Stevie Wonder, Jamiroquai, Joss Stone and Janelle Monae made up the bill for an 'added' day at the 2012 Lisbon Rock in Rio fesitval recently.

Performing a mix of hits such as 'Superstition' and covers including 'The Girl from Ipanema' in front of an audience of more than 75,000 on the fourth night of the festival, Wonder himself has requested three DiGiCo consoles – one each to cover for front of house, vocal and in-ear monitors and band monitors. ‘Having Stevie Wonder personally ask for three SD7s for his Rock In Rio performance was a real endorsement of the console’s standing within both the artist and technical production communities,’ says Ian Staddon, DiGiCo VP of sales.

Supplied (along with the rest of the festival’s audio system) by Gabisom Audio Equipment, Wonder’s set-up required more than 80 inputs, with each SD7 having two dedicated SD-Racks. The FOH console was on a redundant Optocore loop, with the monitors on redundant Madi. All SD7s were dual redundant mirrored engines (audio and control), which assured total permanent redundancy.

‘When Stevie made the jump from analogue to digital, the SD7 was the ideal choice because it’s the digital console that sounds closest to the analogue console he was using before,’ says Wonder’s FOH engineer. ‘All other digital consoles sounded and felt very much like computers.’

‘Gabisom bought the third SD7 specifically for this show, which shows a fantastic commitment to DiGiCo,’ adds Ian Staddon.

More: www.digico.org
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