Yamaha tackles UEFA Euro 2012

Yamaha’s recently launched CL series of consoles were assigned the challenging task of mixing sound at four stadiums at the UEFA Euro 2012 tournament in Poland and Ukraine.

At the launch of the CL series back in March of this year, European audio production company Neumann & Mueller purchased four CL5s especially for the tournament. The desks were used for audio mixing of all in-stadium announcements and pre- and post-match entertainment, with a CL5 installed at each of the Polish venues.

Andy Cooper, manager at Yamaha Commercial Audio Europe’s support centre, supplied support to Neumann & Mueller’s team on the project, alongside Pawel Zachanowicz, Commercial Audio Application/sales engineer for Yamaha Music Europe GmbH in Poland.

“The opening ceremony had a complex audio specification, including wireless microphone inputs, in-ear monitor systems, a DJ music feed and multiple playback tracks from the Outside Broadcast studio,” said Cooper. “The CL5 was located pitch-side and the long distances between devices meant that a digital system was the only feasible solution. As well as the stadium’s loudspeaker system, there were also hangs of loudspeakers for the opening ceremony and monitors for the performers.”

A GPI relay link was also provided from the stadium control room to the CL5, which muted the system in case of emergency.
Neumann & Mueller’s Omar Samhoun managed the audio systems at the four Polish stadiums and was impressed with the performance of the CL consoles.

“The CL5’s performance was great. I really liked the user-defined fader banks and the Premium Racks were really helpful,” he said. “The dynamic equaliser in particular is exceptionally good for these kind of events. Setting up the networking side of the CL5s was also very straightforward and they were exceptionally reliable.”

Meanwhile, Yamaha M7CL digital consoles were also utilised in conjunction with Riedel RockNet to perform the same functions at the four stadiums in Ukraine.

“We are very pleased that Neumann & Mueller chose the CL5 and M7CL consoles for such a high profile event as UEFA Euro 2012,” commented Stefan Zeiger, product manager, Commercial Audio at Yamaha Music Europe.

“With each stadium holding many thousands of fans and every game being broadcast to millions of people across Europe, we were happy to be able to play a part in making the tournament such a huge success.”

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