Musiikkitalo, a 1693-seat concert hall and event venue in the heart of Helsinki, is also home to the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra, the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra and the Sibelius Academy. The exceptional calibre of music performed and broadcast from the venue is matched by the attention to detail that has been lavished on it. A fully floating building, its noise floor is just 25dBA. When sound is this precise, only DiGiCo will do and, as a result, Musiikkitalo is home to several DiGiCo consoles, the most recent acquisition being the Quantum 338T for the front of house position, supplied by INTERSONIC.

Oliver Siitari is head of sound at Musiikkitalo and is responsible for mixing many of the performances in the hall, only taking a break when visiting artists bring their own engineers. For him, DiGiCo is the perfect mix of flexibility, intuitive workflow and pure power, making DiGiCo consoles his preferred choice throughout his entire career.

“We have a Quantum 338T in the concert hall, a Quantum 326 in our smaller hall, plus an SD8 which is currently being used as a monitor console. We are going to upgrade the SD8 to a Quantum 326 in a few months,” he explains. “The SD8 is in a flip case, so we can move it to wherever it is required, and we also have an SD9 and SD11 if we need them. I’ve worked with DiGiCo consoles for a long time, so it’s a very familiar platform. In addition, the flexibility and number of available channels make it perfect for the team.”

The Musiikkitalo is a 360-degree venue, with 22 PA hangs. 30 microphones, used solely for broadcast, hang from the ceiling to capture the natural acoustic of the space. The DiGiCo network is connected to the broadcast network allowing flexible patching between the two. With feeds from DiGiCo being used in broadcast as well, clarity is very important.

Supplied by INTERSONIC, each piece of equipment must earn its place in the hall, making the relationship between supplier and client important when making those choices. As Sales Manager of INTERSONIC, Topi Suuronen comments, Musiikkitalo is a truly prestigious venue which means getting it right is a very gratifying feeling.“Musiikkitalo is the crown jewel of Finland’s music scene. We are pleased and proud that the team have chosen DiGiCo consoles as their mixing solution and is satisfied with them, and us.”

Everything from mixing consoles to lighting fixtures is checked and measured for audibility and RF output. Nothing can get in the way of the sound of the music, so Siitari depends upon robust networking and remote patches to his SD Racks in the sound-proofed machine rooms outside the main auditoriums. “In the concert hall, we have an optical network, and we also have an auto router and patch points throughout the whole house that we can connect the SD Racks,” he says. “From there, we can access the wireless mics or other inputs. The second router works like a gateway to the network and can be expanded to cover the whole house; we have 11 possible performance spaces throughout the venue, so inputs and outputs need to be available everywhere. We also broadcast live every week because the Finnish National Broadcasting Company operates here, too.”

The venue is extremely busy and has a very varied repertoire, the entire setup frequently changes from performance to performance. One night could include high channel count and low amplification orchestral concerts, the next could be the high-octane amplification of pop and techno. For a venue like this, a flexible workflow is indispensable so Siitari relies on the whole toolbox the DiGiCo Quantum 338T has to offer. “The console has pretty much everything, it doesn’t limit me to do things in a certain way,” he continues.  “The workflows are quite different for each genre of music, but all the tools are there. One day we’ll be doing rock and roll or a crossover with a pop artist and a symphony orchestra, and the next, a classical performance, so you don’t want to hear any amplification. That’s a big thing.”

A busy turn-over of nightly performances and multiple halls also means Siitari has a large pool of staff. Ensuring that the consoles are quickly and easily programmable, but robust enough to withstand any possible mishaps is another key bonus of relying on DiGiCo.“There are many users that have to be thought of in our environment, it is one of our biggest challenges day-to-day,” he expands. “We have a base file that includes the Optocore setup with most of the routing already completed.  If I have to make a change in the base setup template, then I obviously have to communicate that to a lot of users! We try to keep a generic template that works as a base for everything, then our team or our guest engineers can start building from there. It helps to keep things straightforward.”

Using the T software has enabled features that are ideal for the concert hall. Siitari has a musical theatre background, so was familiar with the additional features of the Theatre software, and for the concert performances, he finds the greater flexibility and ease of programming a bonus for Musiikkitalo.

“My theatre background makes the T-software feel like a natural platform for me to work on, and there are features I find work well for what I’m doing here,” he continues. “I like the delays on the cross points in the Matrix, I use them quite a lot. For example, if we have a choir that needs some subtle amplifying, but it shouldn’t be really present in the PA, the Delay Matrix allows me to delay those choir groups correctly to all the right places without a system processor in between. I still have control over the level of the signal (in the template there’s the basic PA trim that’s been planned ahead), but I still have access to all the delays to compensate for the acoustic sound. The T-software is really powerful for that.”

For Siitari, the Quantum 338T feels like another member of the audio team at Musiikkitalo and, housed in a Finnish, hand-crafted, custom-made console desk in the venue’s colours, it is a perfect fit. Having a console that can be relied upon to work night after night, easily programmed, quiet enough to blend into a symphony, but powerful enough to keep up with rock and roll, is a huge tick on Siitari’s wish list. When you are as busy as he is, that power cannot be underestimated.“The Quantum 338 T layout is extremely flexible. I like the fact that it doesn’t limit where I can put my channels or how I route them. It’s a very fast desk that can handle high channel counts,” Siitari concludes. “Having this console gives us so many options. Whether it’s 50 strings or just four, it doesn’t matter, the workflow doesn’t need to change. Because the tools are so good, we’re not re-writing the book every day. With over 1300 performances a year, we need the power, speed and flexibility that DiGiCo gives us.”

High-res images available here.

Maria Fiorellino at DiGiCo
Tel: +44 1372 845600
Email: maria@digiconsoles.com
Web: www.digico.biz

Zoe Milton at Gasoline Media
Tel: +44 333 038 4964
Email: zoem@gasolinemedia.com