Meyer Sound News : San Francisco Opera Simulcast Breaks New Ground with HD Video and Meyer Sound

San Francisco Opera Simulcast Breaks New Ground with HD Video and Meyer Sound

"For me, it was important to have Meyer Sound systems at all simulcast locations. We can count on them for control of coverage and achieve 'transparent' sound."

- Max Christensen
Master Audio Engineer, San Francisco Opera

In order to bring the magic of live opera to a larger audience, in 2006 the San Francisco Opera launched a pioneering outreach program that aims to make opera accessible to a broad audience through a series of live, high-definition simulcasts of performances from San Francisco's War Memorial Opera House, offered to the public at no charge. After two previous simulcasts attracted audiences of 8,000 and 14,000 for simulcasts to outdoor locations, San Francisco Opera general director David Gockley brought the simulcasts indoors this summer for a presentation of Mozart's Don Giovanni. Held at four different venues around the Bay Area, the simulcasts all featured large-format HD video displays paired with pristine sound provided by Meyer Sound self-powered loudspeaker systems.

Each of the four venues — the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts Theatre in San Francisco; Zellerbach Hall at the University of California, Berkeley; the Wells Fargo Center for the Arts in Santa Rosa; and the Robert and Margrit Mondavi Center for the Performing Arts at the University of California, Davis — received the HD signals via satellite, and was equipped with a Meyer Sound system appropriate for its needs.

A broad variety of Meyer Sound loudspeaker models were used in the systems, ranging from veteran legacy cabinets to relative newcomers such as Meyer Sound's powerful M'elodie ultracompact high-power curvilinear array loudspeaker. In addition, the extensive Meyer Sound system inside the opera house itself was used for sound effects, offstage performers, and orchestra foldback. "For me, it was important to have Meyer Sound systems at all simulcast locations," says the opera's master audio engineer for more than a quarter century, Max Christensen. "We can count on them for control of coverage and achieve 'transparent' sound."

The opera's longtime equipment supplier, Pro Media/UltraSound of Hercules, Calif., coordinated audio and video for all four venues. Project manager David Bowers helped ensure consistent performances at the San Francisco, Santa Rosa, and Berkeley venues, all of which contain Meyer Sound house systems.

The 750-seat Yerba Buena Center for the Arts Theatre, situated in the southeast of the opera house, provided an intimate atmosphere for its guests. The stereo audio signal was reproduced for them by legacy, unpowered UPA-1A compact wide coverage loudspeakers. House audio engineer Cedric Lathan bolstered the sound in the middle of the wide room by generating a mono mix and sending it to the MVC-5 graduated vertical coverage loudspeaker that serves as the venue's center channel system.

About 50 miles north of San Francisco in Santa Rosa, 1,500 opera fans gathered at the Wells Fargo Center for the Arts' Ruth Finley Person Theatre to listen to Don Giovanni through the venue's superb house system, which is based around twin arrays of five M2D compact curvilinear array loudspeakers each. Two UPM-1P ultracompact and four UPA-1P compact wide coverage loudspeakers fill in the front and corners, while four 650-P high-power subwoofers kick in when needed to provide thunderous effects.

Meyer Sound M2D arrays also anchor the 2,014-seat Zellerbach Hall's sound system. The system includes six arrays of six cabinets per side supplemented by M2D-Sub compact subwoofers and legacy 650-R2 subwoofers. In addition, the hall's new Constellation electroacoustic architecture system was enabled for the occasion, providing subtle, yet effective, enhancement of the venue's natural reverberation.

The 1,800-seat Mondavi Center, which until recently lacked a permanent Meyer Sound system, received special attention from Bowers, who brought in and flew a system of 13 M'elodie cabinets per side, augmented by a groundstacked CQ-2 narrow coverage main loudspeaker and an M3D-Sub subwoofer on each side. Meyer Sound's Design Services team employed MAPP Online Pro acoustical prediction software to help determine proper array configuration and placement, then representatives from Pro Media/UltraSound supplied, rigged, and tuned the system.

Back at the War Memorial Opera House, more than 50 Meyer Sound loudspeakers were available for foldback, offstage singers' voices, and realistic sound effects. In addition to CQ-1 wide coverage main loudspeakers and CQ-2 cabinets — originally designed specifically for the opera house's 1997 renovation — the opera's Meyer Sound inventory includes the MSL-6 horn-loaded high-Q main loudspeaker, PSW-6 high-power cardioid subwoofer, MTS-4A full-range main loudspeaker, UPA-1P wide coverage and UPM-1P narrow coverage compact loudspeakers, HD-1 high definition audio monitor, and a sizable complement of MM-4 miniature wide-range loudspeakers.

The relationship between Meyer Sound and the San Francisco Opera goes back many years, and has proven so symbiotic that the organization uses Meyer Sound loudspeakers exclusively. "Meyer Sound loudspeakers can handle the wide dynamic range of opera, and also the high SPL we need to create for sounds like thunderclaps and deep organ notes," says Christensen. "Where other loudspeakers sometimes sound like they are stressed to their limits, Meyer Sound loudspeakers handle it all with ease. I think that's where they gain their transparency. They have the headroom that other systems apparently don't enjoy."

For the video component, Concept Organization, Inc. of San Francisco supplied the HD video projectors, Tandberg high-def encoders and decoders, and satellite downlinks for the simulcasts. The HD video signal was at 1920-by-1080 pixels resolution, with stereo, 24-bit/48kHz audio embedded in the stream. The Don Giovanni simulcast was the first to use the facilities of the San Francisco Opera's new Koret-Taube Media Suite, reportedly the first permanent high-definition, broadcast-standard video production facility installed in any American opera house. The Koret-Taube Media Suite gives the opera the in-house capability to generate a high-definition, multi-camera live feed of the stage for many uses, including simulcasts and OperaVision, a program, also launched for Don Giovanni, that allows balcony patrons the opportunity to watch a performance on retractable high-definition video screens.

October, 2007