adult
entertainment industry, Hannum says he
doesn’t make it a habit going after such
gigs. “Eric Langan is a great person to deal
with—he’s creative, hands-on and wants to
know everything about what he’s getting.
He’s also a team-builder and makes it fun. It’s
really a party atmosphere,” he says.
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200.0512.Installations.ep.indd 25
December 2005
25
12/1/05 5:26:52 PM
Road Tests
Heil Sound
PR Series
PR20
Microphones
What it is: Dynamic microphones with
high-tech performance.
By MarkAmundson
A
t the AES show, I met a brash older
man with some amazing microphones. That man was Bob Heil, a
legend in his own right as the owner of a
sound company and builder of sound system
speakers, amplifiers and mixers years ahead
of what has been available from other manufacturers. While most us thought that Heil
Sound Limited had faded into history, Heil’s
other passion of amateur radio has kept his
engineering skills sharp. And that sharpness
was enough to design microphones for ham
operators and broadcast talent that kept
Heil innovating in microphone technology.
Through the encouragement of collaboration with Heil’s longtime amateur radio
friend, Joe Walsh of the Eagles, Heil brought
forth the PR series of large diaphragm
dynamic microphones suitable for live sound
applications.
For this Road Test, I received three PRseries microphones (PR-20, PR-30, PR-40).
Although only the PR-20 is a handheld vocal
microphone, the PR-30 and PR-40 work well
in other live sound applications, such as
critical instrument or instrument amplifier
pickup. The PR-20 is a 14-ounce handheld
vocal mic with a nice steel grille and gold
trim ring attached to a nicely curved zinc
grip. The PR-20’s tight cardioid pattern is impressive, but its lack of bass proximity effect
makes it almost impossible to believe. The
PR-20’s 40Hz to 18KHz frequency response
hides reality: Its ultra lightweight quiltedaluminum diaphragm over a neodymium
magnet gives the mic an amazing highfrequency response that rivals diva-grade
condenser in response and betters it in fidelity at high input SPLs. And the high-tech
sorbothane shock-mount system makes
handling noise disappear.
The PR-30 is no slouch either. While
aimed for broadcast usage with its barrel-shaped body/windscreen and 1.5-inch
dynamic element, the PR-30 comes with a
normal mic clip and makes a killer instrument microphone perfect for corporate-type
gigs. Also with a 40Hz to 18KHz frequency
26
December 2005
200.0512.RoadTests.JH.indd 26
response, the PR-30 takes the PR-20’s perfect
mid- and high-frequency and adds a real
warmth to the low-mids without the expected proximity effect mud that other mics
can add.
The PR-40 mic takes its position on the
top of the series with even better cosmetics
and a beautiful dark hardwood case to store
the mic after performance. The PR-40 is 15ounce beauty of a microphone with 28Hz to
18KHz frequency, and it is apparent that this
mic is at home in recording, broadcast and
live sound applications. The barrel mic casing
and very large diaphragm dynamic element
provides more warmth at the expense of a
little top-end frequency response.
The Tests and the Gigs
rolled off a touch above 10KHz.
Out at the gigs, the PR-20 held its own as
lead singer’s dream microphone. The almost
hyper-cardioid pattern and the lack of prox
effect meant that the singer’s lyrics cut
through a loud rock ‘n’ roll band with ease.
And placing the PR-30 and PR-40 on guitar
amps made those sources light up compared
to the usual suspect instrument mics.
If you are collector of mics as tools for
tough vocal and instrument applications,
then having all the Heil Sound PR-series
mics is a must. And at their prices, you can
purchase the whole bunch for the price of
a typical professional studio condenser mic.
And if someone offered up a bunch of PR-20s
at a house gig, I would have thought I had
died and gone to heaven.
Placing my focus on the PR-20, I went
to my mic trunk and collected up my usual
best-in-class vocal mic suspects. No, this is
not a shootout, but listening to a good mic
requires a perspective that only some A-B listening can resolve. So I brought out a bunch
of Audix, Beyer, Electro-Voice and Shure dynamic and condenser vocal mics for critical
listening. My conclusions were that the PR20’s mids and highs are as good as the best
live sound condenser microphones, and the
lack of any low-frequency proximity effect is
almost spooky with the transparent low-end.
Because the lows are so well-balanced with
the rest of the frequency spectrum, the PR-20
would excel with bass voices, or for all those
mumbling mic eaters out there to help catch
a little more diction on their lyrics. And the
rappers and their live sound mixers could really enjoy the diction enhancement and high
SPL cleanliness, even with the windscreen
partially cupped.
Running the PR-30 and PR-40 through
similar tests was just plain unfair as the even
larger diaphragms warmed up the low-end,
but mostly kept things brilliant through
the presence band. I liked the PR-30 as an
all-around perfect voice and instrument mic.
The PR-40 was nice too, but all top end from
PR-20 and PR-30 spoiled me when the PR-40
Who it’s for: Professionals of all types
needing the benefits of condenser
mic clearity, but with dynamic mic SPL
handling.
Pros: Low cost, astounding performance, great looks.
Cons: None.
How much: PR-20 $160 SRP, PR-30
$289 SRP, PR-40 $325 SRP.
PR40
www.fohonline.com
12/1/05 5:32:31 PM
Electro-Voice
Zx4 Speakers
By MarkAmundson
I
am not one to really endorse plastic
speakers, but of all of the poly-whatever
speakers I have reviewed, the ElectroVoice Zx4 comes right to the top in preference. First of all, it “delivers” in terms of sound
quality, and that applies whether it’s wood
or plastic. Next, it is an unpowered speaker,
which is great because I only have one
Neutrik Speakon cable to attach, and the
weight is a modest 44.4 pounds for a 15-inch
+ 1-inch cabinet. But until I see RF wireless
receivers and serious and lightweight power
amplifiers in powered speakers, I will prefer
minimal interfacing and power amplifiers on
the ground. With the Zx4’s program power
rating about 800 watts, I would like an 800watt at 8-Ohm audio power amplifier to be
inside before thinking it could be adequate
for live sound usage.
The Gear
The EV Zx4 is a step back from the Zx5
version in that the drivers are standard
off-the-shelf, tried and true. The DH3 1-inch
What it is: A plastic portable speaker
cabinet good for multiple uses.
