Stage Sound Services invests in Sennheiser Digital 6000
Challenge
In the crowded RF environment of professional theatre, finding a solution that would service both current and future opportunities for subhire and be rider- and specificationfriendly, whilst providing ultimate reliability was essential for Stage Sound Services’s business.
Solution
The company invested in Digital 6000 to supplement its existing stock of Sennheiser products, which delivers ultimate reliability, its RF performance also helping to reduce the licensing cost for touring productions. By using Digital 6000, which is intermodulation-free and therefore allows frequencies to be placed in an equidistant grid, Stage Sound Services was able to get 45 channels of RF into just three TV channels.
"Digital 6000 is based on proven technology in the Digital 9000 system, so any questions about reliability, RF performance, or audio quality were quickly answered."
- James Lewis, Stage Sound Services, Commercial Manager -- Customer Stage Sound Services Ltd
- Products installed 90 channels of Digital 6000
- Website https://www.stagesoundservices.co.uk
- Country UK
- Industry Professional audio sales and rental
- Profile Stage Sound Services has over 15 years in business, and is a well-established rental company, providing technical solutions for sound and video projects for largescale musical theatre productions and corporate events.
“We’ve been working with Sennheiser since the start of the company, initially investing in their wired microphones,” says Stage Sound Services Commercial Manager, James Lewis. “A large proportion of our business is professional theatre, from small plays to full-scale musicals and, in recent years, our stock of Sennheiser and Neumann wired microphones has increased dramatically to accommodate these shows. Last year we started to add Sennheiser wireless into our rental stock, with the purchase of 32 channels of its SK 5212 system for the Funny Girl UK tour. Sennheiser is on many specifications, so it wasn’t a hard decision to make.”
Stage Sound Services’s main motive for investing in Digital 6000, which offers the outstanding audio quality of the flagship Digital 9000 in a two-channel receiver, is the future opportunities it will provide for sub-hire and its rider/specification friendliness.
James adds that Digital 6000’s sound quality was also a major factor, as well as the system’s environmental credentials. “As with most companies, we are keen on green energy,” he says, “so the rechargeable battery and the neatness of the charging system is also important to us.”
Dan Samson, sound designer for the touring productions of Cilla and Cabaret, had used digital radio microphone systems on a number of previous shows and specified them again for both productions, which is where Stage Sound Services’s Digital 6000 systems, which now total 90 channels, were immediately put to work.
“The timing of Cilla and Cabaret coincided with Digital 6000 coming onto the market,” James explains. “The system is based on proven technology in the Digital 9000 system, so any questions about reliability, RF performance, or audio quality etc., were quickly answered. Cilla has over 45 channels of RF including IEMs, so the licensing cost of weekly touring of that particular show also played a major part in the decision.”
By using Digital 6000, which is intermodulation-free and therefore allows frequencies to be placed in an equidistant grid, Stage Sound Services is able to get these 45 channels of RF into just three TV channels.
