As part of Great Southern Nights, Jessica Mauboy played to a Covid-19 version of a packed house at The Sydney Coliseum Theatre and her audio engineer Ivan Ordenes was just so happy to be back doing what he loves.
“On hearing about the show, my first feeling was happiness,” he explained. “For me, Jessica, the band, the crew and the punters …. but then I wondered how we were going to do this.”
Fortunately, Ivan remarked that The Sydney Coliseum Theatre had worked hard at making the venue Covid-safe and he was impressed by the outcome.
Ivan is also Jessica’s Production Manager and he was so busy with that hat on, it wasn’t until a week before the gig that he realised he’d be using the venue’s L-Acoustics L-ISA PA system …. and he’d never encountered it before.
“It’s a very powerful and versatile PA but you do need to rethink your approach on mixing,” said Ivan. “I think the L-ISA requires a surround system to immersive the audience into the sound. In this venue, there is no surround sound and I found it quite difficult to tell the depth of the different sound sources position with such a 2D plane. A 3D setup would allow you to get the most out of this processing.”
Ivan thought it was an interesting PA to have at a venue where touring shows that have never used it before pass through, saying you have to change your entire set up and can’t just give it left and right.
Ivan supplied his own DPA and Audio Technica microphones but the rest of the gear was in-house including the DiGiCo mixing console.
“I was happy with that as I frequently use DiGiCo consoles,” he added. “However I got caught out with the actual model and software on this console which didn’t fit my file exactly. Usually, I do FOH and monitors so we decided at the last minute to split the work and Matt Maddock came onboard to do monitors.”
Lighting design was by Shaun Cook of Lightology who had The Sydney Coliseum Theatre’s excellent stock of lighting to play with. Shaun utilised six fly bars, fairly evenly spaced from front to back, with 16 x Ayrton Mistrals, 10 Levante-S (six in the air and four on the ground), ten cyc lights, LED blinders, fresnels and 35 ShowPRO Pars overhead with another 15 out front.
“The ShowPRO PARs wash the stage really well,” said Shaun. “However, I think the rig could do with some more moving lights especially for the floor to add some more depth as it’s a large stage to fill. I like the Ayrton fixtures but I do find the LED engine a little under-powering at times. The gobos in the Mistral are great but the Levante gobos are just OK. It’s a solid rig.”
Shaun programmed and operated the show on the venue’s MA Lighting grandMA3 in MA2 mode, a console he is very familiar with as his company Lightology, also owns one.
Photos: Dan Mercer
www.dubologystudios.com
www.lightology.net.au
