A recent outdoor show covered by Sound By Design, was held at Kirkstall Abbey near Leeds. The quite unusual site of a ruined abbey provided quite a unique challenge for the team, as it was very long and narrow. With a site width of only 40m, and a depth of 200m the sight lines were potentially quite limited, as well as the delay implications.

The show featured the Northern Ballet Symphonia, under the direction of John Price-Jones, who played a varied program of "Last Night of the Proms" material, finishing with a fireworks finale to Tchaikovsky´s 1812 overture.

The main system comprised a narrow array of just two Meyer Sound MSL-4s each side of the stage with one Meyer 650-P sub-bass enclosure. This system was effective until 70m out, and a delay of one MSL-4 a side was placed at 60m. A final delay of Meyer CQ-1s at 110m saw coverage to 160m, after which we allowed the system to run out naturally, as that area contained the food trucks and bars, where people would want to talk and hear to order!!

FOH control comprised our 40 channel DDA QII, with BSS Varicurve system management. This enabled Engineer Phil Wright, to time-align and equalise the system remotely by radio link, while walking the site, a major advantage on an outdoor event.