OLD LYME, CT — R&B superstar and Dreamgirls actress Beyonce rides the wave of her tremendous popularity around the world during 2007 in The Beyonce Experience Tour. The tour will travel with 38 primary wireless channels and, in a different frequency range, 38 backup wireless channels.
Sixteen of the wireless channels are devoted to personal monitor systems — 11 in stereo and five in mono. Beyoncé and the rest of her band members have a Sennheiser EK 300 IEM G2 monitoring receiver. Eleven of the channels provide wireless instrument support for guitar, bass, and horns, using Sennheiser SK 500 G2 bodypack transmitters. The remaining channels cover Beyoncé's vocal microphone and those of her backup singers and guest vocalists. A bank of Sennheiser EM 3032-U and EM 550 G2 true diversity receivers with Sennheiser A 5000-CP antennas and AC 3000 combiners round out the system.
James Berry runs monitors for the band, Ramon Morales handles monitors for Beyoncé, and Horace Ward helms front-of-house. It falls on the shoulders of Berry to coordinate frequencies made with two Sennheiser NET 1 systems. He commented, "We're the biggest rig to use NET 1 so far, and it's working fabulously. I keep all of the wireless racks below stage, out of sight and out of mind. Then I hook up my laptop to NET 1 and instantly see everything.”
"The last several tours that I have been involved with have used Sennheiser wireless exclusively," Morales says. "I always use Sennheiser personal monitors because of their frequency flexibility. With other brands, I would only have a fixed number of RF channels within a frequency range to work with. In stark contrast, the Sennheiser G2s give me the ability to stay within the presets or move anywhere within the frequency range."
Beyoncé is singing through a nickel Sennheiser SKM 5200 transmitter outfitted with a Neumann KK 105-S capsule. Based on Neumann's KMS 105, 140, and 150 line of live condenser microphones. “The KK 105-S is beautifully smooth and captures every nuance of a talented vocalist's performance," Ward says. Morales agreed, "It's an easy mic to mix for personal monitors because it's so transparent and clean. It cuts through the mix effortlessly."
Ward specified Sennheiser SKM 935 G2 microphones for the backup and guest vocalists because they are designed to to sound good even under less than ideal conditions. "The Sennheiser SKM 935 is a great choice for backup singers and ideal for guest rappers," he said. "Most rappers want to crush the mic, meaning they cup the capsule. The frequency response of most microphones gets pretty crazy under such conditions, but the SKM 935 holds together without a problem."
Ward's FOH mixing technique relies heavily on his Digidesign Venue system. He records every performance to Pro Tools, taking inputs from the preamps on stage. During the day after a performance, while he waits for his full system to be set up for that night's show, he usES the playback as "inputs" and a pair of Klein + Hummel O 300 monitors, an O 900 subwoofer, a Klein + Hummel Pro A 2000 power amplifier, and a Pro M 68 bass manager for monitoring. This process, known as "virtual soundcheck,” allows him to tweak out imperfections from the previous night's mix.
"Using Klein + Hummel monitors is like taking a magnifying glass to my mix and hearing every nuance," Ward says. “I can fix things and know that they've truly been fixed.”
In addition to her hits, Beyoncé and her handpicked, all-girl band perform a suite of Destiny's Child classics in an impressive stage show. Beyoncé and her entourage performed in Japan, Australia, and Europe in April and May before returning to North America for the remainder of the tour.
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