the only amp that’s going to give you
that. There’s 24,000 watts of low end,”
Prinsloo says.
At first glance it seems odd that the
PA isn’t flown. “There’s a firewall that
has to be able to fall and we had to get
a bunch of engineering drawings done
for that and we just haven’t had the place
long enough to get it,” he explains. But
stacking the PA on large, wheeled platforms hasn’t negatively impacted sound.
Flexibility, he explains, is what sets
the QE apart from similar rooms. Both
Front of House and monitor rigs, stacks,
racks and two Yamaha consoles – a PM
4000 and PM 3500 respectively – can
be moved relatively easily to accommodate an incoming act desire to augment
production, or bring in their own. A secondary mix position dead center of the
final three rows of level seating further
enhances that flexibility.
Though it’s a permanent install,
it’s designed, even aesthetically, like a
touring rig. “The consoles are still in
the road cases and the FOH rack is a
touring rack; using multi-pin cables and
connectors so that it could be torn down
in a hurry,” explains Westbury National
Show Systems’ Rob Sandolowich, who
provided a good portion of the system.
Although Sandolowich made some
suggestions to Prinsloo based on Westbury’s current inventory — namely
some Dolby Lake crossovers they had
in overstock — he stresses that Prinsloo knew pretty much exactly what
he wanted. “It’s not like no expense is
spared,” adds Sandolowich. “They had
to think carefully about how they spend
their money.” That meant spreading the
money around to get the most bang for
the buck and a system that measured up
to the demands of virtually any incoming artists’ technical riders. Put simply,
says Prinsloo, “A killer loudspeaker system that sounds absolutely fantastic and
a really nice light rig.”
“He knows our gear and we’ve been
working together for years,” says San-
The Adamson Metrix loudspeakers, mounted
on the venue’s proscenium, supplements the
system’s center coverage.
dolowich. That knowledge helped keep
costs down, allowing the owners to agree
on a combination of new and rented
equipment from Westbury’s inventory.
“Half the clubs you run into in the city,
they’ve got a lot of stuff, but when they
get down to gates and comps, they put
in a bunch of junk. There’s none of that
in this rig, it’s all high quality components.” From mic pack to processing,
the common denominator was doing
right by artists, their techs, and their
audiences.
Simplifying Cable Runs
Another unique element of the build
was the speed with which it was completed. Then again, they didn’t have
much choice given the demands of
their timeline. They took possession of
the venue May 1, 2008, the gear in the
last week of May, and had to be up and
running for their first show by June 6.
Luckily, very little slowed their prog-
ress. One change necessary involved
the cable run from the stage to Front of
House. Previously it had gone the long
way around, offstage, to the wall, up the
outside of the wall and back to Front of
House. “It was just too long so we ran it
through the ceiling. That was really the
only issue,” says Prinsloo.
In all, the install took three days.
Being that the QE was already a working, if underused, theater, much of the
infrastructure in terms of power and rigging was already there. “The fly pipes
behind the proscenium were in good
shape, there’s some nice FOH positions
for lighting,” says Sandolowich. “They
might add rigging for the sound in
the future, but, if you look at the angle
where it’s sitting it’s probably bang on
to where it needs to be. There’s no real
elevation in this venue so there may not
be any reason to fly it.”
Having large conduits and cable
bridges already in place saved time in
