Gemini Sound & KF760 Team Up For NHL All-Star Game
At the recent 2007 National Hockey League (NHL) All-Star Game, Gemini Sound of Dallas was called upon to provide a full-scale concert sound reinforcement system - headed by EAW KF760 Series line arrays - in support of several live music performances.
The event, held at the American Airlines Center arena in Dallas, was highlighted by two fully stocked stages that actually lowered from the ceiling to the hockey rink playing surface during the game’s period breaks for mini-concerts by country act The Wreckers (featuring Michelle Branch and Jessica Harp) and emerging alternative rockers Red Jumpsuit Apparatus.
Gemini Sound emerged from a competitive field as the choice of the NHL to provide sound reinforcement and support for the event, with company president Tim Cain and his team formulated a dynamic main system based upon EAW KF760 line arrays, with two arrays covering the two “sides” of the arena joined by single arrays to handle each “end.” (One of the "end" arrays and two of the "side" arrays can be seen in the photo above, with the existing house loudspeakers clustered above the scoreboard.)
All arrays were flown from trusses, well out of TV camera sightlines, and the 48 total boxes were divided into identical array structures: four KF760 modules flown above four KF761 modules to supply the much wider horizontal coverage required of the ever-widening main level seating all the way to the playing surface.
“The EAW KF760 Series proves time and again that it’s one of the premium line arrays available,” Tim Cain explains. (Tim is at right in above photo, with Chad Cain and Jason Litt, at the mix position.) “Start with a great sonic signature, and then add in consistency plus the ability to smoothly widen coverage with the KF761, and then top if it off with the fastest rigging system in the industry. You really can’t go wrong with this system.” (At right, we see how it looked with both stages lowered.)
To punch up the low end even further, Gemini Sound built custom platforms to fly 10 EAW SB1000 dual-18-inch-loaded subwoofers per side. Each platform accommodated five over five stacks of SB1000’s, positioned to each side of the venue’s main scoreboard structure along both “long” sides of the arena. “The subs added a nice bit of warmth to the signature, which goes with a true live concert-style presentation,” Cain adds. (The photo below shows a KF760 array and one of the SB1000 groups flown above the audience.)
Gemini Sound’s Chad Cain and Mike Milligan served as primary system techs for the event, with Chad Cain also providing the monitor mix for the set by Red Jumpsuit Apparatus. Meanwhile, Jason Litt, a long-time Gemini Sound colleague now with the Dallas office of RTKL Associates, also came on board to assist guest mix engineers using the system as well as providing expert system tuning with an assist from EAW Smaart sound system measurement and analysis software.
The planning and smart design practices paid off with tight, punchy concert audio at every seat in the arena, true to the intent of the NHL in this annual showcase event for the league. “They envisioned big-time concert PA to up the production value, and that was achieved in spades,” Tim Cain concludes. “We kept it simple and slick on the infrastructure side while adding considerable impact to the audio signature. What was achieved here will likely be a building block to even more emphasis on production as the NHL goes forward in the future.”