The Warehouse supports Edinburgh Festival for diverse summer sounds.
This August d&b Partner and leading supplier to the Edinburgh International Festival (EIF), The Warehouse Sound Services, once again ensured the festival’s various sound reinforcement requirements were comprehensively covered. For over three decades The Warehouse has designed, installed and engineered audio solutions for the festival’s broad programme of events. This year, working closely with EIF’s Head of Sound, Tom Zwitserlood, and Head of Technical, John Robb, the team provided systems for live and spoken word performances, including the Scottish National Orchestra, Franz Ferdinand and Sparks, and the Edinburgh International Book Festival.
The 2015 calendar ran from August 7th to 31st and opened with The Harmonium Project, a free outdoor event attracting more than 20,000 to the city’s Usher Hall and Festival Square. Designed by 59 Productions, a series of artworks representing the experience singing has on the mind and body were projected onto the hall, accompanied by a recording of John Adams’s choral work Harmonium. Zwitserlood, together with The Warehouse’s Anne Sullivan, designed the system with sound design by Tom Hackley.
The demands of this striking audio visual performance required a complex and immersive sound experience, as Director of The Warehouse, Derek Blair explained: “The team had to create a 360 degree, 3D sound that created a multisensory effect to match the spectacular visuals. Our challenge was to produce a pure and sensational sound in a challenging outdoor environment. The d&b J-Series line array system is designed specifically for use in large scale sound reinforcement applications; its crystal clear and detailed audio performance, smooth and even frequency response over distance, high dynamic bandwidth, power and headroom capabilities were the perfect choice for this show. The design comprised of left and right hangs of ten J8s, three J-SUBs, a central rolling riser with four J12s positioned at the front of the Usher Hall, with left and right delays consisting of eight Q1s and two Q7s.”
Other audio visual highlights included The Animotion Show, a fusion of imagery and sound, featuring percussionist Dame Evelyn Glennie and acclaimed Russian visual artist Maria Rud. Rud’s evolving paintings were beamed live by projection artist Ross Ashton onto the walls of the quadrangle in the city’s 17th century George Heriot’s School.
Sound equipment and crew for the closing Virgin Money Fireworks Concert, featuring music by the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, were also supplied courtesy of The Warehouse, and mixed by front of house engineer and former company Director Cameron Crosby, who has overseen the event since its inception. The concert utilized more than a hundred d&b loudspeakers all powered by D80 amplifiers, including Q-Series, V-Series and J-Series, and brought Edinburgh’s summer festival season to a spectacular conclusion.
“Our work at this year’s Edinburgh festivals was both challenging and fantastic,” concluded Blair. “The opportunity to provide audio solutions to such a phenomenal range of amazing artists was a privilege and we’ve had such fantastic feedback. Once again our staff rose to the many challenges associated with supplying systems to EIF and other festivals; we’re already planning ahead for next year and looking forward to it.”