Who it’s for: Professional users who
need good cosmetics and great quality
of sound reproduction.
How much: Electro-Voice Zx4 $700 SRP.
Pros: Plug-and-play simplicity, good
looks and quality sound.
Cons: A second handle would be nice.
throat driver is smaller than what I prefer
for a 15-inch low-frequency driver, but this
combination does work and the midrange
does not seem to exhibit any wild frequency
response peaks or dips. I have been substituting the DH3 for JBL 1-inch drivers in many
home brew wedges for years because of the
reliability and great presence band sound.
The EVS15SF LF driver is less familiar to me,
but in the Zx4 cabinet it does its job well by
staying flat down into the 60Hz (-3dB) corner
frequency. So as a complete system, the Zx4
delivers 400-watt continous/1,600-watt peak
power handling across the 60 to 20KHz audio frequency band (-3dB), and does it with
a 1,500Hz crossover frequency at 8 Ohms
nominal impedance.
From a mechanical perspective, the Zx4
has an integral HF horn with a 90º by 50º
short throw to handle the typical smaller
rooms it was designed for. By keeping the
grille on the LF driver only and matching the
colors to a very dark gray, this means that the
Zx4 is perfect for corporate events as well as
rock ‘n’ roll, as it’s visually unobtrusive. One
large handle is molded into the Zx4, and it
also contains the now standard 1 3/8-inch
pole socket for tripod (stick) mounting. For
installs, there are multiple threads for rigging
I-bolts. And even the stage monitor usage
was considered by having two flush feet that
can be flipped around to create a flatter 55º
tilt from its normal 45º rear shape.
The Gigs
Putting the Zx4 to use was pretty much
a plug-and-play experience. I started the
evaluation on sticks with CD tracks and a
QSC PLX3402 smacking it around through
various musical genres. While I get spoiled
listening to subwoofer supported
speaker systems,
the 60Hz corner
and 42Hz bottom
(-10dB) provided
enough thump that
performed better
than most plastic
speaker offerings I
have worked with.
Out at the gigs,
I put the Zx4 into
a small corporate
event setting, and
into stage wedge
operation for a rock
cover band. In both
scenarios, I found
the Zx4 coming up
well. While I prefer
narrower HF coverages and bigger HF
drivers (1.4-inch
throat, please), the
Zx4 did not run
out of gas on high
SPL stage monitor
duty, and had plenty
of fidelity playing tracks
and doing P.A. work
at the corporate gig. I
wished I had a second
handle on the opposite side to two-hand
the cabinet up on the
tripods, but that was
about all I could find to
niggle about.
Feedback
used to play out was the same one used for practice.
It was a small Carvin system that you can get from the
local music store for about $700, and it was run from the
stage (YIKES!). You couldn’t mic the drums—not enough
channels—so the snare always overpowered the rest of
the kit. The guitar players used stage volume instead of
the 10-inch monitors that I assume were mainly for looks
at that point, and because the stage volume was so high,
and oh my, it was a cluster you-know-what. I was always
telling them to change this and do that to try and help,
mainly because they would ask the wives,“How’s that
sound?” and I was the only one who didn’t stroke their
ego. I had done a good bit of singing before I met my
husband, so I’ve been around good and bad sound production. So after a while, I was the only one they looked
to, but the system was limited.
We both know that generally, when someone is
complaining that the band is too loud, the mix is just
bad—which, because everyone runs their own limited
P.A. system from the stage around here, well, you get
the point.
Because of that, we began to build a real P.A. We
now have one of the best P.A.s (owned by a band member and not a sound production company) in the area. I
have become a very proficient FOH and MON engineer,
which has allowed the guitar player to focus on what
he is good at—which is not mixing!
My husband and I have been called on to provide
sound for bands when they really needed a good show
to make an impression. We have even provided sound
for a two-day outdoor gig, during which it rained for
a day and a half, had 14 different bands—of various
talent and ability—and had to have the board and gear
set up inside our van because the tent they set up for
the sound equipment was almost behind the stage
My husband had a gig across town on the final
night of this outdoor fiesta, which required that he
leave as soon as he got the last band situated on stage.
He was very anxious about leaving because we had a
ton of gear to pack and load after the show, and his gig
didn’t end until 2 a.m. Now, I could really expand on this
gig, which would make for some serious laughs, especially if I told you about the karaoke segment! But, we’ll
save that bit of hilarity for a Nightmare because, right
now, I’m about to bring you the AHA! moment.
After all that work—hot, smelly and dirty as I was—I
headed over to my husband’s gig.
Why would I go to his gig being as dead tired as I
must have been, you might ask? Because, you see, my
husband left a crucial piece of his gear behind with me
earlier that evening, and I thought the poor guy might
want his throne rather than a hard chair from the bar
while he PLAYED HIS DRUMS!!
We enjoy FOH, so keep it coming. ‘Cause with all the
drums, and stands and cymbals and speakers, monitors,
amps, EQs, compressors, mixer and cables; we are still
adding more, and your reviews and comparisons are
very helpful.
Karen Morgan
www.fohonline.com
200.0512.RoadTests.JH.indd 27
SPL Computation
Looking at Fig. 1 and adding 10dB SPL, this means that
132dB SPL emanates from the speakers (1,000 watts input),
and at four meters, the 120dB SPL requirement is met. Doing
the math with drops of 6dB at distance doubles tells me that
92dB SPL is still maintained at 64 meters (208 feet) away
from the stacks.
Looking at the problem differently, suppose you wanted
at least 90dB at 100 feet away (about 32 meters)? Then, in
the Fig. 1 configuration, you’d need 96dB at 16 meters, 102dB
at eight meters, 108dB at four meters, 114dB at two meters
and 120dB at the reference one-meter distance. But let’s
say you have 15-inch +1.4-inch top box speakers that only
deliver 98dB SPL at one watt and one meter. Then, 120dB
minus 98dB sensitivity says you need 22dB watts program
into the cabinet from the amplifiers. Then, you must take
the 22dB, divide by 10 (power is in 10-log dB scaling) and
do the base-10 anti-log computation on 2.2 for 158 watts
program power. If 90dB at 100 feet then suddenly becomes
100dB, then you’d need 32dB watts or 1,580 watts of voicecoil melting power. This is where two speakers sharing the
1,580 watts (790 watts per cabinet) on each side of the stage
works; or better yet, coupled together to minimize phasing.
