The Soundcraft Si Performer has a number of enhancements over and above the Si Compact, with a turbocharged version of the Si Compact engine and providing up to 80 channels to mix. Added to this are 35 buses, plus eight VCA groups and eight mute groups, a fully parametric 4-band EQ with shelf on the HF and LF bands, and LCR panning.
"The Soundcraft Si Performer was chosen mainly for work flow and the audio quality it produces," remarked Paul Tucker of Mozaix. "A number of consoles from different brands were tried but as the Church already owns a couple of Soundcraft Vi4 consoles in their main Knox campus, they were already quite partial to the Soundcraft brand."
When it comes to operating the audio, the Church has a large volunteer base who do not necessarily have a high skills set and so the Soundcraft Si Performer's ease of operation is paramount. "The world of digital consoles can be very confusing but the Soundcraft Si Performer makes it simple for the volunteers," said Paul. "They all speak of the ease of getting around the work surface and how quickly they can be up and running on the console."
The Soundcraft Si Performer is a feature-packed audio console with fully-parametric 4-band EQ as standard on all input channels, and as usual on Soundcraft's digital range, BSS graphic EQs on all bus outputs. This is in addition to the already standard filters, gates, compressors and delays on all inputs, compressors and delays on all outputs, which when calculated delivers the equivalent of over 220 rack units of processing in a tiny footprint. Unlike many other digital consoles at this price point, all this processing is fully available all of the time, there are no compromises on the amount of DSP in use.
Ian Moyes, audio director for the Church, candidly admits that he would have preferred a Soundcraft Vi 1 console but the budget didn't allow for this, however he is very happy with his Si Performer which contains everything that was good about the Si Compact 32, along with even better features, such as the independent LCD channel screens and eight assignable VCA groups.
"I was impressed by what the Si Performer 3 offers and of course, it sounds brilliant." said Ian.
Ian notes the ease with which the operational channels can be viewed as a favourite feature.
"The layout of the Si Performer is very clear and I like that you can label the channel screen," he commented. "The four layers of completely flexible patching and increased stereo group configuration are great. The select fader function allows you to assign any fader to any job, and build the work surface you want."
"There are a number of features that have filtered down from the Vi series that we like, in particular the Si Performer 3's FaderGlow colour-coded faders. It's very intuitive particularly when we are flicking between foldback and front of house. We can tell by looking at the faders that we're in a foldback mix because they're all yellow - it's not always obvious that you are in a foldback mix with most digital consoles."
Unique to the Soundcraft Si Performer is the integration of DMX. A DMX512 port is set into the back of the console to provide core lighting control, making it the first audio console that can also operate lights. However Ian states that if he has his way, his Si Performer won't ever be used for lights!
At the same time, the Church acquired a Shure PSM 900 personal monitoring system for use in their main Knox campus.
(Lee Baldock)
