MACHU PICCHU, Peru – North American archaeologist Hiram Bingham rediscovered the ancient Incan city of Machu Picchu, perched in the Andes at 8,000 feet above sea level, 100 years ago. A sound and lighting spectacular was organized to mark the anniversary, with AV company Red Power co-owner Andrés Cuadros using a DiGiCo SD8 to mix the show.
A highlight of the event, directed by Peru's Luis Llosa with 200 actors under the additional direction of Eduardo San Roman, was Peruvian singer Tania Libertad's performance with the Cusco Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Coco Salazar. The musicians included Manuel Miranda on wind instruments and others on drums, keyboards, electric guitar and bass.
"I used 56 inputs on the SD8," Cuadros said. "Two for playback, two for video sends, two for Tania Libertad, and two for FX audio. All of this was via the eight inputs in the console, with the other 48 via the MADI Rack for the orchestra and musicians.
"For outputs I used two for Tania Libertad for her Sennheiser in ear monitors, two for the main PA, one for an FX system, one for a monitor send that was 400 meters away from us using a wireless system, two for a TV recording and eight for orchestra and musicians' monitors.
"I handled the PA, TV recording and monitors all from the same console, using two snapshots for the recorded and live sections," Cuadros added.
The SD8 provided Cuadros with a lot of flexibility. "There wasn't much time to soundcheck," he noted. "So I used the offline software to prepare as much as possible in my hotel, and then had the opportunity to store the rest of my work during soundcheck."
Although Cuadros, who owns Red Power along with Guillermo Riera, was slightly concerned about how the console would perform at high altitude, "everything worked perfectly. This was a project that required our strongest effort and we were supported by our fantastic team. I believe that we have managed something that would have been impossible without the latest technology and the SD8 played an integral part."
Of course a big part of the challenge, Cuadros said, was just getting there with all the gear. "We are located in Lima, so you can imagine what we do to get to Machu Picchu," he noted. "First of all, we needed to make a 1,000 KM trip by truck to Cusco (the technicians traveled by plane), then 200 KM by train from Cusco to Aguas Calientes (the nearest town to Machu Picchu), then 30 minutes by small trucks again." At that point, all the gear had to be transported on the workers' backs – a half-kilometer, on average – all at high altitude.
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