Martin Audio’s MLA multicellular loudspeaker array served main stage headline artists including Marisa Monte, Sandy, Mano Brown and the Gilberto Gil at the annual Festival Coolritiba in Curitiba recently.

Already established at Brazil’s famous Rock in Rio festival, this latest deployment was nearly 500 miles further south, with exemplary sound, and was the result of Marisa Monte’s sound engineer, Daniel Carvalho, insistence as a change from the originally specified festival system. He had managed the mix on the famous singer’s Portas tour through an MLA system, provided by rental company Gabisom (who also service Rock in Rio). Coolritiba was part of a 100-show tour schedule where Marisa Monte was top of the bill.

‘The festival had requested [another brand], but since we were headliners, and they were renting from Gabisom as well, we asked if they could switch to MLA for the festival,’ he explains.

The changeover made, the results, he says, were incredible. ‘For many engineers it was their first time with Martin Audio and all techs loved the sound. The rap guys didn’t ask for additional subs and the promoter himself said he wants the same set-up for next year. Everybody agreed that it was the best sound ever heard at the site, including the Gabisom crew.

Other sound engineers lined up to sing the system’s praises include Maycon Mendes, Sandy’s engineer, who says: ‘Every time I use Martin Audio I am impressed, with the clarity of the highs, the definition of transients and the coverage are impressive and, my master equaliser remains flat. So, it’s just happiness all round.’

Gustavo Mendes, Gilberto Gil’s tech adds: ‘Thanks for the opportunity of using the MLA system, which is for sure the best PA we used in this Gilberto Gil tour.’

Carvalho himself is well qualified to have recommended the system. He has been handling Marisa Monte’s live mix since 2015 and was a studio engineer prior to that during which time he has become an eight times Latin Grammy Award winner as mastering engineer and mixer.

He first encountered MLA when mixing a band at Rock in Rio in 2015. ‘Someone from Martin Audio showed me the Display software and introduced me to the system.’ From that day on he was sold. ‘When the Portas tour came around, I told Gabi from Gabisom, that I would love to try the Martin Audio system. It was love at first hear. At a stadium in Belo Horizonte, Marisa’s manager came to front-of-house and asked, “What happened today? The voice is so clear”. I told him it was our new PA and he said ok let`s use this one from now on.’

At Coolritiba, where a crowd of around 20,000 fans assembled, the main PA was rigged as an LCR system with 15 MLA and a single MLD downfill at the base of each hang. Out fill comprised seven MLA plus an MLD downfill; there was a delay fill of six further MLA, with six MLA Compact as front fill. The rig, which Daniel Carvalho also helped design, incorporated a generous array of 32 MLX subwoofers arranged in castellated broadside configuration.

Asked why he favours MLA, Carvalho is unequivocal: ‘It is easy to design and deploy. The array processing ensures every position in the house sounds the same. And it’s very forgiving; when we have to make sudden changes at venues without the need to recalculate angles – it’s just a matter of changing the preset of EQ settings and the sound delivers precisely what we need.

‘Thanks go to Gabi for placing this much-loved PA in our hands,’ he says in conclusion, ‘and to Josiel Silva and Diego Talasca for rigging everything so expertly.’