Stephane Plisson, front of house engineer (Mylene Farmer, Johnny Hallyday / Calogero / Julio Iglesias / Julien Clerc), has chosen the eMotion LV1 software mixer from Waves Audio for the latest Kids United tour.
Kids United is a French musical group comprising six children aged between eight and sixteen years. Created to support UNICEF campaigns, part of the profits from their albums go to help children in refugee reception centers.
Their first album, Un monde meilleur (A Better World), which went gold in France, was launched on Universal Children’s Day in 2015. The second album, Tout le bonheur du monde (All The Happiness in the World), sold double platinum in France. Kids United tours are highly successful, with concerts sold out in advance.
Plisson comments, “I have been using Waves plugins for more than 10 years, and believe me, I have been waiting for the eMotion LV1 mixer for long time. It was a sweet dream before just to use plugins in live mixing, but now, with the LV1, it’s all there in one tight package. A comfortable workflow is an extremely crucial issue for me. I was searching for a new and solid system, and then I discovered the LV1. It allows me to use my beautiful Waves plugins, and in particular it lets me use them in ultra-low latency by using Waves servers. The combination of SoundGrid audio interfaces (DiGiGrid IOX + MGB) with Waves servers is absolutely remarkable.”
He adds, “Due to a heavy touring schedule, I was also looking for a compact setup (we have more than 100 shows with Kids United), so now, wherever I travel, I just bring my eMotion LV1 setup, and it only takes 20 minutes to install my setup and start running. It’s crazy. The other beauty of it is that I organize all my LV1 sessions at home, experimenting with numerous plugins, and then create my sessions before the show.”
Plisson’s setup includes two Macs — one for the Waves eMotion LV1, the second for live recording using the Waves Tracks Live software and for virtual sound check via SoundGrid — with two Waves Extreme servers. Additionally, he uses one DiGiGrid IOC audio interface for monitoring, an AES output for the system and for the Waves MaxxBCL insert, and a DiGiGrid MGO interface for the MADI preamp from the monitor desk’s MADI stage box.
On his favorite Waves plugins and signal flow, Plisson states, “As far as plugins go, the LV1 has lots of possibilities, so in addition to using a lot of Waves plugins, there are now other companies building SoundGrid-compatible plugins, including Flux Audio and Plugin Alliance, that I use in my live sessions. Virtual sound check is another amazing thing with the LV1, since all you need as an engineer is to connect your DAW to the network switch and record and play back from the network.
“In addition, I record my shows with Waves Tracks Live, and I love it. It’s very simple and solid. The A/B flip option in the LV1 is a life saver. It’s extremely useful. You just patch your virtual inputs and hit play in Tracks Live. I can easily set up the LV1 Mixer like an analog console. It has many options – groups, aux, monitors, DCAs and matrix – and the master section is very creative. The LV1 has its unique transparency, so I can have everything clearly arranged in my touch screen monitors. Since I also add an SSL Nucleus Controller, it’s a front of house paradise. It has whatever I need: the Waves dbx 160 compressor/limiter, the Waves C6 multiband compressor, Waves API 2500, Waves Abbey Road reverb plates, Waves H-Delay hybrid delay and Waves X-FDBK, just to mention a few. LV1 just makes mixing easy and fun.”