Whether on tour in Europe or North America, Electro-Voice XLC & XLD line arrays ensure every nuance of Daniel O’Donnell’s voice is heard clearly on every seat in the house, be that a 2,500-seat theater or a 7,500-seat stadium.
From left: Front-of-house engineer Padraig Grogan, Dave Alderdice (Sound Art Toronto, production manager), monitor system tech Greg Clinton (Sound Art Calgary), video director Marc Stevenson, Dwayne Olde (Sound Art Calgary, P.A. system tech) and monitor engineer Garry Warner
For O’Donnell’s current tour of North America, Sound Art (Canada) deployed a flexible P.A. comprising 24x XLC DVX (main line arrays), 24x XLD281 (side-fill arrays), 4x X-Subs and 6x ZX1 front-fills, all powered by P3000RL remote-controlled amplifiers running IRIS-Net software. Across the pond, Nolan Sound (Ireland) deployed the full X-Line Very Compact setup (XLD, XS212 and XLE) powered by P3000 amps for the singer’s UK and Ireland tours, run with X-subs powered by E-V TG-7 amps and all controlled via Dx38 processors.
“Sound Art has provided E-V sound for all Daniel O’Donnell’s North American tours in recent years, but this year the new XLC DVX is making a particularly strong sonic impression,” says Dave Alderdice, general Manager, Sound Art Toronto. “DVX has noticeably improved low-mid reproduction and the highs have more definition; Daniel has a lot of seniors in his audience, so this really helps improve their enjoyment of the show. Though we have the horsepower on hand to deliver a loud stadium rock show, the XLC/XLD combination works equally well for far gentler music—these boxes simply sound good.”
In using two sizes of line array, Sound Art can reconfigure their standard theater setup to precisely address the various shapes and sizes of venues on the tour. At the Target Center in Minneapolis, one of the larger shows on the schedule, the main XLC DVX arrays were flown high and vertical for deeper throw, with three additional XLD boxes flown under each array to provide down-fill for the front rows.
“I’ve used this same system for a wide range of events and it works well for all styles at all SPLs,” Alderdice adds “You can’t say that about most line arrays. In addition, the RL amps deliver clean power and lots of it, and running IRIS-Net is great—our systems tech is able to go out into the venue with a tablet, tune the P.A. from any point in the room and check the performance of every speaker component. Plus, the whole system packs up into a half a semi-trailer.”
For additional information, visit Electro-Voice at www.electrovoice.com. For additional information on Sound Art, visit www.soundart.com. For additional touring news, visit mixonline.com/live/tourprofiles/.
