Show Imaging ran one of the first major festival deployments of the integrated-cardioid subwoofer to cover a natural amphitheatre for more than 20,000 fans.
At this year’s Under the Big Sky festival, Show Imaging had to cover a natural hillside amphitheatre with no delay towers while keeping the bass off the neighbours. Its answer was one of the first major festival runs of JBL’s new VTX B35 cardioid subwoofer.
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Held on a working ranch outside Whitefish, Montana, on the edge of Glacier National Park, the three-day country and americana festival draws more than 20,000 fans, and its main stage is rebuilt from scratch each year. The stage plays to a hillside, with a creek splitting the flat audience area from the rise, and with delay towers off the table, the whole site – a throw of around 350 feet (about 105 metres) and more than 30 feet of elevation change – had to be covered from the main PA alone. Nearby homes and county noise limits meant the low end had to stay on the field and off the surrounding properties.
The VTX B35’s cardioid pattern is built into the cabinet, steering bass toward the crowd while cutting what spills out behind the stage, without the reversed cabinets, extra amp channels and wiring a traditional cardioid array needs. “In a traditional cardioid hang, every third subwoofer is reversed and wired differently,” says Taylor Wade, technical director at Show Imaging. “With the VTX B35, the cardioid is integrated into the enclosure. You hang it, load the presets and you’re done. It made deployment faster and easier while coupling really well with the VTX A12 system.”
Flown alongside VTX A12 and A12W line arrays, the B35 subwoofers were backed by ground-stacked VTX B28 subs, VTX M22 foldback wedges and VTX A8 boxes handling front-fill and outfills, with Crown I-Tech HD amplifiers driving the lot. Chance Peña and Greensky Bluegrass were among the artists who played through it.
“We’ve always used cardioid on both stages because we’re mindful of the residents,” says Mark Lopez, chief experience officer at Show Imaging. “The stage is pointed away from nearby homes… The VTX B35 helps us continue to be good neighbors while delivering the coverage we need for the Big Mountain Stage.”
By Wade’s account it paid off, with consistent low end to the top of the hillside and, across the whole weekend, not a single noise complaint.
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