The sound of Meyer Sound accompanies the Sydney Theater Company as it reopens

The renovation of the headquarters of the Sydney Theatre Company, The Wharf, has had the installation of 32 speakers, mostly Meyer Sound Ultra-X, and implementing Spacemap Go for surround sound design and mixing.

After being closed for two years to carry out a complete renovation, la Sydney Company Theatre (STC) has reopened its headquarters, The Wharf, at Walsh Bay in Sydney (Australia). One of the highlights of the technical update has been the installation of 32 altavoces Meyer Sound, brand that distributes in Spain RMS Proaudio, mostly from the series Ultra-X.

The system was designed by Bob McCarthy and Josh Dorn-Fehrmann with the implementation of Spacemap Go, Meyer Sound's new tool for surround sound design and mixing.

When 'Playing Beatie Bow' was released at the end of February, the new STC show, became one of the world's first theater productions to use the dynamic surround audio effects provided by technology based on the Galaxy network platform, which uses Milan and a new user interface for iPad.

For the theater sound and video director, Ben Lightowlers, Choosing an appropriate solution was essential, maintaining full control of the budget for sound systems, from specification to installation. Finally, System renewal extended decades-long relationship with Meyer Sound.

“We explored options from other manufacturers but over the years we have been happy with the UPJ and UPM loudspeakers that we were able to easily integrate into new systems.. And we were impressed by the new Ultra-X speakers. They are excellent for vocal clarity, which is essential since the dialogue must be in the foreground, but they are also exceptional for music”, comenta Lightowlers.

The flexibility and scalability of Spacemap Go allows the system to be easily reconfigured to suit different Wharf Theater seating configurations. 1, of 420 places, as well as the locations of specific sound effects sources in each specific production.

The systems were supplied by Soundcorp, a Diversified company. In any configuration, Sound designers can easily harness the surround sound potential of Spacemap Go.

“The fact that you can control Spacemap Go from QLab through OSC made the Meyer Sound solution easy for users to accept”, adds lightowlers.

David Bergman, 'Playing Beatie Bow' sound designer, was the first to harness the power of new technology, assigning up to 20 QLab outputs as direct objects for Spacemap Go.

“To the composer, Clemence Williams, and I loved the way we can execute various trajectories throughout the show. Some trajectories trace slow circles around the public, while others zig-zag randomly. It has been great to move sounds like the wind, the reverbs and solo instruments that, otherwise, "they would be static". Bergman affirms.

Spacemap Go was introduced when Bergman's sound design was already well advanced, but in the future he hopes to rethink the possibilities of dynamic sound from the beginning. “We have just begun to explore the capabilities. Next time I would love to build more specific spatial maps and trajectories”.