Final Thoughts
While people do absorb acoustic power, they do not rob
power (loudness) from adjacent areas. Thus, the watts per
person theory should be thrown out. And the how-manyspeakers computation also falls away, as different speakers
have different sensitivities/efficiencies and large quantities
of the same speaker rarely couple together well, to place
increased SPL into any one location or locations.
What does matter is the intensity of the emitter
(speaker with amplifier) that is pointed in your direction,
and your distance away from that emitter. Things can get
complex in big venues with many emitters and coverage
areas that can overlap. That is why the big shows have
system engineers, and they are in charge of the math and
physics to deliver the correct loudness, in the right areas,
with the best sound fidelity.
December 2005
27
12/1/05 5:35:28 PM
On The Bleeding Edge
“I Hope You Like
Our New Direction…”
I
t may not be obvious, but the directionality of a sound reinforcement loudspeaker
is as important a characteristic as its
frequency response or power-handling capability. Control of “spill” is critical for sound
reinforcement because the environments
we deal with are almost always reverberant.
If we cannot control the direction of sound,
not only does it miss our audience, but it also
does nasty things like bounce off walls, create comb filtering and decrease intelligibility.
Traditionally, sound reinforcement loudspeakers have featured fixed directionality. In
other words, the manufacturer designed the
cabinet for a certain angle of coverage, such
as 60º by 45º, and once you purchased the
box, you were stuck with the dispersion pattern. For that reason, many sound companies
need to purchase and stock loudspeakers
28
December 2005
200.0512.BleedingEdge.JH.indd 28
that are identical except for their coverage attributes, requiring an investment in
more cabinets as well as the space in which
have the ability to turn the box on its side
(turning the box on its side is, of course, the
poor man’s way of modifying the dispersion
Loudspeaker manufacturers recognize
this coverage quandary.
to store them. Several manufacturers offer
molded horns that can be removed from
their cabinets and turned 90º, allowing a
modification of coverage from (for example)
60º by 90º to 90º by 60º for use in situations
where you want to swap the vertical and
horizontal coverage angles. This is a clever
design feature that’s useful when you need
to change the horn’s coverage, but don’t
pattern of a speaker). Unfortunately, removing, rotating and replacing the horn is timeconsuming and not something you’re likely
to do on-site unless the P.A. is going into a
fixed installation, and even with that, you’ll
only have two choices. What if you could
quickly change the directional pattern of a
loudspeaker without having to dismantle
components, or without the need to change
the orientation of the cabinet? Life would
truly be easier and you could provide better
sound in the process.
Sound reinforcement loudspeaker
manufacturers recognize this quandary and
are working on solutions. One of the most
startling introductions at the October AES
(and one of those hit-yourself-in-the-headbecause-it’s-so-obvious developments)
was a new loudspeaker called KUDO from
L-ACOUSTICS, those wonderful folks who
pioneered the line array and brought us
V-DOSC. KUDO (K-Louver Modular Directivity
United With DOSC Waveguide Technology)
is a line-source array designed with two specific goals in mind: 1. To provide their Wavefront Sculpture Technology (WST) in both
vertical and horizontal planes, and 2. To make
this coverage adjustable to fit a wide range
of applications. A medium-format three-way
active system, the full-range KUDO cabinet
incorporates two 12-inch, four five-inch and
two one-inch drivers. The unique design
aspect of KUDO is that each cabinet features
L-ACOUSTICS’ K-Louver technology (patent
pending) incorporating two DOSC waveguides. The user can mechanically adjust the
K-Louver, providing control over the coverage angle of the mid/high section (above
800Hz) and allowing the cabinet to easily be
reconfigured with four different horizontal
coverage pattern settings (50º, 110º, 80º left
or right). Combined with the ability to orient
the cabinet vertically or horizontally, these
four settings yield a total of eight coverage
options from a single cabinet. This versatility
means that KUDO cabinets can quickly be
optimized on-site to suit a specific venue,
allows the array to be adapted for venues
with odd physical characteristics and cuts
down on the amount of inventory a sound
company needs in order to accommodate a
wide variety of coverage requirements.
Taking a completely different approach
to manipulating loudspeaker directivity is
Renkus-Heinz with their ICONYX digitallysteerable array technology. ICONYX employs
Renkus-Heinz’s IC series of loudspeakers
designed to provide unobtrusive sound
coverage under difficult acoustic circumstances. Primarily intended for speech and
music reinforcement in houses of worship
By SteveLaCerra
and transportation center P.A. systems, IC
cabinets are modular columns comprised of
eight full-range coax transducers and eight
channels of Class D amplification developed
specifically for the ICONYX system by D2
Audio (16-, 24- and 32-channel systems are
available). Each amplifier channel incorporates DSP control over a single transducer via
Renkus-Heinz’s Windows-based LobeWare
software. Manipulating the drivers via DSP,
LobeWare lets the user adjust the beam’s
shape and directivity, even after the ICONYX
array has been installed. If it turns out a
column was hung too low, that column’s
acoustic center can be raised using software
instead of by physically moving the array. The
software also enables level and EQ modifications of up to eight IC columns after installation. I can already feel my back getting better.
A similar approach is taken by EAW with
their DSA Series Digitally Steerable Array intended for use in small and mid-size permanent
applications. Each driver in a column-shaped
DSA loudspeaker has its own amplification and
DSP controlled by EAW’s DSA Pilot software.
The software allows the user to vary the vertical
coverage pattern from 15º to 120º as well as aim
the coverage plus or minus 30º. The DSA draws
technology from EAW’s KF900 which employs
Phased PointSource Technology™ (PPST). This
technology was engineered to overcome the
challenge of long-throw (more than 600 feet)
sound reinforcement in which high frequencies
become attenuated more quickly than lows. A
truly long-throw system must have an extremely
focused high-frequency section with very high
output. PSST accomplishes this by clustering the
high-frequency horns closely together so there
are no gaps in the resulting wavefront, and using a measurement and optimization process to
create specific DSP settings for each driver in the
array. The low and mid arrays are separated from
the high-frequency array ultimately making the
system behave like a single giant loudspeaker.
Addressing the issue of directionality from a completely different angle (!) is
Groove Tubes. Their SFX technology is intended for musicians who perform through
stereo rigs but are frustrated with the typical
limitations of doing so: Spreading speakers
widely on stage produces a stereo image
only for listeners in the center, and listeners
to either side miss the opposite channel.
