latest news headlines
Chicago's Museum of Contemporary Art Adds Precision 8
The 300-seat auditorium in Chicago's Museum of Contemporary Art (MCA) hosts an amazing diversity of musical and theatrical styles, from jazz to classical and from pop to avant-garde. Dennis O'Shea, the MCA's manager of technical production, recently added a second eight-channel TRUE Systems Precision 8 preamp/DI to the auditorium's reinforcement and archival system so that all sixteen recording channels could benefit from the Precision 8's clean, warm sound.
The MCA bought the original Precision 8 after upgrading to a Yamaha DM1000 digital mixer. O'Shea explained: "We switched over from the typical 'barge' board to get something smaller and to take advantage of digital memory. With the addition of the sixteen Precision pres we've added a very exclusive layer to the board. The Precision 8 has a warmth, clarity, and consistency that's unlike any other mic pre I've sampled before. Since it's honest and uncolored, it serves all of the varied musical styles that play the MCA nicely."
In addition to live reinforcement, the MCA archives performances to hard drive or digital tape through a 16-channel Aurora converter, bypassing the console altogether. With the second unit, all 16 channels are now fed by TRUE Systems pres.
In addition to a 1.5 Hz to 500 kHz frequency response - which ensures that the much smaller audio range is fully within the linear response of the circuitry - the Precision 8 has additional features that greatly increase its flexibility for the MCA. First, channels one and two are capable of decoding MS (mid-side) stereo information, which O'Shea uses with a pair of matched AKG microphones. Second, two of the channels can serve as direct inputs (DIs), which O'Shea prefers to both his active and passive standalone DIs. "There's an obvious difference that I can hear. The Precision 8 DIs are much cleaner and don't have that 'dry' sound that I associate with active
DIs. It rounds and warms the sound of guitars, keyboards, bass, or anything else we have occasion to use them with."
In picture: Another True Systems Precision 8 mic pre has been added to the Chicago Museum of Contemporary Art's 300-seat performance auditorium.
2nd November 2007
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
