Bose RoomMatch Loudspeakers Control the Sound for Austin's Cedar Street Courtyard

In the weeks leading up to the opening of the Cedar Street Courtyard music venue in Austin, Texas, America's live music capital, the venue was already drawing noise concerns. Due to its close proximity to residences and other establishments, Cedar Street Courtyard was looking to minimize its contribution to the noise pollution problem, and RoomMatch loudspeakers and PowerMatch amplifiers from Bose Professional Systems Division were able to solve these issues by controlling the sound with extraordinary precision. Nashville-based consultant Steve Durr was called in to recommend a sound system whose sonic quality would keep it competitive with the city's many other music venues while at the same time keeping the sound highly controlled and away from reflective surfaces, and keeping the energy channeled within the venue and away from neighboring residences.

The Bose technology was exactly what was needed. Big House Sound was selected to install the system, which consisted of four RoomMatch loudspeakers: one RoomMatch RM7020 and RM7040 array module per side, each chosen specifically for the Cedar Street Courtyard's dimensions, along with four Bose MB24 WR (weather-resistant) Modular Bass loudspeakers, all powered by three PowerMatch PM8500 amplifiers, all delivering 500W to each of their eight channels.

"The results were amazing," observes Zach Richards, director of installation at Big House Sound, who says that the sound inside the outdoor music space is perfectly aimed at the audience and away from reflective surfaces that would let it spill out into the surrounding area. "The situation that this venue, this neighborhood, and this city found itself in is what made the Bose system a good solution. There are lots of new areas popping up where you now find clubs and homes in what was once a warehouse district, so there have to be ways to let them coexist. That's what the Bose technology does -- it lets us build a system that can help contain the sound without compromising its quality. The low-frequency control approach that Bose uses, along with the choice of 20 very specific coverage patterns in the RoomMatch line, lets us tailor the sound system to the venue very precisely. That means we can control the sound very effectively, and not just in the upper frequencies but well down into the mid-low frequency ranges. The Bose RoomMatch systems are incredible tools for the sound control and noise mitigation issues that are becoming increasingly common in cities and especially in areas where you can have music outdoors 365 days a year, like Austin. Cedar Street Courtyard is now a flagship example of how this can be made to work in a way that helps make everyone happy."

Introduced in 2011 and recently expanded with several new modules, the Bose RoomMatch series offers a new class of curvilinear arrays -- the progressive directivity array -- providing both concert-quality sound for live music and clear vocals for spoken word, with unmatched seat-to-seat tonal balance consistency for installed sound systems. The full-range modules are available in 20 different combinations: horizontal coverage patterns of 55, 70, 90, or 120 degrees, and vertical coverage patterns of 5, 10, 20, 40, or 60 degrees.

The progressive directivity array offers the ability to vary both the horizontal and vertical coverage patterns for each module in the array based on the room dimensions. More precise coverage control helps sound system designers ensure good intelligibility with spoken-word program material, especially in reverberant rooms, as well as the best possible tonal balance throughout the listening area.