SFX overcomes this by employing proprietary DSP and two speakers housed in a
single cabinet to create a clear stereo image
anywhere in the audience. The technology has been licensed by Fender for their
Acoustasonic amplifier and is also available
from Groove Tubes for musicians who want
SFX Stereo, but wish to keep their existing
front-end. Hmmm…maybe they can build us
one really BIG stereo P.A. cabinet…
Steve “Woody” La Cerra is the Front of
House engineer and tour manager for Blue
Öyster Cult. He can be reached via email at
[email protected].
www.fohonline.com
12/1/05 5:13:06 PM
The Biz
A
iewers of Rock Star: INXS, the reality
show that sought to find a new lead
singer for the vocally-decapitated
Australian rock band, were getting a little
more reality than they might have bargained
for. Or a little less.
On the other hand, John Gott had carved
out a great niche for himself and should be
the envy of every FOH mixer over the age of
30: After mixing live sound for artists including Pat Benatar and the Talking Heads in the
1970s, he combined a technical gift with an
entrepreneur’s eye to create a few new live
sound and lighting products, one of which
eventually became SLS Loudspeakers.
When INXS was at the top of the charts
the old-fashioned way (by merely selling
records), you’d see some of the usual logos
on their touring gear, including JBL and EAW.
But on their reality show, a larger-than-life
“SLS” was stenciled on the speaker bins.
Welcome to the new landscape of marketing
pro audio.
Show producer Mark Burnett has created
a slew of hit reality programs, but the big
money may be in the product placement.
According to Ad Age, the Survivor creator
picked up $16 million alone from Toyota
for placements on the less-than-successful
The Contender show. That might make the
$100,000 in stock options that Gott compensated Burnett with to put the SLS logo into
the picture seem like small change, but from
the perspective of a cottage industry like pro
audio, it’s a small fortune. And possibly one
well spent—right around the time Rock Star:
INXS was hitting its stride in September, SLS’s
stock was hitting a quarterly high of a little
more than $2.40 a share.
Look at any back issues of pro audio
trade publications going back past 1990
and you’ll see plenty of advertisements
with spec sheets in them—S/N ratios, gainbefore-feedback values, etc. In the early
1990s, as the home recording phenomenon was beginning to get significant
traction, the spec sheets disappeared,
replaced with beautiful, smiling faces and,
in the case of microphones, more than a
few subliminally suggestive poses. This was
the industry’s primitive stab at addressing
what has been a massive change in how
products are now marketed.
But there’s a lot of catching up to do.
Projecting logos on video screens might
seem almost quaint when other companies
are projecting them on the foreheads of
college students. That’s a true story, and it
underscores the assertion made by the great
New Yorker financial writer, James Surowiecki,
writing in Wired a year ago, when he noted
that brands alone may no longer work. “Businesses are now dealing with buyers who
are armed with both information and harsh
expectations,” Surowiecki wrote. “In this envi-
Businesss
ronment, companies that slip up—even if it’s
simply failing to match customer tastes—can
no longer count on their good names to
carry them through.”
The entire sound and music business
has become aware of this sea change to
varying degrees. Guitar maker Fender makes
a surprising amount (it won’t say exactly
From within the industry, the importance
of continuing to preach the message of
professional products to the choir remains
important. Microphone companies and
speaker makers will still need to have the endorsements of leading mixers. But pull back
and widen the picture: What once seemed an
end in itself—getting the high-profile profes-
But reliance on brand alone
is a dangerous path, as anyone
who seen a video clip of a rockthrowing Palestinian wearing a
Nike jacket and a New York
Yankees cap can understand.
how much) of its annual revenue from
clothing sales, which, when you think about
it, is no different than selling a T-shirt at a
concert. Rival Gibson used to advertise in
Vanity Fair—you won’t see many reviews of
API products in there—aiming at the nowaffluent aging yuppie who long ago traded
his Strat for an MBA. A Web site,
www.musicindustrystocks.com, monitors how
publicly-traded companies with a stake in
the pro audio business—and there’s plenty
of them, from SLS to Harman to Mackie/
EAW—are using synergistic marketing to
bask their burgeoning consumer products
lines (and they’re making plenty of them,
too) in the backstage glow of their professional products. That’s the strategy that SLS
was following with Rock Star: INXS—their
newest product line was developed with
input from Quincy Jones and intends to convey a professional sound experience in a residential setting. In fact, given that the $500
Q-Line speaker systems are sold at Wal-Mart,
it could soon bring the concert experience to
a trailer park near you.
Harman Industries, owner of JBL, has
been particularly astute at trying to leverage the value of its professional products to
benefit its consumer divisions. JBL’s VerTecs
are easy to spot both at the Cream performances and in the ads for the band, even as
Harman’s consumer division sponsors Eric
Clapton appearances. Paul McCartney is another Harman endorser, when he’s not doing
the same for Lexus. Autos, auto sound—is
the connection getting clearer?
sional to like your product—now becomes
one step in a longer chain that culminates in
the star of the show getting into a Jaguar on
www.fohonline.com
200.0512.Biz.rg.indd 29
By DanDaley
a commercial that ran just after one for Merrill Lynch on the FOX News Network .
Pro audio companies are right to try
to wring as much benefit as they can from
their brands, and there’s considerable headroom for them to enjoy it as they run to
catch up after slumbering as long as many
have in the cocoon of an insular industry.
(At least, if they want to—an editor of a
well-known music publication recently told
me that his regular advertisers threatened
to pull their ads if the magazine ran “lifestyle” ads alongside gear advertisements,
asserting that an Infinity auto ad could
dilute the impact of a value of the speaker
that goes in it.) But reliance on brand alone
is a dangerous path, as anyone who seen
a video clip of a rock-throwing Palestinian wearing a Nike jacket and a New York
Yankees cap can understand. Does a focus
on the brand put the product itself at risk?
Surowiecki seems to think so, but goes on
to say that that’s what can also save a brand
in the end. “When companies can’t count
on their reputations to carry them through,
they’re forced to innovate to stay alive,” he
wrote. “The erosion of brand value, then,
means heightened competition—and
everything we know about economics tells
us that the more competition, the better off
consumers will be.”
