Presented at La Scala Paris, Dans mes Cordes brings together French singer-songwriter Renaud, pianist Alain Lanty and an ensemble of string players.
With its steeply raked balconies, close proximity between the stage and the front rows, La Scala presents a particularly demanding sound reinforcement environment. For this intimate production, the venue's permanent system combining HOLOPHONIX processing with Amadeus loudspeakers allowed the soundstage to be reproduced naturally, giving every audience member a coherent perception of the voices and instruments.
A coherent soundstage for every listener
For sound engineer Madje Malki, the primary value of spatial audio lies not in creating immersive effects, but in making a genuine stereo image accessible to the entire audience.
With a conventional left-right system, only 10% of the audience experiences true stereo. A spatial sound system makes stereo accessible to everyone, with precise localisation. The audience member looks at the person on stage and experiences the kind of precise sonic localisation you would expect in cinema.
This approach was particularly well suited to Dans mes Cordes. Renaud's naturally unprojected voice remains precisely anchored to the stage, while the musicians retain their physical positions within the sound field. The aim is not to impress through spectacular movement, but to reinforce the coherence between what the audience sees and what it hears.
An architecture designed for spatial sound
This coherence depends as much on the design of the loudspeaker system as it does on the audio processing itself.
At La Scala, HOLOPHONIX drives around one hundred loudspeakers distributed across several Wave Field Synthesis (WFS) arrays, complemented by delay lines, a surround layer and a custom front-fill array developed specifically to cover the first rows. The system was designed to maintain the sonic image at stage height despite the steep elevation of the balconies and the considerable differences in distance between audience members and the loudspeakers.
As Quentin Nivromont, Director of Research and Development at Amadeus, explains, this front-fill array plays a crucial role:
Our arrays are designed specifically for this purpose. The spacing between the transducers is calculated so that every audience member is within the coverage of at least three transducers. With WFS, the front rows perceive the stage image perfectly, without any distracting direct-radiation effect, because the level from each individual enclosure is very low.
HOLOPHONIX is also distinguished by its software architecture. Unlike many systems in which each loudspeaker group is assigned to a single spatialisation mode, the same loudspeaker can simultaneously contribute to several processing algorithms.
One of the advantages of the system is its multi-algorithm architecture. We can run several spatialisation algorithms simultaneously for the same objects,
explains Quentin Nivromont.
This flexibility makes it possible to use the most appropriate technology for each context, whether for concerts, theatre or immersive productions, without modifying the venue's infrastructure.
Technology designed for the everyday life of a theatre
For Alexis Beyer, Technical Director of La Scala Paris, the value of the system is perhaps most apparent in its day-to-day operation.
We are completely satisfied. The system allows us to accommodate every type of production and adapt perfectly to its sound reinforcement requirements within the time available to us. This versatility and adaptability are ideal for our needs and ensure that the sound is consistently optimised.
The theatre hosts up to two productions a day, sometimes with less than thirty minutes between changeovers. In this context, reliability and ease of operation become as important as acoustic performance. Productions developed at La Scala Provence are also regularly transferred to the Paris system, as the two venues share a similar HOLOPHONIX architecture.
Technology that recedes behind the performance
With Dans mes Cordes, the permanent installation at La Scala Paris demonstrates that spatial audio is not simply a creative tool for immersive productions. It can also enhance the coherence of conventional sound reinforcement, naturally aligning the sonic image with the stage and giving every audience member, wherever they are seated, a listening experience that remains faithful to the artistic intent.
