Emeli Sand? relies on Britannia Row for Hammersmith show

A Turbosound system supplied by Entertainment Sound Specialists (ESS) via Britannia Row Productions was used for a recent Emeli Sandé gig at Hammersmith Apollo.

The powerful Flashline set-up – designed to deliver hi-fi sound to large audiences using paper cone midrange transducers – was specified by Sandé’s live sound engineer Darren Connor for the final concert of the singer’s seven-date UK tour.

Connor deployed a configuration of 11 Flashline TFS-900H flown per side, six Flashline TFS-900B subwoofers per side on the floor, two Aspect TA-890H in-fills and two TQ-308 passive two-way front fills for the show.

“This is a system that has been really well thought out, from the flying system right down to the amplifier features,” said Connor. “I was impressed with the contained rigging system where none of the pins or rigging parts protrude. It looks clean and is totally straightforward to fly.

“As soon as I turned on the PA, the two distinct parts of the frequency spectrum that I was immediately impressed with were the high frequencies and the sub frequencies. The fidelity and definition, while maintaining a smooth sound in the higher spectrum, were stunning. This allowed me to create a full range, open, and ‘airy’ mix without it being harsh and offensive to the ear. It also allowed me to be a little more generous with the sibilance on Emeli’s vocal to bring her voice out of the mix a little more.

“I was also impressed with the tightness of the subs. They proved to be extremely efficient, and what seemed the best level at first was actually reduced by 5dB by the time I had finished ringing out the system.”

Connor and the system techs – Adam Smith (Britannia Row Productions) and Martin Wharton and Paul Danson (ESS) – used a combination of SMAART and Turbosound TurboDrive software to configure the Flashline rig, which “made setup and zoning of the system easy,” according to Connor.

For the earlier dates on the tour, Connor opted for Turbosound’s Flex Array speaker system, which combines elements of line array theory with virtual point source technology.

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