V
d
e
d
n
a
r
B
December 2005
29
12/1/05 5:12:09 PM
In The Trenches
By AllisonRost
Jay Ohsiek
Kevin P.
Glendinning
Monitor/FOH Engineer
Rody’s Music/Industrial Sound and Lights
Savannah, GA
912.352.4666
[email protected]
Monitor Engineer
Los Angeles, CA
847.347.1918
[email protected]
Personal Info:
I have been playing drums my whole life.
I got tired of the club scene, but found a
knack for sound. I ran our recording studio,
but after a massive fire, we didn’t rebuild.
My favorite thing about sound is wiring
the rigs up. The only downside is being
away from my wife and kids.
Quote:
I do what I can and can what I do, nothing
more, nothing less.
Hobbies:
Saltwater fishing, boating, playing ball
with my son and daughter.
Quote:
After two weeks at home, I
miss my bunk!
Services Provided:
Full-service production—sound, lighting,
backline.
Equipment:
Crest LMX and GTX, Midas Venice, NEXO
Alpha rig,PS10, Yorkville TX4 and TX9,
Crest power and, believe it or not, Peavey.
Shure, AT, Audix. Yamaha Spx90, rev7,
Roland, dbx.
Services Provided:
Touring monitor engineer.
Clients:
The Cure, Staind, No Doubt, Babyface,
Weezer, Gwen Stefani, deftones, Liz Phair,
Audioslave, The Flaming Lips, Fiona Apple
(upcoming).
Personal Info:
Started out in the clubs of Chicago while
running my own P.A. company and attending college. Hit the road and the rest,
as they say, is history. Still enjoy touring
and mixing shows and the people who
you encounter. World’s finest in my book.
Hobbies:
Surfing, pints, baseball, Michael Mann
films.
Equipment:
Consoles: Midas XL4, Yamaha PM1D, Cadac “M-Type.” Wedges: Firehouse F15, CBA
12AMII(Stealth), ShowCo SRM, EVXW15,
Radian Micros. Mics: Audio-Technica,
Sennheiser, Beyer, Sony RF. Transmitters:
Sennheiser 3056 (ear systems), Professional Wireless Helical w/ Combiners. Ear
Pieces: Ultimate Ears UE Hybrid/UE7/UE10.
FX Outboard: Lexicon PCM/TC M5000/
TC 2290. Dynamic Outboard: Drawmer
DS201, dbx 160SL, Imperial Labs EL8, Al
Smart C2, BSS 609. EQ Systems: TC EQ Station, dbx DriveRack, Lake Contour. Software: SIA Smaart, Driveware, SpectraFoo.
Clients:
Toni Braxton, Sammy Kershaw, Billy
Ray Cyrus, Chevelle, Andy Griggs,
Swinging Medallions, The Embers,
The Tams and more.
Don’t Leave Home Without:
Passport, electrical adapters, a good
attitude and frequent flier numbers.
Don’t Leave Home Without:
My backpack, which
has my whole world in
it, my multimeter, my
headphones.
If you’d like to see yourself featured in “In the
Trenches,” visit www.fohonline.com/trenches
to submit your information to FOH, or e-mail
[email protected] for more information.
http://go.to/tonygleeson
Welcome To My Nightmare
a Stink
Don’t Make
on the Road
W
hat started as a normal seven-trailer
load-out ended in a big stink. Earlier
that day, a member of the headlining band had to “lighten his load,” so to
speak. Everybody in the industry knows that
you don’t do “number two” on the bus, so
he respectfully deferred until we got to the
venue. It just so happened that the dressing room he chose to use belonged not to
him or his band, but to the lead singer of the
opening band.
Load-in and setup went on as planned,
that is, until the opening band and the lead
singer arrived and went to their dressing
rooms. Said singer went in to find a horrible
stench.“What the...? I’m a rock star”, he surmised.“This is unacceptable,” he ranted.“My
room should smell like roses and be trimmed
in gold.” When he caught word that a member
of the headlining band was the guilty party,
he was very upset. After the show, he confronted Mr. Number Two on the loading docks.
When confronted, the culprit admitted to
his action and acknowledged the problem.
30
December 2005
200.0512.Trenches.JH.indd 30
“But we’re all in this together,” he said.
“We work together every day and I
have to put up with your rock star attitude, but I still make you look good.”
So a fight ensued, and the entire crew
of the headlining act went at it with the
crew of the opening act. The next thing
you know, the cops showed up while
Mr. Lead Singer was taking punches
like a punching bag.
It was a very sad load-out that
night, and it seemed to drag on forever.
Needless to say, the opening band was
booted off the tour and the headlining act is still on the road. The lesson is,
if you’re a newly emerging artist and
you’re opening for an established act,
perhaps it’s a good idea to respect the
people you work for and the crew who
sets up their rig every night. Don’t put
up a stink even if someone else does.
Alex Council
Bandit Lites
Gigs from Hell. We’ve all had ‘em and the good
folks at FOH want to hear about yours. Write it up
and send it to us and we’ll
illustrate the most worthy. Send your
nightmares to [email protected] or
fax them to 818.654.2485
www.fohonline.com
12/1/05 5:24:55 PM
Theory & Practice
122 - 26 =104?
SPL Computation
By MarkAmundson
O
ne of the things that still aggravates
me are questions about loudness that
are formatted like; “How many amplifier watts per person are needed for a rock ‘n’
roll show?” And the oft-repeated,“How many
speakers do I need for a room of this size?”
While the innocent are allowed to ask such
questions, I find it disconcerting to hear experienced sound people asking the very same
questions. This Theory & Practice column shall
attempt to cover the basics on estimating the
Sound Pressure Levels provided and—the
reverse—to estimate the amount of gear
need to achieve a desired SPL.
First of all, there is virtually no such thing
as uniform SPL; short of handing everyone
personal MP3 players with the volume controls fixed. Once you assume the locations
for the speakers, common sense tells you it
will be louder near the speakers and softer
further away. (I remember some folded horn
bass bins—Altecs, I think—that I had back in
the day that were louder 15 feet away than
they were right next to the speaker… -Ed.)
The tradeoff will be that you will specify the
“range” SPL, and that will drive the choice
of speakers and maybe even require more
speakers dispersed into the audience if
the range is tight. But in most small venue
situations, speakers are located above or to
the side of the performance stage, and no
capability or accommodation will be made
for additional speaker locations.
