Advanced AV infrastructure brings Birthplace of Country Music to life

The cradle of country music has an appointment at the museum that opened its doors in the city of Bristol last year. The Birthplace of Country Music is a space equipped with the most innovative AV technologies that seeks to offer visitors a complete immersive and interactive experience..

Between Virginia and Tennessee is the Birthplace of Country Music, filial del Smithsonian Institution, a museum that focuses its theme on the history of country music, going back to 1927 y al Bristol Sessions.

Located in the historic center of Bristol, the building, a restored old dealership, has 7.315 square meters and offers multiple theatrical experiences, film and sound, as well as different educational programs and exhibitions.

In this environment, where music is the main protagonist, audio also plays a priority role. This building has an AV infrastructure for whose systems the company has been responsible Electrosonic, while SH Acoustics helped as acoustics and audio consultant to achieve the best sound calibration for the project. StudioMUSarx, under the direction of Joe Nicholson, has been in charge of the design of the exhibitions. Burwil was the general contractor for the museum.

“There were a number of challenges that had to be faced given that it was an old building, with historical importance, that had just been restored. We had to work with acoustically difficult surfaces and create the experience of high quality sound for visitors. Optimizing sound throughout the museum was the goal, whether in rooms or individual exhibitions”, explica Steve Haas, president of SH Acoustics.

theater rooms

The Birthplace of Country Music Museum has five theaters and four of them have been equipped by Electrosonic. the biggest, el Orientation Theater, It has a waiting room whose style simulates a train station.

Visitors hear sound effects and music through historical clips that are activated from panels that have been built into the walls.. When you hear the train slowing down, The doors open and you can enter the cinema room to see the screening 'Bound to Bristol' which is about the musical heritage of the Bristol Sessions.

The Orientation Theater room is equipped with a projector InFocus, speakers Renkus-Heinz, subwoofers Bag End and sound panels activated by Acoustic Enhancements. a couple of monitors NEC watches over the catwalks provides the subtitles.

The smallest room, denominada Greasy Strings Theater, offers a loop video exploring musical techniques. Has a projector installed BenQ and speakers Innovox y Tannoy.

The Chapel Room is designed with a pair of church pews where visitors can rest and watch a video about local evangelical groups and how music has been part of the faith.. It has a BenQ projector, Tannoy speakers and four Acoustic Enhancements that activate the sound panels that are integrated into the banks.

To view the projections, The walls of these three rooms have been covered with Screen Goo surfaces; while video is provided by DVM8500 players from Alcorn McBride.

A stop at the Immersion room comes later in the tour with a video that attempts to make visitors feel like they're part of the country music world., in addition to including interpretations of different artists from Jimmie Rodgers to Lynyrd Skynyrd. This room includes a custom curved screen of Da-Lite, three BenQ projectors, a player Dataton Watchout, altavoces Tannoy y subwoofers Bag End. The walls are covered with murals showing crowds of country music fans at the annual Rhythm Festival & Roots Reunion en Bristol.

Throughout the museum, a series of interactive touch screens are installed Link Touch of 32 inches that engage visitors in various aspects of the Bristol Sessions and country music heritage. Likewise, there are also different experiences available for visitors to experiment with music and enjoy it..

Another interesting experience offered by the Birthplace of Country Music Museum revolves around the artist and television host Tennessee Ernie Ford whose story is displayed in a video kiosk driven by an Alcorn McBride DVM8500 system. The video ‘Rediscovered/Reinvented’ is shown on a monitor 46 inch that is fed by an Alcorn McBride digital video machine, showing how media and movies integrate country music today.

radio station

The museum also has its own working internal radio station. Visitors can see through a glass window what the audio booth and control room of a radio studio would look like. 1940. This vintage room is equipped with the equipment that it would have in those years with authentic Raytheon consoles that allow analog signals to be converted into digital ones.. A low-power FM license has been granted by the FCC and the studio will soon begin broadcasting through its own station..

outside the windows, Electrosonic has provided the equipment to create an interactive environment where visitors can tune in to four pre-recorded shows while the radio station is not broadcasting.. Audio playback is provided by a system LLC Q-Sys.

To manage the entire AV infrastructure of the museum, There are three control rooms on the second floor that have been built by Electrosonic connected through a fiber network.. Museum staff are responsible for maintaining all audio and video equipment.