KOLHAPUR, Maharashtra, India – Sound and Light Professionals provided sound reinforcement for a massive concert that was part of AbhangaNaad: The Voice of Devotion, held at Shivaji University in February. The event featuring some 2,500 Warkari (devotees of Lord Vithoba) singing in unison and accompanied by 1,350 Dhols (traditional Indian dhangar drums), and was attended by His Holiness Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, also known as guruji.
Some 120,000 devotees within an area measuring close to 20 acres witnessed the concert in person, and another 3 million television viewers in India watched the performance, which celebrated Indian folk traditions. To provide the required projection of sound over a large area while still offering speech intelligibility and music reproduction characteristics for the devotional songs and meditation, Sound and Light Professionals relied upon D.A.S. Audio's Aero Series line array system.
"The concert took place on a magnificent multi-tier stage that was around 200 feet wide by 80 feet deep, and 15 feet in height," said Sound and Light Professionals director Manish Mavani. "Sculptures from various temples and replicas of Lord Mahalaxmi, Jotiba, and Vitthal adorned the stage. Accompanied by the choir and the drums, noted devotional singers Ajit Karkare, Balasaheb Waikar, and Tukaram Powar sang abhangs and bhajans (devotional songs).
"The fact that the venue grounds were arranged in two levels posed a unique challenge for us. Secondly, with the stage being 200 feet wide, the sound convergence at the center of the ground from the left-right stacks posed additional issues. Fortunately, our EASE Focus calculations and the broad horizontal dispersion of the Aero 48's really helped us achieve remarkably even coverage throughout the area."
For the primary FOH (front of house) hangs, Mavani and his crew, which consisted of system engineer OS Cijith, FOH mix engineer Ramdas Kalasker, and stage engineer Pramod Vetker, flew four loudspeaker clusters per left-right side -each consisting of eight D.A.S. Audio Aero 48 large format line array elements.
For center fill coverage, the Sound and Light Professionals team deployed an additional stack of four Aero 48's. These were augmented by several D.A.S. Aero CA-28 line array modules spread across the front of the stage for front fill coverage. Three delay towers-each with eight D.A.S. Audio Aero 48's and positioned roughly 150 feet apart-completed the setup.
For the musicians' and vocalists' monitoring system, Mavani's crew placed another 20 custom loudspeaker columns. These columns consisted of a combination of D.A.S. Audio's Avant 12A powered 2-way loudspeaker enclosures and Sound and Light Professionals' own proprietary loudspeakers. Lab.gruppen PLM 10000Q powered loudspeaker management systems and XTA DP448 processors completed the system.
Mavani credited the system in general, and the Aero 48s in particular, for "exceptional horizontal coverage," which proved an asset for the massive choir, loud drum beats and soft meditative speech of guruji. Along with the positive response from organizers, musicians and audience members, Mavani noted that "we've been re-hired for more such future events. When one project leads to another, that's as good as it gets."
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