Marking the close of a five-ear renovation, the historic Himeji Castle in Hyōgo Prefecture held a reopening ceremony was an event not to be missed.
The renovation of what is considered Japan’s most spectacular castle began in October 2009. It is known as Hakuro-jō (White Egret Castle) or Shirasagi-jō (White Heron Castle) because of its brilliant white exterior, and the rennovation involved returning the walls to ‘the white egret’, and repairing the kawara tiled roof and the Shachihoko decorating its ridge.
The opening ceremony, held before an invited audience of 1000 people (including government officials and politicians), saw Martin Audio’s MLA Compact Multi-cellular Loudspeaker Array brought into play, alongside the acrobatic team, The Blue Impulse.
Kobe International Stage Service (KISS) was in charge of sound duties, and chose MLA. There have been many shows staged in this park over the years, but it has been extremely difficult to deliver even coverage to more than 100m depth using conventional point source systems. ‘But after using MLA Compact, I never felt any stress on the system whatsoever,’ says FOH sound engineer, Mr Tsudawho.
Six MLA Compact enclosures per side were rigged in the tower, with two groundstacked DSX subwoofers. ‘The layout was decided to suit the efficiency of the staging although it was not ideal for sound engineers,’ the system tech, he, explains. ‘I changed the coverage area of the system using different optimisations and adopted the infill system for the relevant areas. I also zoned the system to give me greater control of the down filll cabinet.’
He confirmed that the following week there was to be another stage at the same venue – and he had no hesitation in once again fielding the MLA Compact system. ‘Not only the intelligibility, but also the controllability of any sound leakage is remarkable,’ he says.
Himeji Castle site is surrounded by a zoo and many residential properties, and so careful management of the noise pollution problem had been essential. KISS reports that as a result of this event, the Himeji Government are now fully aware of the control properties of MLA.
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