The original audio systems had been installed by Spektra Electronics when the hotel was built and the company was again appointed to handle the upgrade by the hotel's chief engineer, Mr. Leo Hee Swee. The systems for upgrading covered the piano bar/lobby, coffee house and outdoor dining areas. The brief specified a significant improvement in music quality throughout, with and a particular emphasis on system power and speech intelligibility for events such as fashion shows.
During the day, the systems are combined and used to provide recorded background music throughout all three zones. In the evening this is replaced with live lounge musicians in the lobby piano bar and feeding this to the outdoor dining area provides a unique atmosphere with its location alongside the Singapore River.
In the piano bar/lobby, Spektra installed a Yamaha MG24/14FX 24-channel mixing console with DBX 260 digital sound processing. The main loudspeaker system comprises Community XLT43 15-inch full-range loudspeakers with CPL51 15-inch subs. Foldback is provided by two Community MVP15M stage monitors and the whole system is driven by Altair amplification.
The coffee house system uses eight of Community's CPL23 compact loudspeakers and the outdoor dining area uses five Community R25-94X all-weather loudspeakers. Again these are all driven by Altair amplification.
Spektra's C.B. Wee comments, "Audio quality was critical to maintain the atmosphere created by live music and the system needed very accurate dispersion to control coverage and minimise overspill to surrounding buildings. Added to this we have the Singapore climate to contend with, including high temperatures and humidity and short, but extreme, rainfall. Community's R-Series were the perfect choice to deliver on all counts". He concludes, "This job was all about delivering a significant upgrade to provide the quality expected of a hotel of this calibre, and I'm pleased that the hotel's management and the musicians all agree this has been achieved."
(Jim Evans)
