Masque Sound Ushers Sennheiser's New Digital 9000 Wireless System onto the Great White Way

	Sennheiser's new Digital 9000 wireless system

Audio specialist Sennheiser announces that Masque Sound, a sound reinforcement, installation, and design company, recently took delivery of a new Senn-heiser Digital 9000 wireless system. The new acquisition enables Masque Sound to offer its clients the newest and most advanced wireless audio system ever manufac-tured by Sennheiser.

Masque Sound is a third generation company that has been providing Broadway and many large-scale touring productions with the most innovative audio solutions for over 75 years. The highly respected company counts timeless productions such as The Lion King, Mama MIA! and The Phantom of the Opera among its clients.

"There has been overwhelming demand among key designers and theatrical sound professionals to demo and use the Digital 9000 wireless system from Sennheiser," commented Scott Kalata of Masque Sound. "We felt the Digital 9000 was an outstanding investment considering its quality and flexibility, especially as it relates to the upcoming frequency challenges our industry will be facing. We are very pleased to have such an innovative RF system in our possession and so far our clients are really looking forward to getting their hands on it."

Kalata recognizes that Broadway productions require the best possible audio quality to help convey a story, and that today's audiences expect nothing less than a moving and realistic audio experience: "Today's sound designers want audio content to sound as neutral and as realistic as possible," Kalata states. "They clearly want to move away from the companding artifacts that are always present to some degree and can com-promise analog RF systems. The sonic difference between legacy and fully digital Sennheiser radios is night and day to even the casual listener."

The company says the Sennheiser Digital 9000 features completely uncompressed audio, artifact free wireless performance, and superb dynamics while making frequency coordination nearly effortless. These features make it a consideration for theatrical, broadcast, and demanding live performance applications.

On Broadway, there are inherent challenges to achieving a clean wireless signal given the close proximity of television stations, radio broadcasts, and other interference gen-erating venues. The Digital 9000 enables seamless frequency coordination within ex-tremely congested environments: "We need to make sure everything is coordinated to work within the local RF environment," observes Kalata. "Remember, on 44th or 45th street in Manhattan, there could be over a hundred radios working at once, so this can be a huge challenge. Our testing of the Digital 9000 showed that it is incredibly robust and immune to extraneous frequencies, whether they are analog or digital. Because of this, we will be able to use it in environments where traditional analog radio might not be able to operate reliably."

Masque Sound has a track record of innovation, and prides itself on being one step ahead of client demand: "We were the first company to send a digital mixing console out on the road for a major musical tour back in the early 2000s -- at that point, nobody had done anything on that scale," says Kalata. "The Sennheiser Digital 9000 represents a similar innovation, so we felt was had to be involved with it very early on. We aim to always be a leader in the marketplace, not a follower."