The concert featured the 50-piece London Sinfonia orchestra and leading European soloist Tasmin Little, and was performed on a 10m by 8m Star Hire demountable stage with audio production by Pearce Hire. The audience area measured some 80m by 80m and the weather was very warm and calm, perfect for this type of show. In control were a Spirit 328 with two expansion modules, Lexicon PCM80 and Yamaha S-REV1 effects and BSS Varicurve EQ. Microphones were a mixture of AKG 451, Oktava 012 and a pair of Schoeps for Tasmin Little, along with a selection of AKG and Shure microphones. Mic'ing was very subtle; the show was designed to be very classical in nature and provide gentle, unobtrusive reinforcement for the natural sound of the orchestra and soloist.
The PA comprised five PNX102/LA mid/high cabinets and two subwoofers per side, all groundstacked as it had been decided to keep the PA as visually discrete as possible. It features Renkus-Heinz's Isophasic Plane Wave Generator design and a two-point flying hardware system.
Barfoot commented: "The sound was warm but very detailed, needed very little EQ and the boxes had no problem in reaching the back of the lawn. It's very smooth, like a large hi-fi, but the incredible aspect is the throw, with very controlled, excellent coverage. The fact that there's nothing behind and to the sides helped a lot in controlling feedback with so many open mics. I would most definitely like to use these boxes again - they are possibly the sweetest loudspeakers I have heard for this type of event, and they are so small. "The PA was covered up so the audience was unaware of its presence, and the best comment of the day came from the owner of the house - most definitely a classical music enthusiast - who had not realized that the PA was in use, until I pointed out that he could hear the same sound everywhere on his lawn."
(Lee Baldock)
