Soundart KG from Bochum has been responsible for the technical side of this festival for several years. Preparation is always highly complex in terms of meeting the artists' technical requirements: the final design involved a set-up in which the changeover time between bands - sometimes with dancers and an onstage pyrotechnics and laser show - could be carried out in just five minutes including reorganisation time.
The sometimes very elaborate instrumentation of the bands, some of whom had large numbers of acoustic string and percussion instruments, in addition to the complex language used by this particular cultural group, placed major demands on the PA system. All of the artists' technical stage directions asked for audio systems produced by world-renowned manufacturers. This meant that it was essential to involve all of the FOH technicians in the technical implementation of the system.
Soundart, as part of the D.A.S. Audio network in Germany, and working closely with both artists and technicians, deployed the Aero 50 line array system as well as Aero 12A powered line arrays and LX-218A powered subwoofers in the Oberhausen arena. These systems were tasked with the challenge of withstanding the major endurance test that the Nowruz celebrations posed.
The PA system was designed by Lars Schnier, D.A.S. Audio system technician for Germany. He used 12 Aero 50 enclosures on each side for a classic left/right main PA arrangement paired with eight Aero 12A modules as lateral out fill. The 24 self-powered LX-218A subwoofers were set up as five end-fire arrays.
The self-powered Aero 50 system was operated with 16 FP 10000Q Lab.gruppen amps and handled using four LM26 Lake controllers. The signal distribution to all of the components and the equalization of the self-powered systems was carried out using three D.A.S. DSP-4080 processors (structurally identical to the XTA DP 448).
(Jim Evans)
