Production Profile

Bob Seger doesn't tour or record often. The "other" Motor City Madman has released all of three LPs in the last 20 years, and the current Silver Bullet Band tour that commenced in March is his first in five years, and only the second in 16 years. However, when you can sell 20 million of those three records in that time (as Rolling Stone points out, Bruce Springsteen has sold only 8 million in the same time frame) and consistently sell out your tour dates every time around, you don't really have to do anything in volume – except turn it up.

Morris Light & Sound Combines Touring and Installed Electro-Voice X-Line Systems

This year's top country tour, Kenny Chesney, has filled many arenas, amphitheaters, and stadiums over the last decade. But the new Dallas Cowboys Stadium, next to Rangers Ballpark in Arlington, TX and host to last year's Super Bowl, is the largest.

Audio "Team of Rivals" Join Staging Company in Supporting Four-Day Festival

When you think of New Orleans music festival, you think of the Jazz & Heritage. But for locals, there's one that's as dear to their hearts as Du Monde coffee and beignets: The French Quarter Music Festival. This year was the 28th, and over four days in April, 260 local bands performed on 20 stages spread throughout the French Quarter for 533,000 music fans. From brass bands to Zydeco, classical to classic jazz, country to rock, it is a potpourri assault on the senses – the good kind. 

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.

Aside from everything that FOH readers have already tweeted, texted, blogged, posted and/or uploaded regarding the 12 minutes that was the Bridgestone Super Bowl XLV Halftime Show featuring the Black Eyed Peas, Slash and Usher, what follows here is a recap of the week that led up to that moment (and others) in and around Arlington's Cowboys Stadium.

The holiday season has enough stresses on its own without adding a two-week, 12-show tour with longtime music superstars Vince Gill and Amy Grant. But Hugh Johnson, 21-year FOH engineer and production manager for Gill, takes it in stride, delivering excellence through consistency with a dedicated production team giving their best each day.

For the fourth successive year, Duran Audio provided all PA systems for Open Source Festival, which took place at the picturesque Grafenburg race course in the heart of Düsseldorf, Germany.

What started as a way to get around gambling laws has grown into a huge business. Back in 1994, the floating Argosy Casino first set sail on the Mississippi River about 15 minutes from downtown St. Louis. It was the first of the "riverboat" casinos. Today, those "boats" are buildings that float, and some have production venues that rival anything on solid ground.

Late June in Montreal, and the weather hasn't been cooperating for the Montreal Jazz Fest. It may be the world's largest Jazz Fest, but it's still an outdoor festival, with all the unpredictability that entails. Around 2 in the afternoon, after a morning of solid rain, the clouds parted long enough for Jess Gagnon, FOH mixer for Canadian trip-rock band Beast, to run sound check-but the plastic dome tent over FOH stayed up and the plastic tarp to cover the console stayed close at hand.

Had you asked me six months ago who Justin Bieber was, I couldn't have given you an honest answer. Seriously, I had zero knowledge of this 16-year-old Canadian phenom.

Zac Brown seemed to come out of nowhere. I first saw the new King of Country four years ago on a gig called the Rock Boat – a floating festival with about 30 bands and a few thousand fans taking over a Caribbean cruise ship for a week. And I was impressed then. But I thought that with the bib overalls and scruffy longish beard, he stood no chance in a country music world that has become as obsessed with image and fashion as the pop world is. Too bad, right?

"I gotta tell you, this was just the textbook case for success in festival management," beams promoter Dan Liebhauser, who with his wife and business partner, Cher Liebhauser, have been putting Country USA on for 15 years. "We've been saying this was just a paint-by-number operation. Everything fit perfectly and went smoothly."