Yamaha Taps Into The UK’s Biggest Dance Event
24,000 aspiring, amateur and professional dancers attended the 10th anniversary of Move It - billed as the UK’s biggest dance event - in mid-February at Olympia London. With high profile artists performing on the event’s main stage, a Yamaha CL5 digital console with Dan Dugan automixing ensured that every beat and step were heard loud and clear.
The technical production for Move It and its sister event Perform was supplied by Newark-based OneBigStar. With only a 24 hour window to build all the elements for show producer Upper Street Events, all the equipment needed to be fast to rig and then flawless in operation throughout the three days of the show.
The event’s main stage showcased performances from Michael Flatley’s Lord of the Dance, tap ensemble Tap Attack, Big Ballet UK, stars of Strictly Come Dancing, participants from Britain’s Got Talent, Got To Dance and many others. In total over 100 acts performed across the three days. OneBigStar’s front of house engineer for the Main Stage was Neal Allan. “All the acts had backing tracks, which varied from loud modern dance pop to soft classical passages, to suit the many different styles of dance,” he says. “But in previous years some of the acts brought live instruments on the day, so we had to be prepared for that.
Adding to the challenge was that the venue is a highly reverberant space and the background noise is very high at times, as there are thousands of fans plus other smaller stages and dance classes all taking place at the same time under one roof.”
Mixing both the front of house sound and wedge monitors for the dancers, Neal chose a Yamaha CL5 console, with two Rio3224-D i/o units, integrated with Waves SoundGrid. A vital part of the system was a Dugan-MY16 automixing card.
“One of the special requirements was for Tap Attack. It’s fundamental for them to get clear, defined taps above the level of the music, so the crowd can understand what they’re doing,” says Neal. “To achieve this we set up ten boundary microphones and attached six wireless clip mics to the principal dancers ankles. All 16 microphones were routed to the Dan Dugan card, which auto-mixed the taps.”
A slightly unusual use for the Dugan-MY16 card perhaps, but the exceptional result proved just how versatile the product is.
“It would have taken a very long time to set up manually. Indeed it would have been virtually impossible without the Dugan facility, given the tight rehearsal and performance schedule of so many acts,” says Neal. “All of the Yamaha equipment worked flawlessly, as usual, and despite the many challenges we delivered three excellent days of entertainment from the Main Stage, which was enjoyed by thousands.”
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