Speaker Coverage
Sound
g
Stagin
Ligh
ting
But all is not lost if you are limited to
speaker stacks at the sides of the stage. As
many of you know, dispersed speaker positions require an electronic delay of the mix
audio to get the stage wash and side-stage
speakers to align with speakers placed
further away. Given your favorite speed of
sound number for temperature and humidity conditions (about 1,100 feet/second),
just back off about 0.9 milliseconds per foot
of distance from the stage front for each
dispersed speaker. Of course, the downside
is the complexity of having to route delayed
signals to the speakers and determine the HF
nets. This way, the dominant SPL source does
not have significant competition at mid and
high frequencies.
If you did not know it already, most
subwoofer cabinets offer very little dispersion
102db SPL @ 1w -1m + 20dB watts for 122dB SPL@ 1 meter
Fig. 1
horn coverage to the zones desired.
In smaller and straightforward room
shapes, the side-stage speaker stacks can do
all the work. For smaller rooms, the traditional speaker on a stick (tripod) with the 90º by
40º horn is the standard, to toss fewer-thanconcert SPLs at the audience. In bigger and
louder applications, medium-throw speaker
enclosures use 60º by 40º horns enclosed
in trapezoidal cabinets, for throw 100 feet
or a bit more. In wider rooms, two or three
medium throw cabinets are splayed together
to widen out the coverage and still keep the
SPLs high. As in the dispersed speaker setup,
the idea is to have one speaker focused to
each audience section, with other speakers
not covering the section by virtue of being
out of the rated horn dispersion of the cabi-
spherically and diminishes its intensity as an
inverse square with distance. With speakers
as a transducer, dB electrical watts in correlates to dB SPL out via the sensitivity rating
of the speakers. In Fig. 1, a 102dB SPL per
watt per meter sensitivity cabinet with 100watt electrical input (20dB watts) equates to
122dB SPL at one meter.
From the illustration, each doubling
of distance away from the speaker drops
the SPL by 6dB. So 122dB SPL at one meter
equates to 98dB SPL at 16 meters, or about
52 feet away from the speaker. The only way
to avoid this rule is to get into line array
speaker systems for cylindrical dispersion
and 3dB per distance double losses. But even
with line arrays, once you get below the critical low frequency, the low frequencies begin
drop off faster like the spherical dispersion
model. Then you have a real need to add
delay low-frequency cabinets to keep up
with the mids and highs screaming along in
the cylindrical dispersion rate.
Running the Numbers
pattern control below 100Hz. With this known,
most subwoofer cabinets are close to the
stage, either onstage, below the stage or sidestage as space is available and the audience
locations are factored in. With wavelengths at
10 feet or larger, massing identical cabinets
together forms a virtual single cabinet with
the same sensitivity, but with the input power
effectively summed together.
Inverse Square Law
To get at the problem of delivering SPL
into an area, I have created Fig. 1 to show
how SPL diminishes with distance from the
“point” source. Because a speaker or small
cluster of speakers aimed together represents a single point source, when examined
from afar; the resulting acoustic wave acts
The old rule of thumb for rock concert
SPLs in audience areas is the 90 to 120dB SPL
range of loudness. With a normal conversation at 70dB SPL and each 10dB representing
a doubling of perceived loudness, you can
see that at concert levels, conversations can
only be carried on by shouting into each
other’s ears. Now, we can assume that most
concertgoers will not get within a couple
meters of the speaker stacks, so the first 6
to 12dB of SPL loss from the speakers will
not normally be hitting eardrums. So, with
medium- to long-throw speaker cabinets, it is
likely that the maximum SPL capability may
exceed 135 to 140 dB SPL at the one-meter
reference. And that is why those levels are
needed when the demand is 120dB SPL into
audience seating.
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200.0512.TheoryPractice.JH.indd 31
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12/1/05 5:26:58 PM
Sound Sanctuary
Beat Mixing
in the Sanctuary…
N
o, it’s not what you think. What we’re
talking about is getting a controlled
drum beat we can mix with the rest of
the worship band.
It’s no secret that many church music
programs have been incorporating more
aggressive/contemporary live music into
some—if not all—of their services over the
past several years. While the amplified guitars,
bass, keyboards and drums help add energy
and passion to a service, many organizations
are now fighting a new problem: The problem
of overpowering sound levels, with acoustic
drums seeming to be the main culprit.
I have always included live drum kits
in my list of the Evils of Church Sound. The
problem with live kits is usually three-fold: The
first problem revolves around the fact that
very few sanctuaries have acoustic properties
conducive to loud percussive instruments.
If the acoustic decay, also know as reverb,
time of the room is longer than two to three
seconds, the room should be treated with
sound-absorbing products. Unfortunately,
this is hardly ever an inexpensive fix. Think in
terms of $15 to $25 per square foot for a good,
finished look and proper acoustic fix.
(I have come to the conclusion that very
few architectural schools teach the importance of good acoustics because every architect I have ever met is much more concerned
with incorporating aesthetically-pleasing
hard materials like glass, wood and tile into a
room design than the detrimental effect that
these materials have on room acoustics. No
one seems to be telling the architects that if
the congregation cannot understand what
the preacher is saying and what the choir is
singing, the space is a design failure.)
If you have not built yet, make sure that
your architect places a premium on acoustic
performance.
seats! Think about just how good and loud
your main system would have to be to get
over that!
The previously mentioned problems
compound the third problem—obtaining
sufficient acoustic separation between the
vocals and the other instruments. Because
the drums and other instruments are so
much louder than the vocals, some of the
drum and instrument sound ends up “bleed-
No one seems to be telling the
architects that if the congregation
cannot understand what the preacher
is saying and what the choir is singing,
the space is a design failure.
Regardless of your room acoustics, if the
drums are too loud, the other musicians can
no longer hear their instruments, so they
do what you would expect—they turn it up
louder! Then everyone else has to turn up
the stage wedges! It is not unusual for us
to visit a facility and see 68 to 78dB coming
off the stage to the first four or five rows of
ing” into the vocal and choir mics. In this
situation, if the person at the audio console
attempts to bring up the vocals, a large
amount of a very unpleasant and roomysounding drum and instrument bleed is also
fed into the mix. This makes the mix very
muddy and washes out the vocals. If only
there were a way to bring the drums under
control, you could get the other instruments
to come back down to a reasonable level. If
you have made the decision that something
has to be done about excessive volumes,
here are a couple of ideas.
