An independent, experimental cinema house in Lausanne, Switzerland, Cinéma Bellevaux re-opened in October 2021 after its coronavirus pandemic hibernation with a live event headlined by the Ensemble Contrechamps, a renowned New Music ensemble based in Geneva. The evening also marked the debut of Bellevaux’s new Lawo mc²36 mixing console, installed by Swiss systems integrator SLG Broadcast.
An 80-seat venue opened in 1959, Cinéma Bellevaux presents movies with live music accompaniment to provide a unique artistic experiences. Bellevaux owner Gwenaël Grossfeld used the downtime caused by Covid-19 to perform technical upgrades that include a 16-fader mc²36 console and two Lawo A__mic8 I/O units.
‘I want to preserve the cinema as a public and social place that delivers a rich experience from the combination of motion pictures, events and the venue itself,’ he explains. ‘We mix live music to complement the movies, which I record and replay during subsequent showings of the film. Theatre lighting is synchronised to the audio via automation, creating a holistic viewing experience.
‘I knew that I needed a digital audio console that could drive the cinema’s 22-speaker audio system, and also accommodate a lot of audio sources. But I had never used a digital console before, only analogue.’
Lawo provided an mc²36 console for evaluation: ‘The Lawo mc²36 is very intuitive to operate,’ Grossfeld reports. ‘It was easy for me and a sound engineer friend of mine to dive right into working with the mc².’
Also important was the ability to integrate with d&b audiotechnik’s Soundscape, which can be controlled directly from the Lawo mc²36. The console is also well suited to FOH applications thanks to its small physical footprint and high performance – it has an I/O capacity of 864 channels and accommodates up to 256 audio processing channels, plus native support for ST2110, AES67, Ravenna and Ember+.
Grossfeld sees a bright future for his new cinema concept: ‘Our objective is to transform movies from being on-screen art with musical support into an immersive experience of film, lighting, sounds and music in a unique venue. Lawo and SLG understood our goals and found the right solutions.’
‘Ironically,’ he notes, ‘we had to postpone our re-opening until October, but not due to sound issues. The delivery of the screen, of all things, was delayed.’
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