Drummer Boy Sound Inc. used a Martin Audio W8LM loudspeaker system at the Overtown Music Festival in downtown Miami to provide consistent coverage and audio quality in a challenging outdoor environment.
Set along two blocks of 3rd Avenue in the city’s historic African-American district, the festival featured a lineup of pop and R&B artists that included Eric Benet, Kelly Price, Estelle, Carl Thomas, Tito Puente Jr., Jeremih, Ameriie and Jon B.
Describing the challenge, Drummer Boy’s Harold Cummings explains: “The main thing was firing the line array down the avenue flanked closely by buildings on both sides.
“We flew the rig from an Apex 3224 mobile stage, the only one that would fit in the road between the curbs of a two lane street. The Martin Audio W8LM was the obvious choice because we needed a powerful system that was compact, sounded good and could provide audio down to the end of the block for a crowd of around 5,000 fans without too much off-site noise.”
The actual system consisted of 9 W8LM and 1 W8LMD (downfill) cabinets per side for the main hang with 10 WS218X dual 18” subwoofers ground-stacked in front of the stage, 2 W8C 3-way speakers for side fills, 3 AQ28 for front fills, 10 LE1200 and 4 LE1500 stage monitors and Martin Audio MA9.6K amps to power the subs. Allen & Heath D-Live S7000 and S5000 consoles were used for FOH and Monitors respectively.
Asked for reactions to the sound system, Harold responds, “I was so happy, because we got nothing but compliments about the Martin Audio system. It’s the first time we used the W8C for sidefills and our stage has never sounded so great. They’re so powerful even though we could only use one per side because that’s all we had room for. We had AQ28’s across the front of the stage for VIP fill and they were precise, clean and clear so you could hear the vocals really well without it sounding harsh or hurting your ears.
“The FOH engineers were all really happy with how the system sounded, both the consoles and the speakers. Our client, Headliner Marketing, told us they had also been getting compliments all day long about how consistent, clear and balanced everything sounded from the DJ, to the artist and the tracks.
“Events like this make me really happy I have Martin Audio, because I couldn’t do the show without it.”
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