Housed in a historic downtown Nashville building dating back to the 1890s, the Woolworth Theatre brings a Vegas-inspired experience to Music City that includes a sound reinforcement system headed by Eastern Acoustic Works (EAW) loudspeakers in a design and installation by S&L Integrated Systems, based in Thomasville, GA.
Envisioned and transformed and by country music artist Chris Wicks, the theater hosts musical groups, acrobatic performances and comedy acts. “From a sound design perspective, the room is very challenging,” explains Nathan Tomberlin, account executive for S&L Integrated Systems. “It has a very low and shallow balcony — from the stage to the back wall it’s only about 40 feet deep. Rather than a traditional theater that’s long and narrow, this is the complete opposite.
“We also had the presence of glass in the balcony, which we could not touch due to the building’s historical status. We knew we were going to have to throw back the audio and needed a system that could keep all our anticipated reflection issues to a minimum. I immediately knew the solution would be the Anna ADAPTive system from Eastern Acoustic Works.”
The new system incorporates six Anna boxes, with three loudspeakers discreetly placed behind cutouts on each side of the stage. Also included in the new system are JF60Zs for front fills, four SBX218s subwoofers under the stage, MKD1064s for side fills, MKD1026s for the outer balcony and RSX12M stage monitors. EAW UXA4410 DSP amplifiers drive the front and out fills, with audio is run via Audinate Dante networking.
Although this project marked the first time using ADAPTive, Tomberlin was familiar with the brand. “I had heard EAW’s ADAPTive products before and I knew that no one manages audio coverage like they do. EAW is really the only one that does it on a large scale and does it well. What made it even easier is that John Mills, whom I had worked with in the past, was now working at EAW. Also, HWPco, (a trusted AV manufacturer’s sales representative that I have worked with), had picked up EAW as an AV systems partner in the area. All the pieces fell into place perfectly and the decision to go with EAW was a no brainer.”
