Broadcast across North America and around the world, MuchMusic provides a platform for the voices of several generations of music makers and their fans.
The 2010 MuchMusic Video Awards (MMVA), which aired live on Sunday, June 20th at 9 p.m. ET, was a star-packed red carpet affair, and for a production of this magnitude, sound quality is critical.
To ensure the very best production quality, many of the show’s numerous audio signals were routed and mixed using equipment from Lawo.
Andrew Roberts, a well known Production Audio Mixer, was contracted by CTV Inc, Toronto, Ontario to mix the broadcast portion of this year’s show.
Roberts mixed the show using a Lawo mc²56 production console in tandem with a Lawo Nova73 HD router
“I mixed this year’s show using a mc²56 console with a 16 plus 16 (channel / main) configuration and three DSP cards capable of handling 192 channels,” said Roberts.
“We were running 585 input and output signals routed in real time and the Lawo Nova73 HD router handled all production and record paths.”
“There were some significant signal distribution challenges on this event,” Roberts continued. “There were three music stages being mixed in 5.1 by two rooms. Those outputs, along with my ambience mix (from a third location) went to the main mix desk in a nearby truck.”
“The Nova73 HD router was more than capable of managing the task. The interface was easy to use and, most importantly, it was reliable. Had there been any technical issues with the 73HD, the show would have been in real jeopardy. The Lawo router was chosen because of its flexibility and reliability, and it came through in a big way.”
“I had never worked on a Lawo mc²56 before,” he confided. “Initially, I was a little skeptical of the console’s touch screen interface and what seemed like layers and layers of menus and sub-menus.”
“My apprehension disappeared very quickly. I came to realize the mc²56 is, in fact, amazingly intuitive and user friendly. As with any piece of gear, once you adapt to its interface, you’re good to go. It took me about an hour to get comfortable and after that, it was a breeze.”
“The mc²56’s multiple color displays and naming conventions helped me identify my sources quickly,” he said, “and it’s wide variety of monitoring options made listening to fold downs and multiple sources very easy.”
“The console’s mic pre-amps were very clean and the dynamics and EQ algorithms were also very natural. The console’s Input / Output structure (combined with the Nova 73 HD router) made receiving and sending multiple mixes and mix-minuses a snap. The bottom line is that this was an excellent system to work on.”
