The switches are mainly Luminex .”
Using CODA Audio speakers and subs was a bit of a happy accident for Lachance and his team . He admits that CODA speakers were not his first choice for the production , largely because he was unfamiliar with the brand , but supply chain issues wreaked havoc on his original plans .
“ At a certain point , some manufacturers became nervous about the delivery , so CODA became the company that could come to the table and deliver ,” Lachance tells Professional Sound ( with Hugo Larin acting as our French-English interrupter over Zoom , as well as the translator of written responses for all interviewees ). He learned that a CODA rig had been used on tours with Corey Hart and others , and heard good things about the German-designed speakers .
With timing becoming a big issue , Lachance decided to give the company a
chance and , as he says , “ found that for the size of the box , there was a lot of output . It offered solid rigging and construction and they had their control system together . They could deliver a complete package that works . The efficiency of their subs is really amazing . We had only four sub modules for this big theatre ; what we call the ‘ infra ,’ so the extremely low frequency . We have flown low-frequency modules with each of the main five clusters , which is an important part of the sound design for the immersive diffusion system . So , these subs are amazing and to have only four for a 2,300- seat theatre , they really move a lot of air .”
Now , even though CODA was able to deliver sooner than most amidst a global supply chain crisis , that does not mean everything was stress-free . The design was complete and Lachance was ready to decide on the speakers and place an order by the end of 2021 , with plans of receiving the boxes in March or April of 2022 . Ultimately , though , the speakers were delivered on June 16 th , just three weeks before doors opened . The support and on-site visit from Arif Nathu and Bradley Fox from CODA ’ s distributor , SC Media Canada , assured that all would go as planned
“ It was a huge challenge , but we pulled it off . It was luck and hard work and good planning from everyone . We had a guy with lots of experience on these types of shows , Marc-André Gilbert , who was involved with project managing , wiring , and preparing everything . He was critical to the equation . But it was two months of stress with no PA to work on ,” Lachance attests .
Helping to hone and place the sound coming through the speakers is the SPAT Revolution immersive audio mixing software from FLUX :: Immersive . The audio and production teams ’ first tests with SPAT on La Fabuleuse were done in the summer of 2021 . That year , a much smaller , COVID-safe version of the show was staged outdoors . In effect , it was four 15-minute shows to about 400 to 500 spectators , who would rotate from scene to scene in groups . For that , a 5.1 sound mix was done in SPAT , but the true immersive redesign took place this year .
“ The show created in 2021 allowed us to hear these possibilities and to prepare the work for the summer of 2022 ,” says Rivard . “ One of the greatest satisfactions is the intelligibility of the new system , which allows anyone to hear the show well , everywhere in the room and to localize the characters moving on this huge stage .”
Lachance agrees , saying that better placement of objects and voices in the sound field has had a dramatically positive effect on the show and how the audience experiences it .
“ The main thing is intelligibility . La Fabuleuse is a story and you ’ ve got to be listening to what ’ s going on , and there is a lot of vocals . There is the spirit voice that delivers the story all the time , and then you ’ ve got the actors that are coming into play . There are so many actors and voices , so as you can imagine , with the limited resolution of a stereo or L-C-R system , you can rapidly lose that intelligibility when you cramb all this content together . If you make the choice of putting in more music elements to drive your audience , you stand the chance of losing intelligibility too . Sometimes there ’ s a compromise there , because you need the music to drive the dance and drive the audience . So , intelligibility and being able to get that localization , that was definitely the most critical factor ,” Lachance says . “ There are also scenes of the show where there ’ s a war and people are flying by and they ’ re falling from the ceiling and there ’ s pyro , and there ’ s a chopper flying over , and now the audio is following all of that . So , it ’ s just not the same show on a 5.1 with all its limitations .”
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