Shure microphones and wireless systems were used in abundance at the recent Country Music Association (CMA) Music Festival and CMT Video Music Awards in Nashville.
The CMT Video Music Awards, held at the Bridgestone Arena, featured an opening performance by the event’s host, Kid Rock, using a chrome UR2/SM58 wireless microphone.
Joining him for the opening performance were Martina McBride and Hank Williams Jr., who also used UR2/SM58 microphones, as well as Trace Adkins, Kellie Pickler, Randy Houser, Jamey Johnson, and Zac Brow, all using wireless SM58 microphones.
According to Tom Davis, who served as the audio producer for the show, “We received many positive comments this year, saying that this was one of the best sounding CMT Awards in years, both in the house and the live broadcast.
“Putting a live broadcast on the air with 11 live acts and multiple presenters and hosts is always a challenge. Knowing that we can always rely on Shure systems working first time every time is a great comfort.”
Shure endorser Brad Paisley sang “American Saturday Night” through UR2/SM58 wireless, while another Shure endorser, LeAnn Rimes, chose a pair of Super 55 wired microphones for an up tempo version of John Anderson’s “Swingin.”
“For her performance, LeAnn requested the two Super 55s, one on a stand and one to be flown in from the ceiling,” said Shamus Bacon, front of house engineer for Rimes. “The ‘ceiling’ in the Bridgestone Arena, being about 120 feet, presented a small hurdle for the crew. It wound up requiring one 150-foot section of cable, three 100-feet sections of cable, and then another 125-foot snake to the truck – a total of a 575-foot cable run on a Super 55.
“The end result was the ‘sky mic’ versus the ‘stand mic.’ The sky mic lost about 3 dB of level and maybe a bit of low-mid, which the guys in the truck added back in and Eureka, the Super 55s sounded great.”
Several other artists who performed used Shure wireless systems with a variety of different microphones in addition to the SM58, including KSM9 and Beta 58 handheld transmitters. The house band for the show performed using wired SM58s on all vocals except for newcomer Easton Corbin, who opted for his own wired KSM9.
Rounding out the full complement of Shure gear, a standard assortment of Shure drum microphones were employed for most of the drum kits, including the Beta 52 on many of the kick drums and the Beta 98s on almost all of the toms.
