Romance wasn’t the only thing in the air this past Valentine’s Day weekend; so was an L-Acoustics K2 loudspeaker system flown at Hollywood, Florida’s Hard Rock Live for three sold-out concerts by Italian tenor Andrea Bocelli.
Andrea Taglia, who has served as Bocelli’s FOH engineer for nearly nine years, specified the system, which was deployed by PRG. A longtime fan of L-Acoustics’ K1, Taglia also recently used a similar K2 system design for a series of sold-out US arena shows in December (Las Vegas, Houston, Dallas, Chicago, Detroit and New York).
Although Seminole Hard Rock Hotel & Casino’s 5,500-capacity live music venue was certainly an intimate setting to see such an internationally acclaimed artist, Bocelli’s entourage was hardly scaled down. Accompanied by a 68-element orchestra, 60-member choir, backup band and special guests – soprano Ana Maria Martinez, pop vocalist Heather Headley and Mario Stefano Pietrodarchi on the bandoneon – the superstar vocalist was heard beautifully above the accompaniment, Taglia reports.
“My role as a sound engineer, mostly for classical music, is to simply magnify what’s happening on stage,” he says. “Much like a big lens can visually reveal beautiful subtleties, a good sound system should create a sonic intimacy with the audience without modifying the frequency response or image. I’ve found that the natural transparency of L-Acoustics’ K2 system helps me do exactly that!”
For the three most recent shows, which took place on February 12, 14 and 15, Taglia and PRG utilized a main LCR setup of three arrays each comprised of 12 K2 enclosures, flanked by far left and right arrays of 12 Kiva each. A dozen coaxial 8XT enclosures served as front-fills, with two 12XT as in-fills and two more as out-fills. A total of 14 SB28 subs arranged as an arc delay delivered the low end, while a center Kara array of 12 enclosures served as a delay for the center balcony areas. LA8 amplified controllers powered and processed all loudspeakers.
The engineer first tried K2 last summer as a delay for large outdoor shows in Bulgaria and Poland, ultimately transitioning into using the new product for mains. “We previously used K1 mains with Kara downfills and Kudos for far left and right, but having K2s for our main LCR rig and far left and right arrays in larger venues has offered us lighter weight, quicker set-up and a more uniform coverage. The entire touring crew loves them!”
“K2 is a brilliant system thanks to the variable horizontal directivity, the 10-degree maximum inter-cabinet angle and the four positions of the bumper that allow for a large selection of site angles,” he adds. “And I’m really impressed with how L-Acoustics has continued to improve its software tools, which are so trustable. If I have to use a different system, I really miss the level of control that LA Network Manager provides – the quality of the Array Morphing and FIR filters is amazing. And Soundvision is ‘the’ prediction software. Whenever I design a system with it, I know that I can walk into the venue and the system will be perfectly tailored to every single seat. It’s just incredible!”
