Among Norway’s leading vocalists, Helene Bøksle’s winter tours of churches and concert venues have become an established part of the festive season. Although scaled back due to Covid-19 restrictions, the 2020 tour covers a lot of ground, with long mountain drives and internal flights bringing the performer and accompanying musicians to 15 towns and cities on both sides of the arctic circle.
Audio engineer Kenneth Vadset needed a mixing system that could travel with him, providing artists and audiences with the same high-quality experience at every show.
He was already very familiar with the Allen & Heath dLive system, and the just-released CTi1500 surface fitted the brief perfectly.
‘Helene has this remarkable, crystal clear voice and tremendous dynamic range, and that’s what the audience has come to experience,’ Vadset explains. ‘So having high-quality audio equipment from input to output is crucial. The CTi1500 has made it so much easier to carry the system I know and trust with me to every show.’
Weighing in at 11.5kg/25.4lbs, CTi1500 has been developed from the C1500 19-inch surface, with Titanium side panels and other weight-saving modifications driving its flightcased weight below the 23kg/50lbs limit needed to fly as standard baggage on most airlines.
For the tour, the CTi1500 is teamed up with a CDM32 MixRack, which accommodates Bøksle’s vocal mics along with piano, percussion, trumpet, guitars, choir and string quartet. Vadset mixes both FOH and Monitors from the CTi1500, making use of the dLive OneMix app to lighten the workload by allowing the musicians to control their own monitor mixes.
With a lot of mixing to do from a 12-fader surface, he makes full use of CTi1500’s tools for streamlining his workflows. ‘The combination of scenes and softkeys make it very quick to get around, and there are a lot of features that help you be creative with such a small surface,’ he elaborates. ‘I use a lot of softkeys for quick access to monitor mixes and sends, and to do things like muting the reverb in Helene’s in-ears between songs or toggling my talkback mic. The softkeys are also great for selecting the LR mix when I’m working in another layer of faders.’
The tour closes at Hilstrad Church on 23 December, and is followed by a free livestreamed concert for fans who were unable to catch one of the shows on Christmas Eve.
More: www.allen-heath.com
