America has celebrated Christmas round this tree - decorated with 20,000 coloured lights - since 1931. Once again this year, there was a show that attracted thousands of people: this was also thanks to the spectacular ice rink, which, since it was opened in 1936, continues to draw people of all ages.
On stage to celebrate the event, amplified by the 'Outline arrays' - as well as other systems - stars included Aretha Franklin, Shakira, Alicia Keys, Rod Stewart and the Muppets, all performing Christmas classics.
The show, transmitted live on NBC and New York mayor Michael Bloomberg turned on the lights of tree, which will remain in front of the Rockefeller Centre until 7 January 2010.
The company responsible for the audio was PRG. The work of fine tuning the Outline rig was entrusted to PRG sound engineer Matt Bell, who stated: "I chose the Butterfly system because we needed a line array that was compact in design and high powered. We hung all of the systems from Genie lifts, so we were limited to how much weight we had available. The Butterfly system allowed us to hang the correct amount of cabinets to cover the space.
"We were all very impressed with the coherence and intelligibility at 70m for such a small array. The frequency response was very flat and stable which allowed me good SPL levels without interfering with the broadcast mix. This added to the success of the event. My thanks go out to everyone at Outline for their help and support."
(Jim Evans)
