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Sadler's Wells Resounds to Flamenco Festival with d&b T-Series
Orbital Sound has reported that it supplied a comprehensive sound system for this year's Flamenco Festival, staged at Sadler's Wells in late March and featuring six companies in a non-stop two-week programme. The system included the new d&b audiotechnik T-Series loudspeakers, with 16 x T10s and T-SUBS configured as a mix of vertical point-source standalone cabinets and horizontal mini line array groups. This is the 4th year that Orbital Sound has been involved with the Flamenco Festival, working with resident sound technician Tom Hares.
The 2009 Festival kicked off with less than 24 hours to load in and test the system before the first performance, involving two teams working back-to-back to get everything in place. Tom Hares elaborates: "Every year is different with one exception - it's always demanding! On the Friday night before the Flamenco Festival started, we had 120 children on stage in "Dance United", with no spare time whatsoever before the first performance the following evening. Luke Hyde from Orbital worked with our in-house team of five technicians, putting in a full concert set-up that included the loudspeaker system, monitor desk, all the microphones, HME wireless comms, on-stage speakers and most of the cabling. Our long-standing relationship with Orbital is an essential component - we each know how the other works, and do lots of preparation in advance. Importantly, we always feel that they will go the extra mile for us and think the whole project through in advance, so that it all comes together when it needs to. I have always regarded the Q-Series as being are a perfect complement to flamenco music, but this year, we decided to try the T-Series - in the event, they were great to work with, particularly regarding their size and weight, and sounded very good."
Directed by José Antonio, this year's Festival programme featured choreography from three of flamenco's brightest talents: Fernando Romero, Ángel Rojas and Carlos Rodríguez (founders of Nuevo Ballet Español), as well as Antonio Canales.
The T-Series is intentionally designed to address an extremely wide range of small- to medium-sized applications, from multiple cabinet line arrays through to single standalone loudspeakers for deployment in locations sharing the same fundamental requirements, to achieve precise control of directivity and maintain this to the lowest possible frequency. d&b audiotechnik has used a combination of techniques to achieve this - including dipolar low frequency driver arrangements, low compression venting with high excursion drivers and a unique combination of a rotatable waveguide horn and acoustic lens. The T-Series is designed to combine an unobtrusive visual design, with compact dimensions, lightweight, high power and exemplary directivity performance.
The T10 cabinet (470/18.5 x 197/7.8 x 300/11.8 mm/inch) is a passive 2-way design that houses 2 x 6.5" drivers, a 1.4" exit HF compression driver. It can be used either as a compact component in a multiple cabinet line array or, by rotating the horn, as a high directivity point source loudspeaker. The HF driver is fitted to a unique waveguide horn, producing vertical line source directivity with a 90° horizontal pattern that is maintained down to approximately 600 Hz. An acoustic lens placed in front of the horn widens horizontal dispersion to 105°. By rotating the horn by 90°, it produces an accurate point source dispersion that transforms a vertically-oriented T10 into a stand-alone full range loudspeaker, with 90° horizontal and 35° vertical directivity pattern. This is ideal for deployment in locations requiring precise control of directivity. The horn can easily be rotated from outside the loudspeaker without tools or removing the front grill. This is achieved through apertures in the cabinet sides that allow rotation to both the line and point source positions. The two 6.5" neodymium LF drivers are positioned in a dipolar arrangement, providing an exceptional dispersion control even at lower frequencies.
The T-SUB shares the same width and integrated rigging fittings as the T10 and can either be flown at the top of a T10 array, in a separate column or it can also be ground stacked. It is used to increase the low frequency headroom and extend the bandwidth of a T10 column down to 47 Hz. The bass-reflex design utilises a high excursion 15" driver with a neodymium magnet assembly and employs d&b SenseDrive technology when driven by the D12 amplifier. The d&b D6 and D12 dual channel amplifiers provide two different power ranges, incorporate d&b loudspeaker-specific configuration information, including the T-Series loudspeakers, and incorporate analogue and digital signal inputs and links.
19th May 2009
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