EAW keeps the peace at Easterfest
Published: ASIA
AUSTRALIA: EAW’s Anya sound system has been used for the recent Easterfest event in Toowoomba, Australia, marking its first appearance in the country. Situated less than 100m from nearby residents, the venue has been the frequent recipient of noise complaints, and with the extra headache that this provides the management were keen to solve the problem once and for all.
The festival is the largest Christian music festival of its kind in Australia, with close to 500 separate performances, 40 odd venues, and more than 150 artists. This year’s concert, however, has gone down as the first time in the event’s history that organisers received zero noise complaints, with the installers attributing this success to Anya’s fully-adaptable system.
‘Here’s where the beauty of Adaptive Performance comes into play,’ said EAW’s ASG specialist for the APAC region, James Bamlett. ‘The festival is held in a park in the middle of town, so noise pollution is always an issue. But Anya, together with a sub array offering excellent pattern control, allowed them to minimise the amount of spill into residential areas nearby, while still allowing festival attendees to enjoy the full sound experience inside the venue.’
A total of six Anya modules per side were deployed as the main stage L/R hangs, along with 16 SB2001 subwoofers lining the front of the stage. Additional KF740s cabinets were used for outfill, KF364s for frontfill, and NTS250s and NTL720s for sidefill. EAW’s Microwedge cabinets were also used for on-stage monitoring,
According to the manufacturer, the system’s greatest utility at Easterfest wasn’t so much that it can allocate sound anywhere that it’s wanted, but that it gives engineers the ability to eliminate sound where it’s not wanted.
‘To be honest I was sceptical about the extent to which Anya’s pattern control would live up to the hype,’ said David Schenk, event director. ‘The audio at the main stage on day one was excellent. But the really impressive thing was that for the first time ever, we did not receive a single noise complaint during its running time and we didn’t make the slightest compromise on volume or sound quality in the venue.’