Did you see this year's Grammys? I did, and it was packed with fantastic talent, visual extravaganzas and great dance (not to mention the Muppets). The fact of the matter is that I have seen at least 30 Grammy Award shows (this was number 53), and this was probably the best.
Actually, this was definitely the best show, and there is a specific reason for it being so amazing. That reason is because I got a chance to get a tour of the entire show inside out, audio to video, rehearsal to world broadcast (backstage to front of house).
A Fantasy Come True
It all started when my editor, Bill Evans, asked me if I would cover this year's Grammy Award show. That was as big as if Angelina Jolie had had called me up for a date (that is a totally different fantasy, but you get the idea). Needless to say, I was very excited at the prospect of checking out how this year's Grammy Awards show was put together.
The tour was conducted by very accommodating hosts. I arrived with my photographer at the backstage loading ramp of the Staples Center in Los Angeles on the Friday before the big event. We were informed that no pictures could be taken once we were on the floor of Staples Center. That was disappointing, but we managed to get a few shots of me in various locations. Anyway, they directed us to an area where two large, shiny black trucks were parked. These were the Eclipse and Horizon remote recording trucks belonging to M3 (Music Mix Mobile). This is where the music mix happens during the broadcast, as well as where rehearsals for the 16 different acts are recorded. How it works is, an act is rehearsing on Stage A or B in the Staples Center. The audio and video from the stage is sent to a place called Splitsville (see photo, page 21). From there, the signals travel upstairs to the M3 trucks, or out to the front of house consoles for the live mix, or downstairs to the Denali trucks where the audio and video are mixed with audience audio and announcer microphones and prepared for world transmission. That said, let's go back to M3's Eclipse truck, which handles the live music mix, and the Horizon offline remix truck, which has an identical mirrored audio system.
Recording the Rehearsals
The one-hour rehearsal for each of the 16 acts is recorded (audio/video) and sent to the Eclipse remote mix truck. Music mixers John Harris (who mixed the last 18 Grammy shows) and Eric Schilling (7 Grammy shows) each mixer get eight acts. Once each rehearsal is over, the recorded version is exported to the Horizon truck. All the mixer has to do is walk from one truck to the other. There he can work with the recorded rehearsal and fine-tune the mix. In addition, the artist, the artist's producer or any pertinent person can work with John or Eric to help tweak the mix.
Meanwhile, back in Eclipse (truck #1), a new act is rehearsing for their hour and being recorded. The idea is brilliant; each engineer gets the hour rehearsal time and an additional hour fine-tuning time. Of course, all this is just a starting point for the live performance, but the basic snapshots have been stored into the mixing console. So by the time a particular act is performing live in front of the world, it is up to them to deliver a great performance. The mixing engineers will definitely be up to speed.
The Grammy Awards' technical staff continually strives to employ the latest technology, and they have the highest-quality production values on the show. As in years past, the Recording Academy Producers & Engineers Wing members Phil Ramone (Denali truck) and Hank Neuberger (Eclipse truck) again supervised the broadcast audio, while fellow P&E Wing member Leslie Ann Jones supervised the FOH audio. Basically, the Academy sends their golden ears to listen at these critical areas to ensure consistency.
The Backstage Area
After checking out the interiors of the trucks, we walked down the loading ramp into the Staples Center backstage area. This is where the Denali trucks were located. Here, in the first section of this truck, broadcast production mixer Tom Holmes takes the 5.1 audio sent from the M3 Eclipse truck and adds audience audio, announcer mics, hand held mics, video playback, audio playback and so on to make the ultimate audio for world transmission.
There is also an audio playback engineer in the truck to cue the song of the winner of each category. Of course, nobody knows in advance, so this engineer must hit the right button at the right time for the right song – no pressure here!
Next, we walked into the other section of the truck that housed the show's director, technical director, the lighting director and any other video directors who were working. This section of the truck was filled with numerous video screens, and a lot of people were working at the same time. It was a bit crowded so I could only peek in, but it looked very exciting. The video and the audio are merged through a very large router and sent out to the world in seven transmission formats. I don't know what all seven are, but there was satellite, fiber, international and more.
Preparing to Rock
As we left the Denali complex, we walked by the staff/crew radio control area. Now these are not the wireless mics that the individual performers and announcers use. This is the communications for the working crew. There were 80 radios used by this group and 22 antennas throughout the Staple Center arena. Frequency coordination is completely off the hook. Thomas was the staff RF engineer, and he said it takes months to prep for this gig. Of course, they have to be able to make changes on the fly, such as a guitar player showing up with an unexpected wireless system for his rig.
From there, we walked by riser after riser that had been prepped with individual performers' backline gear. Let's say the riser had a drum kit and monitors or keyboards and monitors. Everything was miked up and ready to go. The stage sound crew just rolled the riser onto one of the stages, plugged into a multi-pin and they were ready to rock.
Next, we were at the wireless performance mic section. Dave Bellamy was in charge of this section. Twenty-four antennas were distributed throughout the arena to accommodate all the wireless mics and belt packs. These antennas created four zones for seamless transmission. Dave was backstage with all the receivers and the antenna control module. It was beautiful. Some artists used house wireless and others brought their own, but all the mics were stored in these aluminum baking trays. This very "low-tech" solution kept the signals separated.
The last place for us to go was the Front of House area. Ron Reaves and Mikael Stewart were the F.O.H. engineers and, like every engineer at the Grammys, they were total pros with decades of experience under their belt. ATK Audiotek supplied the live audio for the arena. There were a couple of Yamaha digital boards and a JBL VerTec line array. The sound was top quality, but I would expect no less for this type of event.
When I finally watched the show live on TV on Sunday, Feb. 13, I had a whole different perspective and appreciation of what goes into the production of the Grammys. All in all, it was an amazing tour – much better than any field trips I ever went to in high school. (For crew and gear, turn to page 32).
