JAPAN:
Having taken place recently at Budou Romankan in the Japanese Prefecture of Okayama, Hoshioto Camp 23 is said to have been the first outdoor music festival in Japan to introduce immersive sound.
Each sound by the artists on stage could be heard from wherever they were standing –which isn’t the case with conventional left and right proscenium-type speaker systems – creating a sense of immersion. Local sound rental company, Bright, originally invested in Martin Audio’s WPC system back in 2020. When it was time to upgrade the event’s main speaker system, WPC was recommended as the “perfect overall fit” for its sound quality, controllability and sense of scale, after evaluation against other systems.
Kazuyuki Oshita, president of Bright, said there were other reasons why he recommended it to the organisers, notably its ability to deliver “consistency of sound right across the area”, and to mitigate against noise pollution by being able to contain the energy uniquely within the sound field.
The 16 principal WPC boxes were powered by Martin Audio’s multi-channel iK42 amplifiers, and to create the full immersion, an end-to-end Martin Audio solution was specified, including eight XD15, four SX218 subwoofers, six XP12, various XE300 and ADORN A55 enclosures.
Various other local rental suppliers, introduced to the main contractors by Martin Audio Japan, also tapped into their inventories to complete the complement required, which also included SPAT Revolution processing. These companies included Super 4, Music Reserve, Freeway and Network Papa.
Review notices couldn’t have been more positive. One stated: ”Of course the sound in front of the stage was powerful, but I felt it sounded good even from a distance.” Another said, “I’ve participated in Hoshioto at least five times, including camps, and the sound was the best ever.”
In addition to customer feedback, the organisers also remarked on how effective Wavefront Precision had been in reducing sound leakage into the neighbourhood, while Martin Audio Japan described the entire experiment as being “100% successful”, and that the deployment had succeeded “on every level”.
