For its stage design and surrounding landscape, the SOCH was awarded the Korea Architecture Prize in 1996. World-class musicians as Pavarotti, Sumi Jo, and Andrea Bocellini have graced its stage. The concert hall is also home to the Suwon Metropolitan Symphony and the Suwon Metropolitan Choir, and from spring to fall, it hosts to a wide range of performances by classical and popular performers who traditionally kick off their nationwide tours in Suwon.
The venue's smallish conventional seated area is taken up by 796 seats, but the oval park's meticulously manicured lawns can hold up to 15,000 additional spectators. The installed system will easily cover beyond the permanent seated area, but was not designed to be used as a full park system.
The design and installation was executed by Adamson's Korean distributor Sound Solution's design team manager Mr. Kim Jin Yong who says Adamson was chosen based on a product shootout against another leading high end speaker manufacturer.
The initial design for the venue proved to be problematic due to the nature of the amphitheatre's permanent roof made from a tarp like material. In windy conditions it creates some levels of uncontrollable noise which could not be masked with the previous system's coverage and output. A line array system is much more accurate and directional, and is capable of producing significantly higher SPL than the previous install.
Mr. KIm's design features a classical stereo design of left and right flown arrays made-up of a single double 18" cardioid SpekTrix Subs on top of each array with four 8.5" 5 degree SpekTrix enclosures hung below the bus, and two 8.5" 15 degree SpekTrix W (Wide Angle Vertical Enclosures) for front fills at the bottom of each array. Lab.gruppen C Series 48:4 and 68:4 amplifiers power the Adamson system.
(Jim Evans)