One option, of course, is to invest in an
electronic drum set. Electric kits have the
advantage of giving the sound engineer a lot
of control over the drum levels in the various
mixes. If you have tech-savvy drummers and
qualified sound personnel, an electronic
drum kit can be a great solution. The disadvantages include having to deal with a fairly
complex system of wiring and programming,
and a less natural drum sound and feel that
many drummers dislike. Good, quality elec-
By RichardRutherford
tronic drum kits like the mesh-head Roland
V-Drums start at around $3,800. Don’t waste
your money on an inexpensive electronic kit
unless you crave aggravation. Also note that
while the pads are much quieter than drums,
they still make clicking noises that you may
find annoying in quiet passages.
If you decide that you would like to keep
the sound and feel of a real drum kit, you
may want to try out one of the new portable
isolation enclosures now finding popularity
in many churches. Some of the more popular
systems are made by ClearSonic Manufacturing. ClearSonic IsoPacs are portable isolation
booths that combine acrylic drum shields
with patented absorption baffles and are
available in a variety of configurations and
sizes. The acrylic shields act as a see-through
acoustic barrier while the 1.6-inch-thick
absorption panels are very efficient at soaking up sound. Some of their latest systems
also use a lid system. If you have a room with
a long decay time, the lid option is highly
recommended.
While not completely sound tight, using
an IsoPac or similar product will significantly
reduce the amount of drum sound that will
be leaked into the vocal and other instrument mics. This will allow the audio engineer
to bring the vocals, choir or other quiet
instruments up in the mix without introducing the unpleasant bleed described earlier.
For most applications, just adding a kick
and two overhead mics can bring a bit of
controlled drum presence back into the P.A.
mix. A PZM-style flat mic attached by Velcro
to the underside of the booth lid may also
work great because this method eliminates
the need for large overhead mic stands that
will clutter up the inside of your enclosure.
Either way, if you can control the drums,
you’ll have a good beat to mix.
(Special thanks to Brian Smith at Clearsonics.)
Richard Rutherford is the owner of
Rutherford Design, a lighting, video and audio
contractor. He can be reached at
[email protected].
32
December 2005
200.0512.SoundSanc.JH.indd 32
www.fohonline.com
12/1/05 5:34:03 PM
200.0512.Ads.ss.indt 33
12/1/05 5:08:57 PM
Low or No Minimum Purchase
your source for DIY or repair parts
Case and Rack
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December 2005
200.0512.Index.ss.indd 34
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12/1/05 5:24:22 PM
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Pro Audio Network Wars: Will It Take
A Guitar Maker to Get It Right?
provide high-bandwidth, ultra-low latency
and secure audio and video transport. Such
technologies will dramatically improve distribution and management of digital content
for use in such fields as live music distribution and network-based consumer content
delivery, while providing the foundation for
media content protection.
“The world has migrated to digital media
formats, but many audio/video manufacturers continue to endorse old analog or proprietary connectivity methods,” said Henry
Juszkiewicz, chairman and CEO of Gibson.
“Gibson is committed to leveraging existing
networking infrastructure as the basis for
the high-quality, secure and open method of
transporting digital media. “
“By working with Gibson, Cirrus
Logic looks forward to extending our
leadership position in networked digital
audio markets through a new generation
of products for Gigabit Ethernet networks,”
said David D. French, president and CEO
of Cirrus Logic.
As part of the agreement, Cirrus Logic
and Gibson will jointly develop specifications
for the software protocol that will form
the basis for new products, with Cirrus
Logic’s engineering teams driving the
development of the resulting ICs. The new
protocol will provide backward compatibility with CobraNet, helping ensure existing
customers an easy migration path that can
utilize the ultra-high provided by gigabit
Ethernet networks.
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866.274.4590
800.888.6360
423.892.1837
650.742.9166
800.346.4638
800.890.1073
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www.audioeast.com
www.clearsonic.com
www.dblittle.com
www.hi-techaudio.com
www.discount-distributors.com
www.kanagroocases.com
www.northernsound.net
MARKETPLACE
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ClearSonic Manufacturing, Inc.
dblittle.com
Hi-Tech Audio Systems
Hybrid Case
Kangaroo Cases
Northern Sound & Light
Roadshow Services, Inc.
Sound Arena
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35
INDEX
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Counterfeiters Caught
in Southeast Asia
“These raids also yielded a significant
amount of information that will allow us to
conduct further operations to strike at the
manufacturing sources of these counterfeits. We will continue to pursue those who
seek to deceive our customers.”
In a further series of raids conducted in
September, Shure investigators, assisted by
the Thai Crime Supervision Division, raided
six locations around the Baan Mor and
Phra-pitak roads located in the Phra-Nakorn
district of Bangkok. Several thousand counterfeit Shure products and infringing items
were seized. In addition to these seizures,
five people were arrested and charged.
“As the authorized distributor for Shure
products in Thailand, we are extremely
grateful for the persistence of Shure Asia
Limited in helping us to remove infringing
products from our market. Their committed actions will help us to ensure that Thai
customers are not cheated into buying
substandard counterfeit products,” said
Kasemsin Kanchanachayphoom, assistant
managing director of Mahajak Development Co., Ltd., Shure’s distributor in Thailand.
To date, Shure has successfully conducted operations to stem intellectual
property breaches in many countries
including Australia, China, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand.
Stop Answering
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200.0512.Index.ss.indd 35
December 2005
35
12/2/05 2:00:25 PM
FOH-at-Large
Non-Fatal
Sound Defense
W
hile riding the train one day in
November, I came across an item
reported by the News Wire Service
and, tucked away in the New York Daily News.
The headline over the following article read:
“Ship’s hi-tech noise turned away pirates.”
MIAMI-The crew of a luxury cruise ship
used a military-style sonic weapon that
blasts beams of ear-splitting noise to ward
off a shocking attack over the weekend by
a gang of pirates off Africa, the Seabourn
Cruise Line revealed yesterday.
The ship, the Seabourn Spirit,
had a Long Range Acoustic Device
installed to defend itself, said Bruce
Good, a company spokesman. The
Spirit was 100 miles off Somalia
when pirates fired rocket-propelled
grenades and machine guns as they
tried to get on board.
