New Soundcraft K2 At San Francisco’s Great American Music Hall

The Great American Music Hall, San Francisco's oldest nightclub, has upgraded its front-of-house system with the addition of a 40-channel Soundcraft K2 console.

The K2 replaces the club's 40-frame/36-loaded Soundcraft Venue console, which has been in service since 1989. Despite an intimate capacity of 600, the club regularly hosts a broad spectrum of high-profile artists, including Beausoleil, Southern Culture On The Skids, John Lee Hooker, Doc Watson, Mark Eitzel, Jeff Tweedy, The Tubes, The Samples, Squarepusher, The Mekons, J Mascis, Kate and Anna McGarrigle, Jerry Jeff Walker, Rufus Wainwright and many others.

Lee Brenkman, head of The Great American Music Hall's sound department, comments: "The K2 is actually our third Soundcraft house desk. Our first one was a 16-channel Series 1-S, which was built into a flight case. In fact, it was a show demo model that we bought directly from Phil Dudderidge, Soundcraft's co-founder, at the 1974 AES convention!"

Lee Brenkman with The Great American Music Hall's new Soundcraft K2 mixing console

The new console is located on a mix riser at the back of the main floor and routes its signals out to an assortment of amps driving a JBL Array Series loudspeaker system. Several cabinets are flown in a center cluster while the remaining enclosures are ground stacked on both sides of the 29' x 15' stage. "We opted to install the K2 because it packs a lot of inputs and features into a small footprint," continues Brenkman. "In addition to its 40 mono inputs, there are four full-length stereo input channels and four stereo returns on faders, which means that I'm not eating up a bunch of my mono input strips with the effects returns, house music playback machines and other devices. The K2's eight subgroups and eigh auxiliary sends also provide a lot of flexibility for the price.

The nightclub continues to also employ a 32-channel Soundcraft Delta - purchased with the Venue and still going strong - as its monitor console.

The 5,000-square-foot building was originally constructed in 1907 as Blanco's, a popular restaurant and bordello, following the earthquake and fire of 1906. After serving as a variety of establishments throughout the twentieth century - from a nightclub to a Moose Lodge to a French restaurant - The Great American Music Hall opened under its current moniker in 1972 as a jazz performance venue.

Over the ensuing three decades, the hall gradually expanded its musical focus to host an eclectic mix of musicians, from Duke Ellington, Sarah Vaughan and Count Basie to Van Morrison, the Grateful Dead and Bobby McFerrin. Today, the club's red and gold baroque interior continues to carry guests back to an earlier, more elegant era with its ornate balconies, soaring marble columns and elaborate ceiling frescoes.