Ben Grossman has been wowing audiences with his electroacoustics vielle a roué, or hurdy-gurdy as it is also called. He’s currently out on the road with BT and Trifon, as well as Thomas Dolby, creating a mesmerizing live performance that combines visuals with live 5.1 surround sound.
I’ve really been taking advantage of the dual-engine structure of the Eventide H8000FW. It gives me extreme quad and octal effects on the first engine. Then I’m feeding that signal into the second engine to create a 5.1 reverb. On one level, you’ve got a number of interesting things happening in quad; then when you feed it into a reverb with channels being crossfed, it really brings the sound to life. With the H8000FW, I’ve been able to, in real time, create surround sound textures and atmospheres that are a huge part of our show. For such a computer-centric tour, it’s ironic to note that there are some things that can only be done with the H8000FW for gorgeous, live surround sound design. But really, you should have seen BT and Thomas. Their jaws hit the floor about 10 seconds after they heard me using the H8000FW!
