Feature: Setting the scene

While there’s no denying the impact of immersive audio when it comes to dramatic sound effects and impressive location and movement of sound, it can be equally effective in far more subtle applications. This was recently proved to great effect by the use of d&b audiotechnik Soundscape at the Sapporo City Jazz festival. The technology, which combines object-based mixing and room emulation, was used at the five-day event to transform a performance space with clever ambient programming that enhanced inherent acoustics for naturalistic, uncoloured performances.

Taking place in late December 2019 at the Sapporo Cultural Arts Theatre Hitaru, the entire festival was held on the main stage of the theatre; this included audience seating for 400, catering and a ‘stage on a stage’, creating an intimate jazz club environment. The 1,200m² space was fitted out with tables, atmospheric lighting and a temporary stage at one end, with the curtains dropped to obscure the 2,300-seat auditorium beyond and provide isolation from this reverberant space.

Although Sapporo City Jazz has been running for 13 years over the summer months, this was only the second winter edition to be held at Hitaru. d&b audiotechnik Japan’s technical manager, Craig Lovell, worked with local rental company and d&b customer K’s Sound and its FOH engineer Atsushi Abe to create an immersive environment for the multitude of artists. This sought to convince audiences they were listening to acoustic performances in a small, intimate setting rather than at one end of a large theatre. ‘It was felt that last year the ambience was somewhat dry, with very little in the way of reverberation,’ comments Lovell on the decision to use Soundscape this year. ‘Looking at both the localisation and hall acoustic requirements led K’s Sound to approach us with respect to implementing Soundscape, specifically Soundscape’s En-Scene application for localisation and En-Space for room reverberation.’

K’s Sound CEO, Tetsuya Kazakami, was the driving force behind using Soundscape this year; as well as the room reverberation issue, he was interested in moving on from an L-R-based PA system to one that provided accurate localisation for more realism and positioning accuracy.

‘Last year, when I was in charge of system planning and operation at the theatre, there were two issues to be resolved,’ he recounts. ‘The first was that the audience seating was very wide – about 30m – compared to the stage. When mixing with a stereo L-R system, any use of panning needs to be considered for audiences sitting at the edges rather than those sitting near the centre. Processing is therefore very limited, resulting in almost monaural mixing. This is a common phenomenon in large venues.

‘The second was that this venue is a dead space with lots of sound absorption material, and the natural reverb required for live jazz performance cannot be obtained, requiring a higher ratio of digital reverb, which resulted in an unnatural soundfield. We’d experienced Soundscape several times before, and knew it provided good results, so I approached d&b.’

At the heart of d&b Soundscape is the DS100 Signal Engine with Audinate Dante networking and a 64x64 level and delay matrix. Two software modules can be accessed via R1 Remote control software to be used as toolkits for sound designers. d&b En-Scene allows the individual placement and movement of up to 64 sound objects, while d&b En-Space provides room emulation, adding and modifying reverberation signatures for a given space.

Using En-Scene, K’s Sound flew five hangs of d&b V series line array speakers above the stage, with seven Y10P point source speakers providing localisation on the front-fills. A mixed subwoofer array arrangement consisting of five V-SUBs and two J-SUBs was used in front of the stage, the J-SUBs providing extra LF extension for some of the jazz funk artists that were performing. As the audience seating was quite wide – over 34m – two Y7Ps were required as out-fills to cover seats located in the far extremes of the room.

En-Space was used to provide room reverberation via the surround speakers; these could be smaller than those required if using 360° surround for creative purposes. Six 12S point source speakers, three either side of the stage, were used, with a total of 17 T10 cabinets configured as point sources making up the rest of the surround system. Four amp islands located around the room, consisting of D80 four-channel amplifiers, drove the system. Audio distribution was via Dante from a Yamaha Rivage PM10 FOH console, so four d&b DS10 audio network bridges were called into action.

This was the first time that Abe had mixed with Soundscape. A member of d&b Japan’s EAS (Education, Application and Support) team, Yo ‘YK’ Kato was on hand to guide him through the operation and configuration of the DS100. ‘It didn’t take too long for Abe-san to get comfortable in the operation of Soundscape, both in controlling and manipulating localisation, but also in delivering the right acoustic reverberation for the venue,’ says Lovell. ‘It wasn’t long before he was diving quite deeply into it and subtly tweaking the En-Space convolution reverb engine.’

Adds Abe: ‘By adding En-Space, we created an environment that sounded as if the acoustic instruments were playing in a concert hall. The reverberation was very natural, and I was able to express this further by selecting the most suitable hall type. The amount of reverberation for each source can be changed individually and, while I think pre-setting this is important, I was also able to change these parameters in real time. This was a real benefit.’

He also appreciated the ability that En-Scene provided to express sound and positioning. ‘What I felt the most was a sense of depth, and a feeling that the natural acoustic sound and amplified sound were well-balanced,’ he says. ‘It was very interesting – you could hear the raw sound of the jazz bands, and there was a natural feeling without much sound appearing amplified.

One small but important detail was the use of three audience mics around the venue to set the mood. These were routed directly into the En-Space engine and created an ambient reverberance when the audience entered and left the venue and applauded for an encore.

‘The smaller jazz quartets and quintets like the Steve Gadd band and the Terai Naoko Quartet took things to a new level,’ says Lovell, summing up the success of the event. ‘We were able to gently lift the natural acoustic of the band while maintaining the accuracy of the source for everyone in the room. Other bands that were a lot more amplified also made full use of Soundscape and again it was highly accurate. It was a very interesting exercise in employing En-Space into this format, and I feel we are just scratching the surface of what can creatively be achieved.’

‘In recent years, with the evolution of sound equipment such as line array speakers and digital consoles, live sound has become more controlled and can be transmitted efficiently, but it can also be flat and thin, without any depth,’ adds Kazakami. ‘Many people have been looking for a way to solve this.’

It could be that with the introduction of d&b Soundscape at Sapporo City Jazz, that quest is now over.