News
Pro audio rules at Glastonbury 2009
Andrew Low Jul 3 2009, 11:27am
Worthy Farm invaded by the latest audio innovations
The punters have retreated from their pilgramage and Worthy Farm is in ruins with only a massive clean up crew left to tidy up the mess left by just under 180 thousand punters.
Held from June 24th to the 28th on Worthy Farm in Pilton, Somerset, UK, this year’s Glastonbury festival was blessed with great weather and great performances. Neil Young, Bruce Springsteen, Crosby Stills and Nash, Spinal Tap, the Quo, the list goes on and on, but it was evident that the 39th Glastonbury festival was one of the world’s biggest and most publicised live sound festivals.
The main Pyramid stage was handled by RG Jones, who again supplied a Synco by Martin Audio W8L Longbow main PA line arrays and Martin Audio delays, a Synco cardioid sub-bass array and a complete Synco stage monitoring and drum fill system. The PA is described as an advanced version of the Pyramid Stage PA from 08s set up, which was a collaboration between RG Jones and Martin Audio’s Jason Baird and Jim Cousins, both of whom joined the system design team again this year, along with Chris Ekers.
While the Pyramid hosted numerous mixing boards throughout the weekend, at one point in the weekend there were five PM5D-RH consoles and an M7CL-48 on the stage.
Down the lane at the Other Stage alternative music fans were treated to headlining sets by Franz Ferdinand, Bloc Party and The Prodigy. Scan PA hung its d&b audiotechnik J-Series line array elements with J-Infra subs for coverage at the stage. Neil Young, Crosby Stills and Nash and Status Quo also used d&b monitors for their Pyramid stage performances.
APR Audio supplied a The Jazz World stage with an EV Xline system with X Subs running in Cardiod mode on the Jazz World stage. The EV arrays were running on the EV N8000 Netmax system system. Two Midas Pro 6 systems were used at FOH, as well as a Midas H3000 analog system. Almost half of the bands were mixed on the Pro 6's.
A Midas H3000 was also used on stage with a Helix eq system running through the DN9331 Rapide flying fader remote, connected to the console by the Midas Solo Tracking System (STS).
VV Brown was possibly the busiest artist of the festival with an amazing eight performances, which included slots on the John Peel Stage, the Dance Tent and a slot on the Pyramid. Brown and her band used TL Audio Ivory series 5001 preamps and DI's for all her Glastonbury performances. Bass Player Michael "Smoove Groove" Hamilton has also been using the TL Audio 5051 to to enhance his bass sounds at all of Brown's gigs. Her FOH engineer, Jimmy Sarikas, used his own LS9-32 for two of gigs on the Pyramid and Dance East stages.
The John Peel stage ran Yamaha’s PM5D-RHs at both FOH and monitors, combining them with three of Yamaha’s new SB-168ES stage boxes to provide the Ethersound network. A full RSS by Roland M-400 with the new M-48 personal monitoring system was set-up backstage at the John Peel stage in its Green Room/warm-up stage. The BBC Introducing Stage and the Park Stage both used RSS digital snakes.
Allen & Heath’s iLive digital mixing system was used for Dan Black’s Glastonbury performance on the Orange mobile stage. Black's FOH engineer, Steve Pattison, tours with a very compact set up comprising an iLive-T iDR-32 MixRack for all the sources, and a laptop loaded with iLive-Editor software as a virtual control surface.
Glastonbury nightlife is characterised by endless open areas and tents blasting the latest beats from DJs of all genres. Funktion-One’s purple stacks dominated many of these areas as its speakers were used in the Glade, Arcadia, Dance East Tent and numerous other areas. Yamaha’s M7CL-48 console could also be found glowing through the night in the Dance East, Dance West, Dance Lounge and Pussy Parlure areas. Allen & Heath Xone:92 DJ mixers were used on the main Dance Stages.
Tannoy’s recently launched VQ Live loudspeaker system was used in ‘The Igloo’ tent this year. Having debuted at Glastonbury last year as part of the Dance Village, the Igloo is the brainchild of Igloo Vision, and provides a unique immersive 360-degree projection environment designed provide a 1400 capacity audience with live video mixing and audio. A single stack per side was used, comprised of a VQ Net 60 Live cabinet above an accompanying VNet 218DR Live subwoofer.
Away from the big stages and megastars Glastonbury showcases dozens of bands and performers. In the Green Fields, the Croissant Neuf field has been in existence since the early days of the festival to give a platform for the not so well known acts. Run entirely by solar power the Croissant Neuf Bandstand hosted over twenty five acts performing with an OHM LX system. OHM sales manager Clive Kinton became an honorary crew member for the week and comments, “The sound system performed magnificently for a whole variety of acts from a melodious harp and vocal duo to a full-on dub band. The system was loud enough to cover the field and to encourage people to stop and listen and ran very efficiently to conserve the solar power.”
Full report to follow in Audio Pro’s July/August issue. Email Andrew.Low@intentmedia.co.uk with any Glasto information.
