The audience and press, including The Times, gave positive reviews on the cinema and aural extravaganza, while Royal Philharmonic Orchestra conductor Dirk Brossé commented: "the sound was the best I've ever heard."
Sound design and front-of-house duties for the event were assigned to Fred Vogler, renowned recording, broadcast, and live sound engineer. Vogler recently won Best Classical Album and Best Opera Recording Grammys for his role as producer of Rise And Fall Of The City Of Mahagonny.
"The goal was for the music to have a big impact, which of course required lots of volume," says Vogler. "Typically, getting lots of gain out of acoustic instruments comes at the expense of timber and fidelity; the strings become harsh and the sound becomes rather one-dimensional. Add to that the challenge of achieving a sense of dimension throughout the entire arena, which is difficult in a venue with such high walls."
Consistency between the music and a wide range of dialogue was also an issue. "It wasn't like a scoring session environment, but there was the challenge of getting the orchestra to come across big and loud, and then accommodate bits of dialogue here and there," Vogler says. "The dialogue came from six different movies, made over a 30 year span, so the levels and sound quality were pretty varied."
The audio for Star Wars: A Musical Journey was supplied by Capital Sound, using a massive Meyer Sound system easily on a par with any major rock tour's. Main left-right arrays of 18 MIlo line array loudspeakers each were augmented by centre hangs of nine Mica and six M'elodie line array loudspeakers, along with additional Milo and Mica stacks for out-fill. Low end was covered by more than 24 700-HP subwoofers, and an assortment of MSL-4, UPQ-1P and CQ-2 loudspeakers completed the system. A Galileo with four Galileo 616 processors provided system DSP. Meyer Sound's European tech support team provided technical assistance onsite.
Meyer Sound's Constellation system played an important role for the performers, providing an electronic version of the traditional orchestra shell to allow the musicians to hear themselves in a familiar ensemble performance environment, without the need for any physical construction. The Constellation system at the event deployed a combination of 30 submixes by Meyer Sound's Constellation team, using CueStation software and a selection of UPJ and UPA loudspeakers and USW subwoofers.
A standing ovation from the arena crowd and approvals from Vogler and Brossé reaffirm Capital Sound's decision to use Meyer Sound. "The music of Star Wars is a part of modern culture, and we knew it was important to provide an audio experience that would meet the standards of the most discriminating fans," says Capital Sound's Paul Timmins. "Capital Sound has long relied on Meyer Sound gear to deliver unparalleled performance, and for an epic production like this one, there was simply no other alternative."
For more on this event see Audio File in the May issue of Lighting&Sound Magazine.
(Jim Evans)
