The Kujawsko-Pomorski Music Theatre in Toruń has ‘reimagined’ the Jesus Christ Superstar rock opera by moving it into an unconventional space and staging it as Poland’s first silent disco musical. At the heart of the production is Klang and DiGiCo’s Quantum 225 Pulse.
Known for its avant-garde productions, the Musical Theatre in Toruń has blurred the lines between performance art, concert and immersive installation with its production at the Od Nowa music club. Here, the Klang and DiGiCo systems form the backbone of an immersive sound experience that gave audiences a fresh experience and musicians control over their monitoring environment.
The choice of venue followed the decision to immerse the audience in the story’s sound. Audiences are free to roam the club space, with actors moving among them, using platforms, mezzanines and specially built stages. This set-up demanded a radical rethink of the entire audio concept, which proved to be one of the greatest challenges of the production.
In a space accustomed to hosting rock, jazz, and alternative concerts, a conventional PA system would have struggled to deliver consistent sound to a moving audience scattered across the entire venue. At the heart of the system is the DiGiCo Quantum 225 Pulse, acting as the production’s command centre. With the expanded channel count that the Pulse upgrade delivers, the console handled 80 inputs and 48 outputs, managing all musician, actor, choir and sound effects.
The audio was relayed directly to the silent disco wireless headsets worn by the audience, allowing audience members to fully immerse themselves in the sound of the musical free from any acoustic limitations the venue may have presented. To enhance the experience further and add a physical dimension to the sound, the production used discreet subwoofer systems to add a tactile low-frequency sensation.
Klang, meanwhile, played a crucial role in ensuring the musicians’ comfort and the production’s efficiency. With an 11-piece band rehearsing in acoustically challenging environments, each musician had their own Klang:kontroller, giving independence to create and adjust their 3D mix. Even musicians unfamiliar with personal monitoring systems quickly mastered the intuitive interface, preparing their ideal mix within minutes.
This was a beneficial factor to the sound team, allowing them to focus on the main mix for the audience and manage the sound for the actors and choir, knowing that the musicians were fully in control of their own environment. Klang also enabled quick adaptation to ever-changing stage conditions, as the mobile performance space and musician placements constantly shifted.
‘Klang lifted a huge burden from us, both technically and mentally,’ says Krzysztof Kardas, one of the show’s two FOH engineers. ‘The musicians could easily adjust their own mixes and during an intense rehearsal schedule, with tight set-up times, this really allowed us to focus.
‘In a theatre production staged in such an unconventional space, with a large number of moving performers, the console was rock-solid for us,’ he says. ‘We used dozens of Snapshots, with some scenes requiring up to 30 cues within a single song. The speed, stability, and flexibility of the Quantum 225 proved invaluable, particularly in an environment where every change had to be instant and flawless.’