Meyer Sound PANTHER loudspeakers enhanced the audio experience for the 106th season at the St. Louis Municipal Opera Theatre, commonly known as ‘The Muny’, one of the oldest and most famous outdoor theatrical venues in the US. The theatre, which seats 11,000 people, has had a permanent stage since 1921, although there were even earlier performances.
Meyer Sound PANTHER large-format linear line array loudspeakers were specified by resident co-sound designers John Shivers and David Patridge for the season that ran from mid-June to August, and provided by Masque Sound, a theatrical sound reinforcement company.
Up until last season, the designers were using Meyer Sound LYON loudspeakers, together with LEOPARD compact linear line array loudspeakers. At first they intended to increase the count of LYON loudspeakers, but then decided to try out the PANTHER arrays.
Patridge asked Masque Sound’s Scott Kalata to arrange an in-shop demo at its facility in East Rutherford, New Jersey. Patridge listened to the LYON and PANTHER side by side and said the “improved detail and wider soundstage of PANTHER was immediately evident”.
He added that another game changer was the far-field projection. He said: “With a 300+ foot throw to the rear seating area, that projection made a difference that even non-audio professionals can hear. We have had many compliments on how much better the sound is with the new rig.”
Patridge says that, with the PANTHER loudspeakers, the designers can finally provide spectators in the Muny’s free seats at the back, as well as people all along the side, with the same sound quality as in the premium box seats near the stage.
Shivers and Patridge have also leveraged the venue’s AoIP infrastructure to send outputs from the DiGiCo Quantum SD7 console to the Meyer Sound Galileo GALAXY 816 network platforms and onto the arrays via AVB (audio, video, bridging) networking.
Patridge concluded: “Over the course of 10 years as resident co-sound designers at The Muny, John and I had made all of the possible improvements with the audio package we could think of. Thankfully, Masque Sound has been an amazing partner and has allowed us to improve loudspeakers, consoles, radios and infrastructure, year after year. Various stages of new construction on the venue campus have allowed us to go to a 100 percent AoIP network using a fibre backbone. We were also able to include better rigging for flying the line arrays and this led to being able to enlarge the main arrays for an even wider coverage area.”
