NORTHRIDGE, California – Demonstrating the premium audio fidelity and rider-friendly characteristics of JBL
VERTEC® line arrays, PA Plus Productions recently supplied the live sound reinforcement system for
“Songwriters Night,” held at the Avalon Theatre at Fallsview Casino in Niagara Falls, Canada. The shows
featured six of Nashville’s most successful country songwriters performing hits they have written for Tim
McGraw, Reba McEntire, Faith Hill, Vince Gill and many more. The event showcased the songwriting talents of
Al Anderson, Bob DiPiero, Tim Nichols, Jeffrey Steele, Craig Wiseman and Tony Mullins, telling the stories that
inspired their most popular songs, followed by all six performing each song together.
PA Plus deployed an “in-the-round” setup providing 360 degrees of coverage, with six line arrays each
containing eight VERTEC VT4887 compact line array elements. PA Plus also used 16 JBL MS26 compact
loudspeakers for front fills. Powered by Crown I-Tech amplifiers, the system was remotely controlled and
monitored via the Harman HiQnet™ System Architect™ platform.
In addition to the temporary sound system deployed for the “Songwriters Night” event, PA Plus recently
installed the permanent sound reinforcement system at the 1,500-seat Avalon Theatre, which includes a leftright
configuration of 10 VT4888 midsize line array elements per side, along with six VT4880 arrayable
subwoofers per side. Crown I-Tech amplifiers power the new house system, which also includes AKG
microphones, BSS Audio DPR dynamics and dbx 162SL compressor/limiters.
With Reba McEntire loading in right after the final Songwriters Night performance, PA Plus left the existing
VERTEC midsize house system in place and flew the standalone VERTEC compact system for the Songwriters
Night in-the-round show. In order to expedite loadout after the Songwriters Night events, PA Plus took full
advantage of the configuration functionality available in the venue’s
Crown I-Tech amplifier installation. “Power and processing for the
portable VT4887 system was achieved by simply tying into the
existing speaker lines in the overhead production grid and loading
the corresponding JBL V4 DSP presets into the Crown I-Tech
amplifiers,” said Mark Radu, Systems Engineer for PA Plus. “A
simple re-patch in the grid and preset recall was all that was
required to ready the system for Reba McEntire.”
According to Radu, the acoustic music content of the show was a
perfect match for the VT4887’s. “This was the first chance I had to
work with JBL’s new V4 DSP presets for driving 4887’s with ITech,”
he said. “I was much closer to the desired end result right
out of the box with V4 presets, while the system as a whole
sounded much more coherent from top to bottom. I was happy with
the improvements [JBL’s Director of Tour Sound Product and
Application Engineering] Paul Bauman and JBL Engineering have
made with the rest of the VERTEC DSP presets, and his work on the
VT4887’s proved just as impressive.”
For more information on PA Plus, please visit www.pa-plus.com
JBL Professional is a unit of Harman International Industries, Incorporated (www.harman.com). Harman International designs, manufactures and markets a wide range of audio and infotainment products
for the automotive, consumer and professional markets, and maintains a strong presence in the Americas,
Europe and Asia, employing more than 11,000 people worldwide. The Harman International family of brands
includes AKG®, Audioaccess®, Becker®, BSS®, Crown®, dbx®, DigiTech®, Harman Kardon®, Infinity®, JBL®,
Lexicon®, Mark Levinson®, Revel®, QNX®, Soundcraft® and Studer®. Harman International’s stock is traded on
the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol “NYSE: HAR.”
Harman HiQnet™ is the world's first connectivity and control protocol that integrates all product categories in
the signal chain for professional audio systems of all types, size, and applications. Harman HiQnet no longer
requires the user to manage multiple disparate operating systems or be responsible for programming individual
signal processors, speaker controllers, wireless microphone systems, and mixing consoles. HiQnet was
developed by engineers from across the Harman Pro Group and is coordinated by the System Development
and Integration Group (SDIG), a team of dedicated systems specialists based in Salt Lake City, Utah.
|
