Meyer Sound: Peepshow
Nick Borisjuk about the complex requirements of Las Vegas new Peepshow spectacle and the advantages of the Meyer Sound system.
Peepshow, now playing at Planet Hollywood’s 1,500-seat showroom, is a $12 million budget burlesque spectacle created by Tony Award-winning choreographer and director Jerry Mitchell. Following the odyssey of Little Bo Peep, the show entertains Las Vegas audiences with a rotating celebrity cast, dazzling choreography, and live music surging through a Meyer Sound MICA line array loudspeaker system.
Sound design for the show was entrusted to principal Mark Menard and associate Nick Borisjuk of New York-based Acme Sound Partners, with equipment supplied by East Rutherford, NJ-based Masque Sound.
According to Borisjuk, the Meyer Sound system dovetailed perfectly with the high energy and sophistication of the show. “Mark and I are extremely pleased with the performance of all the loudspeakers,” he relates. “The MICA arrays, working in tandem with the CQ-1 loudspeakers and subwoofers, enabled us to achieve high SPLs without sacrificing clarity and definition.”
The system is anchored by main left and right arrays of 11 MICA loudspeakers each. According to Mark Menard, he opted for the MICA solution because “it is a very good-sounding box, and it was also the largest cabinet I could fit inside the space allowed by the set design.”
The balance of the main system comprises ten CQ-1 loudspeakers for split center clusters and balcony fills; four 700-HP subwoofers in a cardioid arrangement on overhead catwalks; 12 UPM-1P loudspeakers for various fills; 12 MM-4 miniature loudspeakers for runway fills; and two UPJunior VariO loudspeakers as band fills. A separate effects system employs two CQ-1 and UPA-1P loudspeakers each plus a pair of 650-P subwoofers. Processing and drive is provided by a Galileo loudspeaker management system with three Galileo 616 processors. “Tuning the MICA arrays was a breeze thanks to Galileo,” comments Borisjuk.
At FOH mix, Meyer Sound Matrix3 audio show control with Wild Tracks hard disk playback took charge of keeping PEEPSHOW popping with perfect timing. “The playback requirements are very complex,” explains Borisjuk. “We needed a system that would reliably play music tracks, click tracks, SMPTE and sound effects that would be triggered either by conductor and keyboard player Susan Draus or by FOH operator J.J. Hillman. We also needed to fire MIDI program changes both automatically and as external cues. Wild Tracks and Matrix3 were up to the task, and continue to perform flawlessly night after night.”
Peepshow was originally conceived as a spin-off of Jerry Mitchell’s benefit series for Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS.
