PANSTADIA & ARENA MANAGEMENT WINTER 2013/14


NORTH AMERICA SUPPLEMENT


Portable sound


The Edward Jones Dome in St. Louis has used an imaginative approach to add high output sound for music playback with real impact.


F


ully enclosed ‘dome’ stadiums present large challenges to audio


consultants, engineers and sound system operators because of their combination of high ambient noise and sonically refl ective surfaces.


Instead of adding speakers, subwoofers and amplifi ers to the main sound system to improve its music playback capabilities for loud hip-hop music, the Edward Jones Dome in St. Louis, MO took a different approach.


The Edward Jones Dome, the home stadium of the National Football League’s St. Louis Rams, recently purchased an on-fi eld sound system that utilises speakers from the One Systems and On Point Audio brands of One Systems, Inc., headquartered in Nashville, Tennessee, USA.


The new on-fi eld system is used for music playback during pre-game warm- ups and for dance routines performed by the St. Louis Rams cheerleaders. However, the Edward Jones Dome is


44


also used for many other events during the year and the facility’s management wanted their new system to be fl exible enough to work for a number of applications and in different locations.


The system’s confi guration and packaging were conceived and executed by Tony Badamo, Pro Sound and A/V Systems Specialist at Tech Electronics in St. Louis. Tech Electronics was founded in 1963 and has six offi ces in Missouri, Illinois and Indiana. Tech Electronics has used One Systems, Inc.’s products in a number of outdoor and indoor sports facilities as well as for other applications.


Facility requirements


The Edward Jones Dome was built in 1995 and was designed to be confi gurable to handle a wide range of events. The stadium has seating for 66,000 fans and is covered by a 62.12m (205ft) high roof that covers 12.5 acres. The stadium has a Magic Turf System that allows the fi eld’s playing


surface to be rolled up and stowed in an underground pit when the facility is being used for other purposes.


The Edward Jones Dome is owned and operated by the St. Louis Regional Sports Authority. The facility, which is part of America’s Center convention centre complex, is also used for concerts, car shows, concerts, meetings and other sporting events during the year.


To adequately cover the stadium’s large fl oor area and be heard above the noisy crowd, it was determined that four separate full-range vertical array/subwoofer ‘stacks’ placed at each corner of the fi eld would provide the best coverage and fl exibility to accommodate other uses of the facility.


The technical requirements for the new system were spelled out very succinctly:


 The system had to be capable of delivering 128 dB SPL output with a frequency range of 33 Hz to 20,000 Hz + 3 dB.


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48  |  Page 49  |  Page 50  |  Page 51  |  Page 52  |  Page 53