SSL Live at Edinburgh Castle

This summer’s Commonwealth Games in Glasgow were preceded by Live at Edinburgh Castle, a 2.5-hour multi-act concert, televised live on the BBC. The line-up for the event included Culture Club, OneRepublic, Kaiser Chiefs, Motown legend Smokey Robinson, Jessie J, Paloma Faith, and Il Divo. Various acts were backed by a 12-piece house band and the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra. Two SSL Live consoles were provided by Britannia Row Productions.

Though the event was headed by Brit Row project manager Lez Dwight, with Stefan Krista managing the inputs and cross-patch from scores of 12-way sub-snakes, Nahuel Gutierrez operated one SSL Live for the 75-member orchestra, generating group stems for FOH, monitors, BBC broadcast, and 16 personal monitor stems for the orchestra. Niccolo Antonietti used the second SSL Live console to mix monitors/IEMs for the house band, along with guest vocals, guest backline, and Pro Tools tracks, totalling 60 outputs for 30 stereo mixes. Both SSL Live consoles were located remotely with only a BBC program shot to watch. As freelance engineers, rehearsal for the Edinburgh Castle concert was the first time Gutierrez and Antonietti had the opportunity to use an SSL Live console.

Antonietti’s console handled the house band, made up of drums, bass, guitars, two keyboards, percussion, and three backing vocals, as well as director Mike Stevens’ keyboard and guitars. He also controlled the handheld microphones for guests, ambient microphones, intercoms, BBC feeds, and 16 channels of Pro Tools, bringing Antonietti’s desk to 120 input channels. The two SSL Live consoles also had a MADI connection between them to feed stem subgroups back and forth.

Image: Niccolo? Antonietti and Nahuel Gutierrez with SSL Live 

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