The Formula 1 British Grand Prix at Silverstone on July 18 was boosted by sound reinforcement from Electro-Voice and Dynacord. Alongside the entertainment on the track, motorsports fans were treated to a raft of musical performances from Rudimental DJ, Anne Marie and Becky Hill, thanks to a festival stage equipped with Electro-Voice and Dynacord gear.
Safe Hands Audio took responsibility for the audio setup and deployed their Electro-Voice X-Line Advance X2 line-array loudspeaker system to cater to the large crowd. The main front of house system for the stage comprised 24 x 2-212 high‑performance compact 12in two-way cabinets with 12x 12-128 dual 18in subwoofers.
“The X2 is our best option for this kind of production,” said Neal Allen, owner of Safe Hands Audio. “The X2’s rigging weight and compact size were both important considerations, but it was the system’s vocal throw, combined with its punch-to-size ratio, that really made it a perfect fit.
“Due to the capacity crowd, people were spread across the full width of the stage; there was a need to fill a pocket, so we turned to an old friend – 4x X-Line XVLS – to spot-fill a specific area, and it worked perfectly.” Delays and out-fills saw a further 12x 2-212 cabinets alongside 4x 12-128 subs.
Power for the main system was provided by 10 Dynacord TGX20 4-channel DSP amplifiers, each capable of delivering a power density of 20,000 watts. Control and monitoring of the system throughout the weekend came from the manufacturer’s new MXE5 matrix mix engine, combined with the SONICUE sound system software over a Dante network.
“The combination of SONICUE and MXE5 has been excellent because we have full visibility of the system for control,” added Allen. “We are very familiar with SONICUE and the advantages it can bring us now and this has given us the confidence to go fully Dante with our transport.”
