The Ministry of Sound nightclub has extended its partnership with Martin Audio by installing 16 of the company’s new CDD15 (Coaxial Differential Dispersion) installation speakers in the ceiling of ‘The Box’, its premier dance room.
This will enable the Ministry of Sound to utilise Dolby Atmos sound technology and stage a number of Dolby Atmos enabled events, utilising 22 Martin Audio loudspeaker channels.
Incorporating synchronised lighting cues, generated from music mixed in Dolby Atmos, Ministry of Sound will create immersive soundscapes delivered through the Martin Audio CDD’s and the existing ring of six bespoke Martin Audio ground stacks, positioned around the dance floor.
Ministry of Sound production manager, Chris Thoms explained: “When Dolby decided to introduce Dolby Atmos to the club world they were looking for a flagship venue to showcase it. We were approached both as a business and a music company, but more importantly we already had a six-point system set up, and The Box is an acoustically treated space, so it was a perfect fit.
“We told Dolby we wanted to maintain consistency with Martin Audio, so I contacted Jason Baird [Martin Audio’s R&D director]. We discussed various options and he recommended the CDD15 because of its coverage and power output, and the fact that it could compete with the SPL level of our existing stacks and give us enough punch.”
On the sound panning principal, Thoms stated: “With our current dance stack configuration you have always been able to get a Left/Right stereo pan wherever you are standing in the club. With Dolby Atmos, content is free from channel restrictions, allowing artists to pan individual audio objects anywhere across a room, including overhead, while maintaining the original stereo bed.”
The installation proved challenging due to an already congested ceiling. “It’s very tight because we have all the H&V and lot of fixtures up there. In that respect the mounting options on the CDD were useful, half the speakers are on yokes and a few are on steel suspensions. They are set at a uniform distance of 2.3m apart in a grid because they have to be close together to provide the best coverage for spatial elements,” said Thoms.
Lohan Presencer, CEO, Ministry of Sound concluded: “The sound system in The Box is the best in any nightclub anywhere in the world, but for our 25th anniversary next year, we wanted to raise the bar even higher. Dolby Atmos allows our patrons to experience the future of dance music, creating multidimensional soundscapes the likes of which have never been heard before in a nightclub environment.”