The device is a so-called “nonlethal
weapon” developed for the military
after the 2000 attack on the destroyer
Cole off Yemen. The devices have been
deployed on commercial vessels since
summer 2003, officials said.
I’m sure that one can understand how this small piece of reporting piqued my imagination while I
was being held hostage by the New
Jersey Transit Authority. I have flown
to Istanbul in less time than it takes
to travel the 60-mile stretch between Trenton and Manhattan, and
was therefore quite appreciative for
this little article that made my overactive imagination wonder. Once I
lock on to something as juicy as this
little piece of reporting, I can amuse
myself for hours deliberating each
point and nuance, and in a short
time, I can have a whole screenplay
written, directed and produced, with
a marketing strategy to boot. My
first question regarding this article
is, “If pirates could board a vessel in
the middle of the ocean, couldn’t they do the
same with a slow-moving train?”
That said, I began to wonder why these
so-called pirates would want to board a
ship 100 miles out to sea—and what kind of
booty would they be seeking? Did they really
think that firing rockets and machine guns
at an ocean liner wouldn’t alert the captain
to signal for help from the Coast Guard or
the military? After all, in this day and age, the
buccaneer lifestyle can’t be that easy. An F-18
plane, if deployed, can travel the 100-mile
distance and have a pirate ship blown out of
the water in less than 20 minutes after receiving a call for help. Which brings me once again
to the thought of “booty.” What kind of spoils
were these pirates seeking? Jewels, liquor, ship
furnishings? Arr matey, something was not
adding up. After all, why attack a cruise ship
unless the holds were filled with a much more
nefarious cargo, such as military supplies?
Africa is a huge continent. A cruise ship
off the west coast of Africa has easy access
36
December 2005
200.0512.FOHatLarge.JH.indd 36
to Venezuela, Brazil or Cuba, and if a ship is
cruising off the east coast of Africa, it could
easily sail to Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Iran and
even Iraq. These pirates in question seemed
fairly well-armed and funded, which makes
me believe that their attack on the Seabourn
Spirit had a much more sinister purpose, at
this time in our history, than to line their pockets with the passenger’s personal belongings.
I suggest that someone should check into the
ship’s manifest and also consider this attack
as much more than a high-sea hoist by a
bunch of miscreant picaroons. Anyway, you
can see how my feverish imagination works,
and I even had Harrison Ford cast as the ship
captain who saved the day by setting off the
so-called “nonlethal“ weapons that “blasts
beams of ear-splitting noise.”
My next thought centered on these
beams of ear-splitting noise. I wondered, if
they were so directional, how could they be
accurately aimed at a target without affecting anything but the desired mark? What
frequencies did they utilize? After all, this
has to be more serious than 2.5K at 150dB,
because once the “pirates” encounter this
ear-splitting noise, wouldn’t one assume that
these dastardly buccaneers would run out
and buy some aviator, noise-blocking headphones and attack again? My guess is that
the frequency used by this “device” is a much
lower frequency, say, anywhere from 50Hz
and down. At this frequency range, if a beam
of sound were directed towards the pirates
at a very loud volume, it could possibly make
them move their bowels and empty their
bladders and, as I’m sure we all know, it is
almost impossible to attack and board a ship
with a wet load in your pants. Of course, if the
generated noise were not directional, then
everyone onboard the cruise ship would
also be affected by the sound of the “device,”
which would then incapacitate the crew as
well as the passengers. My script has now
morphed into a comedy starring Will Ferrell
as the captain, who is put in the precarious
position of defending a ship filled with pas-
sengers and crew members suffering bleeding eardrums while walking around with a
full load in their pants. Since the pirates are
enduring the same fate, it should make for a
very interesting encounter indeed.
I have delivered you a messy scenario
based upon the scant knowledge given
in the Daily News article but, once again, I
assume that the brainiacs who devised this
sonic nonlethal weapon did a sound check
with it before they deployed it on commercial vessels and placed said object into the
hands of sailors and ship captains. Though
incorrect, it would be typical for the ship
owners to let a layman handle the responsibility of the “ear-splitting beams,” in the same
way that many bar owners let their bar backs
run their sound systems. Then again, does
this device really require a technician and,
if so, what does it pay to travel around the
high seas on cruise ships just waiting for the
chance to fire up the rig?
My guess is that for a gig like this, a
www.fohonline.com
By BakerLee
technician would be on-call 24-7 and that
the device would be on standby at all times,
but I would still need some other questions
answered before taking a gig such as this.
Does the sound technician have to be on
watch in the crow’s nest as part of the job?
If so, it might require a second and even
third technician with whom to split shifts,
and if this is the case, who is considered
the A-1 tech? How much power is needed
to run a nonlethal weapon, and does this
device have more than one setting, or is it
always set for nonlethal? If there is a spike in
power, is it possible it can turn a nonlethal
weapon into a lethal weapon? Is the audio
technician liable? I can only assume (again)
because of the weapon’s nonlethal status,
the scientists responsible for it have also
developed a lethal version, and if so, is the
lethal version only louder, or does the lethal
version utilize different frequencies? Is this
a full-range weapon or can it be run two in
a two- and three-way mode? Is an equalizer
required? Can this weapon be run with an
active crossover, or just a passive crossover?
How long is “long range,” and if the party
that one is attacking with said weapon is
further away than that prescribed distance,
would a delay weapon be needed? For that
matter, can we actually apply this longrange technology to our speaker systems
and do away with delay stacks? Do they
make this device in a handheld version
similar to an audio taser gun? If sound is
classified as a weapon, does that mean only
qualified, licensed audio technicians will be
allowed to mix bands? Finally, if sound is determined to have a lethal status, does that
mean all audio technicians will be required
to register their hands as lethal weapons?
Coming
Next
Month...
•
FOH Interview
Pab Boothroyd on mixing
for real rock royalty—
Sir Paul McCartney
•
Product Gallery
Line array systems were
once so “new” that we could
cover the entire spectrum.
This time, we concentrate on
self-powered boxes.
•
Installations
It’s high noon for the horse
set as South Coast sets to
open in Las Vegas.
12/1/05 5:21:17 PM
12/1/05 5:09:42 PM
12/1/05 5:10:21 PM

a PDF - Front of House

Transcription

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