NHS Battle of the Bands

The Northampton High School Battle of the Bands started my freshman year. Naturally, we were just getting our act together sound-wise, so we didn't rent equipment and used what we had available.

For sophomore year (2005), I was able to rent a large PA from Sonix Pro Audio in Sunderland. I designed the system and we took a caravan of cars down to the warehouse to retrieve the parts. I used 4 18" JBL subs with Crown amps, 4 12"+1" JBL Mains and QSC amps, 6 channels of digital parametric EQ, graphic EQ, and compresion, and effects. I used the console we had just purchased (Soundcraft LX7 16ch), also mounted two recording mics just under the balcony, which connected to a recording console (Mackie 1204vlz) and the computer. The system worked wonderfully, and I made some decent recordings as well.

By some stroke of luck, in 2006, the event was scheduled a week after Commonwealth Opera. For Commonwealth, Scott (Sonix owner) ended up bringing in VerTec line arrays after the VRX didn't quite have enough punch. He also had a 40-channel Soundcraft GB8 console with 10 channels of EQ (6 digital with compression, delay, parametric, etc...), 10 channels of DBX-166-like compression on inserts, a Lexicon MPX550 digital effects box, and several other nice toys.

To make a long story short, I asked nicely, and was allowed to keep the whole FOH setup an extra week. I had used the VerTec for a couple daytime assemblies during the week of the Opera, but we made the call to strike them for the battle and instead, used the SP212\'s and 4 Subs like the year before. I felt better not being entirely responsible for $35,000 worth of speakers. (Not to say I couldn\'t run them- I have for other large shows!!)

It was a breath of fresh air mixing on a large format console. I didn\'t need a second recording mixer, and for better quality, used 2 Shure SM94 condensers connected to my computer running Logic. We also had 4 monitor mixes (an NHS first!), and a separate matrix send for the mains, balcony delay chain, and subs. The show was amazing, and I received several compliments on the sound.