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ADS and the Royal Festival Hall Orchestra
In order the give the public a more in-depth understanding of the structure of an orchestra, the Royal Festival Hall on the South Bank, London came up with an original and unique way of introducing the structure and sound of the orchestra to both children and adults.
By positioning sixty special pods in the physical shape of an orchestra and feeding the sound of individual instruments to each pod, the system enables visitors to listen to the different sounds of the respective musical instruments that comprise the orchestra.
The concept revolutionary to say the least, but the implementation was not so straightforward. The Royal Festival Hall turned to Audio Design Services Ltd., of Stockport to configure a way of creating an amplifier for each pod position without the need to house 60 separate amplifiers. It was also necessary to provide high quality loudspeakers in the pods to faithfully reproduce the original sound of the respective instruments and yet come within a tight budget.
Audio Design used eight Cloud amplifiers each with eight modular forty watt amplifiers, providing adequate power to cover all orchestra positions - this enabled the whole system to be contained within a reasonable rack space. The use of sensitive Sonodine high power ceiling loudspeakers provided the realistic reproduction of sound that was required.
Whilst the feeds to the installation were achieved by some clever electronic and computing techniques, the basic system produced by Audio Design provided the realism that was required. David Hopkins OBE, chairman of Audio Design (pictured), said that his company seemed to have gained a reputation for solving difficult sound distribution problems. He went on to say that in this case there were three criteria – the right product for the job, an extremely tight deadline and finally a budget that was almost impossible to meet. David went on to say that his company has achieved all three – but only just.
Jude Kelly OBE, director of the South Bank Centre, said the initiative had been an unqualified success and the project had already been short listed for an award because of its unique educational value. Jude went to say that plans are well advanced to take the ‘orchestra’ on the road.
20th September 2006
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