Now in its second year, the Brave festival is held in Amsterdam's Tuinen van West, a managed 'green space' that provides a range of recreational facilities away from the city's built-up area.
Held on 15 August and headlined by US indie rockers Augustines, this year's festival featured three stages of live music and a 'food village' featuring cuisine from many different cultures. The festival's production company, Kaboem, appointed Skyline Sound and Light to provide and manage the technical production on all three stages, as well as providing power and lighting for the entire site. Skyline owner Bart Bakker was the technical production manager.
"The atmosphere at the Brave festival is easy and relaxed, it almost feels like going back to the 1960s. It's very family-friendly, different generations come together to enjoy the music and all performers are heard sympathetically," he says. "The acts mainly comprise singer/songwriters, folk and indie rock bands. Because many of them are inexperienced, they are eager, sometimes timid, sometimes clumsy - but often unexpectedly good."
The main stage system featured Yamaha CL3 digital consoles at front of house and monitors, a Nexo Geo S12 PA with CD18 subs and PS15 wedge monitors. The Amphi Stage system comprised a Yamaha DM2000 digital console at FoH and LS9-32 on monitors, plus Nexo PS15/LS1200 PA and PS10 monitors. The smallest stage, in the Speakeasy tent, featured a Yamaha LS9-16 mixing both FoH and monitors.
"Our job is to ensure that the audiences enjoy high quality sound, but also to relax and inspire the performers by giving them a professional production," says Bart. "These are two of the main reasons why we chose Yamaha digital consoles and Nexo loudspeakers, as well as their reliability and because the consoles make changeovers between the performers straightforward."
Although the Dutch summer didn't provide the best weather for the festival, it was enjoyed by over 2500 people, with parents and older children enjoying the music, while younger ones could play nearby in safety.
"We were very pleased with how the stages sounded and the organisers were very happy," says Bart. "The right sound definitely helped to create the right festival atmosphere."
(Jim Evans)
