As its name suggests, The Byre Theatre started life as a semi-derelict cow-shed, cleaned out and set up by a local theatre group, whose audiences sat on cushions on the floor. With the support of donations and local authority funds, a permanent theatre opened in 1970. Its latest incarnation, built by architects Nicoll Russell Studios of Broughty Ferry, was completed in 2001.
Named after its founder, the main theatre in The Byre is the A.B.Paterson auditorium, with a seated capacity of 220. Stage Electrics has installed the M-400 front-of-house console at the rear of the auditorium, with two S-1608 digital snakes providing local inputs and connecting to the amp room.
"The theatre is getting a lot for its money," says Ian Green from Stage Electrics. "With a very small footprint, it saves a lot of space at the control position, especially since all the dynamics and FX are built in."
Martin Thomas, technical guru from RSS, travelled up to Scotland to provide training for the theatre's young production engineers. "The M-400 is so easy to use because it's intuitive - all the actions on the console are logical, such that the sound operators were confident and competent after just half a day's training," he says.
(Jim Evans)
