Meyer Sound News : Belgium Rings In EU Presidency with Meyer M3D Line Array System

Belgium Rings In EU Presidency with Meyer M3D Line Array System

On July 1, Belgium assumed the presidency of the European Union with a gala celebration at the Grand-Place de Bruxelles, a historic marketplace at the center of the country's capital. Every six months, the official leadership of the European Union is passed to another of its fifteen member states, and the festivities associated with this transfer of power have become a great source of national pride.

A historic market square surrounded by 17th Century buildings, the Grand-Place is the Belgian site of choice for state functions and royal ceremonies, and a symbol to all citizens of the country's rich heritage. It also proved a challenging acoustical environment for the providers of the sound system for the event, ETF Event Engineering.

The buildings around the square posed the possibility of unwanted reflections, while the large T-shaped stage divided the square in half, effectively barring the public from the 'sweet spot' between the two arrays. Adding to the complexity of the stage setup, the square itself is on an incline, with a two-meter difference from one side to the other.

ETF chose the Meyer Sound M3D system because of its directional characteristics. "The directional control of the M3D arrays helped solve reflection problems, while their uniform coverage provided excellent sound to all areas of the square," said Valérie Lemaire, ETF spokesperson. The arrays were flown on 16-meter rigging towers on either side of the stage, and were used to play back recorded music, including music for dance, and to reinforce a live classical string performance.

In addition, the system carried speeches in French, Dutch and German. The amplification system, including 24 wireless microphones distributed across the stage, performed flawlessly, thanks to the superior intelligibility and gain before feedback of the Meyer speakers. "Each of our national languages was represented, and all the speeches were perfectly and precisely reproduced," Lemaire continued. "This made the event a great success."

Daniel Leon was sound designer for the ceremony, with Marco Gudanski and Bruno Denis serving as front-of-house engineer and monitor engineer, respectively. The show design was by Franco Dragon. The system design included eight M3Ds, three MSL-4s for near fill, and eight 650-P subwoofers on each side of the stage.

August, 2001