After 40 years at the top of popular culture, Madonna is reimagining her live act with a beautifully curated look at her legacy, alongside her present incarnation. At the helm of the live sound is FOH Mixer Burton Ishmael, who was hand-picked by the “Holiday” singer after hearing his work with Eighth Day Sound client Post Malone.
“It’s very nice to be asked to go on tour by the boss directly!” Ishmael says. “Madonna is an exceptionally clever artist, and there can be a lot of pressure on a world tour, but thankfully, there’s a huge team effort going into what we’re doing, and the Eighth Day Sound crew are experts.
“My job as a live engineer is to ensure that I make the music transferable to the arena setting,” he continues. “Not just hearing but feeling the elements contained in the songs is the step up from the technical part of mixing; being able to create emotions and connections is key. I must bring the energy of the artist and transfer that to the audience and vice versa, from and through my mix. It’s almost like the automation phase of doing a mix on a record.”
Unconventional P.A.
Each piece of gear in the equipment package is chosen “wisely,” Ishmael says from behind his Avid Venue S6L console. “I like this desk a lot, it’s intuitive to me. L-Acoustics has been good to me, too. It’s the system I started on and have had great success with, so I don’t want to change that. The P.A. here is a little unconventional, but it allows the artist to have the whole floor laid out for her to do whatever she likes.”
Systems Engineer Andy Fitton tunes the L-Acoustics K2 system at each stop, working with P.A. Techs Nate Peterson, Tom Lawn, Harrison Travaglino, Ellis Montgomery, and Francesco Grassi. From L-Acoustics, Dave Brooks and Chris “Sully” Sullivan provide remote application support.
The design comprises K2 main hangs and KS28 subs. Outfill and side hangs are K2 with KS28 side subs and Kara II for rear hangs and centre fills. The ground system is KS28, X8 and Kara II, making up an impressive total box count of 206 speakers. The system uses 81 L-Acoustics LA12X amplifiers and two L-Acoustics P1 processors.
Fitton comments: “The design is halfway between an in-the-round system and a traditional end-zone P.A. where the stage is set to one side of the arena. We wanted to have a more dispersed audio system to avoid noise on-stage and to have the speakers closer to the audience so that there is a higher ratio of direct signal to reverberation, pushing the P.A. out into the arena.
“It can be complex to tune but we use the same fundamental principles that any P.A. system is flown with,” he continues. “We’ve fortunately had the backing and support from production to make it work wonderfully. Getting a show of this size in and out of an arena can be challenging, and the P.A. techs work exceptionally hard to keep things moving. Burton designed the system, and I think he put it best when he said the sound of this show is ‘not a greatest hits tour, but a memoir of Madonna’s life’.”
Fitton builds 3D room models using L-Acoustics’ Soundvision software and arranges the speaker deployment to achieve tonal consistency throughout the venue. Once designed and flown, Smaart tuning software and the LA Network Manager control the volume, EQ, and delay times of all the speakers individually, creating a consistent presentation of the mix throughout the scope of each venue.
Monitoring the Stage
Monitor Engineer Matt Napier is at Madonna’s side stage for the 19th year, and he’s worked with the audio provider on many other tours in his career. He comments: “The Eighth Day Sound crew, in particular my Monitor Tech Roger Bammann and Comms Tech Katlyn Mountain, have been great at looking after me. In my opinion, the crew makes the gig, and Eighth Day has fielded a first-class crew for this tour, something I appreciate.”
Having mixed Madonna’s monitors for almost two decades, Napier explains that he constantly re-evaluates how to approach audio in this type of environment: “Looking at the changes you can make to help the artist create such a large spectacle for their fans is an evolution; I’m always striving to make the show better.
“It’s always nice to be asked back by artists you work with, and it’s certainly been a fascinating journey with Madonna, he adds. “Her shows are always at the cutting edge of technology, so with each show, I approach it fresh and make sure I’m ready for the challenge—the biggest often being the environment, trying to make the IEM mix sound as consistent as possible while dealing with the acoustics of arenas.” Madonna has a preference for a Wisycom and JH Audio in-ear system.
As a longtime DiGiCo user, this tour marked Napier’s first time mixing on a Quantum 338. “It’s perfect for this show, as we don’t have a huge channel count,” he notes. “The DiGiCo Mustard and Spice Rack allows me to mix everything on the console, and the ’Naga 6 Multiband Dynamic EQ is the final thing that enables me to ditch any external processing.
“She has always reinvented her sound and style,” he sums up, “so it’s really fun to remix some of the older songs.”
Madonna’s 80-date ‘Celebration’ world tour began on October 14, 2023, at the O2 Arena in London and will conclude in Mexico City on April 26, 2024.
