Electronic Studio Basel embraces IP working with Lawo mixing and stageboxes
Basel Music Academy’s renowned Electronic Studio Basel (ESB) is being upgraded with Lawo IP technology, enabling future prospective sound engineers to be trained on two Lawo mc²36 audio consoles and accompanying compact I/O units. The Lawo installation at the Basel Music Academy (Musikakademie Basel) will also be used for recording contemporary electronic compositions, performed by ensembles small and large, as well as entire orchestras.
The new audio mixing system, which was installed by Swiss system integrator SLC Broadcast, includes two identical 24-fader Lawo mc²36 consoles and corresponding interfaces (supporting MADI, RAVENNA, AES/EBU, analog operation). The two stageboxes each provide 32 mic/line inputs, 32 line outputs, 8 digital AES3 inputs, 8 digital AES3 outputs, 8 GPIO, a RAVENNA port, and a MADI Tie-Line Port (SFP).
Also part of the upgrade are Horus and HAPI audio interfaces from Merging Technologies.
Great importance was placed on the scalability of the components during the selection of equipment for the upgrade. From small mobile recordings to large live concerts with parallel recording, the audio systems are required to use the same digital interfaces and network topology. For large ensembles with simultaneous recording, all components – including virtual soundcards on laptops – are called into use. The flexibility of the Lawo IP-based configuration also makes it possible to work on several projects at the same time.
The Academy places a high value on the use of current technology and equipment in its audio training, especially in the areas of recording studio technology and sound reinforcement. In addition to the theoretical teaching of “audio design”, the opportunity for students to work on a modern mixing console system is also essential. Audio design, as described by Volker Böhm who heads the course, is the “technical artistic implementation of computer-aided composition”.
About the Basel Music Academy
For around 150 years, the Basel Music Academy has been a leading center of excellence for musical education at all levels. A broad spectrum of studies, research and further education are offered under the Basel Music Academy umbrella, from early to new music, audio design to jazz, through the Basel School of Music, the University of Music FHNW (Fachhochschule Nordwestschweiz – University of Applied Sciences North-West Switzerland) with the Institutes of Classical Music, Jazz and Schola Cantorum Basiliensis, as well as the Institute for Further Education, improvisation. In the heart of Basel, the city of culture and music, lecturers and students, children, young people and adults from Basel and all over the world, meet and inspire each other on this unique campus for music – and, since summer 2014, also on the Jazz Campus in Kleinbasel.