Just when we thought we’d seen the largest console to leave the Audient factory, the Concert Hall in Norway’s capital went and ordered an even bigger one.
Delivered in September, the 48 channel ASP8024-HE Heritage Edition comes with all the trimmings, including patchbay, Dual Layer Control (DLC) and producers’ desk. With nine bays, it’s officially the largest Heritage Edition ever made. Luckily, Oslo’s Concert Hall is a big place.
“We were looking for an analog console that doesn’t lie,” says production manager, Jan Olsen Skare explaining their decision. “Obviously the room has to ‘help’ the music, but we wanted the console to have a true dynamic and good preamps.” When introduced to the Audient brand by Norwegian distributor, Prolyd, he wasn’t disappointed. “The mic pres are so quiet and respond amazingly. The EQs are just wonderful and very accurate; I’ve never heard anything sound this good.”
Launched earlier this year, Heritage Edition is billed as the ‘definitive version’ of console designer, David Dearden’s classic ASP8024 design, which boasts a new look as well as an array of added enhancements ‘under the hood’. “We’ve done a few test recordings and we are very happy. Listening in the control room, we ‘hear’ the room as we know it.” Skare has surprised himself too, a self-confessed “analog guy of the 70s”, by admitting to “…rather liking the dual layer part.”
The brand new desk from the British manufacturer is located in a control room which will not only used to record shows, but also as a self-contained recording studio. “We’ll be recording classical orchestra so we’ll need all those channels,” says Skare. Oslo Concert Hall aims to be one of the premier music venues in Norway, presenting more than 300 events a year and receiving over 200,000 visitors.
Now it’s installed, the brand new Audient desk is ready to be put to work with some of the top Norwegian and international artists from a broad range of genres who are on the Concert Hall bill in the coming months.