JBL PROFESSIONAL BY HARMAN AND VH1 SUPERSONIC : A DYNAMIC AUDIO PARTNERSHIP FOR UNFORGETTABLE MUSIC EXPERIENCES
The VH1 SuperSonic festival this February at both Pune and Bengaluru was a melting pot with the finest international and home-grown talent . They came together to deliver the best festival across genres , cultures , culinary experiences , and more . With exceptional music sensations like Prateek Kuhad , Nucleya , Pentagram , Soulmate and several others coupled with foot-tapping international acts such as Jackal , Ablin Myers and more , the event was a huge hit , to say the least . People from all walks of life gathered under a single roof to enjoy a wide range of music , food and fashion . It goes without saying that for such a huge music festival , especially the one in Pune , the need to be equipped with the most avant-garde , futuristic yet highly reliable and sturdy pro audio system was high . It is exactly here , that JBL by HARMAN enters the scene .
The audio brand delivered exceptional acoustic solutions for three out of five stages for VH1 in Pune . To find out more about the sound design of the event , the challenges faced by the installation tea and the pro audio equipment used to power the event , PALM and AV- ICN spoke to Yogesh Nambiar , the Director of Integrated Marketing in India at HARMAN International India Pvt . Ltd and Sudarshan Srinivas , the Co-Founder and Technical Director at Lewminadio .
The VH1 Brief :
When speaking about how JBL was approached for the VH1 SuperSonic event , Yogesh Nambiar talked about how JBL sponsored as an official audio partner for the event . “ This was an event where we approached from two perspectives – one being the pro audio side and the other being the popular consumer brand , that JBL is . Both sides of the business had a presence in the festival ,” Nambiar said .
Lewminadio , on the other hand , was tasked with the stage sound design and the HARMAN audio installation . While talking about the long-standing professional relationship with HARMAN Audio , Sudarshan Srinivas talked about how their past associations helped the team at HARMAN place their trust in Lewminado for the stage sound design . He said , “ Lewminadio has worked with HARMAN for many prestigious events . HARMAN appointed us with the task of deploying and optimising systems for three stages at VH1 Supersonic . They later designated me to take on the role of Festival Engineer .”
Srinivasan further elaborated on the brief Lewminadio received from the team at the VH1 SuperSonic . He said “ The client had the concept of multiple stages in a single venue and gave us the plan for the venue along with the stage locations and the technical riders for the bands that were going to perform at the festival . We were also provided with venue drawings and planned well in advance .” Since they already had prior experience with the venue and knew what to expect , no decision made at the eleventh hour simmered the performance .
The 2 Major Challenges :
Deploying a sound system for an open-air event is easier said than done . Powering the stages at the VH1 SuperSonic , of course , posed its own set of challenges .
1 . To ensure that the external air traffic noise doesn ’ t drown the sound emanating from the JBL sound system . The proximity of the venue to the Pune Airport made it necessary for the system to be loud enough to drown out the noise from the jet engines .
2 . The main acoustical requirement for the event was to make sure that the sound from one stage did not bleed into the other stages . Srinivas , on talking about the solution to this , said ,
The Score
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