International. Celebrating 40 years in the industry, Relles Sound, Inc. has purchased an SSL Live. L500, most recently used for Tommy the Ballet of the Eugene Ballet Company, with music from The Who's classic rock opera Tommy and original choreography by artistic director Toni Pimble. Relles Sound owner George Relles used the console to mix FOH for the show at the Hult Center for the Performing Arts in Eugene, Oregon.
The audio provider for the Center since it was built in 1983, Relles has also been the primary audio provider for many local events, such as the Britt Festival, the Grass Valley Father's Day Bluegrass Festival, the River Rhythms Series, and the Festival at Standpoint. Relles' symphonic clients include Mason Williams, the Oregon Bach Festival and Osvaldo Golijov's 'LaPasion' world tour, as well as the Utah, Spokane, Eugene and New World Symphony Symphonies.
Tommy's rehearsals of the Eugene Ballet Company were Relles' first project with the console, which was supplied through the collaboration between Hi-TechAudio and Delicate Productions. "First of all, I have to say that SSL Live sounds great," he says. "I haven't mixed on a console that sounds so good since my old Gamble, which I still carry with me occasionally to remind myself about the sound of a great console. Like that table, the new SSL also uses a servo input without electrolytic capacitors in the signal path. It gives me the same feeling like, 'wow this is unlike anything else.' "
"The EQ on the L500 is very silky sounding, and the mix tends to fall into place with much less effort," says Relles, who worked closely with Louis Adamo of Hi-Tech to specify the system and perfect all the necessary elements. "With some other modern systems, you can't get the mixture to fall into place; it just never seems to really get together and you're never really sure why. So, you play with the EQ and say "that's not right, it's better, but it's still not on point." But this is not the case with the SSL Live console."
Meyer Sound's longtime distributor, Relles deployed a Meyer JM-1P array speaker system at the Hult Center. "The console made the sound of the Meyer system even more fantastic," he adds. "Both shows were fabulous. The artists received long standing ovations and I had a lot of people who congratulated me on the great sound. Overall, I found the SSL Live to have superb EQ, it's very accurate to mix and musically it's very warm and broad. It doesn't suffer from the phaseshift sonic quality of most other high-end consoles available today. I'm very excited to hear how SSL Live also sounds with my new meyer Lyon linear sound reinforcement system."
Finding the console's gates quite impressive, Relles used them in everything from the bass drum, the drum and five toms to the eardrum and the French horn, as well as the iPod deployed for sound effects. "I used gates much more abundantly than I would with other consoles because they worked super well," he continues. "This allowed me to really clean the mixture, especially using their filters. I ended up using my Waves C4 and Renaissance DeEsser for production, and the dedicated FX loop of SSL Live perfectly patched into my Waves Multi-Rack."
Relles additionally used a MADIface RME to connect his dedicated MADI FX Loop from the L500 to his MacBook Pro. "I also used my personal external effects rack, with a Bricasti M7M, Lexicon PCM 91, TC M5000, TC 2290 and an Eventide H3000," he adds. "I was using a lot of my local analog I/O, but I still have the option to expand for future productions as there is room on the back of the table to add another 16 micro/line inputs and 16 line outputs." Relles also kept its SSL Live-Recorder in its external effects rack. "The Live-Recorder was invaluable for the precise adjustment of all my settings on the individual channels during rehearsals, for use during main production. Overall, it was a great first experience, and I'm just starting to see the capability of this fantastic console."
