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Martin Audio WPS with TiMax processing powers major Montreal festivals

This June and July, two of Montreal’s flagship festivals took place back-to-back in the heart of the Canadian city: Les Francos de Montréal, celebrating French-language artists, and the Festival International de Jazz de Montréal, renowned for its diverse jazz-focused programme. As a partner of both festivals, L’Équipe Spectra equipped the outdoor stage at each event this year with a Martin Audio WPS Wavefront Precision sound system, optimized by TiMax spatial audio processing.

The popular free-admission stage, which regularly attracts audiences of thousands of people, is known as the Desjardins Stage during Les Francos de Montréal and the Loto-Quebec Club Montréal Stage during the Festival International de Jazz de Montréal. It is located at Terrain 66 in the Quartier des Spectacles, at the centre of downtown Montreal.

“One of the key reasons the production team for the festivals were keen on the Wavefront Precision system is because the stages are right in downtown Montreal”, says Claus Frostell of Canadian distributor Erikson Pro. “With the optimisation that WPS provides, and also particularly with Martin Audio subwoofers, we’re able to localise the sound very specifically to the audience area.”

“One of the big concerns we have is noise management”, confirms Dan Meier, Senior Technical Coordinator for both festivals. “The city rules are very strict, and we need to keep good relationships with our neighbours.” The deployed PA comprised eight Martin Audio WPS line array elements per side, supplemented with four Torus T820 constant curvature arrays as front fills and two Torus T1230 models serving as delays. Low-frequency reinforcement was provided by three SX218 dual 18-inch subwoofers and six SX118 single 18-inch subwoofers, all powered by Martin Audio iKon amplifiers.

“We had the three dual 18-inch subs positioned across the front of the stage in cardioid mode, with one facing backwards and two facing forwards, while three of the single 18-inch cardioid subs positioned on each side”, Frostell explains. “With this cardioid set-up we were able to reduce SPL to the rear of the stage by around 30 dB, and were also able to narrow the coverage so that it is focused primarily on the audience area.” The entire system was modelled and optimised using Martin Audio Display 3 software. “For the WPS arrays, we used the Hard Avoid feature for the stage area and optimised the system to concentrate coverage on the audience”, Frostell notes.

For the first time, the festivals’ audiences also experienced the benefits of TiMax spatial audio processing, extending the stereo image across a larger listening area. “The organisers’ main concern was that, because they host a lot of guest engineers, they didn’t want excessive spatial movement or localisation that could detract from the engineers’ mixes”, says Frostell. “We explained that we’re simply enhancing the stereo image across the audience area, and once they understood that, they became very excited about the possibilities.”

“Traditionally, a left-right loudspeaker configuration creates a relatively small stereo sweet spot in the centre of the audience”, he continues. “Using TiMax with the WPS system and Torus front fills, we’re able to expand that stereo image significantly, allowing more of the audience to experience the mix as it was intended. The engineers don’t need to do anything differently - they mix as normal, and we simply extend what they are already doing.”

“This year the stage featured a wide variety of bands, from standard jazz ensembles requiring a more intricate mix with a grand piano, to really loud and bassy hip-hop artists, all of which sounded great on the Martin Audio system”, comments Hugues Bourque, the head front-of-house engineer for the Martin Audio-equipped stage at both the Festival International de Jazz de Montréal and Francos de Montréal.

“We have had bad weather with lots of rain followed by scorching heat, but I never felt it affected the PA”, he adds. “It was a tricky area, but the system provided great coverage and performed very well for the duration of the two festivals.”

(Photos: Martin Audio)

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