latest news headlines
Innovason’s Compact SY40 is Big Hit on Aimee Mann Tour
An InnovaSON Sy40 digital console was the recent choice of Ryan Cecil, monitor engineer for singer, songwriter and musician Aimee Mann, for a string of US dates.
Playing at 1000 or 2000-capacity theatres and clubs across the USA meant that the mini-tour could only carry the essentials, with sonic clarity, flexibility and consistency in the limited space available being of top priority. With racks, stacks and wedges supplied at the venues, only backline for a five-piece band plus microphones and personal monitor systems feeding the compact InnovaSON Sy40 needed to be transported around.
Mann's Neumann KMS 105 mic goes directly into the InnovaSON Sy40 digital console without any outboard processing. "Aimee sings centre stage for the whole show and at one point she sings a new song called ‘King of the Jailhouse’, where she moves over to the piano player's position and plays and sings using his Sennheiser wired Evolution Series 903," said Cecil.
"The InnovaSON Sy40 is perfect because it's a compact console that has everything on board. I found the scene recall especially handy as Aimee would jump from acoustic guitar, to bass, to electric guitar and keyboards."
Ryan, who’s previously used the original InnovaSON Compact Live consoles for the Boston Symphony and the Boston Pops, also rates the Sy40’s ability to provide the band with the same mix everyday. "I would walk on stage and all I would have to do is tune to different wedges and then the guy's mixes were all set,” he says. “Aimee's mix never changes. The onboard compression and EQ are really helpful, especially on an output for in-ears." Innovason’s Sensoft software includes a feature which is invaluable when using stereo in-ear monitors: an independent pan for each input routed in each mix bus/output allows each musician to have their own mix with the required stereo image.
Cecil uses the onboard recallable mic preamps on 32 inputs of the Sy40 as well as mixing to 16 outputs for the five musicians on stage who all experiment with personal monitors, requiring both the on-stage wedges and PMs to be sent all 16 mixes. "To be able to have 32 inputs and 16 outputs going on a console that's not more than four feet wide by three feet deep is pretty impressive,” says Cecil. “I don't know of any board out there I can do that on."
Before the advent of the Sy40, Cecil remembers playing at similar venues where the available consoles were not only too large to run in allotted spaces, neither would they fit in standing-room-only set-ups. " I could position the Sy40 almost anywhere that there was standing room," he explains. "I mixed one venue down in Atlanta where I was actually standing in a staircase mixing - that was where the space was."
The Aimee Mann tour, which features the singer playing acoustic and electric guitar, bass and keyboard, plus a four-piece band of drums, bass, guitar and keyboards, continues with more dates on the West Coast of America throughout August – accompanied once again by the Sy40.
4th August 2004
HEADLINES
news archive
search stories
FOOTNOTE: Select the news type you require in the red band above; this will enable you to see the current news stories from that section
© 1999 - 2012 Entertainment Technology Press Limited News Stories
