The Black Keys, Foo Fighters, Neil Young and Crazy Horse and many others rocked out recently in New York City’s Central Park for the Global Citizen Festival, a free concert highlighting the effort to combat poverty around the world.
New York-based Firehouse Productions provided the live sound reinforcement system for the event, which featured JBL VTX line arrays.
While the Global Citizen Festival was free, the estimated 60,000 concertgoers were only allowed to attend after accumulating points by watching videos on globalcitizen.org about various issues dealing with poverty. In addition to the musical performances, celebrities including K’Naan, John Legend, Katie Couric and economist Jeffrey D. Sachs delivered speeches during equipment changes.
For the main PA system, Firehouse provided 36 (18 per side) JBL VTX V25 fullsize arrayable line array loudspeakers, 32 (16 per side) VERTEC VT4880A fullsize arrayable subwoofers, with two VT4888 midsize line array loudspeakers for front fills.
In addition, 48 (four clusters of 12) VT4889 fullsize line array loudspeakers provided delay fill along with 24 (12 per side) VT4880A subwoofers. Crown I-Tech HD 12000 amplifiers powered the entire system.
“This event was straightforward from a sound design standpoint, as with outdoor concerts many of the obstacles of filtering sound are eliminated, since there are no columns or walls that we have to worry about,” explained Mark Dittmar, Lead Design & Integration Engineer at Firehouse Productions. “The VTX line arrays continue to give us the sound quality and smooth coverage that we rely on and we’ve never had a problem.”
“The light weight of the VTX made the load-in and setup process a breeze,” Dittmar added. “The combination of VTX with the Crown I-Tech HD amplifiers is the best solution out there for live sound applications of all sizes and scopes.”
