Meyer Sound and the Telluride Film Festival have announced a decade-long partnership agreement which outlines a fourfold expansion of theatres equipped with 100% Meyer Sound cinema systems.
For this year’s festival, held over Labor Day weekend, the Galaxy Theatre joined the flagship Werner Herzog Theatre as a second venue to offer Meyer Sound systems. In addition, the Palm Theatre and the Nugget Theatre will be fully furnished with Meyer Sound systems in the coming years as part of the continuing collaboration.
“Even though many of our theatres are temporary venues for film, we are committed to offering our audience a world class experience,” comments Telluride Film Festival executive director Julie Huntsinger. “By partnering with Meyer Sound, we can be assured of benefiting not only from the world’s finest cinema loudspeakers but also the on-site technical expertise to make sure each system is fine-tuned for optimum performance in its acoustical environment.”
For each festival run, Telluride’s middle school gymnasium is transformed into a cinema with special acoustical treatments and finishing design touches inspired by pioneering French filmmaker Georges Meliés. The Meyer Sound cinema audio system comprises Acheron 100 coupled with Acheron LF systems for the screen channels, HMS-12 surround loudspeakers, and X-800C subwoofers for the LFE channels. Processing for drive and optimization is supplied by a GALAXY 816 network platform. For film introductions and panel discussions, the venue has a separate PA system with UPQ-1P loudspeakers and a 750-LFC low frequency control element.
“Telluride continues to gain wider recognition as one of the world’s leading showcases of new and noteworthy cinema,” says Miles Rogers, Meyer Sound’s business development manager, cinema and content creation markets. “Great films deserve sound to match, and we’re proud to be playing an important role in making sure every film’s sound is heard exactly as its creators intended.”
The Galaxy joins the Werner Herzog Theatre, where the Meyer Sound complement is anchored by the same trio of Acheron screen loudspeaker systems plus 22 HMS-12 cinema surrounds, 10 X-800C subwoofers and three Galileo 616 processors.
Although the Werner Herzog Theatre’s building serves as Telluride’s community ice rink outside the festival season, it nonetheless offers a first-class experience for film-goers. “Watching movies at Werner Herzog is a wonderful sensory experience — great picture, great sound,” says film critic and historian Leonard Maltin.
Slated for a complete Meyer Sound upgrade in the coming years are the Nugget Theatre, a smaller year-round venue housed in the historic First National Bank building, and the Michael D. Palm Theatre, a 587-seat performing arts venue located on the campus of Telluride High School. The Palm Theatre already is equipped with a compact Meyer Sound line array system which is used regularly for the venue’s wide range of live music performances and community events.
The Telluride Film Festival was established in 1974 and is held annually over the Labor Day holiday. In a departure from typical film festival procedures, neither the films nor the special guests are announced prior to the festival weekend. Films featured in either the Galaxy or Herzog this year, with celebrities on hand for the screenings noted, included “The Old Man and the Gun” (Sissy Spacek, Robert Redford and Casey Affleck with director David Lowery); “White Boy Rick” (Matthew McConaughey with director Yann Demange); “Destroyer” (Nicole Kidman with director Karyn Kusama); “Front Runner” (Hugh Jackman with writer/director Jason Reitman); “The Favourite” (Emma Stone with director Yorgos Lanthimos); and “Meeting Gorbachov” (theatre namesake director Werner Herzog).
