Charlottetown’s Confederation Centre of the Arts has installed a new sound system in its Homburg Theatre, which is undergoing a major renovation.
The Confederation Centre is located just off Canada’s New Brunswick/Nova Scotia coast on Prince Edward Island and is home to the world’s longest-running annual musical, Anne of Green Gables - The Musical, which recently completed a 51st consecutive season.
Enhancing the venue’s sound system was a priority for the Centre’s management, which received a $375,000 contribution from the Government of Canada, through Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency’s (ACOA) Business Development Program. This was largely split between two key purchases; the expansion of an existing L-Acoustics loudspeaker system with even more L-Acoustics products, and the addition of two new DiGiCo mixing consoles.
The 1,100-seat venue’s system installed in 1999 comprised four L-Acoustics ARCS enclosures configured in a centre cluster, with left and right side stacks made up of three ARCS each, collectively powered by three LA4 amplified controllers. An LA8 drove four stacked SB18 subs, while five compact MTD108a coaxial speakers served as front fills. Two ARCS Wide per side, installed at a later date, covered the upper balcony and were powered by a single LA4.
This system has now been supplemented with the addition of 20 Kara(i), the fixed installation version of L-Acoustics’ Kara touring enclosure, flown 10 per side on either side of the centre cluster. Four SB18 subs per side are hung next to the new speaker arrays, and these are powered by additional LA8 and LA4X amplifiers, including a new LA8 for the existing centre cluster. The updated sound system is rounded out with the installation of a DiGiCo SD7T FOH console loaded with the theatre software package and a DiGiCo SD10 to mix the existing L-Acoustics 112XT wedge monitors. Toronto-based dealer Westbury National supplied all of the new audio equipment.
“The new system has made quite a difference,” said Confederation Centre head of audio Kevin MacLean, who installed it with the assistance of his predecessor, Ron Gorveatt. “We now have a proper line array system, and, with the centre cluster, the theatre can easily move between using just the left and right hangs for music and adding the centre cluster for speech intelligibility for theatrical productions. Also, our new consoles are intuitive and very flexible for any FOH or monitor engineer to use. Literally, any touring music or theatre act can just get off the plane or bus and come in and play.”
MacLean is already planning a second phase to upgrade the ARCS and SB18 to ARCS II and SB28 enclosures. “Budgets are always a consideration for a facility like this,” stated MacLean. “But what we were able to accomplish with the budget we had says a lot about L-Acoustics’ value. We have a true multipurpose sound system that perfectly matches this multipurpose theatre. Good sound is critical to helping us continue to be successful, and that’s what L-Acoustics provides.”
