The main arena itself is equipped with a full Harman Pro rig, offering a matched JBL / Crown / BSS system solution, operating on a Cobranet backbone running HiQnet. But Thomas also holds a serious inventory of complementary Harman Pro components which makes him well placed to add any further reinforcement when the occasion arises.
The most challenging events, he says, are not so much the conventional music gigs as the sports events - such as the NHL (ice hockey) and NBA (basketball) matches. For the past two years ETASound has provided sound and broadcast facilities for the NBA basketball Europe Live event, and over 16,200 people attended the first game between the Miami Heat and NY Jets, when the event was also broadcast to over 200 countries across the world.
Last month, the sound company was on site again for a series of matches between the New Jersey Nets and Toronto Raptors - and this was notable for being the first regular-season NBA game staged in Europe.
ETASound provided two Soundcraft Vi1 mixing desks, multiple radio microphone systems, broadcast splits and press conference facilities (including the second Vi1) along with a full engineering crew.
"The small format desk is perfect in this layout and with 64 inputs, it has plenty of capacity," he says. "This, despite the large number of mic inputs and splits to the OB trucks, as commentators, cheerleaders, a DJ (who plugs his laptop or instant replay machine into the desk for independent control), and the half time interval acts (such as Escala from Britain's Got Talent) go through their routines.
"We make sure that the only thing anyone has to do is plug into the existing house system - the VerTec provides extremely even coverage throughout the arena." The PA is only part of the story as ETASound also provide all the feeds to broadcast - via the host broadcasters to the States for ESPN Freeview. There are separate splits for the mics and the music from the Vi1, along with show relay feeds to go into talkback.
(Jim Evans)
