Forever Living Products is a massive worldwide company. Their business is health and nutrition, and they are often name-checked as the biggest grower of Aloe Vera and the biggest bee-keeper on the planet. When they bring their staff together from around the world it’s always a busy and vibrant event that needs organising on a massive scale.
The 2010 European show took place in March at Wembley Arena. Often dubbed the most famous indoor concert hall in the world, the 12,000-seater stadium was entirely taken over for the two-day event, which involves 9,000 participants each day throughout an eight-hour show incorporating presentations, training and entertainment.
London-based Sound By Design was once again called upon to provide the sound and communications requirements. Key design considerations for a PA of this size and complexity are to provide seamless coverage that allows for clear and invigorating spoken word to the audience, while having the volume and impact of a pop concert for the entertainment sections of the show.
Front Of House centred around a DiGiCo SD7 – the only console on the market that could handle the show’s 140 Inputs. And feeding those inputs were some fifty channels of Shure’s flagship UHF-R radio microphone – ten handhelds and forty bodypacks with a combination of lapel, headworn and condenser mics on battery-powered phantom PSUs, all running simultaneously. Shure’s UHF-R system was chosen due to its proven RF stability, even in the most arduous radio conditions.
With fifty radio mics, twelve channels of Shure PSM700 wireless in-ear monitors, a dozen radio comms, two dozen walkie-talkies and an LED wall that is notorious for creating RF problems, Sound By Design looked to Shure’s Wireless Workbench software as an invaluable tool for managing both the radio mics and the frequency spectrum.
“It’s a massive event,” said Phill ‘Chappie’ Chapman, Hire and Resources manager at Sound By Design, the company that’s organized Forever Living’s annual show for the last 10 years. “With around 140 inputs there’s an awful lot going on. Obviously 50 of those are the Shure radio mics, but we use a lot of hard-wired mics on stage and a massive number of playback channels as well. It’s quite a complicated show!”
“We’ve traditionally used a couple of different brands, but we’ve always found the Shure UHF-R mics to be a bit more steady in RF world, to be honest. They’re pretty much the only radio mics we have in stock here. Some people can’t really understand how it worked before Shure launched the UHF-R because the RF is so good! Basically they’re rock-solid – they seem to work very well in difficult buildings that otherwise soak up RF signal. That’s always impressed us about the Shure stuff.”
For 10 years the Forever Living Products shows have gone from strength to strength, and 2010 has been no exception. The event has been a massive success for Sound By Design, with the fluid nature of the show keeping the entire crew on their toes for the whole two days. The Forever Living Products executive team commented that they had never heard such a clear, great sounding gig. Roll on 2011!
Leave a Reply