With a stellar reputation for managing audio at major events throughout the country, Firehouse Productions once again pushed HARMAN’s JBL VTX loudspeakers and Crown I-Tech HD amplifiers to its limits to reinforce the sound for the 2014 Global Citizen Festival. Famous world-renowned artists and bands such as Jay Z, The Roots and DJ Tiesto performed at this show, delivering an event that matched the passion of individuals supporting this movement.
Dedicated to ending extreme poverty by 2030, the Global Citizen movement hosts this annual event to raise awareness to drive change in this world, promoting activism through live music. Firehouse Productions took this goal to heart, when it designed and set up an incredible system at the stage in the Great Lawn of Central Park.
For this outdoor venue of 55 acres, the system featured two hangs of 18 VTX V25 line arrays per side, 38 VTX G28 and 16 VT4880A subwoofers for the main PA, complemented by four hangs of 12 VT4889 loudspeakers for delays. The entire system was powered by 60 Crown I-Tech 12000HD amplifiers loudspeakers for the mid-high sections and 24 I-Tech 12000HD amplifiers for the subwoofers. The system was monitored and controlled with JBL HiQnet Performance Manager™.
“Both our engineers and the audience liked the sound very much,” said Mark Dittmar, VP of Design and Engineering. “The VTX boxes performed consistently, with powerful bass and clear highs. Though it’s an outdoor venue, we’ve set up enough delay towers to reach every corner of the venue. As always, there were no challenges that we couldn’t overcome with these line arrays.
“The biggest thing for us is to have a single amplifier that can power every JBL loudspeaker we use, so we can use just one amp rack design for everything,” said Dittmar. “The flexibility is really incredible.”
Transcending international boundaries and languages, the one-day show called upon this generation to take real action in terms of education, sanitation and healthcare. Thus, there could be no room for failure when it came to the compelling messages by the top musicians in the world.
“We’ve meticulously designed and tested this unique system for the purpose of being able to support a show that goes on for the whole day,” said Dittmar. “Thanks to the Crown amplifiers, we were confident that performance remained uninterrupted.”
