JBL VERTEC on Tour with Royal Netherlands Air Force Orchestra Netherlands-based Story Sound has embarked on a theatre tour with the Royal Netherlands Air Force Orchestra, using a Harman JBL VERTEC subcompact line array system. According to Michael Story, who owns the rental company with his brother Egbert, the system is perfect for the sub-1,000-seat capacity venues the orchestra will be playing at between February and May to present its themed orchestral music program, Tribute To Michael Jackson. Although the company has worked with JBL loudspeakers for its top-tier client projects for many years, the VerTec subcompact line arrays had not been released in time for use on last year's orchestra tour. However, as soon as the system was available, Story couldn't wait to use it. "We tested the new VerTec subcompact line arrays against numerous other systems," he noted. "They won hands-down due to their power, fidelity and sonic clarity." When it came to prepping the Orchestra production, Story Sound designed a scalable system, using a larger configuration at venues such as the Chassé Theatre in Breda, where the tour opened. The tour is carrying 32 VT4886 subcompact full-range line array elements and 12 VT4883 subcompact arrayable subwoofers, mounted on multi-box dollies for fast load-in. Story explained, "For most venues we field 12 VT4886 elements per side and ground stack four. But for the larger theaters, such as the Chassé, we increase this to 16 VT4886 elements per side." "We have found there is greater dynamic range with the VT4886 compared with other systems we tried, and the clarity in the low end is amazing," Story continued. "It provides a massive difference, offering very high fidelity and enormous power from a small footprint." Meanwhile, Story Sound also evaluated different digital mixing platforms for the tour before selecting Studer Vista 5SR consoles for use by front-of-house engineer Remko Luijten (and backup Wibo Vermeulen), and the two monitor engineers, Ger Arts and Taco Peut. "Although the other desks we evaluated were set up for live music, the whole sound team simply prefers the Studer sound -- it is just wonderful," he said. To accommodate the inputs from a 55-piece brass band, two similar mix environments have been provided for both the front of house and monitor positions. "Both systems are configured with similar DSP and five MADI inputs and sometimes the orchestra rehearses with just a monitor board-so there is no need to build up the whole FOH rack," Story concluded. 
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