For sound reinforcement duties, the Country Music Association (CMA) awarded the contract to Sound Image, which supplied a large-scale L-Acoustics K1 system for the headlining concert each night--all four of which sold out more than six weeks in advance.
Project manager Curt Jenkins and his crew deployed a system comprised of 72 K1, 12 Kara and 16 Kudo line source elements, 16 K1-SB and 32 SB28 low frequency enclosures, and 78 LA8 amplified controllers. Also currently on tour with K1 systems from Sound Image are Kid Rock and Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers.
LP Field's two primary loudspeaker arrays consisted of six K1-SB and 16 K1 with three Kara down-fills below, flanked by angled side hangs each featuring two K1-SB, 12 K1 and three Kara. Two six-Kudo auxiliary arrays covered the extreme left and right upper stadium seats, while two delay hangs near the back end of the field were both comprised of eight K1.
Low frequency reinforcement was augmented with three cardioid stacks of four SB28 per side and four pairings of two SB28 for centre sub-fill. Two stacks of two Kudo enclosures were perched atop the far left and right centre sub fills to both cover the first 30ft of the audience as well as help bring the imaging down from the main system. All systems were powered and processed by a combined total of 24 LA-RAK touring racks, each equipped with three LA8 amplified controllers.
Jenkins, who is perhaps best known as Lady Antebellum's production manager, points out that Sound Image Engineers Roz Jones and Rich Davis, along with the onsite assistance of L-Acoustics touring application engineer David Brooks, were instrumental in the deployment and tuning of the system.
"Huge outdoor stadiums like LP Field are always particularly challenging for concert sound reinforcement because not only do you have to cover a huge number of seats, but you also have to deal with sound coming from a variety of different places--mains, aux hangs, far side hangs, delays and so on," says Jenkins.
"But I have to say that once we lined everything up with Dave Brooks' assistance, the transition between all of the different arrays was so incredibly smooth--way smoother than I had even anticipated. While we were tuning the system, I was overwhelmed by how much it felt like I was listening to this giant stadium rig as if it were a set of high-end studio reference monitors with a whole lot of horsepower. The coherency and tonal balance was really amazing."
(Jim Evans)
