In May 2015, a small band of fans of the US rock group the Foo Fighters from Cesena, in the central Italian state of Romagna, decided that they were fed up with travelling long distances to see their favourite band every time they toured. The Foo Fighters hadn't played in Romagna since 1997, and had no plans to return.
Led by Fabio Zaffagnini, the friends decided to stage a live performance of the Foo Fighters song Learn To Fly. The plan was to have 1000 musicians playing simultaneously, film the performance, and send the video to the band in a bid to convince them to add Cesena to their next tour.
As Zaffagnini explained: "If you really want something, you have to be ready to beg. It works better if there's 1000 people behind you." The project succeeded beyond everyone's wildest dreams: the video of the performance, which was entirely crowdfunded and carried out by volunteers, received over 30m views on YouTube and went viral. Within days, Dave Grohl, the Foo Fighters' lead singer, had responded on-line, and in November 2015, the Foo Fighters opened their next European tour in Cesena's Carisport stadium. The 1000 musicians who participated in the original Rockin'1000 video were allowed in for free.
Inspired by this success, Fabio Zaffagnini decided to repeat the experience and build on it, organising Rockin'1000 - That's Live, an entire concert of rock music played by another mega-group of over 1000 volunteer musicians. Again, what began as a crazy concept became a huge success, with over 1200 musicians performing on 24 July at Cesena's Dino Manuzzi Stadium to a crowd of over 14,000 onlookers.
The concert featured 250 drummers, 250 guitarists, 250 bassists, 30 keyboard players, 30 violinists and even 30 bagpipe players, all playing a selection of hits by David Bowie, AC/DC, Jimi Hendrix, Nirvana, the Beatles, the Clash, the White Stripes, and Led Zeppelin, forming what may have been the biggest rock band of all time.
Microphones and amplification for this ground-breaking concert were supplied by Italian technical services company Roadie Music Service, supported by Shure's Italian distributor Prase Media Technologies.
Following weeks of technical preparation and planning, Shure microphones were used throughout the event, by all of the musicians, the conductor Maestreo Sabiu, the leaders of the individual groups of the musicians, and the technical support staff.
Over 170 wired mics were deployed, including Shure SM58, SM57, Beta 52, SM81 and Beta 98 A/C, but because many of the musicians were mobile during the concert, wireless microphones were also used, including 56 channels of Shure ULX-D digital wireless system. The Shure AXT600 Axient spectrum manager was used to analyse and monitor the wireless frequencies being used in the stadium during the concert.
(Jim Evans)
