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Wednesday, September 01, 2010

DiGiCo’s SD8 Selected For The Cranberries Tour

The Cranberrries monitor engineer Waring is fond of the amount of flexibility DiGiCo products afford him.

After re-forming in 2009, Irish rock band The Cranberries set out on a 2010 European Summer Tour.

Their audio rig centers around a DiGiCo SD8 digital mixing console, manned by Oliver Waring on monitors.
“I’ve been using DiGiCo consoles for a number of years,” says Waring. “I started out teching with a D5 when I was looking after Dave Guerin, monitor engineer for Morrissey.”

“Then I inherited the monitor position and looked after Morrissey for a couple of years on the D5, later upgrading to an SD7.”

“I’ve been working with The Cranberries for a couple of months now and I’d inherited a console from another manufacturer that wasn’t my first choice.”

“I changed to the SD8 and at its first soundcheck, after just one song, the band commented how different it sounded: that it was a lot crisper, a lot clearer and they knew straight away that something had changed.”

“There are features they have that, from a monitor engineer’s point of view, I haven’t seen on any other desk,” he said. “It’s great to have the ability to move the faders to any bank on the desk. I can have outputs next to inputs and control groups completely customised, all of which means complete flexibility.”

Waring has found the move from a D5 to an SD7 was a big jump in quality and he was interested to know that both sonically and in terms of software, the SD8 was the same as the SD7.

“The transition down a level was very simple, no effort at all!” he recalls. “It’s just like the SD7, but with less horse power.

“I also love the fact that I’ve got auxiliary rotaries on each bank, so regardless of which channel I have selected, I can be dialling in to one mix, whilst dealing with something else.”

“I like to be able to twiddle the knobs and do things like you would on an analogue console, and be able to do more than one thing at once with more than one channel. I was blessed with two hands, so I may as well use them!”

The band is mainly on in ears, with side fills as back up, although drummer Fergal Lawler is not a fan of in ears, so Waring gives him wedges instead.

“This set up means that the SD8’s graphic EQs are ideal,” he says. “I have two graphic EQs on my sidefills and I’ve set up a macro to punch the second one in.”

“Delores [O’Riordan], our singer, has a habit of running right into the sidefill when she’s dancing, so I’ve got a button on the macro section straight to the second sidefill GEQ for whenever she’s there. I just tap it in and it takes all of those nasty features right out. Perfect!”

DiGiCo Consoles Website

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API Increases Marketing Efforts In India

API is looking forward to introducing a new generation of audio professionals to its product offerings at Broadcast India 2010, October 21-23.

Automated Processes Inc. is pleased to begin actively participating in the Indian professional audio market.

Because of the buoyant, film-centric nature of the Indian music industry, audio production remains steady.

The country has seen a proliferation in new FM radio stations as well as an increase in the number of live events the country is holding.

After researching India’s market, API decided now was the right time to expand its presence.

“Broadcast India 2009 was our first trip to gauge the Indian market,” said Dan Zimbelman, director of sales at API, “and we’re keen to tap into their recording industry. We have tremendous strength in the West and have just celebrated our 40th anniversary.

Users know that when they want the ultimate in sound, sonics and dynamics, API is their ‘go to’ for mic pres, equalizers and consoles.”

Given the vast size of the country and the traditional distribution challenges in India, API hired the Asia Pacific Media Group (APMG) to appoint and manage a number of dealers around the country – a different strategy than the usual sole-distributor, “winner-take-all” approach marketing groups often take.

API is looking forward to introducing a whole new generation of audio professionals to its analog consoles and signal processors at this year’s Broadcast India, which will be API’s third tradeshow in India.

The company also participated in PALME Expo India in 2010. API anticipates that their JDK Audio line in particular will resonate well in India’s price-sensitive market.

In an effort to reach even more specialists, API and APMG are planning workshops throughout India so that audio engineers can hear API’s unique sound firsthand.

“We don’t believe that every studio, engineer or producer in India needs an API console,” said Zimbelman, “but we do believe that if every studio recording ‘real’ music has two channels of API mic pre, then the sound on the front end will change their product dramatically.”

“Once they’ve done that, the desire to improve every part of the signal path will kick in.”

Automated Processes Inc. Website

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L-Acoustics Monitor Package Chosen By On Stage Audio

The new LA-RAK touring racks and coaxial 115XT HiQ wedges made their initial debut at Chicago’s popular Ravinia Festival.

On Stage Audio (OSA) recently made its inaugural L-Acoustics purchase with the addition of a new monitor package comprised of three LA8-equipped LA-RAK touring racks and 16 coaxial 115XT HiQ wedges.

OSA purchased the system at the request of Chicago’s Ravinia Festival, which used the gear for three months this summer in its 3,200-seat, open-air, covered pavilion.

Hosting the summer residency of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra since 1936, Ravinia also featured a diverse array of non-classical artists who used the monitors.

Following the festival’s summer season on September 7, the L-Acoustics racks and wedges will be available as a rental system package for tours and other productions.

“The decision to buy this system was initially driven by our client, but we’ve all come across these wedges on various tours and have always really liked them,” said OSA Senior Staff Engineer Carmen Educate.

“So when Ravinia told us they wanted to use 115XT HiQs in their Pavilion this summer, we jumped at the chance to add them to our rental inventory. I’ve come to love the clean SPL that the wedge delivers as well as its extremely linear response when boosting level.”

“It’s a very smooth and tight-sounding little speaker.”

Educate said that the festival’s management, crew and performing artists have all been extremely satisfied with the monitor package’s performance. “Everyone there loves the rig.”

““They’ve been more than happy with it, and so have we. Although this was officially OSA’s ‘maiden voyage’ with the brand, we really like the product and are hoping to move further into L-Acoustics’ larger systems.”

According to Ravinia Festival Master Audio Technician Sam Amodeo, “Our summer festival schedule is extremely full, so every second is critical.”

“The quality and fidelity of the 115XT HiQs and LA8s have been great and actually enabled us to save time on sound checks, so they’ve been a prized addition this year.”

“This is the first season for On Stage Audio at Ravinia and we could not be happier with the condition and performance of their audio package,” said Ravinia Festival Technical Director Mike Robinson.

“Having OSA as a vendor and L-Acoustics as a brand has pretty much removed all reliability concerns.”

Founded in 1904, Ravinia Festival is the oldest outdoor music festival in North America and attracts approximately 600,000 people to as many as 150 diverse performances each year.

Over the past century, the festival has hosted such luminaries as Louis Armstrong, Leonard Bernstein, Duke Ellington, Ella Fitzgerald, George Gershwin, Janis Joplin, Yo-Yo Ma, Luciano Pavarotti, Itzhak Perlman, Stephen Sondheim, Isaac Stern and Frank Zappa.

More information on the festival is available on their website.

 
L-Acoustics Website

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